When one reads this week's debate on Sri Lanka in Britain's House of Commons, one is sent in a virtual time capsule to a bygone era when Andrew Bonar Law was the British Secretary of State for the Colonies informing the Honourable Members of the 'Mother Parliament' of developments in Ceylon, one of its many colonies at the time.
In those days, the 'Commons' would discuss such things as the 1915 riots in Ceylon when British soldiers squashed an uprising of 'natives' with impunity and a drum-head court martial headed by a junior army officer would try, sentence and incarcerate their leaders in squalid prisons where some would die of typhoid. They would debate how to enlist the services of the Ceylonese to fight their enemy in a world war, and how they could keep a people in abject subjugation for more than 150 years.One would think that times haven't changed, and that the elected representatives of Great Britain, as they modestly call their country, have missed a historical fact; that Ceylon became a free and independent nation in 1948.
There was, however, a difference. The British MPs debating Sri Lanka this week and giving gratuitous advice on how it should manage its affairs, were compelled to do so by the pressure of their voters and not due to any imperial design. It is now the Sri Lankan Diaspora that is dictating, to some extent, British (foreign) policy.
The Labour MP who introduced the motion to debate Sri Lanka was candid enough to admit that she was a "novice in international issues". It was a matter that related to her London constituency of Mitchen and Morden where she had voters concerned about Sri Lanka, and those who obviously helped her win the recent elections.
Some sense seems to have prevailed at Government level but the new Tory Foreign Office Minister did re-iterate Britain's support for the recent lambasting Sri Lanka received at the UN Human Rights Council in Geneva indicating no change in British policy towards Sri Lanka with the new administration.
That the Diaspora lobby has been smarting over the past year since the successful liquidation of the LTTE by the Sri Lankan Security Forces is public knowledge. Having failed to stop it, they did the next best thing - made pointed charges at the Forces and their political superiors lobbying the legislators, media, INGOs and rights groups.
Into this pie did the Government of Sri Lanka stick its fingers. First it was to lambast the West, even after the war was won; then prevent their ministers from visiting; then insult the West, asking them to go to hell bragging about sovereignty saying we can do very well without the World Bank, the IMF, GSP+; and then send delegation after delegation to the same West - Cabinet Ministers, the Treasury Secretary, the Attorney General to argue our case for concessions. We have appointed some real square pegs as Heads of Mission to these capitals in the process because of their 'loyalty'. We then align ourselves openly with Iran, Libya, Venezuela as if to poke the West in the eye; and then comes the infamous fallout between the Commander-in-Chief and the Army Commander for the 'spoils of war' souring what ought to have been an otherwise historic chapter in the contemporary history of this country. The resultant victimisation, and betrayal by word and deed was only to be lapped up by those who enjoyed the spectacle.
The cumulative effect is the insensitivity on the part of the UN Under Secretary for Political Affairs to come here and announce - on the eve of the day when the nation salutes its soldiers for defeating terrorism that cost over 60,000 lives -- the appointment of an international panel to advise the UN Secretary General on alleged human rights violations that occurred during the last days of the LTTE. Sri Lanka mind you, is one of the senior members of the UN, more than 125 countries becoming members after Sri Lanka became a member in 1955.
Clearly, the public, if not also the President, have been misinformed that all was well; and that the UN chief's panel to probe was not to be a reality.
Our Political Editor points out the dismal failure of successive Foreign Ministers of the Rajapaksa administration to ward off the West-backed UN move. What Minister G.L Peiris told the media soon after he met the UN Secretary General last month in New York was that he had impressed upon the UN Chief that any such appointment of a panel was "unprecedented", and that it was "premature". He told the media that it was "politically unacceptable to Sri Lanka". Now what?
The President is right when he spoke during his address at the V Day celebrations of countries that support terrorism unless it directly affects them. He was alluding to the West for giving backdoor succour to some terrorist organisations.
In the meantime, what the West and the UN are inadvertently doing by their insistence to probe 'war crimes' allegations is to give the Sri Lanka Government a handle to justify the trammeling fundamental rights and freedoms in other areas and its heading towards one-party constitutional rule by using the 'foreign meddling' card to win mass support.
What will follow now is a tirade by the Government against the Opposition and the INGOs to keep the local constituency on its side. For surely, at least on this solitary issue, the majority of this country's citizens would want to side with a Government that ended thirty years of terrorism. They see the patent double-standards of the West. But for the Government, with elections over, the need now is to ensure that the country does not go to economic ruin, thanks to its sometimes scandalous, largely incoherent, and clumsy foreign policy.
It must take steps to prepare its (defence) brief. While relying on super-powers with their veto powers to avoid a full blown 'war crimes' inquiry at the UN is one thing, the Government must know that we are not living in an isolated world, and whatever we may say about double-standards, that is the unfortunate, unequal real-politik small countries must face. By accident or by design, the EU statement at the UNHRC last week, the House of Commons debate, the visit of the US special envoys on human rights and the UN envoy this week all came together as if to whack Sri Lanka in the knuckles.
The government has two options: One is to deprive the so-called experts to advise the UN Chief visas to enter Sri Lanka and scream “blue murder” as we are a sovereign nation and the UN chief has no powers to do what he is planning to do. The other is this probe can be easily turned around by a more professional approach sans the hysterics. A team of eminent lawyers, diplomats, soldiers and academics must be assembled towards this goal, and not all of them need to prove their 'loyalty' to the Government as long as they are loyal to the nation.
Wild allegations against our valiant soldiers must be thrown out of the window once and for all. This probe can, in fact, be turned into something positive - an example to the West itself, on two issues -- one, how to win a war against terrorists. And second, how to do so as justly as possible. |
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