Sri Lanka’s Love-Hate Foreign Policy

By Dinouk Colombage -November 26, 2013 |

Dinouk Colombage

Sri Lanka has for the past several years boasted a love-hate foreign policy with the West and our Big Brother to the North, India. With two US sponsored resolutions being passed at the United Nations, Tamil Nadu’s continued assault on the government over allegations of war crimes and Canada’s Prime Minister’s, Stephen Harper, decision to boycott the Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting (CHOGM) 2013 appears to justify the hate section of our foreign relations. Of course a declaration by the Australian Prime Minister, Tony Abbott, that he saw nothing wrong in Sri Lanka and continued support at the UN from nations including Uganda have seen an outpouring of gratitude.

Unfortunately, foreign policy dictates the standings of a country on the global stage and in the case of Sri Lanka the impression continues to falter. When Sri Lanka was scheduled to host CHOGM 2013 the government leapt at the opportunity to showcase to the world that our country is progressing beyond the three decade long civil war. The decision by the leaders of Canada and India to boycott the event appeared to leave the government unfazed. Prince Charles, the King in waiting, and the Prime Ministers of Britain and Australia were still on their way and so our Ministry of External Affairs spun the story that India and Canada stood to lose out. Rather than attempting to offer an olive branch, the regime went on the offensive suggesting that one of the leading regional powers stood to lose out from boycotting a glorified holiday to Sri Lanka.

Tamil Nadu has proven to be a thorn in the side of Indo-Lanka relations since the war ended in 2009. CHOGM 2013 was the perfect opportunity for our Foreign Ministry to begin repairing the cracks by offering India unrestricted access to the North of Sri Lanka. Instead the government was forced to wait until the Tamil National Alliance sent a separate invitation to Manmohan Singh requesting he visit the former war zones.

Having missed a golden opportunity there the government welcomed the news that David Cameron would be visiting the North. Unfortunately the love part of our foreign policy went no further. Cameron’s visit to Jaffna, and his subsequent meeting with the TNA and family members of those who have disappeared, left him with a sour impression of the supposed reconciliation efforts. In fact he chose to break protocol and publicly announced in Sri Lanka that he is giving the country till March to organise a credible investigation in to the allegations otherwise the UN would do so. His comments followed on the heels of his Foreign Secretary,William Hague, who also called for an independent, international investigation.           Read More