West should listen to the government or get out

By Prof. Nalin de Silva

(February 05, Colombo, Sri Lanka Guardian) Chris Morris of the BBC has a very partial record when it comes to reporting events on Tamil racism, separatism and terrorism which came in chronological order. They are in alphabetical (English) order as well and could be called Tamil RST. It is not only Chris Morris but almost all the BBC reporters not to mention the BBC Sinhala programme Sandeshaya and the Tamil programme, that have taken a biased stand. BBC as an institution is pro Tamil RST just as much the CNN is.

These organisations try to present to the world a picture of innocent Tamils suffering under the so called hegemony of the Sinhala Buddhists and still talk of Tamil homeland in the British demarcated northern and eastern provinces. Even on Sunday the first the CNN has referred to Tamil homeland in those two provinces, when it has been proved beyond any doubt that there is no so called homeland of Tamils in Sri Lanka. Even late Dr. Neelan Thiruchelvam towards the end of his life had accepted that homeland was not a correct concept. Any intelligent person, if there is any, in the BBC or the CNN should be able to understand that Sri Lanka was finally demarcated arbitrarily into nine provinces by the British only in 1889 and the Tamils would not be able to claim any homeland in provinces demarcated by the British. Prof. G. H. Peiris has done an excellent study of the problem and has shown that there is no basis whatsoever for such claim. Some insights into the problem can be gained by reading Monograph of the Batticaloa district of the eastern province, Ceylon, 1921 by Mudliyar S. O. Kanagaratnam that has been translated recently into Sinhala by Mr. Y. W. Gunawardhana, former GA of Ampara. Even today there are not many Tamils in the interiors of the eastern province, more than hundred and fifty years after the British first settled down the Tamils who were brought as labourers from South India along the maritime provinces of the east.

In any event it is not only Chris Morris who has been partial towards Tamil RST. There was once a BBC reporter who after taking liquor provided by the Sri Lankan Airways tried to be funny with an air hostess and then shouted at the Sinhalas for the way "they treated the Tamils". The western media that dominate the news have been propagating these myths about the injustices done to the Tamils by the Sinhalas. It is based on these myths that the west then comes out with so called solutions to the Tamil RST problem. If anybody was under the impression that the Tamil diaspora has been very efficient in their propaganda then he was mistaken. The Tamils were and are not efficient in these matters but the propaganda carried out by BBC, CNN and other western media on behalf of Tamil RST made the diaspora appear to be very smart. It was not different from inflating the fascist murderer Prabhakaran into a military genius by Solheim and others, and as we have seen the LTTE could only hide or run. It is the myth of superior military power of the LTTE and also the other myths around the "injustices" to the Tamils that kept Tamil RST going, and it is now clear that the creation and propagation of these myths were the work of the western powers, as we have often said. The western media including the CNN and the BBC are not impartial as they are partial towards western Christian modernity and hence anti Sinhala Buddhist.

The submarines and other equipment that are supposed to have been built by the LTTE carry the trade mark of Switzerland and other western countries and the people now know what has happened to the aid that was sent to the northern province through the NGOs. The western embassies had not been silent humanitarian observers in these matters and it is clear that some of them had used their diplomatic privileges to help the LTTE. We have been saying all these for the last few years but very few people believed what we had to say. The LTTE may have collected some money from the diaspora, but they would have got money, perhaps more money, from the western countries. Even if the countries involved were Norway, Germany and Switzerland, these countries would have had the tacit approval from other countries, especially UK and USA. From the very beginning Norway did what USA/UK wanted it to do rather than acting independently.

