Seeking security

Editorial Tamil Guardian 18 May 2013

Four years have passed since the Tamil nation suffered the zenith of genocide inflicted upon it by the Sri Lankan state, where tens of thousands of Tamils were herded into a tiny of slither of land, only to be massacred with heavy artillery, systematically raped and tortured, deliberately starved, deprived of humanitarian assistance and murdered in cold blood. The evidence - not only indicative of the appalling nature of the crimes, but the intentional and systematic way in which they were perpetrated – is increasing. Yet despite this, and the ample time that has passed, Tamils have not seen a credible, international process towards accountability and justice, or a meaningful attempt to deliver a political solution that ensures their future security. The Tamil nation is instead, more exposed now than ever before – its identity is being destroyed, its claims to nationhood are being dismantled and its homeland erased of its Tamil character.

Sri Lanka’s 2008 offensive against the LTTE, was actively endorsed and supported by the international community. Over and beyond the providing of military expertise and arms, the widespread proscription of the LTTE and associated international arrests, criminalised Tamil support of the resistance movement, and forced the Tamil nation to publicly dissociate itself from the LTTE.  Yet even after this ‘anti-terror offensive’ reared its genocidal head, (as Tamils had long argued was the case), the world did nothing. Far from being ignorant of the horrors unfolding, the international community - intent on eradicating any perceived impediment to its agenda of stability – hoped destruction would be swift, and turned away. At the height of the Tamil nation’s suffering, the international community failed to act – a wilful impotence which emboldened Sri Lanka to intensify its bloodbath, and laid the groundwork for takes place today.

Four years later, despite welcome and increasing censure, the international community fails to hold Sri Lanka accountable for the past, through an independent, international inquiry. Instead, it appears incapable of moving tangibly past the futile call of requesting a manifestly unrepentant, genocidal state to investigate itself. No doubt strengthened by this effective granting of impunity, Sri Lanka’s program of destruction - through a process of structural genocide – continues.  Yet the international community once again fails to halt it, or meaningfully instigate a process to resolutely address it. All the while Tamil resentment is growing. As the Tamil nation long feared, the absence of armed resistance has led to the unchecked burgeoning of Sinhala Buddhist chauvinism. Whereas in 2000, the LTTE’s sheer military might compelled the government to the negotiation table, today there is no incentive or compulsion for abuses to be reined in, or discussions on a political solution to be had. The Tamil nation’s political power and its longstanding demand for a lasting solution to the ethnic conflict has sunk to a point of irrelevancy in the eyes of the state.

Meanwhile the TNA, purported to be representative of the Tamil nation, continues in its failed policy of concessionary engagement, with a state unashamedly intent on imposing Sinhala Buddhist hegemony. In endorsing the 13th Amendment as a first step towards further political discourse, the TNA has adopted the weakest Tamil political position in decades; one that was rejected by the  TULF over 25 years ago. The futility of provincial councils, as a means of providing any meaningful security to Tamils, is only more evident today. Instead of working towards mobilising a wider pressure base internationally, within the diaspora and domestically, the TNA leadership’s recent alliance with the UNP ignores the chauvinism at the heart of Sinhala polity, and the unwavering popular support it continues to have within the Sinhala electorate. Apparently unwilling to step beyond the framework of reforming Sri Lanka to a pre-Rajapaksa era state, the TNA utterly fails to address the fundamental flaws inherent to the Sri Lankan state. It is these flaws that legitimised the 60 years of Tamil oppression, sanctified the mass slaughter of Tamils in 2009 as necessary to safeguard the integrity of the unitary state, and underscore the Sri Lankan state’s post-2009 project of structural genocide. As we have argued previously, more harm is done to an oppressed nation by having an ineffectual representation, than by having none at all.

The factors that led to the armed conflict have only intensified over the last four years. The military defeat of the LTTE left Tamils at the mercy of their now triumphant oppressors. The Tamil nation’s reluctant progression from peaceful protest to the taking up of arms was a natural response to escalating oppression – as evident in similar struggles worldwide, including those currently at play. The Tamil nation’s call for an independent state of Tamil Eelam, and its overwhelming support for the leading proponent of it – the LTTE, was born out of and sustained by the unremitting need for security in the face of genocide. Coupled with the TNA’s ineptitude and the international community’s failure to mitigate the immediate problems of the Tamil nation, today non-violent Tamil resistance is growing: from student protesters, civil society activists and alternative Tamil polity in the North-East (working at grave risk to themselves), and to diaspora activists worldwide. This May 18th, as the Tamil nation remembers on genocide past and present, and looks towards the 5th year of ‘peace’, the need for security is only more apparent; and the Tamil nation’s determination in achieving it, more profound.

Dangerous game of ‘diaspora politics’ is here to stay

By: David Carment and Yiagadeesen Samy Published on Fri May 17 2013

LUCAS OLENIUK / TORONTO STAR

Tamil protestors line the streets of downtown Toronto in March 2009 demonstrating against the political turmoil in Sri Lanka.

