A PUBLIC FORUM featuring Professor Paul James, Jeremy Liyanage and Others at RMIT Kaleide Theatre, 360 Swanson Street, Melbourne
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Author Archives: thuppahi
Learning from Sri Lanka: Two Foreign Academics buck the Trend
Arie Kruglanski and Michele Gelfand, 19 September 2012 **
The world has a lot to learn from Sri Lanka. This island nation, south of India, was torn by a vicious civil war for twenty-six years, which ended in 2009 with a clear victory for government forces over the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE). Since then, the ruling authorities have done a remarkable job forging reconstruction, rehabilitation and reconciliation with the Tamil minority. This is truly an example of how military victory needs to be followed up by forgiveness and peacemaking.
Demining is slow and meticulous work ……. IDPs at play -Pic in July 2009
Without a doubt, the LTTE has been one of the most vicious and dangerous terrorist organizations ever. It was formidable militarily, complete with a navy (the Sea Tigers), air force (the Air Tigers) and a highly developed intelligence capability. The last push against it was relentless and bloody, claiming significant casualties on both sides. When the war ended, nearly three hundred thousand displaced Tamil civilians were left in the government’s care. These were persons who the LTTE dislocated from their villages and whose land was strewn with hundreds of thousands of mines (across five thousand square kilometers of land), making their resettlement impossible. An immense demining effort took place; now, three years later, only 5,424 internally displaced persons (IDPs) remain in a temporary welfare village awaiting their return home on completion of the demining process.
Medical Centre in Zone 2(?)-Pic in July 2009
The Sri Lankan government proceeded to rebuild the destroyed infrastructure in the LTTE controlled areas of the island. It constructed a network of new roads, bridges, schools and hospitals and provided economic and vocational assistance to the returning IDP resulting in over 20 percent annual growth in the northeastern parts of Sri Lanka. Continue reading
The Beheading Fanatic and his Mum
Pic by John Tozer 
ALSO SEE Ernest Corea in http://www.eurasiareview.com/17092012-middle-east-violence-no-excuse-for-vile-provocation-analysis/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+eurasiareview%2FVsnE+%28Eurasia+Review%29
AND NOTE THIS RESPONSE FROM A FORMER WALLABY TURNED NEWS-COLUMNIST: 
Burning with Zealotry
Tony Allen-Mills, courtesy of The Sunday Times and The Australian
HE thought he was going to play Samson, the biblical strongman who lost his locks to Delilah. Instead Tim Dax, an exotically tattooed actor struggling at the seamier margins of Hollywood, found himself carrying a spear on a low-budget film called Desert Warrior. The only desert in sight was painted on a warehouse wall in central Los Angeles. At the time neither the plot nor his character made much sense to Dax. Yet he posed where he was told for $US75 a day and assumed the film, like most of his other acting credits, would swiftly disappear on to remaindered video shelves. Continue reading
Ruqaya! Brindha! Little Girls Front Up
Michael Roberts
Brindha Yesterday. Ruqaya Today. Two different scenarios: yet, as it seems, both sharing the manipulation and grooming of sweet little girls by their parents and ethnic adults in order to press political claims. 
Pic by James Crowther
But can’t seven to ten year olds think for themselves? Maybe up to a point. Certainly both Ruqaya and Brindha in their different contexts fronted up confidently and spoke lucidly. Had they not been coached though and fired up, and thus moulded by elders whom they trusted? Probably, most of us would say. Continue reading
Military Fiscalism and the Politics of Market Reform at a Time of Civil War
Rajesh Venugopal, ** courtesy of the author and EPW…Note that this article appeared in the Economic and Political Weekly (EPW) vol 49, issue 49 (December 2011)
1. The Problem: By the late-1990s, almost two decades of civil war in Sri Lanka had wrought a heavy economic cost: the physical destruction of economic infrastructure, lost production, foregone investment, the flight of human capital, and the diversion of vast resources to military purposes were quantified as over a full year’s worth of lost GDP (Arunatilake et al 2001). Other studies quantified the cost of the war as a loss of between 2-3 percent of economic growth per year, implying that ceteris paribus, Sri Lanka’s 2002 GDP of $900 per capita was half of what it would have been if there had been no war (Central Bank of Sri Lanka, henceforth CBSL, 1998, quoted in World Bank 2004: 10). The north-eastern part of the island in particular suffered to a very disproportionate extent during these years, and came to have the lowest income levels, the highest poverty levels, and the worst provision of health and education in the island (Sarvananthan 2008). Indeed, due to the exclusion of the north-east from national accounts and most census statistics since 1990, much of the cost of the war is not incorporated into published GDP and other socio-economic data. Continue reading
Jane Russell’s Reflections on Oppression, Violence and the Paths of Response available to Us All
Jane Russell, 13 September 2012
This lengthy comment was inserted by Jane Russell in response to Nalliah Thayabharan’s lengthy diatribe against the oppressions of the caste system in the Jaffna Peninsula in the mid-20th century. I believe Russell’s little essay deserves greater prominence and used my prerogative to present it as an article in its own right in thuppahi. Clarification of the background is provided at the end of this post. Web Editor.
