Archive for the ‘Vavuniya’

It is a hostage crisis, stupid!

Image courtesy The Telegraph The Sri Lankan military is dealing with probably the largest hostage crisis in world history. Sri Lanka and its present leadership will be forever remembered for how it handles this unprecedented predicament. As a long and protracted battle draws to a miserable end, it is right to be intensely concerned about the civilian population trapped between the advancing Sri Lankan military and the cornered LTTE. It is easy to believe conservative reports that put civilians killed at an average of 35 to 45 a day – more than 4,000 since the beginning of the year – with a great many more severely injured. This is by all accounts an enormous tragedy. Recall that the 9-11 attacks in the US, which has become a focal point of history, killed less than 4,000 people. Sri Lankan lives should not be considered any less important. Understanding the Crisis There have been many divergent arguments made over many months about…

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Ape Lankawe: The Great NGO Pantomime!

For anyone concerned with the plight of innocent civilians, the reports from the North are depressing. The latest ‘avalanche (!?) is yet to be fully screened, searched, scrubbed and bleached for any LTTE connections and corralled into what the Government calls ‘welfare centers’. As to what awaits these men, women and children, thereafter and for how long is not clear at this point in time. But every one agrees that it is going to be a tough and miserable time for them. As usual, despite knowing that there is going to be a large number of people displaced, in fact demanding such a displacement for a long time, the Government is woefully and recklessly underprepared to receive and take care of its most vulnerable citizens. And as usual, a bulk of the emergency responsibility by default will fall on the assortment of humanitarian agencies including the UN, ICRC and the NGOs – who are only slightly better prepared than the…

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Let this be the moment that defines us

For over three decades, we have bombed and shot each other, split our tears and shed them only for ‘our own’, split our joys and celebrated as ‘their’ mothers, wives and children cried. This war will not end when the last shot if fired. Let us not wait till the last shot is fired. Let us not wait for tomorrow… for the ‘war’ to ‘end’ to realise that we are but branches of the same family tree. Those who would have been our friends, and relatives if only we had not let murderous guns separate us, lie without shelter, unclothed, maimed, bloody and hopeless. They need us now. So even while those on many shores protest and shout slogans, let us unite in our own communities, and use the power already devolved to us – not by any constitution or law, but by our inalienable inheritance – to collect clothes, food and other essentials for our fellow countrymen and women…

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A thought for the IDPs in the camps

It is hard for those who have no access to the camps in the North to form a realistic opinion on the plight of the over 65,000 refugees who are supposed to bestuck in an ‘event horizon’ inside them. While the authorities paint quite a rosy picture of it, their detractors seek to discredit the claim. Assuming that the truth is half way between them, I wish to offer a few suggestions on how to improve the ground situation, depending on my past experience of working for the displaced in the North. The main complaint is about the conditions in the camp. The tents in which the refugees are housed are reported to be too small, too low and uncomfortable. The material with which the tents are built is said to be unsuited to the hot climate and to make matters worse, the trees that would have provided some cooling shade have been removed by bulldozers. Understandably, what has been…

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Sri Lanka’s IDP camp Manik Farm is what it is (but what is that?)

Most of the arguments about Manik Farm (and other transit camps in the North of Sri Lanka) seem to get stuck on definitions and comparisons.  Is it a concentration camp?  Is it like the camps run by the Nazis or old colonial powers?  I believe these debates miss the most important question: what is the actual predicament of people who have escaped from the Wanni to be held in these camps?  Can we spend just a few minutes to really consider their situation?  Or does victory mean we do not need to know the cost of liberation and do not care what their new form of captivity means to those who have been newly ‘liberated’? Family Separation When people were fleeing the fighting, families were often split up.  When they reached the Sri Lankan forces, men and women were separated for screening and after that were herded into vehicles to be taken to transit camps.    Although they assumed they would…

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Truth, more bitter than fiction for IDPs in Sri Lanka

