SOURCE: http://www.asiantribune.com/index.php?q=node/7471
23/09/2007
Published on Asian Tribune (http://www.asiantribune.com)
Daya Gamage – US Bureau Asian Tribune Analysis
Washington, D.C. 23 September (Asiantribune.com): The United States’ policy toward Sri Lanka’s crisis is one that has given the separatist Tamil Tiger outfit, Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE), a life line for survival, not just recently, but for a very long time. The pronouncements of leading Congressmen and State Department officials from time to time vis-à-vis Sri Lanka situation, the policies placed both by the American lawmakers and the administration’s foreign policy executor the Department of State, the total indifference to the plight of Sri Lanka in the hands of a ruthless terrorist movement and the U.S. actions that have placed the ‘Tamil issue’ on the lap of the Tamil Tigers have undoubtedly given Sri Lankan separatists a solid life line.
Sri Lanka’s president Mahinda Rajapaksa arrives in New York to address the General Assembly of the United Nations on 25th September amid this atmosphere unfavorable to this South Asian nation with significant decline of U.S. development assistance with the freezing of military assistance ratified by the Senate early this month and most favorable to the Tamil Tigers when the Congress and State Department in their actions have given a life line to the separatists in totally ignoring the alternate Tamil voice which is part of Sri Lanka’s mainstream democratic politics.
The Webster’s dictionary version of ‘Life Line’ is (a) a line to which a drowning or falling victim may cling (b) a means or route for transporting indispensable supplies (c) a source of salvation in a crisis.
When State Department assistant secretary Richard Boucher espouses LTTE’s ‘Tamil Homeland’, a concept officially forwarded by the latter in Government-Tiger talks in Thimpu in 1985, which subsequently never became an issue in later deliberations, America ‘transported an indispensable supply’ as a life line to the Tigers complicating Sri Lanka government efforts to find a reasonable solution to the National Crisis.
When Democratic Congressman Frank Pallone, a co-chair of Congressional Sri Lanka Caucus, in a written testimony to the House Foreign Affairs Committee on August 01 this year, sees Sri Lanka crisis as a conflict between the Sinhalese and Tamils the powerful Congressman has not only made any attempt to understand the ground situation in Sri Lanka, but has legitimized the ‘struggle’ of the Tamil Tigers despite, in the same testimony, he condemns LTTE terrorism. That’s the life line that we are talking here.
Has Sri Lanka’s overseas public diplomacy so pathetically defaulted for the Chairman of the House Subcommittee on Middle East and South Asia Congressman Garry Ackerman to declare in the well of the House on August 01 at the hearing on ‘Situation in Sri Lanka’ that the Rajapaksa government has “given a free reign to Sinhalese nationalists” that has “led to the acceleration of chaos and drift away from democracy” in Sri Lanka?
Or this Congressman, who heads a vital House committee, is fed a distorted version of the ground situation by the State Department? And, who feeds the State Department’s South Asian Affairs Bureau? The U.S. Embassy in Colombo does comprehensive socio-political and economic analysis for the State Department on daily basis.
So, the life line for the Tamil Tigers in fact starts in Colombo, and this ‘transportation of indispensable supplies’ to the LTTE started way back in the late 80s, effectively facilitated the latter during the brief Ranil Wickremasinghe regime in 2001-03 with State Department deputy Richard Armitage at the helm.
The American ambassador to Sri Lanka Robert Blake told in Colombo this week, quoted by local news media, that the United States has not cut aid to Sri Lanka. Asian Tribune on 23 August, based on Congressional documents, revealed that U.S. economic assistance to Sri Lanka for FY 08 was reduced and that the Foreign Assistance Appropriation Bill for FY 08 included the suspension of military aid to Sri Lanka. The latter was on a recommendation of Senator Patrick Leahy the chairman of the judiciary committee and chairman of the subcommittee on foreign assistance. On Leahy’s recommendation, the State Department early this year suspended the US$1000 million grant under the Millennium Corporation Account. Sri Lanka was one of the 16 countries earmarked for Millennium Cooperation assistance.
Wittingly or unwittingly the United States is providing a life line to Sri Lanka’s Tamil Tigers who are committed to win a separate independent state for the ethnic Tamil minority in the nation’s Northern and Eastern Provinces.