The Conservatives' foreign policy is too often based not on principle, but on pandering to diaspora communities in order to win votes.

Thestar.com columnist Natalie Brender recently argued that Prime Minister Stephen Harper’s decision to boycott the Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting (CHOGM) in Sri Lanka this November is because of that country’s deteriorating human rights and governance record. Harper’s purpose, she claims, is “to convey principled condemnation of what’s happening to human rights and democracy in Sri Lanka” in a challenge to our claim that this is more obviously pandering to the Tamil diaspora in order to win votes.

She then went on to state that sometimes “Ottawa’s foreign policy decision-making is logically inexplicable except by reference to a diaspora community’s pressure and votes” and that “those cases of egregious pandering to diaspora communities are not the rule in Canada’s foreign policy-making – neither with the Harper government nor with previous ones.”

We could not disagree more. Whether one calls it “pandering to specific groups,” “diaspora politics” or “creative statecraft,” it is much more frequent than Brender thinks and it is also not going away anytime soon because of the political incentive structures shaped by Canada’s demographic trends.

According to data from the recently released National Household Survey on Immigration and Ethnocultural diversity in Canada, in 2011 more than 20 per cent of the total population in Canada is foreign-born. In the last five years, the largest source of immigrants to Canada was Asia (including the Middle East), and most of these immigrants settled in the country’s largest urban centres. More importantly, the concentration of immigrant populations in specific parts of these urban centres means that they are the key to who wins these related political ridings. Justin Trudeau should take note.

Calling the Canadian government’s policy on Sri Lanka “principled” is misleading to say the least. Consider that, in 2009, Tamil Canadians filled the streets of Toronto and Ottawa to protest against what they called a genocide and to support intervention and a demand for an immediate ceasefire. One can hardly imagine more dire circumstances when the need for action was so obviously apparent. Thousands of civilians were caught up in the final stages of the Sri Lankan conflict. According to a UN report released in 2011, as many as 40,000 civilians may have been killed during the final stages of the civil war; many more have since suffered at the hands of harsh government reprisals and punitive policies.

A significant amount of evidence has been collected to confirm that war crimes were indeed committed during the final stages of the Sri Lanka conflict. Why didn’t Canada call for intervention at the height of the conflict when fact-finding and mediation were most needed? If there was ever a time for a principled foreign policy, 2009 was it. Yet the Harper government did nothing. For one, political necessity meant the Harper government was wary of a Tamil electorate which had thrown its support behind the Liberal party in previous elections. The Conservatives also feared their hard-line domestic security agenda would be compromised if Tamil Tigers were seen to be benefiting from Conservative action.

But now with the war over and the Tigers defeated, the political landscape has changed and the benefits of chasing after Tamil votes are pressing. Tamils are now openly courted by all parties, but no one it seems is more focused and determined than Stephen Harper. For if he is to have any have chance of maintaining a hold on a majority of seats in the House of Commons, in the next election, it will be because of political gains within Canada’s ethnic communities. The Liberal lock on immigrant support it seems is no longer self evident. In fact in an obvious attempt to win over Tamil votes, Jason Kenny suggested earlier this year in a press conference that it was a bad idea for his party to have declared the Tigers a terrorist organisation.

It would be enough for us to argue that there was no principled policy at play here, if being principled means abiding by and enforcing a commitment to basic standards of human rights and rule of law; and especially when violations of those rights are egregious and self-evident. One expects a government espousing “principles” as a cornerstone of its foreign policy to at least understand and apply these basic and fundamental tenets of international diplomacy through thick and thin.

But we have other concerns. As the Conservatives work assiduously to court diasporas from regions of the world deeply immersed in conflict, one must ask if these immigrants are fleeing oppression and long for freedom or are moving here because of business opportunities. With diaspora politics probably the most salient political issue of the 21st century, we are seeing the emergence of a more conservative society that fits perfectly into Harper’s Conservative agenda. If previous generations of immigrants brought in their suitcases issues such as human rights, democracy and the like, now we see a different kind of interests at play: business success perhaps at the expense of human rights, rule of law and justice.

Obviously not all of Canada’s foreign policy decisions are the result of diaspora politics but many of the important ones, including the likely boycott of the next Commonwealth meeting in Sri Lanka, are. As we have argued before, this “dangerous game of diaspora politics” is mostly about short-sighted, self-interested politicians. We believe Canadians need to wrestle the diaspora political agenda away from our elected officials as it is far too important to be left in their self-serving hands.

David Carment is a fellow at the Canadian Defence and Foreign Affairs Institute and editor of the Canadian Foreign Policy Journal at Carleton University.Yiagadeesen Samy is an associate professor of international affairs at Carleton University and a research associate at the Ottawa-based North-South Institute. You can access their research and writings here and here.