In Sri Lanka, there are events in motion that have created just the perfect environment for “event-horizons”. An “event-horizon” in the movies is usually a black-hole where any hapless space faring vessel when caught, has to go through a slowing down in time. Hapless people caught in its fringes are unable to escape due to the pull of the black-hole. While it is possible to escape from these “event-horizons”, it usually is about someone else coming and rescuing. But mostly those caught in these “zones” are soon forgotten. Though time has not literally stopped, it nevertheless does run at a pace totally different from what is real. I am referring to the events none other than the conflict which is in full swing, and the hapless victims unable to break out of its pull. Sri Lanka, specifically the North has been in the grasp of a black-hole for the past several years. Most of the time almost no information gets…

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Einstein was a Refugee

Refugees are sometimes active have agency they Leave, Flee, Sneak Flow over boundary lines unchecked like rivers they Escape, Hide Cross territories they Flood places like unnatural disasters are associated with Asylum and Sanctuary they are A Problem An Issue Sometimes they have a voice if only passive they become Internally displaced (slightly more dignified) ordered out forced out asked to quit resettled relocated They come in all shapes sizes colours types Afghan, Kosovo, Vietnamese. Kashmiri Palestinian Sri Lankan Tamil Muslim Sinhalese environmental political etc etc etc etc If they are lucky they metamorphose into Returnees If they are really lucky they find their relatives If they get really very lucky they become famous. For more information, click here. Repost This Article

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Where We Are and Where To?

“War is the highest form of struggle for resolving contradictions, when they have developed to a certain stage, between classes, nations, states, or political groups, and it has existed ever since the emergence of private property and of classes” said Mao . Thus, a civil war in Sri Lanka which is a capitalist economy with its strong feudal remnants is to preserve the class interests, privileges and benefits of the ruling elite. It could be argued that the recent political and cultural bashing of ‘the other’ in the Sri Lankan society commenced in a major way, following the signing of the ceasefire agreement (CFA) in 2002. The military and political weakening of the LTTE intensified in 2004 with Karuna Amman (Muralitharan) relieved or expelled from the LTTE, who was probably recruited by the pro-GoSL forces and RAW. By the end of 2005, the parties to the conflict were on the verge of an all out war against each other. Sinhala…

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Your opinion on a war ‘over in 3 weeks’ and a ‘post-LTTE’ Sri Lanka?

A senior government minister claimed today that the war would be over in 3 weeks. Whether we believe him or not, commentators like Ahilan Kadirgamar (writing in Himal Southasian, February 2009) have called attention to the dynamics of a ‘post-LTTE Sri Lanka’, suggesting that “Post-LTTE Tamil politics will have to move beyond ethnic and territorial concerns to forge solidarity among minorities, in order to reframe the ‘national question’ in Sri Lanka”. This is a decisive year for Sri Lanka, whether you choose to believe in these conjectures and formulations or not. On the humanitarian and economic fronts alone and in particular, current conditions cannot be sustained. For this and a number of other reasons, war in the manner it is being conducted today cannot be sustained for much longer. As Ahilan Kadirgamar goes on to note in his article, In a post-LTTE era, the Mahinda Rajapakse regime will be tempted to continue its politics of opportunism to consolidate and entrench…

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A recent trip to Vavuniya: For the future looks dark and gloomy

Though I have been following the news about the war in Vanni, and the damages made to human lives and properties, I never thought it would be so bad until I went in person. I got a call from one of our parish members from one of the interim camps saying our foster son Rev. Daniel was killed in the war. The first time I experienced the steps in grief, which I had lectured several times to my students. “No, No, it can’t be” I cried. I straight away went to the Anglican Bishop’s office. I couldn’t control my tears when I saw Rev. Nesakumar. They told me that he was safe and is in one of those camps. The next day I booked the seat and took the train to Vavuniya. I started early morning and reached Vavuniya in the afternoon. My foster daughter was waiting for me at the station. We straight away went to the camp. Nobody…

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A thought for the stranded refugees in Vanni

I wish to draw wider public attention to the following extract appearing in “A short note from the Vanni” written by “Witness” and appearing in the Groundviews on September 30, 2008: “The people now staying at Vattakachi and Tharmapuram areas are requesting to announce these areas as “safe zones” for the civilians. Food and shelter are desperately needed, as people are suffering without anything to eat and nowhere to rest.” I can visualize the pathetic situation vividly as I personally watched a similar scene in 1996 when refugees marched back to Jaffna from Kilinochchi. Unfortunately, the above revelation has failed to attract sympathetic attention to the miserable plight of the refugees in Vanni today. Instead a barrage of comments has followed on the larger issues of our ethnic conflict defending and condemning positions taken by parties on both sides. The on-going debate cannot reduce an iota of the present suffering of the refugees. Our indignation over political inequities often takes…

