“The people have used ballots instead of bullets, that’s a great victory for us”, said Sri Lankan Health Minister Maithripala Sirisena last Sunday, even though the ruling party he represents suffered a heavy defeat at the polls in the war-torn north and east of the island-nation.
By RNW's International Justice Desk in Sri Lanka
The Tamil National Alliance (TNA), formerly controlled by the LTTE (Tamil Tigers), won control of three quarters of the councils in the Tamil majority region.
The government’s optimism may be premature though. RNW visited Sri Lanka to interview former Tamil Tigers fighters - “Yes, if life doesn’t improve here then I would fight again”, says Madu. “I don’t want war again but we need basic rights.”
RNW interviewed nine former Tiger fighters in the walled compound of an NGO which is keen to remain anonymous, in the eastern town of Batticaloa. Six men and three women sat and spoke openly to RNW about the war and their lives today. Despite government proclamations of racial harmony peace, many Tamils in the east and north of Sri Lanka still live in fear of the police. They complain they do not enjoy equal rights with Sinhalese citizens.
A state of rehabilitation
Looking around the table the former guerilla fighters are unassuming and meek. But look a little closer and you notice scars from the war – both physical and emotional. All nine joined the Tamil Tigers during the 30-year civil war, most voluntarily, two were coerced. Some surrendered in the war’s denouement in the Spring of 2009, others were captured afterwards.
All were sent to so-called ‘rehabilitation camps’, effectively prisons, where at first many experienced maltreatment and shortages of food and medicine. Later with the help of NGOs their experience of the camps became more positive as they were taught skills and received ID cards, ready to attempt reintegration into post-conflict life.
The three women, in their twenties and thirties, spoke of the anxiety of uncertainty - unsure if they were in prison, if and when they would be released, and whether they would be allowed proper contact with loved ones. ‘Actually the most important question was: what will happen tomorrow?’ said Parinita. Most of all, they wanted their freedom back.
Freedom, but not as we know it
‘But once we were released, we still had no freedom,’ said Abi, referring to the many military checkpoints that Tamils still have to go through every day. Police are suspicious and oblige former Tigers to sign a ‘Good behavior paper’ every month. ‘We don’t have equal rights here. Last month the police suddenly arrived and searched my house. I don’t know what they wanted.’, she said.
Many Tamils claim that it is harder for them to find work than it is for Sinhalese. The group points out that no Tamils are allowed to join the police force, and that even in Tamil-majority districts local government jobs are difficult to get without speaking fluent Sinhala.
The former Tigers complained of ‘Sinhalese colonization’ of the north and east of the island. Colombo offers incentives to Sinhalese people to move to the former Tamil strongholds. Tamil ‘rehabilitation’ sometimes involves Hindu Tamils being made to take part in traditional Sinhalese Buddhist rituals.
Speaking in tongues
Even the police and military in Sri Lanka’s north and east don’t speak, or refuse to speak, Tamil. RNW experienced this first hand when witnessing a Tamil being questioned in Sinhala by police – when the man asked to be addressed in English as his Sinhala was poor, he was ignored.
In the West the image of Sri Lanka as being free from oppression and violence has taken root. Recent investigations by Britain’s Channel 4 and the UN have focused on atrocities committed during the civil war. Human rights issues existing today in the north and east are being overlooked. These are the same rights issues that helped lead the country into one of the world’s bloodiest civil conflicts in the 1980s.
Battle for peace
Former Sri Lankan president Chandrika Kumarantunga now urges her successor Mahinda Rajapaksa to work towards an ‘inclusive society’ and share political power with minority Tamils. ‘I too, am glad, extremely happy that the war has ended and terrorism defeated. But, I cannot blind myself to the fact that although we have won the civil war, we have not even begun the battle for peace.’
Closing the interviews with the nine Tiger fighters, RNW returns to the question of long-term peace - with the Tamil Tiger leadership dead and the infrastructure supporting their cause all but wiped out, could they imagine picking up arms again?
“If we don't feel our rights being respected in the coming years then yes, I can imagine I would. “ said Saathuryan.
