“I honour the cause of Tamil Eelam. I am British. But, we are standing here at Trafalgar Square that celebrates the British Empire. Look at the statue over there. It is of General Henry Havelock. It celebrates the massacre of Indian people in 1857 when, the history books would truly reveal, at least 10 million people were massacred by that man.” said Dr Andrew Higginbottom, the Principal Lecturer in Politics/Human Rights at Kingston University, taking part in the Mu’l’livaaykkaal Remembrance event in London on 18 May 2011
He continued, “This was not just any genocide; this was a genocide planned, including by the international powers, who knew what was going on!”
Arundhati Roy, the Indian author and political activist who is best known for the 1998 Booker Prize winning novel The God of Small Things and for her involvement in environmental and human rights causes, said “The most horrific things I have seen and testimonies I have read are from Sri Lanka” and expressed her angst over how the Sri Lankan state forces targeted hospitals, and bombed people after forcing them to move into a No Fire Zone. The world allowed this to happen, and it will continue to allow this to happen”.
Conservative MP Robert Halfon questioned the international attitude: “Why is that the people across the world, in the Middle East, are crying out for freedom, demonstrating, and the world is looking on and is supporting them in some ways, and yet when the Tamils cry out for freedom and Tamils are murdered and detained in hundreds of thousands, why is that the world does nothing”, Halfon said that this attitude has to stop. He further said, “Tamils deserve freedom, they deserve dignity and they deserve their independence, as they want. That is the right of any nation on earth. It is the right for the Tamils too.” He majestically concluded his memorable speech saying, “As a Jewish person, all I can do is to support Nations who have suffered from Genocide,”
This is the right and popular view of the informed fair and right minded British In fact the world has changed radically since May 2009 when the horrendous nature of the Rajapakses brutality entered the public domain, but not most of the British politicians and diplomats who have learned the art of giving carefully crafted statements .
A lesson in history
In February 1945, as the Second World War neared savage end, British then Prime Minister Winston Churchill ordered 300 bombers over the city Dresden, in Germany. They dropped more than 3,900 tons of high-explosive and incendiary bombs on Dresden. “People were caught in fires as hot as 1000° C”, Britain’s National Archives record. Investigations conducted by a historical commission later concluded that between 22,700 and 25,000 people were killed. Historians of the war still debate whether Churchill’s cold-blooded decision to target civilians was a war crime — or an act that saved lives, by breaking the will of Germans to fight on.
Did the British government under Tony Blair helped RAW and killed so many Tamils lives to break the will of the LTTE to fight on? It is simply pathetic that the Tamil lobbyists has not yet lobbied enough to extract a simple historical statement of truth from the British government that the North and South of Sri Lanka are historical and traditional homeland of Tamils.
The Tamils demoralized after the failure of the democratic Ghandian non-violent 3 decades long struggle to save the Tamils, began supporting the armed struggle of the Tamil youth fighting Sri Lanka’s violent genocide. Naturally the Tamils looked up to the LTTE to save their lives from the oppressiveSri Lanka genocide on a scale that shocks the world especially the West.
The essence of LTTE’s stand is that everywhere and always, ‘rights are not given; they are taken’. It is also time to bring to the attention of all concerned that, the vast majority of the denizens of the north and east seek the restoration of their rights and not devolution of power’; that, while the LTTE was simultaneously leading the armed resistance. Evidently some naively believe that rights could be won and defended without power, unaware of the time-tested truth: ‘ those without power cannot defend freedom’.
Mrs. Sonia Gandhi
This genocide of Tamils was carried on with the fullest aid and assistance of UPA Government of India, at the behest of Mrs. Sonia Gandhi. The United Progressive Alliance (UPA) is a coalition of left political parties in India formed after the 2004 general election. Sonia Gandhi being the president of Indian National Congress, became the chair person and she made Manmohan Singh the Prime Minister of India. The council of Ministers were drawn from members of the UPA. Pranab Mukergee and Manmohan Sing naturally became Sonia’s acolytes.
