SRI LANKA: Two Years of President Rajapaksa- An Assessment: Part II

(November,19, New Delhi, Sri Lanka Guardian) His actions have not brought any comfort to the Four Co-chairs and India who have been supporting him all along. They have influential human rights watchdogs which have been arm twisting their governments into action on this question. These nations have objected periodically to the lack of response from the government in Sri Lanka. However, by and large, things have continued the same way in Colombo despite some cosmetic response and commissions of enquiry. The ongoing confrontation in Sri Lanka with the LTTE who has ceased to be the darling of international community, has restricted their options.

[Part I of "SRI LANKA: Two Years of President Rajapaksa]

Handling of international opinion

Surprisingly Rajapaksa has shown a Machiavellian understanding in handling foreign powers, which have interests in his country and the Indian Ocean region. These include the international do-gooders club of Tokyo Donors Conference (EU, Japan, Norway and the US), and more importantly India. As a result he has been able to internationally run with the hares, while hunting them at home on issues of governance – rule of law, human rights and humanitarian concerns, and lack of accountability. These intangible issues are difficult to quantify. Their audit to pinpoint areas of weakness is time consuming. And their progression in the UN is equally slow. The President understands these nuances and has managed to prevent concerted international action against Sri Lanka. While he professes to be sympathetic to the cause of human rights and cites his own record, his priorities are different. At the moment, he knows what is good internationally does not garner populist votes at home.

His actions have not brought any comfort to the Four Co-chairs and India who have been supporting him all along. They have influential human rights watchdogs which have been arm twisting their governments into action on this question. These nations have objected periodically to the lack of response from the government in Sri Lanka. However, by and large, things have continued the same way in Colombo despite some cosmetic response and commissions of enquiry. The ongoing confrontation in Sri Lanka with the LTTE who has ceased to be the darling of international community, has restricted their options. Most of their actions have been limited to discussion and complaints about human rights violations and misconduct of security forces and their paramilitary supporters and threat to cut off aid. No major actions beyond that have been taken. The President appears to have worked out a response style to exploit this attitude of external powers. He always addresses their concerns and takes some tentative action. Though this band-aid methodology is unlikely to yield lasting results, it buys him time.

While Rajapaksa has shown a calibrated readiness to discuss international concerns at the UN, he has firmly objected to the presence of a structured UN mechanism at home. He seems to have understood the way the UN and its creaking bureaucratic structure works. Amidst the cackle of rival powers, the UN takes a long, long time to translate ideas into action. On the other hand, unwittingly the UN has helped the Sri Lanka government by marginalising the need for the Four Co-chairs to raise issues already discussed at the UN. This suits the President.
International mediation

The President's decision to carry out systematic military operations without denouncing either the ceasefire agreement (CFA) or the peace process, appears to have made the roles of Norway and the SLMM largely irrelevant in impacting the situation. As a result, the chances of reviving either the CFA enforcement or the peace process have become minimal. In any case they were rendered out of date when the security forces redrew the map of the east after grabbing areas of LTTE control. These developments appear to have divided the cohesion within the Four Co-chairs that had existed in the early years of CFA

On a five-point scale of approval for the President's current 'war-in-peace strategy', Japan with five points appears to be wholly, though silently, supporting the President. On the other hand Norway as a one-pointer is at the other end, disapproving their progressive marginalisation. The EU does not appear to be clear on how far it should go on either side of the scale as its member-countries have their own national priorities at work. But the EU has a clear international counter terrorism strategy; so it precludes putting the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE), a recognised terrorist body in many EU member countries, on par with a flawed but elected Government of Sri Lanka.

The India card

India, the reluctant big brother, has been studiously avoiding any open or close involvement in Rajapaksa style of running the country. It is still focusing on strategic aspects of peace process rather than contentious issues of tactical governance, because they are the least controversial. Currently getting involved too closely in Sri Lanka does not suit the Manmohan Singh regime because of its survival preoccupations. His desire to hold on to the continued support of Tamil Nadu political parties has precluded the Indian prime minister from acting on Sri Lanka's request for supply of arms or overtly supporting the President's military actions. Thus India, perhaps wittingly, has opened a convenient door for Sri Lanka to import arms from other countries including China and Pakistan.

President Rajapaksa also perhaps assesses that in the long term, if Tamil refugee outflow to India is kept in check, and India's counsel is listened to India's ruling leadership will continue the present policy on Sri Lanka. That includes silent defence and intelligent cooperation with Sri Lanka without publicity. India has political constraints in entering into any defence pact at present with Sri Lanka. Except for some spares and ammunition for Russian generic weapons, and the so called non-lethal defence supplies, India is not going to help Sri Lanka's appetite for weapons. The President understands this. He also seem to know that lack of any political urgency in Tamil Nadu and the mess over building strategic ties with the US are other disincentives for any loud Indian intervention in the island at present. President Rajapaksa who initially wanted India to join the Tokyo Donors Conference has probably dropped the idea having understood India's reluctance.

India has built strong business partnership with Sri Lanka and the trade between the two countries has been growing fast. So it will be futile to expect India to intervene in Sri Lanka in the same fashion as it did two decades ago even if the circumstances in Sri Lanka change. The Tamil leadership in Sri Lanka should understand this and contextualise their expectations.

