COLOMBO: The 19-year-old war between the government and the LTTE is over. It is now the battle by the Tamil Tigers for the best possible global position, not as terrorists, but as ‘liberators’ of the Tamils living in Sri Lanka. Transforming 20 years ago from a group of gun-toting boys to become one of the world’s most ruthless guerilla organizations, the LTTE first began its global preening after the ceasefire of February 2002. Money was taken out of the organization’s coffers for extensive travel in the European region and in South Africa. The LTTE, possibly with adequate guidelines from its London-based theoretician, Anton Balasingham, extracted itself from the northeastern Killinochchi jungles where they had waged their bloody war for a separate Tamil state.
No longer declared as terrorists within Sri Lanka, they went out and broadened their network throughout the world for what they called the ‘Tamil cause’. But their fangs remained deeply submerged in a troubled ceasefire, with a total of 2,837 ceasefire violations levelled against the organization, in the latest statistics regarding ceasefire violations released by the Nordic truce monitors.
The killings carried out by the LTTE since the February 2002 truce and its gross ceasefire violations were naturally not discussed at these high level meetings between rebel leaders and European delegates.
The perfect position, which the LTTE wanted to be portrayed was of an organization fighting for the liberation of the Tamils and to be seen as being victimized by the government. Killings that were highlighted were the killings of the LTTE, allegedly by the faction supporting the LTTE dissident, Karuna. Here, such killings were highlighted as killings ‘helped by the government’.
The LTTE clearly wanted to keep their bloodied skeletons in their cupboards. The split in their organization last year with the former LTTE militant Karuna taking up arms against the LTTE leader Vellupillai Prabhakaran and the widescale killing that followed, was naturally, not fit subject matter for the LTTE’s discourses with European leaders.
In the aftermath of the December tsunami disaster, the LTTE leaders, in a tour of Europe begun in March this year, spanning nearly two months, unleashed their widest propaganda against the government for not releasing “enough aid” to the north east, which suffered equal damage as the South.
The LTTE leaders’ European tour, which began in the second week of March, was arranged by the Norwegian peace brokers to help the rebel group familiarise itself with the international community. Having undertaken similar tours the previous years, LTTE leaders, notably its political wing leader, S. P. Thamilchelvam was familiar with the nuance of playing the role of the victim. Unable to make the government formulate the much debated Joint Agreement with the LTTE to share international aid, the LTTE’s international travel and meeting with European leaders this year was seen by the Tamil Tigers as a pathway to score against the government. Where international opinion was concerned, the LTTE having a series of efficient and convincing websites, cleverly covered up its systematic ‘daily based’ killings in the east as well as its sporadic killings and abductions carried out in other parts of the country.
In their European visit this year, the LTTE delegation comprising its political wing leader, Thamilchelvam and LTTE police chief, Nadesan visited Finland, Italy, Austria, Switzerland and the EU headquarters in Brussels. In their meetings with European leaders, the LTTE leaders briefed them about their ‘freedom fight’.
Face with a large number of allegations levelled against the government such as neglect of the Tamil people and the peace process, senior government Minister Ratnasiri Wickremenayake recently said that the UPFA would ‘go international’ regarding the LTTE killings.
The LTTE killings in the past three years of the ceasefire, had totalled to 390 people, according to statistics maintained by the government. The Sri Lankan military says that little has been done by the government to counter the propaganda launched by the LTTE against the government. “There is much that the Nordic truce monitors can do, in taking the LTTE ceasefire violations to the world. This would hopefully bring international pressure on the LTTE to stop their killings.”
