WHY SRI LANKA DOES NOT
We cannot expect either gratitude or apology from India but it is our right to set the story straight as far as India’s role is concerned in establishing terrorism in Sri Lanka. We now need the world especially the Indian people to understand how its Government had launched the separatist struggle in Sri Lanka making a friendly nation a guinea pig to governments and illegal arms industries that turned Sri Lanka into a theatre of war. It is to the credit of the Sri Lankan State and its valiant armed forces that showed the world how even the most sophisticated and technically savvy terrorist movement can be eliminated within just three years and raises anyone’s concern why other movements exist if the will to eradicate terrorism prevailed just as it finally did in Sri Lanka.
Sri Lanka weathered a terrorist movement that ran an international campaign as the victim, used “ethnicity” as a camouflage and was brutal enough to be “recruited” by international forces to carry out their “designs” with time. These design range from political, economic and sociological to even religious emancipation of Asia.
Our contention is that it was India that helped make Asia vulnerable to these external players who today use “terrorism” as sufficient grounds to deploy “security”, “political advisors”, “strategic counsellors” and others all to either further advance or use ground situations to newly create challenges for Governments and nations that are economic targets to secure natural assets.
Nevertheless, lest people forget some of India’s dark and ugly past vis a vis its role in establishing terrorism in Sri Lanka needs continued mention. No friendly nation would secretly create training programmes for Sri Lankan Tamil youth to be turned into militants and ordered to create anarchy in Sri Lanka even if that excuse was due to India’s anger with Sri Lanka’s political leadership. Sri Lanka was certainly caught unawares, its army at the time was ill-equipped and it was also considering these scenarios that the LTTE made its theatrical entry in 1983. The background to that entry should raise the question whether Black July was also staged to provide legitimacy to the movement and enable it to openly carry out its terror campaign and asks the logical question why Sinhalese would attack Tamils to bring international condemnation to itself. This should raise anyone’s eyebrows whether the riots itself were also pre-planned and in Asian countries an exchange of a few notes will suffice to do what the CIA did in Iran.
Be that as it may the initial years of LTTE’s “liberation” crescendo was steered undoubtedly by India. Why would India threaten to invade Sri Lanka and politically humiliate the nation by sending its air force over Sri Lanka’s territory demanding that the cornered Prabhakaran be released in 1987 (Vadamarachchi)? It was in real- izing that external players were also lobbying the LTTE that made India quickly push for its version of a political solution – the 13th Amendment and the Provincial Council system.
It is having signed this that India no longer required the explicit services of the LTTE and probably would have contributed to giving orders to the IPKF to eliminate the LTTE – which severed ties with India resulting in LTTE-Premadasa joining their voices to demand India remove the IPKF forthwith. That LTTE was steered not only by India became clear with the assassination of Rajiv Gandhi and it questioned why India did not at that time take a sincere stand on LTTE at least over the death of its former PM without allowing LTTE to unofficially continue to use Tamil Nadu as a logistics and safety base.
Was it because it had concluded that Tamil Nadu leaders lacked the capability of launching Eelam in India or was India as it appears now to be remotecontrolled by western forces? It is perhaps time the Indian people dwell on the notion why neighbours on its border unanimously find India a threat to them personally as well as to the entire South Asian region?
Shenali Waduge for Eurasia Review