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and more and more Most of the groups were having offices in neighbouring Tamil Nadu, across the Palk Straits, in southern India where the politicians of the day were providing them with succour in the form of abode, finance and even training facilities. The central Government in New Delhi was squeezing the arm of President J.R. Jayewardene, forcing him to talk with the rebels, primus-inter-pares at the time being, Velupillai Prabhakaran's Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE). The Thimpu talks the previous year had failed to break the impasse. The LTTE - and other groups - declared what they called the Thimpu Declaration which, inter-alia, called for the recognition of a Tamil Homeland in the island's north and east, which was unacceptable to the Government of the day. In 1986, President Jayewardene was proceeding to Bangalore for the SAARC summit. The Indians who had by then taken control of things here were forcing the LTTE to come there as well. The rival Tamil rebel groups were agog. Was the LTTE now going to talk after their leader had labelled all the Tamil political leaders of the day as scoundrels and traitors for dealing with the Colombo Government? The LTTE had boasted it would win 'Eelam' on the battle fields of the north and east. These were pre-mobile phone, IDD facilities and satellite communication days. But radio frequencies were easily accessible, and the groups would have to rely on radio links to communicate with their cadres across the Palk Straits - and they would also listen-in on the conversations other groups would be having with themselves. This was a known fact. Each group knew the other was eaves-dropping, and sometimes, when nothing else was happening, they would curse each other, but they wouldn't know exactly which transmission was being tapped into. And there was no other way of communicating either. Enter Douglas Devananda, a former leader of the former EPRLF (Eelam Peoples' Revolutionary Liberation Front) and present leader of the EPDP (Eelam Peoples Democractic Party) as well as cabinet minister of the incumbent UPFA Government. Mr. Devananda, who once trained in Yasser Arafat's Bekaa Valley training camps in Beirut, was behind one of his sets, eaves-dropping on LTTE conversations one day. All the groups at the time, the EPRLF, TELO, PLOTE and the EROS, were keen to know if the LTTE would go to Bangalore to have talks with President Jayewardene. Some of the LTTE hardliners were being difficult. They were refusing to go for talks. Their long-time spokesman Anton Balasingham was equally insistent that they do. One
of their hardliners, Thileepan who later fasted unto death in protest
of the IPKF - the Indian Army's presence in the north and east post-1987
- radioed to Madras (now Chennai) where Balasingham was residing
at his fairly comfortable Besant Nagar residence along the tree-lined
Adyar area: Thileepan:
"What are we going to tell our people? We have always told
them that we can't believe the Sinhala Government, and that we have
to go in for an armed struggle". Douglas Devananda is fond of telling this story over the years, driving home the point that the LTTE is feigning peace talks, and even if it does come for talks, it is likely that it will, like Oliver Twist, keep asking for more, and more, and more. The LTTE's pathological hate for Mr. Devananda is no top secret, and feelings are clearly mutual. It was only last morning Tigers gunned down one of his top men in the north, Thambithurai Pathmaraja. He was one of his main men in Tellipalai and had to be moved to the safety of the Rathmalyaya village in Puttalam. But Tiger guerrillas had got wind of it. Their pistol gang shot him dead. Giving the Devananda disclosure credence, however, is the LTTE's actual conduct, not just then, but even now. The rebel group that has effectively eliminated the EPRLF, TELO and PLOTE leadership and only couldn't deal with the EPDP, however hard it has tried, not too far back i.e. on October 31, 2003 proposed ISGA (Interim Self Governing Authority ) as its document in response to proposals of the then Colombo Government, the Ranil Wickremesinghe's UNF Government. The UNF Government responded the next day, however lukewarmly with Prof. G.L. Peiris, the UNF negotiator, saying that ISGA can be discussed together with the Government's proposals. But just then, the then Opposition PA raised hell clinically analysing ISGA, and calling it a 'sell-out', which it was, except that the UNF Government had not agreed to ISGA. They had agreed only to discuss it. ISGA was used as a launching pad to clinch a partnership with the JVP, take it as an election issue, and throw out the UNF Government. In power and place, the PA-JVP coalition (UPFA Government) said that ISGA could be discussed together with the Government's proposals. A reversal, no doubt, but then the LTTE took up a different stance, saying talk on ISGA - or nothing. Desperate to accommodate the LTTE, the UPFA Government took another side step. It now says, "ok, lets talk ISGA first", preferring to keep silent on whether ISGA or a self-rule authority must be set up first before talking on other issues, like the final solution. The JVP, however, is adamant that the final solution must be discussed along with ISGA, a shift from its hard-line stance itself. Now comes still another manoeuvre on the part of the LTTE. The LTTE's political wing leader S.P. Thamilselvan, who runs the rebel group's day-to-day business, the kind of CEO, this week goes on record saying that the movement is prepared to be "not rigid". Neatly timed with the partly Norwegian funded National Peace Council taking a team of 'southern' journalists to meet him, where he drops this neat plant to unsuspecting 'southern' journos', on the eve of Norwegian peace broker Erik Solheim's visit to the Wanni just a few days later. It was a timely feeler. The Peace Council cleverly took these journos for a good ride. The