The life line is given to a terrorist movement which has no acceptance over a majority of the 12 percent Tamils. Those who are providing the life line in their acts, pronouncements, policy decisions and behaviors do not want to know that 54% of ethnic Tamils in Sri Lanka now live with the majority Sinhalese in other provinces and that the remaining Tamils who live in areas under the control of the LTTE in the North are in fact captive people and that the ethnically mixed Eastern Province has been rid of the Tamil Tigers and that the genuine Tamil grievances and LTTE terrorism are two distinct issues.
It is to the delight of the LTTE that the leader of the international community, the U.S., has declared her interest in a solution to Sri Lankan crisis provide them with the life line they need to bring pressure on Sri Lanka to compromise to LTTE positions that the majority of Sri Lanka Tamils oppose, the Tamil political parties in the democratic mainstream reject and detrimental to the other ethnic groups Sinhalese and Muslims.
Throughout this crisis the United States covertly believed that the LTTE represents the Tamil aspirations, and now overtly supports that position with policy measures, pronouncements, strategies and acts. Does one have any doubt that the United States Congress and the Department of State provide salvation to the most ruthless terrorist organization that has been designated a ‘foreign terrorist organization’ in the United States?
To answer that here is what the former American ambassador to Sri Lanka Jeffrey Lunstead in his knowledgeable paper to the Asia Foundation “The U.S. Role in Sri Lanka Peace Process 2002-2006: US Interests and Engagement in Sri Lanka” in May 2007 says how the U.S. views LTTE terrorism and Al Qaeda terrorism:
Since 9/11/01 “U.S. Treasury experts on terrorism financing visited Sri Lanka several times to work with the government on strengthening the Sri Lanka financial system’s ability to cut off terrorist financing flows. While this might be considered a strategic (US) interest, it was also limited by the fact that the LTTE is essentially a local Sri Lankan phenomenon with no clear ties to other terrorist groups with a world-wide reach. The U.S. opposes all terrorist groups, but all such groups are not equal in the extent to which they threaten U.S. interests directly.”
Ambassador Lunstead infers in his paper to the Asia Foundation that the U.S. Treasury Department visits to Sri Lanka were in fact to benefit the United States: “The U.S. provided assistance on global terrorism issues, to which Sri Lanka responded willingly.”
The popular African web site ‘Africapath’ in its September 01 edition made the following interesting comment about the West’s indifference to terrorism and separatism in several countries. The web site encouraged Ethiopia, Somalia and Sri Lanka “to take matters into their own hand and expose the double standards of the West”: “As widely reported”, Africapath says “the Eritrean government continued to support rebels in Ethiopian borders as well as the ICU militants against the Somalia traditional government. But the real issue for the West was that some individuals in the ICU were responsible for US embassy bombing in east Africa. Thus it was not a surprise that the United States warned the Eritrean government about its financial and arms support for anti-government ICU fighters in Mogadishu. This showed that the United States is concerned about terrorism only when its interests are affected. It is important for all those nations, like Ethiopia, Somalia and Sri Lanka, who are facing violent secessionist movements and terrorist organizations armed by Eritrea, to take the matters into their own hands and expose the double standards of the West.”
It has been alleged that Ranil Wickremasinghe’s 2001-2003 regime facilitated the Tamil Tigers to re-arm and rejuvenate for the movement to become more vigorous with enhanced ability to negotiate. The 2002 Ceasefire Agreement greatly favored the LTTE to re-gain an influential position. Many analysts point the finger at Norwegian role in that effort.
It was the United States, through its ‘most favorite’ Wickremasinghe government, that gave fillip to the LTTE. It should be borne here that the U.S. always considered successive Sri Lankan administrations as ‘Sinhalese dominated’, that the minority Tamils had genuine grievances (which nobody denied, not even the current Rajapaksa administration) and that the LTTE is the vanguard of the minority Tamils in Sri Lanka while covertly accepting that the suppression of the LTTE amount to the suppression of the Tamil minority in this South Asian nation.
How the United States provided the life line to Tamil Tiger movement during the Ranil Wickremasinghe regime is not this writer’s fabrication or fantasy; one could get an inference from what the then American ambassador to Sri Lanka Jeffrey Lunstead said in his speech delivered at a seminar on ‘Sri Lanka: Prospects for Peace” at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, Washington, DC on 14 February 2003. Washington’s reciprocity to Wickremasinghe’s pro-West regime greatly enhanced the military and political clout of Sri Lanka’s Tamil Tigers.
