A Brief History of the Current Ethnic Conflict in Sri Lanka
February 29th 2008 05:36
A Brief History of the Current Ethnic Conflict in Sri Lanka
To take a simplistic view of the Sri Lankan Ethnic conflict would be to force a false narrative upon a nation’s history. Such a view would be a disservice to everyone and offer no real understanding of what has happened. So when reading all the news reports and cleaning all the different websites about Sri Lanka we must wade through a lot of propaganda from both sides of the conflict. Just publishing an opinion can lead to a huge amount of counter opinions by interested sides.
Conflicts between the Singhalese majority and the Tamil minority had its roots in the past with several wars. Yet as the time moved on these became less frequent. European colonization both diminished and added to the tensions as different sides were either given privileges or denied them to further the goals of colonialism. However it is a proud boast of Sri Lankans that they won their independence by unifying all the ethnic groups. The other proud boast is that it was achieved without losing a single drop of blood. A boast that even India could not make.
Yet the inequalities imposed during the British Colonial Rule created opportunities in the nation for politicians to pander to Singhalese mostly Buddhist the majority. Some sources claim that a secret deal between a few elite politicians was struck in 1951 to restructure the nation to favour Buddhism, but such claims are hard to prove and may also be a conspiracy theory.
It was in the early seventies at the time when Ceylon was renamed as Sri Lanka that the tensions became evident. Overnight the President introduced a number of radical reforms designed to socially reengineer the society. It is sometimes referred to as the Sri time. Most obvious was the name Sri Lanka. There was the introduction of new license plates with the letter Singhalese language symbol for ‘Sri’ as part of the number. The official language was changed to being exclusively Singhalese and in doing so government jobs were forbidden to people who had studied in any other language. This meant that not only did the Tamils have to leave public service positions but so too did Burgers and Sinhalese who had studied in English. There were court cases where Tamils won the right to have their jobs restored but the government refused to obey the courts.
Fast forward to 1983 and we have the making of a nation where people were being forced to divide along ethnic lines. The arrival of violence was most historic when a police station was attacked in the East of Sri Lankan by Tamil extremists and all the police were killed. Newspapers became incensed at the violence that was reported as unprovoked with one paper going so far as to print the head line ‘Kill Tamils.’ Soon after riots broke out all over Sri Lanka where Tamils were attacked and killed randomly. Some had their homes destroyed and others were thrown onto fires. As a result there was a mass exodus of Tamil refugees and the Liberation Tamil Tigers of Eelam (LTTE) came to the fore.
The LTTE quickly established itself as a force that was willing to engage in provocative and ruthless tactics to achieve its goals. One of their earliest attacks was to send gunmen to the temple of the sacred Boa Tree and kill Buddhist monks as the meditated. On the same day they attacked a bus in the town of Anrudapura killing more than twenty civilians. The total numbers of civilians killed in one day is said to be 146. The Sri Lankan forces responded in an equally vicious manner often killing innocent villages.
The LTTE were able to arm and perfect the tactic that they invented: the suicide bomber. The southern province of India called Tamil Nadu became not only the supply route for weapons but also a place where weapons factories were established for the purpose of sending arms to the Sri Lankan conflict. At this time some Indian politicians were openly supporting the LTTE and providing them with shelter. With money flowing from displaced sympathizers the weapons kept coming. The LTTE were tenacious enough to control territory from the North of Sri Lanka and all the way down the East coast. This became the de facto Eelam state which was ruled over by the LTTE and also became the conscription ground for their war. They did not hesitate to conscript women and children for combat duties. Female suicide Bombers were pioneered by the LTTE.
The Indian Government sent armed peace keepers into a reluctant Sri Lanka with the pronouncement that they would bring an end to the conflict. It was estimated that at their peak there were 3 times as many Indian Soldiers in Sri Lanka than there were Sri Lankan Soldiers. Yet despite their numbers no major territory gains were made by the Indian Army. In fact the Indian Army brought their problems as they were reports of human rights violations and rapes. There were also reports of Indian soldiers supplying weapons to some favoured LTTE cadres whilst killing others. The Indian Army reputedly had a major drug problem where some soldiers would shoot up on heroine before going into combat. After combat they would have little recollection of what they did (a desperate method to avoid post stress disorders). The Sri Lankan President at the time Premadasa was also accused of supply weapons to selected LTTE cadres, yet despite the fact that he was absolutely ruthless this claim is yet to be confirmed. However the result of this mess was that the LTTE further entrenched their position. By the time the Indian army left to be redeployed for a crisis in the Punjab there was little love lost between all sides.
Rajiv Gandhi was assassinated later assassinated by an LTTE female suicide bomber. Then months later Sri Lankan President Premadasa was assassinated by an LTTE suicide bomber. To date only the LTTE has ever manage to kill two world leaders (this feat is more remarkable when considering how well protect both leaders were at that time).
