Sri Lanka: The Forgotten War on Terror

I got back from Sri Lanka a few days ago and it is an amazing and beautiful country but it is still suffering under a grinding war. Even though the fighting is localized in the north and east there are still fears of terrorism in other parts, particularly the capital Columbo which though in the Southwest part of the country has still suffered several terrorists bombings. Signs that a war is going on are everywhere in Columbo with troops with Kalishnikovs practically everywhere and checkpoints. When I went to eat at a posh restaurant in a hotel and bank I had to go through a security check like getting on a plane. Outside of the Columbo and even along the Southern coast there are still checkpoints here and there along with a military presence in some key sites.

It seems like most Americans don't know about the almost 30 years long civil war in Sri Lanka or know much about it so some brief background. The country is majority Buddhist native Sinhalese and the rebels are ethnic Tamils who came from Southern India who are predominantly Hindu. Many of these have been here for generations and The main Tamil group is called the Liberation Tamil Tigers of Elaam (LTTE) although since then it has split into a couple of different groups and there is some infighting between them. The LTTE want a separate Tamil country in the North and East and are upset over perceived Sinhalese dominance and discrimination. The conflict started in the early 80's after nationalistic Sinhalese governments came to power and instuted policies to emphasize the importance of Sinhalese identity, such as making Sinhalese the official language instead of English making all official public work and education in Sinhalese. Since then there have been some periods of relative peace with the longest being a cease fire in 2000 that saw the reopening of rebel held areas and a relaxing of the Sinhalese laws. The tsunami though ended the cease fire when the LTTE refused to allow the government or NGO's access to LTTE held areas and since then bombing campaigns have returned and recently the government has started an offensive. It has been speculated that the LTTE might've suffered a catastrophic blow from the tsunami as it hit rebel held coastal areas very hard and that the leader of LTTE might've died in it along with some of their most elite fighters who were based on a seaside base. The LTTE leader hasn't been heard or seen since.

Many Americans tend to believe that terrorism, particularly the use of suicide bombers, is primarily a Muslim phenomenon. They would be surprised to learn that the LTTE were the first to use suicide bombing and continue to use it. Many of the LTTE suicide bombers have been women. The LTTE also use child soldiers and are linked with international drug trafficking. It might also surprise many Americans that Muslims haven't been participants but hapless victims in this conflict with many of Sri Lanka's minority Muslim population driven out of rebel head areas.

Why the conflict in Sri Lanka has gathered so little attention in the West and the US has probably been due to a few things. Sri Lanka is a long ways from the US, both the LTTE and government have been very careful about affecting Westerners and the LTTE aren't Islamic and are thus not seen part of a worldwide conflict on Islamic-Fascism. From talking to Sinhalese themselves they see their own conflict very much as part of the War on Terror and have adopted the language of the war on terror, such as always referring to LTTE and other Tamil group fighters as "terrorists" and they will say things like when Jaffna was briefly captured by the government as "taking it back from the terrorists."

All of this unfortunately been hitting a country that is still suffering from the tsunami and one that has a lot of potential to be successful. They are located on major trade routes, in a position to take advantage of India's growing market, have alot of natural resources for a country that size and beautiful beaches and ancient cultural sites. In the meantime this war on terror has been largely overshadowed by conflicts on the other side of the Indian Ocean in Middle East.

 

There's nothing innate about Tamils that make them violent. (geeimsobored are you inclined to violence? ) In Sri Lanka in the central region there are Tamils who were brought over by the British to work the Tea Plantations who have no interest in the rebellion. This primarily is a problem with the LTTE and not other Tamils.

Interesting POV on Indian attitudes about the LTTE geeimsobored.

 

Following up on Deckard and Hotballa's comments there is foreign investment coming into Sri Lanka particulary from Korea but development is hampered by the war but also by corruption along with the Sinhalese language policy. One of the engineers I was talking to said that the lack of adequate English skills has made it difficult for the Sri Lankans to participate in the Global IT market like India has and also they haven't been able to build up a good IT or physical infrastructure. For example they started to build a super-highway but couldn't complete it so most of their roads are overcrowded, narrow with lots of non-auto traffic on them. This engineer works for a steel mill and he told me also that the most dangerous jobs Sri Lankans wouldn't do and that they were actually importing low caste workers from India to do those. So there are several things at the moment keeping Sri Lanka from joining the Asian Tigers.

One thing that is interesting about Sri Lanka that I heard from a Singaporean professor just the other day is that in the 1950's and 1960's Sri Lanka, Myanmar (Burma) and the Philipines were the most advanced countries in SE Asia and that Singaporeans used to send doctors and other profesionals to be trained in those countries. Now things have totally changed and from what I saw in Sri Lanka it is way way behind Singapore and lagging well behind Thailand, Malaysia and even Indonesia.

 

Good points Mulletman regarding the nature of the conflict being secular and about about the LTTE killing moderate Tamils. As for the suicide bombers I heard from Sri Lankans and saw in some other sources that an LTTE militant was the first to use the tactic when he blew up a school being used as a military base. I don't have the info off the top of my head or time to look for a link but will try to follow up. Otherwise if one of the wikipedia adepts could.