I came across this site about a fortnight ago. It inspired me to submit my thoughts about. Thank you in advance for reading.
From February 2009 until now (the end of 2011), there have been 3 years of trauma unleashed on the Tamil people. The depths of the mental trauma that the Tamil people have faced are just as low as before. Everyone is a shell of their former selves. The areas of the Northeast - the Tamil homeland - are even more militarised, more raped, more tortured - just more wholly and systematically oppressed. Does it not remind you of books you've read, like the end of 1984, where those with the Will to Freedom are tortured until they left with barely the will to live?
For nearly 3 years, I've been beside myself wondering our people are "lost" irrevocably to a savage "legitimate" government. But I don't think we are lost. We are not lost, not yet, not even close.
I understood what most others did, too -- China was the real enemy. India had blood on its hands, too. The US was the US. The first couple of years were difficult. The Sinhalese government's racist nature was exposed through its triumphalism, and the world responded as if it never knew about this Mahavamsa mindset. It's as if all of the decision makers and academics in the world had no clue that the political structure of the island was the single source, the single generator (enabler and self-reinforcer) of all of the problems to do with the conflict -- language, employment, equity, religion, education, economic development, nationalist narratives, hegemony, and violence. Adding insult to injury, the Tamil Diaspora knew all of this. And the international community knew all of this. And the Tamil Diaspora knew that the international community really did know all of this, even though they acted like a lot of cabbages. The Channel 4 documentary Killing Fields proved that we were right. Tamils have not yet had governments to step up and be their allies. In that state of helplessness, it was really disturbing to hear various groups step in and wax nonsensical about the Big Bad Tamil Diaspora, that we're militant, angry dark-skinned people and to naturally be feared. I'll explain later why such assertions are patently wrong. But I'd like to single out morally and politically hollow organisations who were releasing such flatulence -- chiefly, the Sri Lanka Democracy Forum (SLDF) and their relatives (figuratively and literally) University Teachers of Human Rights (UTHR). These people are as bankrupt and useless as Ahmed Chalabi was for Iraq. Their raison d'être was criticising the Tigers, but now the Tigers are no more. Many Western NGO's were guilty, hopefully unwittingly, in repeating such assertions that the Tamil Diaspora should be feared and clamped down. No, not only are Tamils and the Tamil Diaspora a natural ally for the West, but the Tamil Diaspora are a wealth of talent and expertise that can be recruited to organically build up the Tamil homeland the right way.
Why the Tamil Diaspora are an Ally and Asset
I no longer want to believe that all is a long way gone, that the best chances for freedom and peace are behind us. Things have changed, indeed. Perhaps the predictions turned out to be true -- politics are never permanent, and it's all about changing alliances. China has been the enabler for Sri Lanka in recent times. Sri Lanka is like a symbol or barometer of world politics. Simultaneously, China quietly slipped onto the world stage, and they did that artfully in Sri Lanka. With China's help, Sri Lanka made India and the States look like bumbling fools, no?
And making sense of the world politics seems so much clearer. As predicted, India is looking like it might need the US's help already. The 2010 Commonwealth Games in New Delhi were severely underwhelming, while the Beijing 2008 Olympics were overwhelming. The US could use India's help as it isn't doing too well these days with its economy (and Europe are suffering, too, frightfully).
When it comes to Sri Lanka, there's too much at stake -- the US and India thusly should band together with Tamils and fight off China and the Sinhalese government. Tamils and India and the US are all natural allies. For example, so many Tamils from India are working professional jobs in the West, including many high-tech jobs in the US. India is the biggest immediate threat to China, so every neighbour of India is a Chinese ally, including Pakistan. So Pakistan, India's neighbour and sworn enemy from childhood, is screwing the US now, and the States is cheesed. Whilst US is setting up a presence in Australia to counter the Chinese threat, and whilst Diego Garcia is far too far to be useful, could we Tamils not consider renting out Trinco harbour to the US (not India) for, say 50 years, the way the Panama Canal? After all, India should not be spending too much effort on regional dominance. India's thirst to profit off of its natural resources is wrecking its precious environment and the livelihoods of its poorest and its tribals. These rudderless destitutes are being picked up by the ever-growing Maoist insurgents, China is helping the Maoist rebels bring down the Indian government, and India can't stop it despite its scorched-earth tactics on its own people. While these things deplete India's treasury, it is the Tamils and others in South India that are a huge cash cow for India with all of their IT companies and international manufacturing.