Let’s quote what Lunstead said: “On external economic issues, the new government took a distinctly free-trade approach, which also gained the favor of the U.S. government. In international trade negotiations, such as the WTO Ministerial Meeting in Cancum, Mexico in September 2003, the U.S. and Sri Lankan delegations worked closely together, as the GSL tried to help bridge the gap between developed and developing nations.”
In fact, Wickremasinghe regime went totally against the aspirations of the developing world in Cancun and sided with the most unpopular stand taken by the U.S.
Ambassador Lunstead says: “The pattern of limited U.S. engagement with Sri Lankan ethnic conflict changed dramatically with the start of a new peace process in 2001-2002. This was not due to any dramatic change in U.S. strategic interests in Sri Lanka, but rather to a combination of other factors: (a) The Post-Sept. 11, 2001 atmosphere that ushered in a new determination by the U.S. to confront terrorism on a worldwide basis (b) The election in Sri Lanka of a UNP/UNF government led by Ranil Wickremasinghe that was markedly more pro-West and pro-free market/globalization (c) The personal interest of then-Deputy Secretary of State Richard Armitage.
In fact, this writer answered (a) as the U.S. did not connect the Tamil Tiger terrorism to Al Qaeda global terrorism. Lunstead’s (b) was the main reason and the U.S. through the Wickremasinghe regime created an atmosphere with the connivance of Norway that greatly benefited the Tamil Tigers, foremost were favorable clauses in the 2002 Ceasefire Agreement.
“The Wickremasinghe government set out a program to drastically accelerate this process. (of market-driven economy started by Jayawardene and continued by Kumaratunga) More important, the new approach was largely in line with U.S. government thinking on economic and international development issues” says Lunstead.
Asian Tribune in these columns has often questioned the Rajapaksa administration’s overseas public diplomacy strategy as faulty and that it cannot match the LTTE misinformation, misrepresentation and lobbying in the West. Nevertheless, in recent times Foreign Minister Bogallagama, Minister Lakshman Peiris, Prof. Rajiva Wijesinghe, Dr. Dayan Jayatilleke etc. have gone to a great extent of presenting Sri Lanka’s ground situation vis-à-vis Tamil Tiger terrorism, human rights, disappearances, national security and political solution to many vital audiences in major capitals.
During President Rajapaksa’s last visit to the U.N. principal players of the Congress and State Department officials were well briefed about Sri Lanka’s ground situation.
Sri Lanka’s frustration was clearly manifested in foreign minister Bogallagama’s submission in his address to the Royal Institution for International Relations (RIIR) Brussels on the theme “Sri Lanka : the Quest for Peace” on September 3.
Sri Lanka Foreign Minister said his countrymen are saddened by the misperceptions, distortions and deliberate aspersions cast upon the Government of Sri Lanka in foreign countries, for they do not reflect the reality of the ground situation, in a country that is endeavoring to rid itself of the menace of terrorism. The Minister added that such accounts are particularly disappointing and discouraging to those engaged in trying to end, what many have been content to dismiss as an “intractable problem”. The Minister urged greater objectivity in the reporting of developments in Sri Lanka.
“This by no means suggests that there are no issues of concern relating to human rights, displacement of persons affected by the conflict. However, I am indeed appalled at the steady stream of deliberately circulated disinformation, which is deeply disappointing and discouraging to those of us engaged in trying to end what many have been content to claim as an intractable problem. I would like to avail of this opportunity to share with you some of these concerns, in the true spirit of transparency” he further said.
“Had some sections of the international community taken pre-emptive action to ensure that the LTTE did not grow to be the monster it presently is – directly, through its front organizations, using the hapless Tamil expatriate populations estimated to be over a million, we might have been able to avoid the brutal killings and destruction to a significant degree” he faulted the international community obviously the United States in mind.