The names of the former fighters quoted here have been changed to protect their identities
Click here to read the first story in this series of three from the RNW team in Sri Lanka
(Keep an eye on the International Justice website for the next story about Sri Lanka - the current calls for justice)
Email this Article
Printer-friendly version
vijith arunasiri bandulahewa
9 October 2011 - 10:36pm / srilanka
reply
as we know India divided by the British in 1947. as well as they wanted to divide the Srilanka. they firstly ( up to 1995 chief of the Srilanka government intelligence was British officer (MI6) and most of other officers are Catholics which hate the Buddhist and the country) create a clash between Sinhalese and Tamils in July 1983,after that Tamils got the sympathy of the entire world,as well as Tamil youth formed the several armed groups like EROS,PLOT.. etc against the government. after destroying the every Tamil guerrilla organisations other than LTTE and continue war about 30 years the reason for this was govt intelligence give each and every support to the LTTE not to the srilankan forces.as well as each and every bomb blast and killings done by the LTTE with the help of government intelligence service. after come in to the power (bodujaya sena party) we claim the cost of the war (2300 billion rupees, the government estimate)and cost of the damage to the economy of the country and people of the forces as well as north and east Tamils, Sinhalese and Muslims from the BRITISH GOVERNMENT.
Vijith Arunasiri Bandulahewa,leader and secretary of the bodujaya sena party www.sinhalayani.com
My father used to own most of you ceylonese people. Sri Lanka does not belong to the Sinhalese. Tamils in Ceylon are not from Tamil Nadu. They have been living in Ceylon for many years. If the sinhalese schools teach truth and love, we won't be having this issue. In order to hide truth Sinhalese government burnt down the Tamil library to destroy all evidence.
Now CH 4 video shows the true colors of this disturbed race called Sinhalese..
If Sinhalese people can ask Tamils to go to Tamil Nadu, the Tamils can tell the sinhalesew to go to Bangladesh!!!!!
Didn't your history book say when vijaya came to the island with his criminal friends he met a Tamil girl??????
Doewsnt that say something?????
Sri Lanka won the battle against the Tigers but not the war against Tamils.
Freedom is nearing the Tamils and Sinhalese are paranoid!!!
crazy thinking, during a peaceful time
Please all people stop calling names to each other. Lets keep our thaughts to our self. Sinhala and Tamil people let us call our self as Sri Lankans. History will change. If u people do not know get on internet and learn.
Lets be happy that there is no deaths taking place in our country. There are 5% of tamils and 5% sinsala people brainless ideots. They only talk with no knowledge of what has hapend. All this is because we are ruled by "not our party" If our paty is in power then what our government is doing is correct. PLEASE REMEMBER ALL THE LEADERS WHO RULED THIS COUNTRY FROM 1948 UPTO DATE HAS DONE THEIR BEST FOR THE COUNTRY. IT ONLY THAT WE DO NOT APPRICIATE.BWCAUSE IT IS NOT OUR PARTY THAT IS NOT RULING.95% TAMIL PEOPLE INTHIS COUNTRY ARE HAPPY WITH WHAT THEY HAVE. IT IS THE 5% THAT IS NOT HAPPY. LUCKY FOR THEM AS IT IS ONLY 5%. SINHALESE PEOPLE 30% WILLBE HAPPY AT ANY GIVEN TIME AS THEIR PARTY IS RULING THE COUNTRY. ALL THE NAMES AND INSULTS THAT ARE MENTIONED IN THE COMMENTS ARE FOR US,LESS WE TALK UGLY AND NEGATIVE THINGS WE WILL BE HAPPIER.AFTER ALL OUR AVERAGE LIFE SPAN IS JUST 70 YEARS ON THIS LAND.GOD BLESS ALL OUR COUNTRY BROTHERN. LET US LIVE IN PEASE
When the Tamils show up in Canada they are handed everything from housing, to food, clothing, medical attention, schooling,furniture, language classes,education, job training, day care, legal representation, etc.for free and they still bitch about Canada not doing enough for them. When the ship arrivals were incarcerated until their identies could be confirmed they started fights in prison and about a half a dozen had to be put in segregation.They even complained about the food saying they ate better on the ship.
