16.11.2008
The
T.N.A. Members of Parliament had failed in their duty
to tell the Government of Tamil Naad that all these years,
for more than a quarter of a century, it is the Sri Lankan
Government that had been feeding the L.T.T.E. Leader,
his family his cadre, and the people in the L.T.T.E. held
areas.
Also
President of the Tamil United Liberation V.Anandasangaree
challenged the Tamil National Alliance parliamentarians
to dispute that whenever a fresh stock arrived in Vanni,
the L.T.T.E. took all what they wanted and also replaced
their old stock with the new arrivals and passed on to
the people, the balance.
Anandasangaree
while emphasizing it was Sri Lanka Government which was
feeding the LTTE leader, his family, his cadres he also
pointed out that Tamil Nadu has simply ignored his earlier
request not to allow the L.T.T.E. to create a “Jaffna”
in Tamil Naad.
Misled
by the T.N.A. Members, Anandasangaree said, “Tamil
Naad is exposing to grave risk its own people in particular
and the whole of India in general. If Tamil Naad fails
to stop this trend, very soon it will have a training
center for suicide bombers. I am sure history will record
this, for Tamil Naad to regret deeply one day.”
Given
below the full text of the statement by V. Anandasangaree
President of the Tamil United Liberation Front:
The
Role Of India In Sri Lankan Ethnic Issue
The
resolutions unanimously passed at the Tamil Naad Assembly
demanding the Central Government to pressurize the Sri
Lankan Government to stop the war immediately and to start
talks with the L.T.T.E. is shocking and totally unacceptable
even to the Tamils of Sri Lanka. This will certainly cause
a lot of embarrassment to the Government of India itself.
It
is a pity that the supporters of the motion had failed
to realize that it won’t take much time for the
Sri Lankan Parliament to pass a vote of censure against
the un-warranted interference of the Tamil Naad Assembly.
It is very unfortunate that the Tamil Naad Government
had taken such a decision merely to please some hardliners
who have their own agenda, which will soon prove detrimental
to India’s own Sovereignty and integrity.
Very
soon those who supported these resolutions will deeply
regret for being misled by a handful of extremists who
know nothing about the Sri Lankan ethnic problem and merely
acting on hearsay. I hope, based on the latest developments
the Assembly will soon meet to reverse the decision. I
insist on an all party delegation to visit Sri Lanka on
a fact finding mission, since so far except Hon.P.Chithamparam
who played the key role in negotiations more than 20 years
back, only two others came from Tamil Naad, one of whom
a Film Director who met Mr.Prabaharan and left. The other
who is the Leader of a small party in Tamil Naad also
left after having lunch with some TNA members of the Sri
Lankan Parliament who were fraudulently elected by the
L.T.T.E as their proxies.
We
Sri Lankan Tamils very much welcome friendly advice and
all other assistance from Tamil Naad to solve the ethnic
problem. But if it is going to be misled by a handful
of pro-L.T.T.E. Leaders who have their own agenda and
act without foresight or proper under-standing and without
adequate information, it will be a great boon to the Tamils
of Sri Lanka, if only Tamil Naad will keep silent. With
several thousands who managed to escape from the clutches
of the L.T.T.E., much more than 50% of the Tamils live
in peace and harmony in predominant Sinhala areas with
the Sinhalese and Muslims. They live and work together,
play and eat together and even own houses and buy new
mansions. Although some of the inciting speeches made
at various places in Tamil Naad recently caused a lost
of embarrassment to the Tamils who live among the Sinhalese
and Muslims and Caused irritation to the Sinhalese, yet
people are living in peace and tranquility, in spite of
the atrocious activities of the L.T.T.E. in these areas,
that causes the deaths of many innocent people and destruction
of property. Any action taken in Tamil Naad without being
counterproductive should only help to solve the problem.
The said resolutions passed at the Assembly contrary to
helping to solve the problem will only help to aggravate
it.