When one goes through the list of equipments and weapons that have been found in the Vanni by the armed forces one realises the catastrophe that was awaiting. According to The Island of 2nd February "the largest ever arms, ammunition and equipment recovery made in a day on the Vanni front over the weekend included US built guns capable of firing chemicals, thermo-baric weapons and nine mortar launchers of different calibre". It is clear that the LTTE was the most favoured terrorist group in the world by the west. The west as we have often said has been playing a double game. They have not only given publicity to the terrorists as so called liberators but provided them with weapons and other equipment. The USA may not have provided the LTTE directly with weapons and war machinery but we cannot dismiss the opinion that they did have an understanding of what was happening in the guise of so called humanitarian aid to the people in Vanni by the NGOs, INGOs and western governments such as Norway. When some of the western countries including USA banned the LTTE the bankrupt middle class sang hosannas to Bush and others. However, we knew that it was merely an eyewash and the USA was against the LTTE only so far as it had some connections with anti western terrorist organisations in the Arab world. As far as the terrorist activities in Sri Lanka the west was not against the LTTE and gave it the maximum support. We must have it on record that under Obama the same policy will continue.

As far as the west is concerned there are two types of terrorist organisations. The first type is the organisations that are anti USA, anti west and may be anti modernity. The second type consists of those organisations that are anti other cultures and that serve the objectives of western Christian modernity. The west would do all that can be done to eliminate the first type but would support the second type of organisations. The LTTE is a type two terrorist organisation. It is an offshoot of Tamil racism, and later on separatism, which was created and nurtured by the Dutch and the British, and is openly supported by Norway, Germany and some other western countries. If the ambassadors of these countries try to be funny and present a threat to the independence and sovereignty of the country, then the government has the right to make them persona non grata and deport them. The government cannot allow any other country big or small to work against the sovereignty of the country. The western countries that said that the LTTE could not be defeated have been exposed and neither they nor India which trained the LTTE should be allowed to impose their so called political solution on the government.

It is very clear that the LTTE had been preparing for a major offensive using the submarines, aircrafts, not the light aircrafts that were used on behalf of the LTTE recently, and one wonders what would have happened if the humanitarian operations were delayed by an year, or even if Chandrika Kumaratunga had continued as the President until 2006. The Tamil racism created and nurtured by the Dutch and the British had wanted to have Tamils as heads of the local legislature with the connivance of the British. This did not materialise, as it was impossible to make a majority a minority with artificial conditions imposed, even for the British. From about 1915 the Tamil leaders and the British governors began to fail in their attempts to make Sinhalas a minority in the legislature, and in 1976 SJV Chelvanayakam finally realised that it was an impossible exercise. SJVC opted for a separate state and Prabhakaran took up arms against the state to achieve what the former had dreamt. It is now clear that the west had not abandoned its former objective and was in the process of arming the LTTE to take over the entire country and not just the northern and the eastern provinces. If not for the fact that the Sinhala people elected Mahinda Rajapaksa as the President in 2005 and not in 2006 we would have lost our sovereignty, under Ranil Wickremesinghe. However, as it is Wickremesinghe is about to lose not just the elections but most of the party members and he may invite the western ambassadors to become honourary members of the UNP.

Unlike in the era of few decades ago we are now in a position to understand and predict what the west is up to and when they and their cohorts in Sri Lanka shout about the innocent people held by the LTTE as a human shield we know what they want. The figures of these people have varied from 150,000 to 400,000, with Jayalath Jayawardene claiming the latter figure that includes 2000 pregnant women according to him. We have to be thankful to Jayalath Jayawardene for coming out with these figures which nobody else seems to be in possession. However, after giving 48 hours for these people to leave the LTTE, which was a de facto ceasefire, either not many people have been allowed to leave or they have not left voluntarily. Further the humanitarian west did not pressurise their darling LTTE to release these people and one can only feel sorry for the plight of them. The government has no alternative but to proceed with operations making sure that minimum harm is done to these people and will have to act as in a situation where terrorists hijack a plane. The government has to liberate those held by the LTTE, and if the west tries with their tricks without respecting the sovereignty of the country and not listening to what they are told, the government will be forced to take stern action against at least some of the ambassadors whose role has been revealed in the recent past.-Sri Lanka Guardian