Editorial

What Now?

The LTTE leadership, at least what is left of it and a few hundred hardcore cadres, are surrounded by the army in the “no-fire zone.”  This has been the inevitable scenario for some months now. Any plans Pirapaharan had of pulling off a miracle and pushing the army back or delaying the inevitable for long enough to ensure the international community give him yet another breather, is no longer an option. 

With anything between 70,000 to 150,000  people held hostage by the LTTE, the question for the military and the government is how to complete the stated mission of annihilating the LTTE without creating a massive humanitarian catastrophe. The success or failure of that would have a decisive bearing on the future of this country.  

In the last two years as the war raged, both the LTTE and the government have lost a great deal of credibility with the Western world commonly referred to as the international community. If the ‘final victory’ comes at the cost of even greater loss of credibility with the Western world, the country would pay a huge long term cost financially but more importantly socially. It took years of diplomacy through the indefatigable work of late Foreign Minister Lakshman Kadirgamar to erase the tarnished image of the country after the 1983 riots and a series of massacres allegedly by the army in the first phase of the war.  We do not need the label of a ‘pariah’ state again and it is best avoided if the government handles the situation with finesse and foresight.

Today the LTTE has nothing to lose. Whatever influence/sympathy the LTTE and its supporters in the Tamil diaspora had in the West was lost many years ago. The assassination of Kadirgamar and engineering the defeat of the pro-negotiations candidate — Ranil Wickremesinghe in the 2005 presidential election — took care of that. The cynical way the LTTE is using ‘its brethren’ as a human shield, firing and killing those trying to escape and the forced recruitment of children as young as 15 as cannon fodder has done immeasurable damage to its image. Mass demonstrations organised by the LTTE’s international network in the Western capitals are not going to change that. No its long past that phase.

So, it is now a game for the government to lose rather than for the LTTE to win.

The only way the LTTE can have a respite is for the government to mishandle the current humanitarian crisis.

President Rajapakse’s regime has many complaints against the West, some of them genuine. Rajapakse was convinced that the West especially the EU never accepted his victory at the presidential elections and was continuing to undermine his government and helping the UNP’s efforts to topple it. He may have had some justification for this belief.

The government was also miffed to put it lightly that the EU and the USA were threatening to cut off aid when the government responded to the LTTE attacks and launched Eelam War VI. It is Japan our biggest aid donor who stood firm and refused to play ball with the rest of the Co-Chairs. The Co-Chairs continuing to call for a ceasefire in the face of a series of military victories and the strong criticism of government excesses in the field of human rights was proof as far as the President was concerned that the real agenda of the West was to save the LTTE.

An already paranoid government could not understand why the EU and the USA kept on calling for a cease-fire even when it was abundantly clear that Pirapaharan had no interest what-so-ever in a negotiated settlement. Much more than the others it was the EU which was guilty of this.

That is well into the past. The government now needs to look to the future. There is a golden opportunity for the government to win over the West and its many critics within the international human rights organisations. It is vital that the government handles the issue of how to wipe out what is left of the LTTE without creating a humanitarian catastrophe, with sophistication and humaneness. In this endeavour whatever support, advice or help that anybody can provide must be accepted.

 Norwegian bashing has been a favourite pastime for many in this country, especially for a major section of the media. The fact of the matter is that it is only the Norwegians who can still have a dialogue with the LTTE leadership.

The best resolution to the current situation is for the civilians to be ‘rescued’ unharmed. For this to happen the LTTE needs to see the inevitability of their position. Pirapaharan has only one option. That is to negotiate safe passage for him and a few other leaders in exchange for releasing the civilians.

The government in return will have to give a guarantee that those LTTE cadres who surrender will be treated within the laws of the country and the noncombatant support staff rehabilitated. Although as of now it looks akin to a mission impossible to persuade Pirapaharan to let go of the human shield it is still worth a throw.

The stark truth is that if the current situation is mishandled resulting in a large scale loss of civilian lives, Sri Lanka can win the war but lose the peace.