It
is very unfortunate that the recent agitations, that included
demonstrations, formation of human chain, hunger strikes,
hartals by various organizations and trades, held at various
Districts all over Tamil Nadu demanding the Central Government
of India to intervene, contrary to the expectations, have
become counter productive. By over doing things, the people
of Tamil Nadu, misled by the inciting speeches of pro-LTTE
Leaders from both Sri Lanka and India, have only made
it impossible for the Government of India to act freely.
Left alone, the Government can tackle it without offending
any-body. Without realizing the adverse effects their
action will have, two gentlemen who represent the LTTE
and claim the LTTE as the Sole Representatives of the
Tamil People of Sri Lanka, had thanked the participants
when the hunger strike organized by the film stars in
Chennai ended.
India
as a mighty big nation and the world’s largest Democracy
cannot just jump in to action, merely because pressure
is coming from a powerful section of the population to
intervene in the Sri Lankan issue. India must first of
all, satisfy itself whether the demand coming from a section
of the population is reasonable and justifies its intervention.
Even if its intervention is justifiable, India can intervene
only in an advisory capacity without being accused of
interfering with the Sovereignty of the Sri Lankan Nation.
India with its large intelligence net-work need not be
told what and what is happening in Sri Lanka. Therefore
one should understand that response of the Indian Government
for the various representations made to it will be subjected
to the Government’s own observations.
The
Sri Lankan ethnic problem is now over fifty years old
and still with no hopes of an early settlement. The adoption
of Sinhala as the only Official Language of Sri Lanka,
in violation of Section 29 of the Soulbury Constitution,
which was the main or rather the only provision for the
safeguard of the minorities, can be taken as a landmark.
I am one of those who had lived in Sri Lanka through out
this period and very well know, as to who and who had
erred and how a Paradise on earth is lost. Recalling the
bitter memories of the past will not help us to solve
the problem. Let us face it as it is today. I am not acting
as anybody’s agent nor as a stooge of anyone. What
I say is truth and nothing but that truth and can be challenged
by anyone who doubts my credibility.
The
Leader of the Tamil National Alliance is also the Leader
of the Parliamentary Group of the Illankai Thamil Arasu
Kadchchi and its President as well. He laments that he
is disappointed with the manner in which India had handled
the problem by merely sending food to the displaced Tamil
people. He should try to win the confidence of the Indian
Authorities without misleading them with fabricated stories.
There is no doubt that a lot of human rights violations
are taking place both in the Government controlled areas
and areas under the control of the L.T.T.E. Many people
are involved in the violations in areas under the control
of the Government. The TNA Leaders should tell the world
as to what extent the L.T.T.E. is involved in such areas
without putting the entire blame on the Government or
on any Para-military group. They do not utter one word
about the violations in the L.T.T.E. held areas. One of
the very serious charges leveled against the Government
by the L.T.T.E. and endorsed by the T.N.A. Parliamentarians,
which had roused the feelings of the People of Tamil Naad,
is that the Government is trying to annihilate the Tamil
People. This is a fabrication of the L.T.T.E. which the
T.N.A. is selling all over the world, and very successfully
in Tamil Naad. The T.N.A. must prove it with facts and
figures, without making wild allegations. It is also a
duty of the T.N.A. to tell the world that most of the
people trapped in Vanni had been driven into Kilinochchi
from three other neighboring Districts, and are held under
compulsion to be used as a human shield for the protection
of the L.T.T.E..
I
am not trying to find fault with the Leader of the T.N.A.Being
a senior politician he should have acted with great caution
in handling this sensitive issue. He had come into the
scene very late and by the time he came in to the scene,
the damage is already done. All sorts of accusations had
been made, very irresponsibly, in Tamil Nadu against the
Sri Lankan Government, incited by pro-LTTE elements, without
realizing that ultimately it is with the Sri Lankan Government
that matters will have to be sorted out, not by compulsion
and only by persuasion. The enthusiasm generated had become
so uncontrollable that it ended up with the most un-pleasant
and unexpected threat of demanding a separate state of
Tamil Nadu, which demand remained buried for over 50 years,
now revived. This would have caused a lot of embarrassment
to the Government of India which is now in a dilemma.
