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A SHORT HISTORY OF THE TAMIL EELAM LIBERATION STRUGGLE
INTRODUCTION Sri Lanka formerly called Ceylon in English and known in Tamil as ILANKAI or EELAM is an island situated at the southern extremity of the Indian subcontinent, separated from it at its narrowest point by only 22 miles of sea called Palk Strait. It lies between six and ten degrees north of the Equator, and on the longitude of 79 to 81 degrees east. Its area is 25,332 square miles comprising Sri Lanka 18,042 and Tamil Eelam 7,290 sq miles. The total population is 17,103,000, according to latest population statistics (1991), consisting of 12,656,000 Sinhalese, 3,113,000 Tamils, Muslims (mostly Tamil speaking) 1,214,000 and others 120,000.
THE EARLY TAMILS
The Tamils are an ancient people with a history dating back to atleast 2,500 years. The Tamil language, the lingua franco of the Tamils, is one of the five oldest living languages of the world. The Tamil classical literature, popularly called the Sangam (Academy) literature (1st -4th Century AD) is a collection of poems of lasting quality and artistic merit. They reflect faithfully the high level of civilization and literary attainments of the ancient Tamils.
THE EARLY SINHALESE
The Sinhala people trace their origins in the island to the arrival of Prince Vijaya from Bengal in India, about 2500 years ago. The Mahavamsa, a Sinhala chronicle written by a Buddhist Bhikku by the name of Mahanama, (6th Century AD) records that Prince Vijaya arrived on the island on the same day that the Buddha attained enlightenment.
WHO CAME FIRST
Although attempts are made to trace the history of Ceylon before the arrival of Vijaya (about 500 BC), who is credited as the founder of the present Sinhalese race, there is sufficient historical and archaeological evidence to prove the existence of a high level of civilization before him. The proto history of Ceylon could be traced back to atleast 5000 years to the period of Raman of the epic Ramayanam. Raman (the same Raman about whose temple there is violent dispute between the Hindus and Muslims in Uttar Pradesh India at present) who was an Aryan king from north India fought against the Tamil Yaksha king of Ilankai (Ceylon) Ravanan who had abducted Rama's wife Seethai. Jawaharlal Nehru in his book Glimpses of World History describes the war between Raman and Ravanan as a war between the Aryans and Dravidians.
Therefore, the oft-repeated question as to who came first, the Tamils or the Sinhalese, is a controversial subject emotively debated by both the parties, but the following observation by the eminent Sinhala historian and Cambridge scholar, Paul Peiris represent an influential and common sese point of view:
" ... it stands to reason that a country which was only thirty miles from India and which would have been seen by Indian fisherman every morning as they sailed out to catch their fish, would have been occupied as soon as the continent was peopled by men who understood how to sail ..... Long before the arrival of Prince Vijaya, there were in Sri Lanka five recognised isvarams of Siva which claimed and received adoration of all India. These were Tiruketeeswaram near Mahatitha; Munneeswaram dominating Salawatta and the pearl fishery; Tondeswaram near Mantota; Tirkoneswaram near the great bay of Kottiyar and Nakuleswaram near Kankesanthurai. Their situation close to these ports cannot be the result of accident or caprice and was probably determined by the concourse of a wealthy mercantile population whose religious wants called for attention ...." (Paul E. Pieris: Nagadipa and Buddhist Remains in Jaffna: Journal of Royal Asiatic Society, Ceylon Branch Vol.28)
EARLY POLITICAL HISTORY
The early political history of the people of South India and Sri Lanka, before the advent of the European powers, is largely a chronicle of the rise and fall of individual kingdoms. South India was ruled mostly by the three great Kings Cholas, Seras an Pandiyas. Sometimes they fought against the invaders and some times they warred against each other. In addition to these three great kings there were also petty kings who ruled over large tracts of land, nominally independent, but paying tribute to one or more of the three Kings. Among the three kings the Cholas were easily the most powereful and the only naval power in India. The army of Raja Raja the Great (984-1014) invaded Ceylon, made Rajarata a part of the Chola empire, and founded Polonnaruwa as the capital city.
