As for your point about the Tamils having limited options, that’s absolutely true. I just don’t like the spurious argumentation based on an inadequate understanding of the subject, in this case British devolution. However, your new position that the Sinhalese could probably pull off a non-13th amendment military occupation of the North and East without much fallout seems to contradict your oft repeated stance that the implementation of the 13th is a sine qua non, a basic precondition for the sustenance of good relations with the rest of the world, and India and the West in particular. You’ve made this argument, not I. You didn’t just make it, you vociferously advocated it, shouted it from the treetops, and perhaps even paid a small price for doing so. I now ask, have you changed your mind? And does this mean that you have lost the argument to the likes of Malinda Sen et al?

I also caution against using the Foreign Committee report as anything other than another voice in the debate within US policy circles of how to proceed with Sri Lanka. The report was also out of sync with the actions to date of the ranking member of that committee. It remains to be seen if the report was means something more than the personal loyalty to Sri Lanka on the part of Nilmini Gunaratne and her friend (ably assisted at State by Bob Blake), or whether it in fact reflects a genuine change of heart on the part of the influential members of that Committee. Samantha Powers and Susan Rice and their ilk represent a different voice, as do other voices on the Hill that recently secured passage of a bill imposing stringent conditions on military aid. How this difference of perception plays out remains to be seen.

JR went to Royal and Chandrika went to Bridgets, both went to first tier schools.

There are always exception to the rule. Still, both JR and CBK were not accused of war crimes, both held a higher moral code fighting their enemy, their own citizens. Not like the present or foreseeable future bunch.

Excepting the above, you have accepted the rest of my reasoning?

In your face.

Jews are a Jew first and whatever country national. On the other hand, the Tamils call them selves differently, eg: Canadian Tamil, American Tamil etc.

In my opinion, those who want to get out of their ‘Ethnic Ghettos’ are those who have already lost their Ethnicity. Remember the educative fable ‘The Fox who Lost its Tail!

If a community has its own Language and Religion, the host country treats them like third class, take the African American (the Blacks in Europe) and if their native country is not wealthy, like Haiti and Somalia, they are at the bottom.

On the other-hand, own religion, own language and wealthy country of origin, the people are treated as equal – Jews and Japanese – moderately wealthy like South Korea and India or assumed moderately wealthy, like Sri Lanka are second class.

Since I have been out of the country from the 60′s and have been fairly moderately successful in career and substance, I still feel third class, because my country of origin is a failed state. Thankfully I did not go down to 4th. as yet because I still have my language and religion. My children and grand children, wanting to remain atleast 2nd class in the land of their birth, Canada and USA are now studying Tamil in Sunday schools.

Get Off the High Horse, you say.

I respond ‘Ignorance is Bliss’

To interact with others as equals, that your opinions have value,one has to be respected, not tolerated.

Muruges,

Don’t even go there buddy! Stand up on your own two feet and work together to bring about a more intellectually dynamic community. We must get out of our ethnic ghettos and introduce our children to a more enriching and intellectually stimulating set of values. This is what the Jews did for themselves.

As Tamils we can also learn from others. Every community brings its own cultural capital into the host country. Get off your high horse…it’s high time we interacted with others!!!

July 83 took place under JRJ Jayewardene who went to a first tier school. Chenmani happened on CBKs watch and she went to one too. Hope you feel comforted by the thought.

I am unable to retiurn the compliment about your educational credentials or lack of them because I don’t know you or of you at all, and probably no one else on GV does either. However, I am assuming that your credentials are betrayed by your argumentation, that the UK is in effect…federal1 The official submission of the UK at the UN HRC ‘s Universal Periodic Review, while it could have finessed the definitional issue, asserted instead that “the United Kingdom is a unitary state comprising the territories of etc etc” Doubtless you know something about the UK that the UK Foreign Office and the team of legal experts assembled under its umbrella didn’t! I recommend that you read Asanga Welikala’s presentation to One text Initiative on ” Diversity and Devolution within a Unitary state: the British example” for a solid academic treatment of the topic. But let’s cut to the chase: you and Sri Lanka’s Tamils do not have a wide menu of options regarding devolution. It ain’t a seller’s market. Its either the defence, protection and implementation of 13th amendment (or what’s left of it) OR the roll back of even that, a heavy military presence with a 400, 000 strong army and Sinhala settlements which make nonsense of any notion of homeland. The US Senate Report shows that GOSL has enough straegic leverage to sustain such a course because the US will be bidding against China. The natural postwar bounce of the economy will make it affordable. Get real.