In order for the US and India to get it right, they need to take everything that they did wrong from 2001-2009 vis-a-vis Tamils in Sri Lanka and do the opposite. They need to see that Tamils, the US, and India are natural allies for years to come. They need to truly recognize that the only way to clamp down on the Sinhalese government, which is motivated by a racist bent of oppression, is to change the political structure of Sri Lanka. The Northeast needs to be structurally protected, it needs to be treated as a distinct, whole, a geographic unit, to reflect its separate existence from the rest of the island for millennia until the arrival of colonialists -- they speak a separate language (Tamil), they practice separate religions (Saivaite Hinduism, Islam, and Protestant and Catholic Christianity), a separate culture with a distinct shared history. Any lasting political solution for the island must take this reality into account. The Sinhalese have been working for the past 50 years to erase this ethnic reality and replace it with Sinhalese Buddhists. Changing a political structure may not be the easiest, but an autonomous political unit for the Northeast is what should've existed all along. A separate Northeast will be favorable to India and the US, stable, and predictable. In contrast, the Sinhalese have become experts at playing not just 2, but 3, superpower countries off of each other. Trinco is the 3rd best harbour in the world, and it is right on the shipping lanes between China, the Middle East, and Europe. What is best for the Tamils is best for India and the West.
What I Want Tamil Autonomy to Look Like
I want Tamil Autonomy to look like a bigger version of Singapore, a Tamil-speaking South Asian version. After all, before the Sinhalese started colonizing the Northeast after Ceylon got its independence, the area was overwhelmingly Tamil-speaking. There is a ton more land than in Singapore, and it is just as lush and tropical. And the hard-work ethic and emphasis on education is very ingrained in the people of the Northeast. The nexus with the mainland (Tamil Nadu / India) is reminiscent of what Malaysia is to Singapore. Oh, by the way, there are lots of Tamils in Singapore and Malaysia. I want to see the Northeast also be a regional hub of the IT industry. I want to see it be a site of cultural preservation, yet seamlessly integrating the past with technology and modernity. The right balance of protecting the environment (land, water resources) with development and advancement.
I want Tamil Autonomy to also look like Kerala. Everyone should be well-educated and prosperous. Fertile land should be dedicated for being a "bread basket" (or "rice bowl")
of tropical crops for the region. Hindus, Muslims and Christians should coexist harmoniously, without religion being such a big deal that it leads to conflicts. The people should be interested in high-quality literature, movies, and art. The Kerala brand of communism is more like a European mixed-market economy. The Tamil-speaking homeland should be like Western Europe in that regard -- universal health care, good public transportation, and other good services and infrastructure. I want to see a Tamil-speaking soccer team in the World Cup, playing high-calibre football while wearing red-and-yellow jerseys. Or cricket, I suppose.
What We Need to Do to Achieve Freedom for Tamils
Tamils need to get the message out. And Tamils need to understand that this is no longer a world we have to be suspicious of. Regardless of whether the rest of the world wanted to understand us before, times have changed. The world will be on our side, soon enough, if and when we put our best foot forward. But there are a few things we need to do.
We need to learn how to explain our point of view coherently. When it comes to talking about the present and the future, the LTTE is a moot point. They're gone, so how is talking about them now helpful? Remember the LTTE, forgive the LTTE, never forget the LTTE, but don't bring them up in conversation. Instead, we need to focus on the humanitarian needs of the people of the Northeast. And we also need to teach people that changing the political structure is the only way that healing will last. Any other band-aid solutions won't stick long. Right now, as people talk about fact-finding missions, the important line of messaging is this:
If you care about peace in Sri Lanka, then there needs to be reconciliation first. Peace has never been achieved without reconciliation. For reconciliation to happen, we have to have accountability, and for that, we need the full truth about what happened. To have the truth, we need to have all of the information available.
When it comes to accountability, the Sri Lankan government should be punished for any dastardly egregious deeds. The Tigers, in turn, are accountable for any of their deeds, but since they were all killed, it's a moot point.
We also have to shape our arguments to reality: our interests, and the interests of the US and India naturally overlap. It is true now, it may have been true before, and it will be true for a long while to come. Tamils have a lot to offer to the world, and they deserve international backers. But remember, when it comes to rehabilitation, humanitarian needs and political changes should be pursued simultaneously. We in the Diaspora cannot forget the fundamental political problem -- the self-reinforcing nature of the political structure of the island -- by solely focusing on the humanitarian needs, or vice versa.
We have to carry ourselves professionally when we talk publicly -- calm, collected, confident, but also very considerate about all points of view. For example, there are out-of-touch groups of Tamils in the Diaspora who hypocritically claim that the Tamil Diaspora should be ignored and not trusted (e.g., SLDF). They are politically well-connected, though. Groups like these attempt to speak on behalf of Thamils, but when you discuss specifics, they often give a distorted picture. Here's something reasonable that you could propose, that such groups would be against:
De-militarization of the Northeast should happen soon with Western international peacekeeping forces on the ground in control of securing the region. An interim council for the Northeast should be established to handle region-specific needs. After a period of 5 or 10 years, during which rehabilitation and redevelopment can take place, the _inhabitants_ of the Northeast should be given a referendum so that they can decide their political future, like Southern Sudan or Bougainvillea. And there needs to be a buffer of 5 to 10 years of development so that deescalation reconciliation can happen.
Who can argue against people's right to self-determination, or a reasonable, concrete plan towards peace and normalcy?
Lastly, we have to learn these skills. And once you learn these skills, you have to turn around and teach a dozen more people those skills, and so on. With enough people educated, we can band together to make a positive dent in the universe. Cheers.
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