This renewed demand will have to be nipped in the bud
on one hand and the Sri Lankan problem dealt with extreme
caution on the other. The Leader of the T.N.A. who should
take the blame for this new development cannot find fault
with the Indian Government. He can’t expect the
Indian authorities to swallow whatever advice given by
the TNA members. From the time the 22 TNA Members got
elected to Parliament fraudulently with the help of the
LTTE’s fire power, as the whole world knows, their
credibility became questionable. They weakened themselves
by accepting the LTTE as the sole representatives of the
Tamils and started functioning as proxies of the LTTE.
In such a situation, they have lost their right to represent
the Tamil people.
A
new problem that had cropped up is the demand of the Tamil
Naad Government to have the 2000 tons of aid to be distributed
to the Internally Displaced Persons by the ICRC under
the supervision of the Indian Embassy Officials. The Central
Government had to concede to the demand of the Tamil Naad
Government, deviating from the usual practice, under similar
circumstances in the past. The Central Government had
no option because the Tamil Naad’s demand itself
is due to the pressure from others. In any case the demand
of Tamil Naad is too petty and certainly an insult to
Sri Lanka and its people. It should not have been conceded
to, under any circumstances. The T.N.A. Members of Parliament
had failed in their duty to tell the Government of Tamil
Naad that all these years, for more than a quarter of
a century, it is the Sri Lankan Government that had been
feeding the L.T.T.E. Leader, his family his cadre, and
the people in the L.T.T.E. held areas. They must be honest
enough to tell Tamil Naad that whenever a fresh stock
arrived in Vanni, the L.T.T.E. took all what they wanted
and also replaced their old stock with the new arrivals
and passed on to the people, the balance. Let any T.N.A.
member challenge this statement.
I
have to come out with these facts since I feel ashamed
of the demand of Tamil Naad. The Tsunami of 2004 left
several thousands dead. People were starving and there
had been instances in which old Sinhalese women had walked
8 to 10 miles with food parcels on their heads for the
Tamil and Muslim victims whom they had never met. There
is enough evidence to prove that the L.T.T.E. did not
fail to claim more than what they were entitled to, out
of the Tsunami Aid. Once before, following an attack by
the L.T.T.E. on the ships taking food to Jaffna, two years
back the ICRC refused to give escort. Some Sinhalese sailors
took the risk and navigated the food ships to Jaffna.
It is very unfortunate that no one from Tamil Naad ever
bothered to come on a fact finding Mission, to see what
is really happing in Sri Lanka. The two gentlemen mentioned
in this letter were here on a pleasure trip.
Misled
by the T.N.A. Members, Tamil Naad is exposing to grave
risk its own people in particular and the whole of India
in general. My repeated requests to Tamil Naad, not to
allow the L.T.T.E. to create a “Jaffna” in
Tamil Naad, had been totally ignored. If Tamil Naad fails
to stop this trend, very soon it will have a training
center for suicide bombers. I am sure history will record
this, for Tamil Naad to regret deeply one day.
Apart
from those who are directly involved in the war, I am
perhaps the only one who could have given a proper briefing
of the real situation in Sri Lanka. The fact that I was
the Member of Parliament for Kilinochchi, is known to
the Chief Minister of Tamil Naad. The war-clouds had now
shifted there, with people of four districts trapped or
driven into it by force and detained by the L.T.T.E. under
compulsion, with no effort taken by the 6 million people
across the sea, to liberate them. They are only applying
pressure on the Sri Lankan Government virtually to protect
the atrocious L.T.T.E. terrorists.
The
Central Government of India and the State Government of
Tamil Naad should now get together and free the people
who are now trapped in areas under the control of the
L.T.T.E. and allow them to get into areas where more than
80% of the Tamils live. They should also agree jointly
to persuade the Sri Lankan Government to devolve power
on Provincial Councils a kin to those devolved on various
States in India. This is the only way peace can be brought
to Sri Lanka.
Courtesy - Asian
Tribune