NON CHRISTIANS IN THE WEST AND THE TAMILS
It appears that the government has decided not to de-proscribe the LTTE. It was earlier reported that the government was thinking of lifting the ban temporarily. It is not known whether the decision taken by the government to refrain from de-proscribing the LTTE is temporary. What is known for certain is that the government is under pressure from various quarters, including the western aid donors and it has been vacillating on number of issues connected with Tamil racism.
The LTTE has said in its press release after the discussions Thamilchelvam and others had with Solheim and the other Norwegians that the international community should understand that the LTTE cannot participate in so-called peace talks as an illegal, criminal entity with a distorted false label as "terrorists". The LTTE is adamant that the proscription should be lifted and wants the west, the so-called international community, to interfere further.
The LTTE says it cannot participate in the so-called peace talks as an illegal criminal entity. The government, at least at present, is of the opinion that the ban cannot be lifted. If the west does not force the government to de-proscribe the LTTE or if the Sri Lankan government at least for the time being refuses to be influenced by the west then what are the alternatives available. If the west for some reason or other continues with the ban of the LTTE in some of their countries then what are the options available to them?
It is unfortunate that the west does not want to understand that the LTTE is a criminal entity fighting to weaken the Sinhalathva in this country and make the Sinhalas a non entity in the present Northern and eastern provinces demarcated by the British in the present form as late as 1889. The west does not want to understand this as they are also in effect trying to do the same and the LTTE is attempting to finish off what they started in 1817-18 by massacring the Sinhala people in the present eastern and uva provinces.
If the LTTE is a criminal entity, a terrorist organisation, in the opinion of the west and if the LTTE does not want to participate in the so-called peace talks then there is only one way if the west is honest. If the USA has banned the LTTE because of its terrorist activities and if the UK has named the LTTE as a terrorist organisation genuinely then the USA and the UK should tell the LTTE that even if the latter participates in "peace talks" the proscription of the LTTE would not be lifted. (This does not mean that I support the so-called peace talks. I am only trying to illustrate a point.) If the LTTE is a terrorist organisation in the eyes of the USA and the UK at present, then it should be a terrorist organisation irrespective of what it promises to do in the future. At present these two countries have named the LTTE a terrorist organisation after taking into consideration its track record in the last few years. This record has not changed since the LTTE was proscribed and there is no new "evidence" to show that the LTTE is not a terrorist organisation. Hence it is not possible to de-proscribe the LTTE even if takes part in the so-called peace talks. The past record of the LTTE includes participation in "peace talks" with the government on a number of occasions and the USA and the UK have named the LTTE a terrorist organisation, in spite of these participations. What is evident is that the LTTE has only one objective, namely to establish a separate state and in order to achieve that they are prepared to do anything, including declaring cease-fire and participating in "peace talks" enabling them to be better equipped to continue the "war" against the state.
The west is of the opinion that the Tamils in Sri Lanka are not treated properly, or that they have genuine grievances. Solheim and others have made statements to the effect tat the aspirations of the Tamils have to be met in any solution to the so-called ethnic problem. Many westerners, academics, journalists and others visit Sri Lanka on "fact finding missions" and go back with "material" that reinforces their attitudes towards the "ethnic problem". However, none of them speaks of Prabhakaran, in the same vein as they speak of people like Milosevic whom are described as war criminals. To the west the Tamils in Sri Lanka are discriminated and the "struggle" of the LTTE is justified. They know of only one solution to the problem. That is to achieve Peace, by abdicating legislative power in the present northern and eastern provinces to the Tamil racists making Sinhalas a non entity in those provinces. What they do not tell us is, if the Tamils in Sri Lanka, not merely those in the northern and eastern provinces, have grievances, how it could be rectified by abdicating power in the northern and eastern provinces only, to the Tamil racists. According to them the Tamils in the other provinces would continue to have these "grievances" and they do not tell us how the "grievances" of the Tamils in the other seven provinces would be eradicated by the "solution" they advocate.
A Swedish national who was in Sri Lanka recently, wanted to find out from me the solution we offer to the so-called ethnic problem. I told him that the problem is nothing but that of Tamil racism and the solution to the problem is the eradication of Tamil racism and acceptance of the significance of the Sinhala language, the Sinhala culture, Sinhala history in Sri Lanka. He did not understand what I meant by the word significance and wanted to find out whether the Sinhalas accept the significance of 25 percent of "minorities" in the country. He then went on to tell me how his country has treated the non Swedish speakers in Sweden, as if the so-called minorities in Sri Lanka are not treated well, and emphasised that Sweden is a multi cultural, multi religious country.
I had to tell him that all countries in the world are multi-ethnic, multi religious, multi cultural etc., but the west has two ways of dealing with this concept. One is the weak concept of multi culturalism, where it is accepted that there are more than one culture in a country but the significance of one of those cultures is accepted. It is multi culturalism in the weak sense that is practiced in the western countries where the significance (and the dominance) of the western Judaic Christian civilisation is accepted axiomatically. In the west the people may be equal before the law but their cultures are not equal according to the tradition. In the rest of the world the west wants the others to follow the strong version of multi culturalism where not only that the people are equal before the law but the cultures are also equal. ( It is not the dominance of a culture but the significance of a culture I am thinking of.) The west insists that there should not be a significant culture in these countries in order to prepare the way for the domination of the Judaic Christian cultures in these countries as well.
To make my point clear to the Swedish national, I asked him several questions. In answering some of my questions he told me that non Swedish speakers can study in their languages only upto year six or equivalent, that there are no non Christian ministers in the cabinet and that there are no non Christian religious holidays. In fact as far as I know none of the western Christian countries have declared any non Christian religious holidays, though they claim to be multi cultural and multi religious societies. When I told him that the Tamils could study up to the university level in Tamil and that in certain disciplines theses for postgraduate degrees could be submitted in Tamil he did not know how to respond to it. In Sri Lanka where the west, through their academics (people such as Thambiahs and Seneviratnes are also their academics )and journalists including the Sinhala speaking journalists who are paid by the NGO's and sometimes by the Sri Lankan government, claims that Sinhala Buddhist Chauvinists have discriminated against the Tamils, there are non Sinhala cabinet ministers and non Buddhist religious holidays. The UN may have recognised Vesak holiday but how many countries in the west have declared a holiday for Vesak. There are many Buddhists, especially Mahayana Buddhists, living in the west but their "human rights" are not recognised in those countries. According to Ven. Mandawela Pannawansa Thero who is in France, there are about five hundred thousand Buddhists in that country, but Vesak has not been declared a holiday.
The "human rights" in the west are defined relative to the Judaic Christian civilisation, though they are projected as universal human rights. In Sri Lanka non Sinhala Buddhists enjoy more rights than what the non Christian white communities have in the western countries. If the west is genuinely interested in peace and not the Peace of Solheim and the others they should help the government to defeat the LTTE, which is a pre-requisite for peace in Sri Lanka, while the western academics and the journalists should campaign for the rights of the non white Christians in those countries before thinking of preaching the others on multi culturalism.
Professor Nalin de Silva
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