Hated by its own Subjects
LTTE Seeks Refuge in International Interferers
Dilrook Kannangara
Vanni is LTTE’s open prison; close to 300,000 people, all of them
Tamils, are forced to live and closed to leave. Their conditions are
much worse than prisoners and rather closely resemble that of laboratory
mice, slaves and farm animals. LTTE's totalitarian rule is very similar
to the story line of George Orwell's much acclaimed novella 'Animal
Farm'.
This LTTE’s open prison must be busted as soon as possible. Democracy
is the only tool that can do that. The democratically elected popular
government is trying its best to save its citizens trapped under the
jackboot of the LTTE in Vanni where the LTTE still rules. It was reported
many times that Vanni dwellers were forced to give blood for wounded
LTTE fighters and children were not spared from the blood theft. They
are forced to labour without pay in building military installations
for the LTTE and used as sleuths by the tigers often resulting in death
or serious injury. These crimes are committed on top of child soldiers,
forced prostitution and heaps of other cruelty on the same people whom
the LTTE claims to liberate.
In a democratic setting LTTE cannot survive a day longer under these
tyrannical conditions. Thanks to terror democracy remains a dead beast
in Vanni where people are not allowed to vote at elections and democratic
political activists are killed in thousands by the LTTE in the good
name of peace. Although there are more than 40 political parties including
more than 15 Tamil political parties, none are represented in Vanni
as the LTTE claims to be the sole representative of its unfortunate
subjects.
A very large number of child soldiers (close to 5,000) surrendered to
the Sri Lanka Army since 2006; hundreds of thousands of Tamil people
walked through heavily mined territory and ran to the open arms of government
troops during the past two years (most of them were classified as IDPs
but almost all of them were soon resettled in their very own houses);
amidst threats of heavy punishment by the LTTE people brave booby traps,
landmines and snipers to cross over to government controlled areas even
today. After 25 years of war more than 54% of Tamils have settled down
in Sinhala (the majority community) majority areas fully controlled
by the government hundreds of kilometres away from LTTE controlled areas.
Those who are still trapped in Vanni increasingly support security forces
to infiltrate into LTTE controlled areas and attack senior LTTE terrorists.
How long can the LTTE carry out ethnic cleansing and genocide against
the very same people whom it claims to represent? These LTTE subjects
are human and their desire to rise against suppression is only human.
Then the important question begs – how on earth can the LTTE still
manages to survive amidst so much anger from its own people?
The answer is simple; LTTE compensates the enormous hatred its subjects
have towards it by the support it receives from international interferers.
Most importantly the large Tamil Diaspora in Canada, UK, Switzerland,
France, etc. donate close to US$ 300 million annually (and growing);
some are forced to give money (or their old relatives still living in
Sri Lanka to avoid the harsh winter of these countries will have their
throats slit). LTTE has connections to other terror groups throughout
the world and have benefitted from Talibans’ SAMs, Hamas’
suicide kits, North Korea’s attack boat technology, etc. That’s
not all; a large number of businesses engaged in the NGO industry, disaster
management industry, the humanitarian crises management industry, human
rights monitoring industry and related ventures also support the LTTE.
Their support is manyfold. At the lowest level there are those who directly
support the LTTE cause. Many of these groups were identified and punished
by the government of Sri Lanka by not allowing them access. Then there
are those who sympathise with the LTTE as it exploits humanitarian crises
for its advantage. Many humanitarian groups that came after the 2004
tsunami had unwittingly supported the LTTE by providing them with funds
for humanitarian work, material – mainly food and tents that ended
up in terror camps and moral backing by merely functioning under the
command of the LTTE. Almost three years after the tsunami a large number
of affected families still live in refugee camps in LTTE controlled
areas whereas the government managed to resettle all displaced people
in areas under its control amidst allegations of astronomical levels
of corruption. Additionally there are foreign interferers who try to
project as independent parties but criticise the government for war
and related matters knowing very well that the LTTE is not bound by
the International Law and human rights treaties. The more they criticise
the government the more emboldened the LTTE becomes as human rights
laws are not applied to all parties to the conflict equally. Misusing
human rights to silence the government has become a prominent LTTE strategy!