The world knows a little more than what India wants the world to believe about its role in the brutal military resolution in the screen of ethnic conflict in Sri Lanka. Further India is witnessing rising turmoil all around its borders.
International concern on human rights violations, threat to the media, the state of lawlessness including killings and abductions, and other issues have been mere formalities and have been never translated into action.“Defeated Tamils must knuckle under victorious Sinhalese domination”, is what the Sonia UPA government, or rather RAW wants?
Hence the gratuitous advice to the Tamils from the Delhi South Block’s Friends of Rajapakses urging the Tamils “But in the three years that have passed since the defeat of Tamil Tigers,(Colombo and) Delhi …behave as if the Tamil problem in Lanka was over, and the past is a bad memory which should be allowed to lapse in silence.
Diaspora Tamils to remember
Confront them and never encourage or follow them. “Behold how good and how pleasant it is for brethren to dwell in unity”. -Bible Psalms. Let us up hold the fine British traditions of free speech, an impossible luxury in Sri Lanka, but let us always remember that perception is more than just passive reception of information. Attempts are being initiated to sabotage the growing support of the international community to redress the injustice the Tamils suffered!
Keeping one’s head up and straight is the stand we need. Let us think logically and don’t do anything rash or self-defeating. Success doesn’t come from giving up and quitting, it comes from dreaming and believing that you can get through anything if you set your mind to it.
It is high time, that the expatriates accepted the great words of – Oliver Wendell Holmes; “The great thing in this world is not so much where we stand, as in what direction we are moving.” Also the fitting words of Malcolm X. “If you don’t stand for something you will fall for anything”.
CH4 and Callum Macrae.
The greatest contribution of Channel 4 to the Tamils is bringing out into the open the truth about the savagery of the Rajapakse, disabusing the cruel images of the LTTE parleyed to the world by the South Block Friends of Rajapakses Channel 4’s more balanced picture of the Tamil armed resistance earns it the respect and eternal devotion of all Tamils.
Keeping one’s head up and straight is the stand we need. Let us think logically and don’t do anything rash or self-defeating.
Before the release of the CH4 documentary, the general attitude was to hope for an early end to the conflict by the elimination of the LTTE as a fighting force, so that the imperialist countries can get on with furthering their interests in this island of strategic interest. Irrespective of how the war ends and the conflict continues in other forms, the ‘international community’ has little to offer to the victims.
Quote
“I am writing this in Addis Ababa on the evening of May 16th.
Tonight I was at a screening of the film as part of the Addis international film festival, here in Ethiopia. No Fire Zone is never an easy film to watch – but to watch it today was particularly painful and sad. The terrible events that took place exactly four years today – the executions, the sexual violence, the torture – as well as the final stages of the massacre of innocent civilians – are brought home even more sharply by this forth anniversary.
But the message is getting through, I believe. “
Let me make a humble timely appeal, please!. You have read Callum’s message, haven’t you?
Let us make his task easier and see his enthusiasm and professionalism is on display.
“It is a war waged with the superior manpower, resources and tacit assistance from Indian establishment as well as from all the powers of the world against a humble people who only fight for their liberation and to defend them from genocide.” Malaysian Opposition Leader Annuar Ibrahim.
Tamils who stood their ground against all odds accepting the worst suffering imaginable in the Eelam War; however one call it as ethnic conflict, civil war, a genocide, but not! The Vanni Tamils were willingly accepting the worst suffering imaginable, it was sacrifice as the enthusiastic willingness of fighting cadres of LTTE to become black tigers. The clear message to the world is, “We want Eelam!”
The case is as simple as eating a pie. India in fact RAW with the covert support of the UK & the Sri Lanka government forces killed citizens of a particular ethnicity, namely Tamils. Remember, that we are living in a world where the independence movements of Kosovo and Timor-Leste were backed by the international community, and Guatemalan dictator Efrain Rios Montt is on trial for genocide committed during the civil war in his country.