The assassination of Rajiv Gandhi had an unexpected twist for the LTTE because for the first time the role that they were playing in Tamil Nadu was examined. Weapons and bomb factories were shut down and LTTE operatives were expelled or arrested. Yet the LTTE still controlled much of Sri Lanka and were capable of engaging the Sri Lankan army in direct conflict. It was a stalemate in many ways that was draining the nation’s economy.
The terrorist attacks in the USA on 9-11 also launched the War on Terror where one good decision President Bush made was to try to stop money flowing to terrorist groups. This did dent the funding of the LTTE but did not ruin them. At around the same period the Sri Lankan Army took possession of rapid fire truck mounted rocket launches which gave them a tactical advantage in jungle warfare. The LTTE was slowing losing territory.
The Tsunami gave a devastating blow to the LTTE for a period of time. However when financial aid started to flow from around the world some went to directly support the LTTE. In other cases the LTTE levied part of an aid convoy before letting it pass along roads toward devastated areas. Rumours that the LTTE leader (Pirapakaran) had been washed out to sea but they proved false.
There was another change of government with a policy of directly confronting the LTTE in battle. An estimated 5000 lives have been lost in the last two years alone as the war heats up. The Sri Lankan Government has published map indicating that the LTTE area have been reduced down to small patches that they claim will be capture by the end of 2008. Whether this is possible is yet to be seen. Whether they are telling the truth is another matter.
The modern ethnic conflict that started with laws designed to give advantages to the Sinhalese and create a Buddhist haven quickly became bloody civil war. The attacked on a police station killing 13 was used as an excuse to kill Tamils indiscriminately in the riots 1983. This gave the LTTE the excuse to launch ruthless attacks upon civilians, Buddhist Monks and holy shrines in order to provoke another riot and further divide the Tamils from the Sinhalese population. Child soldiers were used in several combat actions (the head of the female child soldiers was an Australian nurse) and the litany of massacres include hacking villagers to death. Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch have also documented cruel retribution by Sri Lankan government forces (disappearances being the second only to Iraq.) Yet the legacy of the LTTE will be: the invention of the suicide bomber and the explosive belt. Both of these were exported via their connections with Al Qaeda to the Middle East.
Addendum:
It is regrettable that due to the nature of this subject Inflammatory comments on this post will be deleted.
How does violence play out?
To take a simplistic view of the Sri Lankan Ethnic conflict would be to force a false narrative upon a nation’s history. Such a view would be a disservice to everyone and offer no real understanding of what has happened. So when reading all the news reports and cleaning all the different websites about Sri Lanka we must wade through a lot of propaganda from both sides of the conflict. Just publishing an opinion can lead to a huge amount of counter opinions by interested sides.
Conflicts between the Singhalese majority and the Tamil minority had its roots in the past with several wars. Yet as the time moved on these became less frequent. European colonization both diminished and added to the tensions as different sides were either given privileges or denied them to further the goals of colonialism. However it is a proud boast of Sri Lankans that they won their independence by unifying all the ethnic groups. The other proud boast is that it was achieved without losing a single drop of blood. A boast that even India could not make.
Yet the inequalities imposed during the British Colonial Rule created opportunities in the nation for politicians to pander to Singhalese mostly Buddhist the majority. Some sources claim that a secret deal between a few elite politicians was struck in 1951 to restructure the nation to favour Buddhism, but such claims are hard to prove and may also be a conspiracy theory.
The Sinhalese letter 'Sri' was put on the license plates of all cars for years. The practice has now stopped.
It was in the early seventies at the time when Ceylon was renamed as Sri Lanka that the tensions became evident. Overnight the President introduced a number of radical reforms designed to socially reengineer the society. It is sometimes referred to as the Sri time. Most obvious was the name Sri Lanka. There was the introduction of new license plates with the letter Singhalese language symbol for ‘Sri’ as part of the number. The official language was changed to being exclusively Singhalese and in doing so government jobs were forbidden to people who had studied in any other language. This meant that not only did the Tamils have to leave public service positions but so too did Burgers and Sinhalese who had studied in English. There were court cases where Tamils won the right to have their jobs restored but the government refused to obey the courts.
LTTE insignia.
Fast forward to 1983 and we have the making of a nation where people were being forced to divide along ethnic lines. The arrival of violence was most historic when a police station was attacked in the East of Sri Lankan by Tamil extremists and all the police were killed. Newspapers became incensed at the violence that was reported as unprovoked with one paper going so far as to print the head line ‘Kill Tamils.’ Soon after riots broke out all over Sri Lanka where Tamils were attacked and killed randomly. Some had their homes destroyed and others were thrown onto fires. As a result there was a mass exodus of Tamil refugees and the Liberation Tamil Tigers of Eelam (LTTE) came to the fore.