Rajiv Gandhi wanted the IPKF commander to shoot the white flag carrying Prabha.
The order was sent through Dixit, the commander had replied that no responsible and respectable Army Officer will shoot anyone carrying a White Flag. This story is well documented by the last IPKF commander.

It only happens in Sri Lanka.

What, pray tell me, did Thonda achieve for his people? Most of his people are still living the way they did some 450 years ago, a one door ‘Thakarang Shed ‘ with no indoor running water or toilet. They use to work about 50 hrs a week in the 50′s, but now it is about 45 hrs a week. Their living condition has not changed much either.

As for the Tamils, the Tamil leadership tried every possible parliamentary practice available for peaceful coexistence with dignity from 1948 to ’72 and got thrown into the Beira Lake. Every agreement were abrogated and Chandrika never implemented any agreement or undertaking.

Really Dayan, with your considerable credentials you should analysis more than be a propagandist for MR or SF. Don’t you think that there are more Singhalese below poverty level than the entire Tamil population? In 1955, a united Ceylon with both Singhalese and Tamils being considered somewhat equals, were the envy of the Prime Minister of Singapore. After 1956, the dominant Singhalese governing the country for the last 50 years, grew the country like the proverbial bulls tail – downwards. Now Sri Lanka is fighting for last place with Somalia.

What of the Tamils? The third of the population that were chased have re-established themselves in their host country as a very thriving community, possibly second only to the Jews. The other two third, suffering under the military yoke, would also thrive eventually. That is the Singhalese man’s fear and thats why successive Singhalese leaders, all try to decimate the Tamil families and truncate the Tamil areas, so that the Singhalese population will not ask awkward questions.

Though the Tigers are gone, the Singhalese leaders still have to keep the Tiger Bogey alive to keep distracting the Singhalese Mass. This is the reason for the IDP still in camps, the army in the North and East is to keep the locals cowered.

The Singhalese always blamed the British, claiming they favoured the Tamils and that is why the the Tamils were, proportionately more successful than the Singhalese. During the last 55 years the Singhalese ran the country, introduced all kinds of affirmative and blatant discriminatory laws to give the Singhalese a leg-up, but still managed to run the country to rival Somalia.

Who-ever wins this election, it does not look at all promising for Sri Lanka. Excepting Premadasa, all the leaders upto Chandrika, came from well established families with old money and recoganized good schools.

MR and SF are new money people from second and third tier schools and it shows. Unfortunately for Sri Lanka, those who would follow MR, when he finishes his second term, appear to be common thugs and war lords, worse than even SF.

My belief is, eventually, maybe 100 years from now when Sri Lanka gets a little more affluent, when the Singhalese poor could also find jobs, consequently drying up the pool for the Buddhist Sanga, saner council will prevail and more accountability expected from their politicians. The influence of the Sanga also beginning to fade.

May be by then Sri Lanka would have climbed back to present day Bangaladesh.

My father coined the phrase ‘ Kiyanne Banna, Kadanne Pansala.’ in 1956.

How true it is still in 2009.

Sorry that I thought you inferred the junior rather than the senior. It was my oversight.

BTW, although I do not wish to be drawn into any issues, contentious or otherwise over the Senior as it is of no relevance to the instant topic, the current presidential election, what good did the poor plantation workers got from his political game or gamble? Their lives were almost static.

That the forces are going o be stationed in the North would have to be decided based on what the govt thinks is right and good for the country but it will never escape the feelings of ordinary Tamils of the sheer domination and this ultimately will create resentment. The majority of the Tamils want to move on and it will be prudent to win them over to nib terrorism in the bud. Without the people’s support this problem is not going to go away.