V Prabhakaran's ego appears to be preventing him from taking any initiative to reconstruct his relationship with the ruling Indian leadership. The LTTE continues to be banned in India. Indian security has been put on the alert against LTTE activity on Indian soil. This suits Rajapaksa as his India policy seems to be working, at least for him. He has used it to further his military agenda, at the cost of the peace process, without overtly courting adverse reaction from India.

Widening ethnic cleavages

Perhaps the biggest disservice the Rajapaksa regime has done is to fritter away the fund of good will and understanding between Sinhala and Tamil communities that had existed in the first two years of peace process. The Chandrika-Ranil combine despite their dithering over methodology, had faith in the pursuit of peace. Most of them time their public utterances were translated into action towards this objective. This was responsible for the glimmer of hope that Tamils had nourished that at last their lives would return to the peace mode.

As opposed to this, the President's often repeated statement that while his government "remains determined to fight terrorism, we are equally committed to seeking a negotiated and sustainable solution to the conflict in Sri Lanka," has been belied by his actions on ground. There had been a lot of foot dragging in handling the subject itself. Little has been done to revive the peace process. The war lobbies are in the forefront.
Right from the time Rajapaksa issued his manifesto, it was clear that his overwhelming desire to win over the Sinhala vote banks and emerge as the sole leader of Sinhalas overrode other priorities. His subsequent passive response to Tamil sensitivities only re-emphasised the importance of being a member of the majority community in Sri Lanka. The endless security checks, mysterious white van disappearances, and sudden appearance dead bodies in what appeared so much like Mafia killings have heightened the latent sense of insecurity among Tamils.

Undoubtedly, the callous disregard of the LTTE to observe the CFA in both letter and spirit had provided sufficient provocation for the government to act. However, on a number of issues affecting Tamils the government had shown equal callousness. The abandoning of the P-TOMS, the plan for aiding tsunami victims in north and east, is a typical example.

With the Eelam war heating up once again it is going to take a long time to regain the faith of Tamils in getting what they expect as 'fair play' – autonomy for the areas where they live in majority. The President's much heralded All Party Committee (APC) to work out southern consensus on the Tamil question, like many other committee and commissions is tied in knots. It has probably been put on the backburner because of other urgent military and political priorities of the President. It is no wonder that Tamils are now feeling that their concerns are no more a national priority.

Future portends

When Rajapaksa came to power there were a lot of political loose ends: the national leadership was at a dead end and military objectives goalless and merely reactive. The government was on the defensive in dealing with the Norwegians and Sri Lanka Monitoring Mission (SLMM). The LTTE was dictating both political and military terms. Karuna's break up with the LTTE had created a new paradigm in the east. All these issues required policy directions and deft handling by the government to turn them to its advantage.

President Rajapaksa has used them cleverly to his military ends in freeing the Tamil areas from the LTTE control and build up his case for 'liberating the north' from the LTTE.

At the end of two years of office with political parties tied in knots, and India sidelined in his policy horizons, the President is probably working out strategies to take him through his term with success. That would enable him to make it easy to extend it to a second term in office.

After all said and done, the President has come out a clearly goal oriented person, though some of the goals appeared parochial. He has managed to get hold of most of the Sinhala constituency at home, impressing them with the heavy handed military option instead of pursuing a slow and tedious peace process with a recalcitrant LTTE. To handle international opinion, the President has projected Sri Lanka as another front line country in the global war on terror. This has also quietened them down.

The nation is paying a huge human and economic cost in men and material in pursuing a war that holds the promise of victory to the war lobbyists. Counterinsurgency wars without political solutions are always diminishing economic propositions, tuning productive national efforts into ephemeral gain of territory with unclear end results. Sri Lanka is no exception to this rule. Already the cost of living is hitting the roof and tourism, the main source of employment and income, is suffering. World Bank's caution notwithstanding, the President appears to be bent on his singular pursuit of war in preference to peace.

The LTTE's record of CFA violations, arms procurement and trafficking, killings and human rights excesses when the peace process was alive, has left it internationally high and dry. Even in countries that had lent a sympathetic ear to Tamil grievances during the last two decades, the LTTE is being shunned. In fact, these countries are involved in the process of dismantling the LTTE support network. That probably makes the President and his military lobby think that after a bloody battle or two in the north, the Tamil issue would become a historical aberration rather than a struggle of minorities for their rights.

They cannot be more mistaken. The quest for democratic rights of Tamils has continued because successive governments have dithered on the issue during the last two decades. Even the first three years of comparative peace from 2002 has not qualitatively made a difference to the Tamil grievances. Military action alone is not going to make the ordinary Tamils participate in the democratic exercise in Sri Lanka. They will continue the fight in some form or other till they are satisfied, whether the LTTE exists or not. After all, the LTTE thrives only on Tamil grievances. That is the bottom line. The President has shown a great deal of political alacrity in handling issues at home and abroad. He has to handle the Tamil issue with the same alacrity if he has to emerge as the President who makes a difference.

In any case the President is far from routing the LTTE in its home turf in the north. If the second failed attempt of the security forces to make headway in Muhamalai last week is any indication, the LTTE continues to remain strong in the north despite its losses. The security forces and the nation will be required to sacrifice more men and material before military victory of sorts comes in the near future. And that is not going to be the end of the agony of the nation and its people.

(Col. R Hariharan, a retired Military Intelligence specialist on South Asia, served as the head of intelligence of the Indian Peace Keeping Force in Sri Lanka 1987-90.He is associated with the Chennai Centre for China Studies. E-mail: colhari@yahoo.com)