The LTTE quickly established itself as a force that was willing to engage in provocative and ruthless tactics to achieve its goals. One of their earliest attacks was to send gunmen to the temple of the sacred Boa Tree and kill Buddhist monks as the meditated. On the same day they attacked a bus in the town of Anrudapura killing more than twenty civilians. The total numbers of civilians killed in one day is said to be 146. The Sri Lankan forces responded in an equally vicious manner often killing innocent villages.
The LTTE were able to arm and perfect the tactic that they invented: the suicide bomber. The southern province of India called Tamil Nadu became not only the supply route for weapons but also a place where weapons factories were established for the purpose of sending arms to the Sri Lankan conflict. At this time some Indian politicians were openly supporting the LTTE and providing them with shelter. With money flowing from displaced sympathizers the weapons kept coming. The LTTE were tenacious enough to control territory from the North of Sri Lanka and all the way down the East coast. This became the de facto Eelam state which was ruled over by the LTTE and also became the conscription ground for their war. They did not hesitate to conscript women and children for combat duties. Female suicide Bombers were pioneered by the LTTE.
The Indian Government sent armed peace keepers into a reluctant Sri Lanka with the pronouncement that they would bring an end to the conflict. It was estimated that at their peak there were 3 times as many Indian Soldiers in Sri Lanka than there were Sri Lankan Soldiers. Yet despite their numbers no major territory gains were made by the Indian Army. In fact the Indian Army brought their problems as they were reports of human rights violations and rapes. There were also reports of Indian soldiers supplying weapons to some favoured LTTE cadres whilst killing others. The Indian Army reputedly had a major drug problem where some soldiers would shoot up on heroine before going into combat. After combat they would have little recollection of what they did (a desperate method to avoid post stress disorders). The Sri Lankan President at the time Premadasa was also accused of supply weapons to selected LTTE cadres, yet despite the fact that he was absolutely ruthless this claim is yet to be confirmed. However the result of this mess was that the LTTE further entrenched their position. By the time the Indian army left to be redeployed for a crisis in the Punjab there was little love lost between all sides.
Rajiv Gandhi was assassinated later assassinated by an LTTE female suicide bomber. Then months later Sri Lankan President Premadasa was assassinated by an LTTE suicide bomber. To date only the LTTE has ever manage to kill two world leaders (this feat is more remarkable when considering how well protect both leaders were at that time).
The assassination of Rajiv Gandhi had an unexpected twist for the LTTE because for the first time the role that they were playing in Tamil Nadu was examined. Weapons and bomb factories were shut down and LTTE operatives were expelled or arrested. Yet the LTTE still controlled much of Sri Lanka and were capable of engaging the Sri Lankan army in direct conflict. It was a stalemate in many ways that was draining the nation’s economy.
The terrorist attacks in the USA on 9-11 also launched the War on Terror where one good decision President Bush made was to try to stop money flowing to terrorist groups. This did dent the funding of the LTTE but did not ruin them. At around the same period the Sri Lankan Army took possession of rapid fire truck mounted rocket launches which gave them a tactical advantage in jungle warfare. The LTTE was slowing losing territory.
The Tsunami gave a devastating blow to the LTTE for a period of time. However when financial aid started to flow from around the world some went to directly support the LTTE. In other cases the LTTE levied part of an aid convoy before letting it pass along roads toward devastated areas. Rumours that the LTTE leader (Pirapakaran) had been washed out to sea but they proved false.
There was another change of government with a policy of directly confronting the LTTE in battle. An estimated 5000 lives have been lost in the last two years alone as the war heats up. The Sri Lankan Government has published map indicating that the LTTE area have been reduced down to small patches that they claim will be capture by the end of 2008. Whether this is possible is yet to be seen. Whether they are telling the truth is another matter.
The modern ethnic conflict that started with laws designed to give advantages to the Sinhalese and create a Buddhist haven quickly became bloody civil war. The attacked on a police station killing 13 was used as an excuse to kill Tamils indiscriminately in the riots 1983. This gave the LTTE the excuse to launch ruthless attacks upon civilians, Buddhist Monks and holy shrines in order to provoke another riot and further divide the Tamils from the Sinhalese population. Child soldiers were used in several combat actions (the head of the female child soldiers was an Australian nurse) and the litany of massacres include hacking villagers to death. Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch have also documented cruel retribution by Sri Lankan government forces (disappearances being the second only to Iraq.) Yet the legacy of the LTTE will be: the invention of the suicide bomber and the explosive belt. Both of these were exported via their connections with Al Qaeda to the Middle East.
The language barrier was dropped later and now all government documents are in 3 langauges. English, Sinhalese and Tamil.
Addendum:
It is regrettable that due to the nature of this subject Inflammatory comments on this post will be deleted.
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