End of Stalemate

Following LTTE supremo Pirabhakaran's recent statements, the spectre of war in Lanka has arisen again

Arjuna Ranawana Toronto

Threatening to demolish three year of a fragile peace, war seems to have begun dogging Sri Lanka again.

Or so suggested the tenor of the annual address by the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) supremo, Vellupillai Pirabhakaran, at ceremonies — held on his birthday on November 26 — in memory of his dead fighters.

The Tamil Tigers, Pirabhakaran said, would resume the stalled peace talks with the Sri Lankan government only if Colombo agreed to discuss his proposals for an Interim Self-Governing Authority (ISGA), which would be dominated by the LTTE.

"If the government of Sri Lanka rejects our urgent appeal and adopts delaying tactics, perpetuating the suffering of our people, we have no alternative other than to advance the freedom struggle of our nation," Pirabhakaran said. "The thirst of the Tiger is Tamil Eelam — the motherland", or, at the very least, a separate state for the minority Tamil community.

His statement belies the optimism the Tigers have been recently feeding the international community, particularly the Norwegian mediators. During peace negotiations held between the two warring parties in Oslo in 2002, the Tigers formally agreed to resolve the Sri Lankan crisis through a "federation policy".

The Sri Lankan government of President Chandrika Kumaratunga has responded with some testy rhetoric of its own. "A call, couched in threatening language, from the LTTE now for a resumption of negotiations without conditions, while setting conditions itself by insisting unilaterally on a single agenda item is scarcely conducive to good-faith negotiations,'' a government statement said.

But Kumaratunga is left with few options. In October 2003, she had dismissed the then government of Ranil Wickremasinghe on charges that he was caving in to the demands of the Tigers. A coalition of her People's Alliance party and the People's Liberation Party, known by its Sinhala initials, JVP, won a narrow parliamentary victory in April 2004, vowing that it would never negotiate a solution based on the ISGA.

A nominally Marxist organisation, the JVP has strong support from Sinhala majority hardliners and is opposed to any form of negotiation with the LTTE unless the rebel group dissolves its formidable guerrilla army — which, given the state of things, is an unrealistic demand.

With Kumaratunga — whose election is separate from that of Parliament — cornered, Wickremasinghe’s United National Party of Ranil Wickremasinghe has stated that it will leave the handling of the peace process entirely in her hands.

In the past three years, with a lull in the war, the harried Tigers have had a chance to rearm and rest. The removal of travel restrictions following the peace agreement meant that Tiger cadres could easily infiltrate government-controlled regions. A resumption of hostilities could mean suicide bomb attacks on government installations and personalities.

The Tigers suffered their biggest blow a few months ago when their top military commander, Vinyagamoorthy Muralidharan — code named Karuna — in charge of the Batticola-Amparai district, split from the main organisation.  Karuna's strong support base is in his native Eastern Province; he is said to control a third of the LTTE forces.

Over the past few months, there have been occasional skirmishes between the LTTE rival factions, with many of Pirabhkaran's top supporters in the east being assassinated, allegedly by Karuna's gunmen. The LTTE's main arm struck back, killing several of Karuna's supporters, even in the capital Colombo; it also accuses the Sri Lankan military of helping Karuna's forces.

The Tigers' weaknesses are probably offset by the problems the Sri Lankan armed forces are facing. The government doesn't have the economic strength to fight a protracted war: in fact, before the truce was signed, low morale had led to more than 10 per cent troop desertion.

Since the armed forces are entirely politicised, launching a full-scale offensive against the Tigers must be the last option of Kumaratunga's advisors. Also, the remarkable patience of the Norwegian mediators might at last be running out: Oslo sent out its Foreign Minister Jan Petersen last month to meet with Kumaratunga and Pirabhakaran, but little progress was made. Usually, lower-ranking officials handle negotiations, and Petersen's intervention is clearly a last-ditch effort.

If war does break out, it will be truly devastating in human and economic terms. Twenty years of civil war and the distortions it has caused in Sri Lankan politics has paralysed the country's institutions and wreaked havoc with its economy. A resumption of hostilities could drag it down into an abyss it may not be able to emerge from.