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‘Emergency’ back again – Tamil Homeland trepidates

The state of ‘Emergency’ brought into effect now, is a subtle and horrendous strategy authorising the ‘Sinhala’ State forces to suppress the Tamil freedom struggle. During the last two decades and many times before, this piece of legislation has been ruthlessly made use of with meticulous precision by Colombo in enforcing ‘wild governance’ in the occupied areas of the Tamil homeland. Taking away peace from the Tamil people, this ‘piece’ from the Sri Lankan ‘book’, has caused the deaths of several thousands of their brethren and did provide immunity to the occupying forces to illegally arrest, detain, torture and make many of them just numeric in the list of ‘disappeared’.

The government of Chandrika Bandaranaike Kumaratunga has brought the whole island under a state of emergency at a time when there is an environment of relative peace. A State of emergency and a Cease Fire Agreement (CFA) are two situations that cannot prevail concurrently. Proclamation of emergency therefore, has placed the CFA in grave risk.

The holistic intent of the CFA is to ‘remove’ the cloud of war in the Tamil homeland and bring about an environment that could be called peaceful. It is such a situation that would create an environment conducive for political negotiations. And, the peace process gets a fillip only in such an atmosphere, a matter that was comprehended and mutually agreed upon by the parties to the CFA.

But, the government of CBK, consequent to the assassination of Lakshman Kadirgamar, proclaimed a state of emergency and by extension, has created a war panic. Kadirgamar was killed in the capital city of Colombo, that too, in a High Security Zone. To apprehend assassin/s in such circumstances, is to bring about a sudden halt to all traffic in the city, may be after declaring a curfew and carry out a search operation. That is the most realistic exercise.

Reality being that, one smells a political intent behind the declaration of emergency this time round and therefore rejects the simplistic explanation that it is to apprehend the culprits. It is very clear that there is a political agenda ‘necessitating’ the declaration of emergency. CFA, it is apparent, is the target of the ‘guns’ of emergency. Similar to the fate of P-TOMS that has been sent into a state of paralysis in the Sri Lankan judicial exercise, the emergency has pushed the CFA into grave risk and the service of the Sri Lanka Monitoring Mission (SLMM) meaningless.

Hot on the heels of the declaration of emergency, a disabled, right arm amputee LTTE member has been ‘arrested’, but in actuality abducted, by the occupying military in Jaffna and taken to Colombo. The state of emergency precludes LTTE from discussing the matter with the military. Nor can the SLMM intervene in the matter. The state of emergency, as is usual in this island, provides to the forces, ample arbitrary powers to arrest, detain unlawfully, torture and kill. Tamil people are being arrested indiscriminately and at random all over the island. Large number of Tamils have been arrested and detained in Colombo. Fifteen women including two instructors, engaged in a vocational training project under the auspices of UNDP in Mannar, have been arrested by the forces without adducing any reasons. All in all, a tense and panicky situation is in the making in all parts of the Tamil homeland. Human rights activists here are powerless to be effective.

This time again, as history has witnessed several times in the past, all the Sinhala parties have extended their support to the government to ‘pass’ the bill, extended support only because it is aimed at suppressing the Tamil freedom struggle. This is a peculiar political phenomenon Tamil people are being asked to face again. It is this attitude that pushes the Tamil people into abject frustration, in that, whatever move, whoever initiate to bring peace, consolidates Sinhala parties to join hands in successfully nullifying it.

Talk about direct talks between the Government and the LTTE on strengthening the CFA, is on the air these days. If the state of emergency is to continue for long, something that is not unusual in Sri Lanka, one foresees a tragic situation in which even direct talks may not be of any use. It is therefore the yearning of all peace loving people that emergency should be lifted, and lifted immediately.

26 August 2005

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