Why British ‘humanitarianism’ is a joke

By Malinda Seneviratne

(May 03, Colombo, Sri Lanka Guardian) British Foreign Minister (and would-be Prime Minister) David Miliband has to be pitied. He’s working hard for his constituents, some of whom are vociferous Tamils who are either ignorant about Sri Lankan realities or unabashed supporters of the LTTE. So this Mr. Busybody came all the way from ‘great’ Britain to orchestrate a ceasefire. He had to go back empty-handed but only after he got an earful from the Secretary of Defence. Sad! Doubly sad!

I feel sorry for young David because he has nothing to show his constituents who have succeeded in making a mockery of Britain’s noises about zero-tolerance of terrorism. London looks quite the ‘traditional homeland’ of terrorism these days, with hundreds of paper-tigers waving the LTTE flag (not the Union Jack!) and dying to get Prabhakaran saved. David failed them. Why? David really is too small to get such things done. In fact, David, as they say, doesn’t have a leg to stand on.

What’s the key word for Miliband? ‘Civilians’. So let’s talk civilians and how Britain has treated them and treats them. Perhaps David might learn something.

‘Great’ Britain is notorious for taking potshots at civilians. They’ve made it an art form over the years. Hundreds of thousands were killed by the British during the happy days of the colonial enterprise. Over 100,000 thousand people in this island were slaughtered by the British in 1818 and thousands of others during other rebellions later in the same century. They were not ‘combatants’. They were what, David darling? They were ‘civilians’, my dear.

Plunderer

‘Civilian’, David, refers to a person following the pursuits of civil life, especially one who is not an active member of the military or police. Now think about all those people in all the unhappy countries that your ancestors decided to plunder and that your Government has decided to continue to plunder. Millions, baby, millions! Add to all that the loot that ‘great’ Britain took back home, the look that in fact made Britain ‘great’. Add to this the destruction of culture. That’s a lot, chum. A lot of ‘concern’ for civilians, eh?

Is that all ‘in the past’? Are they the crimes of ancestors? Should David get off scot-free? Well, first of all, David is a direct beneficiary of the loot that found its way into banks in England. Secondly, when a country plunders another country, all citizens of the plunderer and their progeny are in debt to the plundered and their progeny. Thirdly, that kind of ‘concern’ for citizens is not a thing-of-the-past thing. It is a thing-of-the-present as well.

Let’s remind David. When the USA imposed sanctions on Saddam Hussein’s Iraq, ‘great’ Britain applauded. Some 500,000 Iraqi children died as a result. When the USA launched Operation Desert Storm against Iraq, ‘great’ Britain applauded. Thousands of Iraqi civilians died. When the then President of the USA, George W. Bush, sent his troops into Iraq to look for non-existent weapons of mass destruction, ‘great’ Britain applauded and joined the search party. These two countries, together, devastated Iraq, killed tens of thousands of Iraqi civilians. So are you surprised, brother, that we in Sri Lanka don’t think much of your concerns regarding civilians?

Concerned over civilians

Mahinda Rajapaksa was right to be amazed at how David and his partner-in-crime in France, Bernard Kouchner, could be more concerned about civilians in Sri Lanka (non-White and without any British ancestry as is the case in Zimbabwe) than himself, President of Sri Lanka and therefore constitutionally responsible for the security and wellbeing of all Sri Lankans. He could have added that David has ‘civilian issues’ of his own, as pointed above. In fact David ought to agitate against himself and his Government; he should move for a UN Security Council resolution against ‘great’ Britain for a) crimes against humanity, b) unconscionable idiocy and c) for not compensating for grievous harm done, to Sri Lanka and other countries in the so-called Commonwealth.

A ‘humanitarianism’ that declares war on a country on account of non-existent weapons of mass destruction, imposes sanctions that further entrench tyrants in power will causing untold suffering to the civilian population including the deaths of half a million children, requires turning once vibrant cities into so much rubble, and more than all this, insists on offering a ‘human shield’ to a terrorist organization is certainly a ridiculous proposition. A ‘humanitarianism’ that says ‘will not tolerate terrorism’ while at the same time bends over backwards to throw a lifeline to a terrorist, is pretty dumb, to put it mildly. British humanitarianism, friends, is a joke. British humanitarianism is about profit. Miliband’s brand of humanitarianism is limited by the votes he can get or stands to lose. It is as simple as that.

The anwer

So what’s really bugging our friend David Miliband? I couldn’t figure this one out. Well, I finally did. Or rather, the answer appeared in a poster held outside the British High Commission a few days ago by some protestors: ‘We did to the LTTE what you could not do to the Al Qaeda. Envious?’ Must be true. There’s no other explanation. After all, as another poster asked Gordon Brown, the man David would love to replace, ‘Would you offer a humanitarian lifeline to Osama bin Laden?’

Bernard Kouncher is French. He can be forgiven for getting lost among English words and definitions. Not so with Miliband. English is his mother tongue. Maybe his mother taught him what ‘humanitarianism’ means. Maybe not. He could have learnt it somewhere though. He didn’t. He should have and still can. He is not, after all, Elisa Dolittle, although he certainly does very little while doing his utmost to undo what’s been achieved at great cost by our citizens, not his.

Malinda Seneviratne is a freelance journalist who also edits the monthly magazine ‘Spectrum’. He can be reached at malinsene@gmail.com.

-Sri Lanka Guardian