Sri Lanka Foreign Minister Lakshman Kadirgamar has matched the genocidal war launched by his Government on the Tamil people
with his own belligerence. He told Reuters on 20 February:
"Third parties coming here is absolutely out of the question. This is an
internal matter.. several governments, individuals and non governmental organisations had
offered out of goodwill to help end the war but…. It (mediation) becomes an
interference in our internal affairs and we will not tolerate it at all."
Tamil people will hope that the ‘several governments and non governmental
organisations’ who had 'offered out of goodwill to help' will take the Foreign
Minister at his word and also stop giving external aid to the
tune of more than 860 million US Dollars - which aid has served to prop up and support Sri
Lanka’s genocidal war on the Tamil people. After all, as Foreign Minister Kadirgamar
has been at pains to point out, the conflict is an ‘internal matter’ and there
is no reason why taxpayers in foreign countries should foot the bill for the Sinhala
dominated Sri Lanka government’s ‘internal’ military adventures.
Again, hopefully, the United States too will take Foreign Minister
Kadirgamar’s warning seriously and withdraw its Green Berets and technical aid. The
conflict in the island is an ‘internal matter’ and Sri Lanka, it appears, will
not tolerate foreign offers even when made 'out of good will to help'.
However, perhaps even Foreign Minister Kadirgamar will admit that there are matters in
relation to the conflict which are not internal. Human rights
and the Universal Declaration of Human Rights are not internal matters. The humanitarian
law of armed conflict and the Geneva Conventions are not internal matters. Genocide is not an internal matter. It is an international
crime.
Under the Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide, acts of
murder committed with intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnical, racial
or religious group as such are considered as acts of genocide.
During the period commencing May 1995 and continuing uptodate, the actions of the Sri
Lanka authorities in their war on the Tamil people in the North-East of the island of Sri
Lanka amount to genocide. The fact of the murder and rape of members of the group, of
torture and grave attacks on their physical and mental integrity and of the subjection of
the group to conditions leading necessarily to their deaths are clearly proven by the evidence.
Margaret Trawick, Professor of Social Anthropology, Massey University Palmerston North,
New Zealand was moved to comment on 28 April 1996:
"I have been struggling in my mind against the conclusion that the SL government
is trying to kill or terrorize as many Tamil people as possible; that the government is
trying to keep the conditions of the war unreported internationally, because if those
conditions were reported, the actions of the military would be perceived as so deplorable
that foreign nations would have no choice but to condemn them. And this would be
embarrassing to everybody. But it seems now that no other conclusion is possible..."
And, under cover of press restrictions which the Non Governmental Organisation Article 19 has described as going ' far beyond any
legitimate interest in protecting national security or public order' Sri Lanka's
genocide continues to the present day.
The Commander in Chief of the Sri Lanka armed forces, President Chandrika Kumaratunga
and the Sri Lanka government have celebrated the genocidal onslaught on the Tamil people
at victory ceremonies evoking memories of earlier
conquests of the Tamil homeland by Sinhala kings. They have failed to investigate the genocidal acts committed by
their armed forces and para military agencies. They have refrained from intervening to
prevent the genocide. The U.S. Department of State, Sri Lanka Country Report on Human
Rights Practices for 1996 concluded that " immunity for those responsible for human
rights abuses remained a problem". The attitude of President Kumaratunga and her
Government amounts to incitement to crime and criminal negligence and must be judged as
severely as the crimes actively committed by those under their command.
The fundamental rights and freedoms of the
people of Tamil Eelam are of direct concern to the international community, which is
entitled and duty bound to ensure that these rights are respected, particularly when they
are openly breached by one of its member states. Genocide is not an internal matter. It is
an international crime - and transcends state boundaries.