Within weeks of release from prison while they await their refugee hearings they have already joined the mobs protesting on the streets. We take care of them better than we do our own citizens, and gave them a fresh start in life only to be accused of everything from racist to guilty of genicide. They openly fly Tamil Tiger flags even though The LTTE is a listed terrorist group in Canada. They have shown absolutely no respect for our country and Canadians are getting pretty fed up with the Tamil demands, insults and disrespect and the final straw was when they closed down our major highway placing their tiny children in front of them so the police couldn't do anything, and then blocking the emergency routes to the hospitals in Canadas largest city making very ill cancer patients, etc. walk to the hospital for their treatments because they couldn't get past the couple of hundred thousands Tamils in their protest.
Of course, the one defence they keep using to gain refugee status in Canada is their tales of disappearances in Sri lanka. Quite a joke actually when you figure there are over 300,000 Tamils in Canada, most all in Toronto who from what most of them say didn't tell anyone they were leaving and snuck out of the country. Then they demand the government in Canada have no contact with Sri Lanka to try to establish their real identity because it will place their families in harms way,and beg not to be deported because of unsuccessful refugee claims yet 71% of those who were still waiting to have their refugee claims finalized went back to Sri Lanka for holidays.
Sure their are lots of Tamils missing from Sri Lanka but they snuck out of Sri Lanka and now are collecting welfare cheques in western countries who were gullible enough to fall for their sad stories.
We even now have just arrested four more people charged with smuggling the people in on the Ocean lady and surprise, surprise in less than two years at least one of them has married and has a pregnant wife and the child will be born a Canadian which they no doubt will use as one more excuse not to be deported. It's quite the game they have going on !!!
What has the Tamil community given Canada in return for taking them in? Constant protests, insults,lies, a major drain on our social programs, gangs, extortion, disrespect, tens of thousands of senior or unemployable people who have never contributed a dime to the pensions, health care or welfare they all depend on,and demands. ( Not requests, DEMANDS)
Whereas Canadians were once very soft hearted towards the plight of the Tamils, in a recent survey 77% of Canadians do not want anymore Tamils admitted into Canada. They have no one to blame for that shift in support or loss of reputation except themselves.
Provide evidence to back up your so called facts, evidence like CH4 gave to the world
Unless the Singhala mass accept there is a problem in the country, this problem will not be solved. Singhala morons are in the lala land. Rajapakshe family and their close friends stealing money from the people and getting super rich. They are borrowing money from China like there is no tomorrow. What till you do when Chinese ask for the money back. Rajapashe famill @ friends will settle in the west leave the country in a mess. They all hold duel citizenship in western countries.
The post-war situation has been very messy less than perfect. No argument there. But if there's anything we can learn from the last three insurgencies in Sri Lanka it is that a resort to violence to solve political grievances is utterly and truly idiotic.
'Madu' appears not to have learnt anything at all.
Listen to these wise words by Dr Jayatilleke:
"In hard science when an experiment repeatedly fails and finally blows up the lab with it, the very assumptions which form the basis of the experiment are reassessed and often abandoned. The empirically evident track record of Tamil nationalist politics in Sri Lanka is that of repeated failure capped by defeat." http://tinyurl.com/3wov9hh
We have known for some time now why the foreign media were not allowed to operate in the north. It is simply because of this tyoe of obviously biassed and putrid comments from some whites who have no regard for the country in which they are allowed to work in. All they are interested is in making a name for themselves in their home country,in this case the Netherlands,at whatever expense. They also know that this type of muck raking will cause immense amount of mis-understandimg within Sri Lanka and abroad. Obviously, they do not care a damn.
