Chris Slee
Fears are growing that a renewed war could break out between Sri Lankan government troops and the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE). The Tamil guerrillas have complained to Scandinavian peace monitors that government soldiers have participated in attacks on LTTE positions.
In a letter to the monitors, reported in the September 22 London Tamil Guardian newspaper, the LTTE said it suspects that the aim of the Sri Lankan Army (SLA) is "to provoke the LTTE ... thereby leading to the disruption of the entire peace process".
Between 1983 and 2001 the LTTE waged an armed struggle for an independent Tamil homeland in the north and east of Sri Lanka. In 2002 a cease-fire was signed. The LTTE expressed a willingness to accept something less than total independence, but insists on a high level of autonomy for the Tamil areas. It has proposed the formation of an Interim Self-Governing Authority for the north and east.
However, the Sri Lankan government, while signing a cease-fire agreement with the LTTE, has dragged its feet on implementing key provisions of the agreement, such as the return of displaced people to their homes. The SLA has continued to occupy large areas of Tamil land, preventing hundreds of thousands of people from returning to their homes and farms.
As a result, the peace process has lost momentum, and after the April 2004 Sri Lankan elections a new coalition government was formed by parties even more hostile to Tamil self-determination than the previous United National Party
government. In the Tamil areas, however, support for the pro-LTTE Tamil National Alliance was overwhelming.
Since early 2004 there have been frequent clashes between the LTTE and paramilitary groups allied to the SLA in the eastern part of Sri Lanka. The SLA is largely composed of members drawn from Sri Lanka's majority Sinhalese-speaking population, but it makes use of Tamil paramilitary groups to carry out actions for which it wishes to deny responsibility.
One such group is led by Colonel Karuna Amman, a former LTTE commander in the Batticaloa region who led a short-lived rebellion against the LTTE national leadership in March 2004 before fleeing to SLA-controlled territory.
The SLA has been preparing for a new war by strengthening its ties to the US military. The SLA has participated in joint training exercises with US troops, and has increased its purchases of US military equipment. US Special Forces are training elite SLA troops. The SLA has also been strengthening its links with the Indian armed forces.
The head of the US State Department's counter-terrorism unit, Cofer Black, recently visited Sri Lanka. Despite the cease-fire, Washington has continued to classify the LTTE as a terrorist group.
Washington has recently moved to undermine the Tokyo Declaration — an agreement among countries providing aid to Sri Lanka that makes aid conditional on progress in the peace talks — by announcing unconditional loans to Sri Lanka. The US has also pressured Japan and the Asian Development Bank to do likewise.
From Green Left Weekly, October 13, 2004.
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