Not signing human rights treaties certainly have advantages for terrorist
groups and these advantages are substantial.
LTTE’s severe lack of local support is more than compensated by
the support it gets from what it calls the ‘international community’.
This conduct of the LTTE very closely resembles the conduct of some
Eastern European countries from 1945-1989. East Germany, Hungary, Bulgaria,
Czechoslovakia, Poland, etc. had tyrannical governments that had no
real support from their people. However, they survived thanks to Soviet
interferences in terms of heavy economic, political, military and cultural
intrusion. Unfortunately the very same is happening in the 21st century
in Vanni – LTTE controlled area.
How did these East Europeans find democracy and freedom? It dawned on
them like a sweet dream the moment international interferers stopped
interfering. The same is true about de facto LTTE controlled areas.
The international community must understand that there is no ‘LTTE
government’ in LTTE held areas. It is a tyrannical administration
much worse than communist dictators of former Eastern Europe. As long
as the international community recognises the de facto LTTE controlled
area as a locality to manage differently and channel economic, political
and moral welfare for the de facto LTTE controlled areas through the
LTTE, it continues to glorify the LTTE in the eyes of its unfortunate
subjects. Terror leaders of the LTTE would turn to their dissenting
subjects and say ‘even the foreigners ‘approve’ our ways
and who are you to oppose us’. This is the only stick and the carrot
the LTTE has today to beat-up and bribe its subjects to toe the line.
The moment this lifeline drops, the LTTE drops dead freeing all Vanni
dwellers from the 25 year old LTTE open prison.
However, LTTE knows this only too well and hence guard whatever the
support it gets from international interferers with all their might.
They have been very lucky to have rotten and corrupt fat cats among
international interferers who would be glad to see the conflict and
division continuing. The moment the division ends, their multi-million
dollar pay packs dry-up, their importance suffer a sudden nasty dip
and they become nobodies. Their selfish and wicked agendas strike a
nice chord with the whims of the LTTE just like the old communist dictators’
desire to remain in power struck a chord with the interests of the Soviet
Union.
LTTE terrorists that are at the receiving end of public anger will lose
their only support base when pro-LTTE international interferers are
silenced.
Sri Lankan government should not tolerate any interfering foreign or
local groups meddling with its territorial and sovereign rights. However,
there is at a tremendous advantage as the interests of rogue foreign
parties and the LTTE converge most of the time. By punishing these unwarranted
interferers, the government is killing two separatists in one stone!
As the war hots up LTTE would be under tremendous pressure to keep fighting,
continue recruiting child soldiers, further suppressing human rights/fundamental
rights of its subjects and to suppress public dissent against it. Its
only lifeline today is foreign interferers and the government must do
its utmost to cut this umbilical cord that will plunge the LTTE politically
and militarily into a morbid spin. LTTE has demanded that the ‘Extortion
Highway’ be reopened so that tigers can easily transport weapons
to government controlled areas, terrorise people in other areas to move
into LTTE held areas and to extort money from travellers. This shows
the desperation of LTTE terrorists to strength its human shield, replenish
explosives, recruit more children as soldiers and widespread terror.
International interferers must understand that they achieve nothing
by pressurising the government to give in to LTTE demands as the government
is very heavily backed by the people; it is the LTTE which has no peoples’
backing that should back down giving into the wishes of its own subjects.
LTTE terrorists are dreaming about Kosovo; many attempts are afloat
to trick the international community to accept a Kosovo type separation.
However, once again it has to fully rely on the international community
for all this as its own subjects have already rejected such moves.
Democracy can once again take root in Vanni only on the carcasses of
tiger terrorists. As there can be no viable alternative to democracy
and there cannot be any compromise on democratic rights, there cannot
be any compromise between Sri Lanka and Terroristan; Sri Lanka must
prevail and Terroristan must perish. Only then the conflict will end.
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