We LTTE terrorists love to lie! We now wanna fool the world about bogus persecution to keep getting asylum abroad. If we Tamils are persecuted we must go to Tamil Nadu and not Canada. We racist Tamils think we are superior so that we must jump immigration queues to get asylum. We Tamils have tongues made to lie 24/7. We Tamils are such liars that even if we are persecuted in Sri Lanka, so what? We Tamils committed genocide of Sinhalese for the past 60 years by blowing up daily suicide bombs in Colombo. We Tamils are war mongers who dont like peace in Sri Lanka
Well documented genocide of Sinhala North & East by Dutch, British colonisers and their (imported) Tamil collaborators:
This amazing map, found at the Beeldbank National Archives, the Netherlands shows that more than 85% off all villages in Yapanaya or Jaffanapatnam in the early Dutch era, were in fact Sinhala. More so shocking, when today, not a single Sinhala family lives in the North.
http://www.atlasofmutualheritage.nl/detail.aspx?page=dafb&lang=nl&id=3660
Please visit the museum and see this for yourselves; do not blindly accept the false histories put forward by those who propagate the "Tamil Eelam/Ancient Tamil homeland" myths.
This shows your color and how civilized you are. You can only give what you have inherited.
WE SHITMIL TAMILS ARE LOSERS FOREVER! WE CAN ONLY SHOUT HEE HAW HEE HAW WOOF WOOF WOOF WOOF LIKE BLOODY DONKEYS!! WE ARE THE SMELLIEST ASSHOLE SHIT LICKERS EVER!
http://www.crisisgroup.org/en/regions/asia/south-asia/sri-lanka/209-reco...
Reconciliation in Sri Lanka: Harder than ever, 18 July 2011:
‘’Two years since the defeat of the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE), Sri Lanka is further from reconciliation than ever. Triumphalist in its successful “war on terror”, the government of President Mahinda Rajapaksa has refused to acknowledge, let alone address, the Tamil minority’s legitimate grievances against the state.’’
http://www.bbc.co.uk/sinhala/news/story/2011/07/110720_bbckili.shtml
Struggle of IDPs in Kilinochchi, 20 July 2011
It's only very recently that journalists have been allowed in without army escort.
Just talk like parrots...
2007 - Eelaam, Eelaam, Eelaam, Eelaam ...
2009 - Genocide, Genocide, Genocide, Genocide, Genocide, Genocide, Genocide....
2010 - War Crime, War Crime, War Crime, War Crime, War Crime, ....
Typical rajinican's pagal-jokes!
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-south-asia-14229631
Building a new life after the war in Sri Lanka, 21 July 2011
I'm a western PhD in Zoology and know enough to tell the western doctor is a sly fox, but neither western nor a doctor.
What ever comments have be written in the most vulgar form by Sinhalese hiding behind names such as anonymous, are simply talking a lot of rubbish and want to hid behind behind lies. If you want to know the raw truth of yourselves go to the root of the matter and read the history of SL by quality authors from the west. Any idiot can say that Tamils first settled in SL. Just look at USA, who owned the land in the beginning and how it looks now. Similarly it is the same in Australia and New Zealand. The only difference is the white man doesn't hide this fact like you fanatic facist Sinhalese. Of they are 10% or more Sinhalese who would agree with me. So all Sinhalese go and get your facts right. What I mean is not from fanatical Theros or Sinhala chauvnists. Sinhalese from all western countries must be send to SL and then only you shall understand. You enjoy everything in a democratic countries in the west but deny the Tamils to have their Tamil Eelam. What kind of primitive people you are. Time and tide will tell and you shall regret for what you have inflicted on the Tamils since 1948.
Interesting comments coming from Germany; where the Turkish communities are victimised and racially abused on a regular basis.Human rights? Equal rights? Or is Nazism an accepted cultural belief?
Basically, Justine, " Get your own house in order, first"
I would like to see the Germans give part of their country to the Turks!!
