Within a short span of time the whistleblower website WikiLeaks seems to have thoroughly shaken up conventional thinking on weighty matters such as freedom of information on the one hand, and international diplomacy on the other. The most challenging aspect of the WikiLeaks revelations seems to be that with the technology now out there, it appears that governments can no longer keep anything secret. Is this a good thing or a bad thing? Is this a case of media freedom taken to its logical conclusion, or is this media anarchy? Are these questions irrelevant since there is nothing much that can be done about it anyway?
Now that these communications are in the public domain, like it or not, the ‘truths’ and ‘lies’ they expose will become the subject of debate, and may irreversibly affect the way people look at the governments of the rich and powerful. The communications relating to Sri Lanka so far revealed seem to corroborate what some analysts have been saying for some time about the Sri Lanka policy of western states generally and the UK in particular. Two Sri Lanka cables have appeared and been reported on. One from US ambassador Patricia Butenis with the subject title “Sri Lanka War Crimes Accountability: The Tamil Perspective” dated Jan. 15 2010, and another from British Foreign Office ‘Sri Lanka Team Leader’ Tim Waite with the subject title “Sri Lanka: Update on UK Action and Thinking” dated May 7 2009.
In the latter communication Waite lays bare the then British Foreign Secretary David Miliband’s Sri Lanka policy as being driven by considerations of pandering to the 300,000-strong Tamil diaspora in Britain with a view to wooing them for their votes. UK policy on Sri Lanka was thus driven not by objective assessments of the ground realities and humanitarian concerns for a long-suffering civilian population caught up in the conflict, but by hard-nosed calculations driven by pressures originating in domestic constituencies where the Tamil diaspora represented a sizeable vote base.
Quote: Waite said that much of HMG and ministerial attention to Sri Lanka is due to the "very vocal" Tamil Diaspora in the UK, numbering over 300,000 and who have been protesting in front of Parliament since April 6. He said that with UK elections on the horizon and many Tamils living in Labour constituencies with slim majorities, the Government is paying particular attention to Sri Lanka, with Miliband recently remarking to Waite that he was spending 60 per cent of his time at the moment on Sri Lanka. Unquote
The Foreign Secretary could surely not have been unaware that the “very vocal” sections of the Tamil diaspora in fact represented the Tamil-Tiger-flag-waving pro-LTTE sections.
Or that the LTTE was listed as a terrorist organization by UK and others in the EU. Miliband’s call for a ceasefire, if implemented, would have saved the LTTE leadership to fight another day. The cable exposes how a matter of a few hundred thousand British votes took priority over the fate of small state battling a ruthless terrorist enemy.
Waite mentions a statement to parliament by Miliband that refers to the purpose of his visit to Sri Lanka with French Foreign Minister Bernard Kouchner on April 29, 2009, as follows:"to highlight the need to bring the conflict to an end in a way that minimizes further civilian casualties; to press the case for the humanitarian relief effort to be ratcheted up, as the UN and EU have been calling for; and to make clear the need for a long-term political settlement that meets the aspirations of all communities in Sri Lanka."
Terminology such as “ratcheting up” the case for humanitarian relief efforts reveals Miliband’s insincerity to the unintended audience of this communication. Urging a special UN Human Rights Council session on Sri Lanka, and supporting the US position on delaying an IMF loan, were among the other UK policy decisions discussed in the cable.
It may be recalled that when there was a concerted effort last year by some European states to pass a UNHRC resolution condemning Sri Lanka for alleged war crimes, it was Britain that led the pack.
The US embassy communication dealing with the issue of Accountability reveals that Butenis, to her credit, has at least made an effort to consult some stakeholders among the Tamil political leadership in forming her impressions. As a result for instance it is acknowledged that accountability is not a high-profile issue among Tamil politicians in the country, and that bread-and-butter issues were the immediate concern. It notes that “There is an obvious split between the Tamil diaspora and Tamils in Sri Lanka on how and when to address the issue.”
Elsewhere, Butenis makes certain pertinent observations but does not pursue them to their logical conclusion. For instance she says that “There are no examples we know of a regime undertaking wholesale investigations of its own troops or senior officials for war crimes while that regime or government remained in power.” But she does not go on to ask the obvious question that one might expect to follow: “Why then is Sri Lanka being singled out for special treatment?” An attempt to answer this may have provided some useful insights on the diaspora-related nature of the war-crimes hysteria that continues to invade the discourse relating to Sri Lanka in the west, obstructing an objective assessment of the circumstances of Tamils in Sri Lanka.
Not having pursued this line of inquiry, Butenis retreats to the usual western assumptions when she goes on to say (in the next line): “In Sri Lanka this is further complicated by the fact that responsibility for many of the alleged crimes rests with the country's senior civilian and military leadership, including President Rajapaksa and his brothers and opposition candidate General Fonseka.”
The criminality of the LTTE is only mentioned in a bracketed ‘Note’ that draws attention to the State Department’s Report to Congress on Incidents during the Conflict, and a report by University Teachers for Human Rights (Jaffna). The bracketed (downplayed) status of this reference would seem to point yet again to the colossal gap in western awareness as to the real nature of the LTTE, and to the scale on which the organization’s propaganda has succeeded in pulling the wool over the eyes of the western media and the general public in relation to their murderous project. |
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