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A short note from the Vanni

By Witness I traveled to the Vanni on 17th September, with the hope of getting a lorry load of foodstuff from Vavuniya to Vanni, but it was impossible, as the Killinochchhi Government Agent’s convoy had been stopped at that time. From Omanthai exit – entry point to Killinochchi, the situation was very different than when I had traveled in the previous months. There were no people on the road up to the Killinochchi hospital. As I approached Murikandy I observed that everything was burnt and smashed. While I was passing this place last week, it was full of people and the place looked very busy, but now it has become a no man’s land. The people have vacated from there due to bombing and shelling and the shops were also destroyed. There was heavy traffic in the Killinochchi town, as people were crossing the A9 to Vattakachi and Tharampuram areas. Hospitals are full of injured people, including in the outer…

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Sri Lanka – Killing for Peace

Channel 4′s recent programme on Sri Lanka broadcast recently in England. As noted here, … the team making a documentary for Channel 4 was ordered to leave Sri Lanka’s embattled Jaffna peninsula on the orders of the country’s military [even though] reporter Sandra Jordan, camerawoman Siobhan Sinnerton and producer Dushiyanthini Kanagasabapathipillai had received permission from defence authorities in Colombo before flying into Jaffna. It was not clear why the Channel 4 crew were made to leave, but the private Daily Mirror newspaper quoted a military official as saying they were sent back for their own safety. “Around 100,000 British tourists holiday in Sri Lanka every year, but thanks to a clampdown on the international media, few realise that away from its famous beaches, a new chapter in the country’s 30-year civil war has opened, in which innocent civilians are paying a bloody price.” Repost This Article

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A veteran internally displaced person (IDP)

I am a veteran internally displaced person (IDP), if that is a status that I could be given and everybody could be proud of. I am originally from Vavuniya and the conflict many years ago displaced the whole of my village and many adjoining villages. We, as so many others, fled for our lives forgetting all our valuables, given the assurance that we will return within days. I was young and with my parents, we moved to be temporarily located in Kala – Oya, Anuradhapura. It was a massive hall without any partitions and deprived all of us from privacy. Change of clothes was also done in the open or we had to wait till it was quite dark. We lost our modesty as the days passed by. The once conservative families we were took a sharp turn within a few days. We had no source of income and we were a forgotten entity no sooner the euphoria of the…

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Sri Lanka on tsunami alert after Indonesia quake (Updated)

12 Sep 2007 12:31:03 GMT Source: Reuters COLOMBO, Sept 12 (Reuters) – Sri Lanka issued a tsunami alert on Wednesday for its north, south and eastern districts following a major earthquake in Indonesia, the National Disaster Management Centre said. “We have issued a warning for the south, north and east after the quake,” Keerthi Ekanayake, an official at the centre told Reuters. Sri Lanka was battered by the 2004 tsunami that hit the Indian Ocean rim. – Reuters story ends – Update #1 (7.00pm): Read the alerts issued on JNW and also visit their site for updates. Update #2 (7.15pm): Reuters news alert SMS thru Dialog says “Small tsunami hit Indonesia’s Padang, Sri Lanka expects small tsunami by 7.30 – Disaster Management Centre” Update #3: (7.34pm): Reuters news alert SMS thru Dialog says “Disaster management center lifts tsunami warning, says no effect; US Geological Survey increase earthquake magnitude to 8.2″ Also see Reuters web update here. Repost This Article

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About Groundviews

Located at the Centre for Policy Alternatives in Colombo, Sri Lanka, Groundviews is a citizen journalism website that uses a range of genres and media to highlight critical perspectives on governance, reconciliation, human rights, the arts and literature, democracy and other issues. The site has won two international awards, including the prestigious Manthan Award South Asia in 2009. The grand jury's evaluation of the site noted, "What no media dares to report, Groundviews publicly exposes. It's a new age media for a new Sri Lanka... Free media at it's very best!"

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