Tamilnet follows up as if they are only following-up, with the following; "However, he said that the government should not put forward counter proposals before resuming the negotiations and insisted that the ISGA proposals should be the basis for the talks to begin," Tamilnet quoted Mr. Thamilselvan as saying -echoing the words used in the Colombo press. So, what the Tamilnet says what the Colombo press said Mr. Thamilselvan said, is a dramatic shift from its earlier position, for he told The Sunday Times only last month that the very setting up of ISGA "was a must" (Mr. Thamilselvan's words), and that the proposals for it received a mandate from the Tamil people through the TNA. To use his own words, he wanted the ISGA institutionalized. But more so, the new wording needs to be gone over once more. "The government should not put forward counter proposals BEFORE resuming the negotiations". This is the shift in their stance. There is no mention of the Government putting forward counter proposals AFTER resuming negotiations. So when Mr. Solheim lands in Sri Lanka, the LTTE is willing to be "not rigid". Happy with that new position, Mr. Solheim says the Government must ensure there is a consensus in the 'south' , and that its forces must stop supporting para-military units attacking the LTTE. The LTTE, of course, must also stop killings in the east, he adds. With such sound advice, Mr. Solheim left Colombo back to Oslo where he came from. He met everyone in Colombo but was not granted an audience with Mr. Prabhakaran. He could only meet the LTTE-CEO. When his parting words to the local media is that there is "frustration" all round, within the Government, the LTTE and the people, with the stalemate, one could surely add that there is also frustration with the Norwegians. For they have simply not delivered the goods, or in this case, the peace. And a lowly functionary like Mr. Solheim making an occasional visit to this country to see what's going-on in this outpost, is obviously proving not good enough. What then is actually happening? From what we hear the LTTE knows that its inflexible stand - to establish ISGA first/then talks -- does not have universal approval. It is seen as being utterly unreasonable, even by the pacifists, something certainly no self-respecting government can agree to, quite apart from JVP's opposition. The
LTTE does not want the Norwegians to agree with the Colombo Government
either that it is they (the LTTE ) who are being inflexible. Nor
for President Chandrika Kumaratunga to go to New York and tell the
world that it is the LTTE that is being rigid. Now comes the un-written 'deal'. The LTTE has sent signals to Colombo urging the Government to agree to saying that they will talk on the LTTE's proposals, ISGA. Once that is agreed, the LTTE is willing to accept a Government proposal. This is what Mr. Thamilselvan carefully crafted by saying the Colombo Government should not put forward counter-proposals BEFORE starting negotiations on ISGA. Counter-proposals AFTER, is another matter, it seems. This, in effect, would mean that the LTTE position of wanting ISGA created before any further talks is no longer its position. This is a kind of gerrymandering of sorts through the negotiating process. They want to show up to their cadres that they are not yielding to the Government, and yet, showing the world-at-large that they are willing to be "not rigid". This would again put the cat among the pigeons in the UPFA camp. While undoubtedly it would put pressure on President Kumaratunga to accept such a position vis-à-vis the 'southern electorate', she is quite the person who will do it. How the JVP can explain all this to its constituency is the question. It is already under pressure for going back on its words in many other fronts. On the military front, the LTTE is making some noises, taking pictures of Army bunkers, abducting policemen and doing some spot-assassinations. Yet, its clout in eastern Batticaloa has been considerably weakened by the Karuna breakaway. How ready it is for another full-blown war is one thing, but launching a typical guerrilla war is another. The newly appointed Tri-Services Chief Admiral Daya Sandagiri this week sounded a stern warning to the LTTE. In the process, however, he fired a salvo across the bow of the politicians. After inspecting a tri service guard-of-honour upon assuming office as Chief of Defence Staff, at the auspicious hour, he said that if the Government provided the Navy its full requirements, the LTTE would be easily defeated at sea. He repeated it again at the annual parade of the Naval Volunteer Force on Friday. His fire may have been aimed at the former UNF Government, but he forgets that the UPFA Government has held the Defence Ministry for the past 10 months. It was also cute that such a remark should come from Admiral Sandagiri who just refused a Government offer to buy him the best gun for the re-conditioned US coast-guard cutter "Courageous", and he decided to turn down the offer saying it was too expensive. He declared that the drought and rising oil prices had made things difficult but a Cabinet Minister said it was not for service chiefs to say those things. Not when the Government is able to buy them the best despite all the problems. He had wanted to save money for the Government by fitting a second-hand gun from "Sayura" fitted onto "Courageous ", which a defence analyst compared to fixing a mechanical braking system to a BMW equipped with state of the art ABS systems (though "Courageous " is not exactly a BMW). This week, after some criticism, he said he would find another gun, though again, it’s not what the Government has offered him. So, while the Sri Lankan Defence Establishment fights over a single gun to be fitted to a ship, and Sri Lankan Air Force pilots are being forced to fly down some shaky aircraft from Ukraine, much against their wishes, to its dwindling fleet, the LTTE is planning a world-wide campaign to prop up its own shaky image. CEO Thamilselvan plans a visit to Europe very soon for this purpose. Except that the entire exercise has received a thundering rebuff from a respected Tamil politician. V. Anandasangaree, the leader of the TULF, has issued a letter from Toronto setting out the coercion and fear the LTTE is applying on the Tamil diaspora, and calling the Canadian Government to ban the proposed 'Pongu Thamil' rally there. The likes of Mr. Anandasangaree and Mr. Devananda - and Karuna, have become thorough embarrassments to the LTTE and its much heralded ' Sole Representatives of the Tamils ' theory. Mr. Devananda does not stop telling people the 1986 story where the LTTE keeps changing its stand from time-to-time to suit its purpose. He is defiant even in the wake of his men being gunned down. He says that what the LTTE is now working towards is dragging the peace process until the next Presidential elections next year, when they will once again be touted by the politicians of the 'south'. In the process, he says, they will want to create a situation like in East Timor, where they will show the world that they have a State-in-waiting. Then, after dragging this process through the months and the years, they will claim nationhood status. |
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