Despite an year-long presentation of facts to the international community, especially to the United States, the 22 June 2007 passed U.S. House bill and 06 September 2007 ratified Department of State, Foreign Operations, and Related Programs Appropriation Act, 2008 imposed this sanction on Sri Lanka:
SEC. 690. None of the funds appropriated by this Act under the heading `Foreign Military Financing Program' may be made available for assistance for Sri Lanka, no defense export license may be issued, and no military equipment or technology shall be sold or transferred to Sri Lanka pursuant to the authorities contained in this Act or any other Act, unless the Secretary of State certifies and reports to the Committees on Appropriations that the Sri Lankan military is suspending and the Sri Lankan Government is bringing to justice members of the military who have been credibly alleged to have committed gross violations of human rights, including extrajudicial executions and the recruitment of child soldiers.
This is the latest life line offered to Sri Lanka’s Tamil Tigers by the United States Congress with the connivance of the South and Central Asian Affairs Bureau of the State Department whose head is Richard Boucher who advocated ‘Homeland’ for the Tamils in the North and East of Sri Lanka. His principal assistant in charge of Sri Lanka, Stephen Mann, was deputy chief of mission at the American embassy in Colombo when the Mission was headed by Teresita Schaffer who believes that the LTTE represents Tamil aspirations.
Section 710 of Title 7 of the International Development and Security Assistance Authorization Act says:
(1) The Interagency Group on Human Rights and Foreign Assistance
has been an effective mechanism for coordinating and
implementing United States human rights policies;
(2) The President should consider establishing the Interagency
Group on a more permanent basis;
(3) The Interagency Group should examine proposals for not
only economic assistance but also for security assistance;
If above was the criteria which are used to give economic assistance, award Millennium Grant and military aid one wonders as to how a blatant human rights violators like Indonesia and Egypt receive enhanced economic and military aid from the United States. Both countries have received increased assistance for FY 08.
Under the Ranil Wickeremasinghe regime the United States facilitated the Tamil Tigers in a different way while enhancing economic aid to Sri Lanka reciprocating the regime’s ‘slavish attitude’ toward the former. The grave consequences are still felt as a result of the solid life line the U.S. gave the LTTE during the 2001-2003 period. The Rajapaksa administration is currently struggling to undo some of those measures detrimental to the national security of Sri Lanka amidst all odds from the “rapacious’ West. Now, the leading members of the U.S. legislature and the officials of the State Department are continue to maintain the life line the United States offered the Tamil Tigers since the late eighties.
The great journalist Mervyn de Silva in May 15, 1990 edition of Lanka Guardian writing an eulogy to Sri Lanka (EPRLF) parliamentarian Sam Tambimuttu, who was assassinated by the LTTE hit squad in front of the Canadian High Commission in Colombo said:
“…Right through the ‘war’ in the east, before and after the arrival of the IPKF, Sam Thambimuttu was the reporter’s first choice for what in the professional patois is called a ‘check’ and a ‘double check’…There was the more exacting professional demand rooted in the very character of a highly competitive profession. Beat your rival. Get the story out first.
‘For the foreign correspondent’ (the foreign-foreign, or the local stringer) the source is vital. So is the ready access to the source. But most of all, reliability. And credibility. Since this is not a personal, but a professional’s tribute to Sam Thambimuttu, I have had to break an old established rule not to reveal the source. In this case, however, Sam’s
assistance to the International press, particularly to the BBC, was hardly a secret. His name has been mentioned a hundred times.”
It was to Sam Thambimuttu that this writer often turned since early eighties to get interpretations to what was going on in the East and North of Sri Lanka who became a valuable source of information. The last occasion this writer met Sam was little before his brutal assassination by the Tamil Tiger hit squad opposite the Canadian High Commission immediately after his audience with the political counselor of the American Embassy at the Chancery building in Colombo. By that time he has answered a question posed by the political counselor “How could the LTTE managed to be so powerful and influential to dictate the agenda of Sri Lanka?” Sam told this writer that he analyzed the situation in the country vis-à-vis Tamil Tigers, terrorism, ethnic issue, Tamil grievances and devolution of power to the periphery. But he told the State Department official in his Chancery office that there has to be a big power behind the LTTE to even dictate terms to the Government of Sri Lanka and influence its national agenda.
While munching Indian cuisine and consuming intoxicant beverages at the well known Indian restaurant Greenlands in Colombo Sri Lanka, Sam Thambimuttu finally elaborated what he failed to do when he met the political counselor of the American Embassy. His verdict was the United States was morally behind the LTTE and that strength was well enough for the LTTE to become what it was which this writer dismissed at that time.
- Asian Tribune -