There are elements of fascism in every society — the class system in the UK, although ameliorated by a welfare state, still bears a strong resemblance to the brutal Victorian class structure which condemned millions to poverty, misery and death 150 years ago: the underclass in the USA today live in conditions akin to outcastes in Asian societies: in Africa, south and central America, China and Russia, there are millions of victims of proto-fascist social structures –everywhere human beings are divided, either by class or race or religion, and this enables one powerful group to abuse less powerful groups and to justify this abuse on the grounds that members of other groups are less human and deserving. If you want to find an example of modern social fascism, look no further than the gun lobby in the US… but there are so many examples..…..the treatment of homosexuals in certain African states, the mistreatment of Shia by Sunnis in Bahrain, the systematic murder of tribal peoples in central America……… the list is endless and endlessly enduring. Continue reading
A Sinhalese reflects on the present in the light of July 1983, retributive Tamil emotions & the Tamil motto ‘work is worship’
Hemantha Warnakulasuriya, courtesy of http://dbsjeyaraj.com/dbsj/archives/7233where the title reads: ‘Work is worship’: The work ethic success of the Sri Lankan Tamils
I have often wondered why we, as a nation, cannot progress as rapidly as our neighbour – India. Any political analyst would of course heap the blame on the politicians and the political authority. I have pondered whether in fact this was true. All politicians are voted to power by us and we sometimes condone their activity. When Monnekulama was convicted for bribery by the Talgodapitiya Commission and disfranchised for seven years, he re-contested the Kurunegala seat and won again. People seem to accept the fact the politician need to be corrupt. They must have a phalanx of security guards and a fleet of vehicles to show their authority and power.
Borella Junction, 24/25 July 9 1983–Pic by Chandragupta Amarasinghe Continue reading
An American Analyst surveys the Sri Lankan Scene
Sam Baker, in The Asia Sentinel, where the title reads “Sri Lanka rejoining the World”
The place isn’t a paradise for minorities but the economy is recovering— The government of Mahinda Rajapaksa in Sri Lanka has probably botched its dealings with the United States, the European Union and the United Nations. Still, the disenchantment with Colombo may be overblown three years after the end of the 26-year civil war, which ended in 2009. While major countries and agencies continue to wag their fingers in irritation, they are privately moving ahead with interacting with the government.
During a recent macro research visit to the country, we found that there are lingering domestic tensions that risk renewed flare-ups of uncoordinated incidents of violent conflict, but domestically the civil war is now a non-issue with zero risk of a sustained violence derailing a structural peace.That doesn’t mean there has been much reconciliation. The New York-based Human Rights Watch NGO said in July that since the war ended the government “has not launched a single credible investigation into alleged abuses.” Continue reading
Normalization Process proceeding in North, says Aryasinha for the government
Statement by Ravinatha P. Aryasinha, Permanent Representative of Sri Lanka and Leader of the Sri Lanka Delegation to the 21st HRC yesterday
My delegation takes note of the High Commissioner’s statement. Sri Lanka is firmly committed to maintaining the independence of the OHCHR, and supports the High Commissioner in her efforts to fulfil her mandate as contained in GA resolution 48/141. Towards this end, we see constructive engagement by states aimed at increasing transparency in funding and staffing of the OHCHR, as a means of enhancing the institution’s credibility, efficiency and independence.
Independent functioning: We also encourage special procedures to vigilantly and vigorously observe the provisions as delineated in HRC Resolution 5/2 and the Code of Conduct as annexed, in the execution of their respective mandates, through a professional and impartial assessment of facts, to maintain credibility. Continue reading
