Reading The Invisible Text

As before, too much is being read into the Heroes’ day speechwhen there has been no shift in the position of the LTTE on the "Tamil question." In the midstof the ongoing peace process, it is natural for analysts to look for nuances in the annual speech, Prabakaran,the LTTE chief gives on the eve of the Heroes’ day, to commemorate the deaths of his cadres in the ethnicstrife, many of whom have given up their lives voluntarily in the hope that one day, their leader would bringindependence to the Tamils.c

This is the problem Prabakaran is facing in making any speech which would be carefully weighed not only bythe Tamils and the Sinhalese in Sri Lanka but also by the international community.  Then, there is thechanged global environment after September 11 attacks when no distinction is being made between freedomfighters and terrorists.  In the recent Oslo meet on aid to the strife torn north east, the USA in thesame context declared that the LTTE should abjure violence and drop its demand on secession before it couldconsider removing the label as "terrorist outfit".

It is too much to expect LTTE to accept such conditions and too premature when the core issues on thepolitical issues have not been discussed at all in the peace talks.  Today the LTTE is having completecontrol of considerable territory in the north east, with their own police stations, customs offices, banks,taxation laws, courts and other adjuncts that go for a normal state. Balasingham at some point mentioned about"one country- two systems" which is actually the reality today.  The political dispensation sofar offered by the Sri Lankan government ( the most generous so far, has been that proposed by PresidentChandrika at the beginning of her tenure) comes no where to what LTTE holds now and even such proposals havebeen scuttled or whittled down due to pressures from the opposition or the Buddhist monks.  The way thePresident and the Prime minister have been at loggerheads over the handling of peace talks would give nosatisfaction to the LTTE to trust the majority community to provide a just solution.

Some of the responses of the analysts starting from "LTTE having opted for regional autonomy" to"LTTE insisting on secession" arise out of lack of understanding of the compulsions of the LTTE inthe current global environment. There is some excitement in the response of the Sri Lankan government as theysee a "paradigm shift" in the approach to the conflict resolution by the LTTE.

In our view the LTTE has not moved away from three out of four of its basic demands made by all the Tamilgroups who assembled for the first time at Thimpu in the eighties to find a solution.  The three demandswell known by now, are- 1. Recognition of Tamils as a nation. 2. The Tamils have a homeland. 3. Recognition ofright of self determination for the Tamils.  Any consideration of "regional autonomy and selfrule" has to take into the consideration these three factors.

Some of the highlights of Prabakaran’s speech are

• The LTTE cannot ignore the changing global environment and the need to adjust its freedom movement.
  
  
• The LTTE is on equal footing while talking to the Sri Lankan government and the doors for peace talks wereopened by them only when the military situation was in their favour.
  
  
• The LTTE is prepared to attempt the peaceful path with all sincerity.
  
  
• Ranil Wickremasinghe’s government is also attempting to find a solution to the problems faced by theTamils with all sincerity and courage.  The progress in peace talks is mainly due to the way theNorwegian facilitators have handled the talks.
  
  
• It gives them satisfaction that the international community has come forward to help in the reconstructionand rehabilitation of the Tamil areas.
  
  
• The occupation of Jaffna by over 40000 Sinhala troops and the presence of High Security zones have madeJaffna an open jail.  Unless this issue is sorted out, Jaffna can never be peaceful in the real sense.
  
  
•  The LTTE is willing to talk on all aspects of the Tamil question.  The talks should have nopreconditions or time limits and should be free.
  
  
• From Thimpu to Thailand, the LTTE has been insisting that the basis for a solution to the Tamil questioncould be only on the three issues namely, Tamils as a nation, recognition of home land for Tamils and theright of self determination.
  
  
• The LTTE is willing to favourably consider any proposal of self rule and autonomy but if their right toregional autonomy and the right to rule themselves are denied, the LTTE will have no alternative but to go forsecession.

On the eve of Heroes’ day, the "Eelam" website has produced a comprehensive list of all LTTE cadres who died during the period 27.11.1982 to 30.9.2002.

In all, a total of 17,648 cadres (fighters) have died of whom 241 belong to the "Black Tigers"outfit. Of these 13,882 are men and 3766 are women.  It looks that proportionately, the women havesuffered more casualties. District wise breakup would be Jaffna 6487, Batticola 4535, Wanni 2521, Trincomalee1479, Mullaithivu 1291, Mannar 1037 and other districts 298.

(Dr. S. Chandrasekharan is Director, South Asia Analysis Group)