MY APPA IS A JANITOR
MY AMMA IS A WHORE
I AM A STUPID TAMIL CUNT
WHO BEGS FROM DOOR TO DOOR
I PIMP MY SIS
I PIMP MY MUM
I SUCK WHITE COCKS UNTIL THEY CUM
Justin- There are indeed some vulgar comments on this web site, but don't all in to the trap of spurting out LTTE propaganda in defense of Tamils. Not all Tamils are LTTE nor are all anti-LTTE propagandists with vulgure mouths Sinhalese. To even attempt to compare Sinhalese in Sri Lanka with white Americans and their colonization of North American, in an attempt to say Tamils lives there first only shows your lack of understanding of history. What makes you think that people responding to these messages are only living in the West? limb out of your little box. There is no validity in 'giving' Elam to Tamils by carving up a piece of Sri Lanka. If there is an ethnic home for Tamils it is surely Tamil Nadu. Sri Lanka is for Sri Lankans, not Tamils, Sinhalese,Muslims, Malays or Burghers.
I am a western doctor PHD of zoology and can tell Dr. Browne is a sly fox, but neither a doctor nor a westerner.
I have been following Sri Lanka situation for the last two decades and Sri Lankans are a a very peace loving public. Never mind whether you are a Sinhalese, Tamil, Muslim or The Off spring of the Europians(Cant rememeber the exact name)
Have been to the North/South East and West. In the west and south where there's more Sinhalese population, The all other three Races lives in harmony. So many Tamils and Muslims own busineses and they have no issues. Tamils Control the prestigious businesses like jewellary, RIce/ Floor and textile. Muslims are doing Tea/Spices/Garments/Coconut Etc: With that said what Tamils wants is not fare.Can Sri Lanka afford to give 40% of the land to 15% of the population? I think Tamil Community also should realize to reconcile and live in harmony with other races/Religions. Also Remember the the last 30 years, Tamil representatives called Tigers,Chased away all sinhalese/ Muslim and other races out of north and East.They had their own land/ Houses/ Shops/ Farms etc; But they had to vacate withing 48 hours otherwise tigers will kill them. Also how many sinhala and Muslim village's been masecured by the tigers. The buddhist priests were chopped to death.Infants were sliced like in the butches shop.So many bombs have been detonated and so many people were killed. So with all that its not fare for the Tamils to ask for a seperate Land in Sri Lanka.Has ever been an incident where a tamil person has been chased out of any sinhala/Muslim community....No. Also how come Tamils are controlling 30% of the business in Sri Lanka??? thats its self is an answer to many questions.
Andy-Washington DC
I feel you know better than the sri Lankans about sri Lanka,
U Mr,
U only the visitor to sri lanka and don't know basic problems. Majority discriminating the minorities all the way to president level. We don't feel like Sri Lankan Citizen.
50/50 equal opportunity that's all we need
Tamils want their own state with their own laws:
That's RACISM. I've lived in the South and I had Tamil neighbors and they owned the property. Do Sinhalese get their own state too?
They don't feel Sri Lankan:
That is just sad. They must realize that the feeling should come within them. What they're doing is expecting the government to feed them like babies and dream about getting refugee status from UK, Canada or Norway.
Ex-Terrorists expect owesum jobs:
TRY A DUTCH COMPANY. Do you know any other country battling major terrorist outfits rehabilitating terrorists? NO COUNTRY is the world will do this. Learn to be thankful.
DUTCH like to poke into other people's business:
NORWAY did the same and we all know what happened. You support terrorism and suddenly your own children become terrorists. Mark my worlds, the whole of Europe and Canada will have to deal with their own LTTEs within the next decade.
And tamils dont wants to learn singhalese, what would the Netherland people like if the forigners after 1000 years in Netherlands did not learn German/hollandish language???? what would they say ??
I cant belive it...still even tamils in Colombo cant even speak the language.
Try again, these tamils have nothing more in there brain to make a own country in our lands. If they wants a own land go back to Tamil Nadu.. Sri lanka belongs to the singhalese...The other minorities can live with us in peace if they like. Godbless the forces.
Tamils still dont let singhalese to buy land in the north.
Tamils gangsters is over repsentive in crimes and rape, in the south.
This will make the kindly singhalese people angry one day and another black july can happen very easy.
Post new comment
Please be reminded all comments must be in English, short and to the point - guideline 250 words. Abusive and inappropriate comments will be removed.