Rarajah's sone Rajendra (1014 - 1044) further extended the Chola empire, so that in the 11th century the mighty Cholas ruledd over Ceylon, Kampuchea, Malaya and greater part of Indonesia.
The society was fuedal in structure and alnd was the most dominat means of production. The Sangam literature provides evidence of the lucrative two-way trade these kingdoms had with far away Roman and Greek empires.
INDEPENANCE IN 1948
Sri Lanka attained its independence from British colonial rule in February 04,1948. The first parliamentary elections were held in 1947 under the Soulbury constitution. The total members of parliament was 96 with an additional 6 appointed members representing minority communities. Mr.D.S.Senanayake, the leader of the United National Party (formerly Ceylon National Congress), formed the government. He became the first Prime Minister of an independent Ceylon.
THE KINGDOMS
Ceylon had been ruled by both Tamil and Sinhalese kings, the Tamil Kingdom comprising the north and eastern parts and the Sinhalese Kingdom(s) the western & southern parts of Ceylon. There were brief periods when the whole of Ceylon came under a single ruler. Otherwise, there existed two or more Kingdoms and the Tamil Kingdom always one of them. The Tamil Kingdom, later came to be called the Jaffna Kingdom existed as a separate polity for centuries. The first war between a Tamil King who ruled Anuradhapura and a Sinhalese king from the south was fought in the 2nd century BC.
In 1505 when the Portuguese landed in Ceylon there was not one but three Kingdoms, the Jaffna Kingdom in the north & east, the Kotte Kingdom in the west and Kandyan Kingdom in the centre. The Jaffna Kingdom was captured by the Portuguese when the king of Jaffna was defeated in June,1619. He was captured and taken by the Portuguese to Goa where he was hanged. The Portuguese ruled Jaffna Kingdom from 1619 to 1658. The Dutch who captured the Kingdom from the Portuguese ruled till 1795 and the British till February 03,1948.
The Jaffna Kingdom was ruled as a separate polity both by the Portuguesepresentation. This demand came to be known as 50-50 envisaged allocating 50% of the parliamentary seats to the Sinhalese and the balance 50% to the Tamils, Muslims, Burgers and other minority groups. This was rejected by the Soulbury Commission, but they did incorporate Section 29 (2) (b) and (c) which curtailed the legislative power of Parliament to "make laws for the peace, order and good government of the island". This Section provided that no such law shall impose any disabilities, or confer any advantages, on members of any one community only.
TAMILS LOSE CITIZENSHIP AND FRANCHISE
Before the ink could dry on the new constitution, the Ceylon parliament passed the Ceylon Citizenship Act No.18 of 1948, which deprived a million Tamils of Indian origin their citizenship.
This was followed up with the Ceylon (Parliamentary Elections) Amendment Act No.48 of 1949, which deprived the Tamils of their franchise as well. This category of Tamils who had 7 seats in the Parliament and held balance of power in a further 20-30 electorates failed to elect even a single member in the elections to the parliament held in 1953.
THE RISE OF SINHALA-BUDDHIST NATIONALISM
The deprivation of citizenship of a million Tamils was the result of actions of a Sinhala -Buddhist majority which regarded the island as the exclusive home of Sinhala Buddism and the Tamils as invaders from Tamil Nadu in South India.
" The history of Sri Lanka is the history of the Sinhalese race ... The Sinhalese people were entrusted 2500 years ago, with a great and nobel charge, the preservation .... of Buddhism .. in 1956 will occur the unique three fold event - the completion of 2500 years of Ceylon's history, of the tie of the Sinhalese and Buddhism ... The birth of the Sinhalese race would thus seem to gave been not a mere chance, not an accidental occurrence, but a predetermined event of high import and purpose. The nation semed designed, as it were, from its rise, primarily to carry aloft for fifty centuries the torch that was lit by the grear World-Mentor (the Buddha) twenty five centuries ago.. " (The revolt in the Temple, by D.C VIjayawardena, 1953).
This is just one example of what has become the battle cry of the Sinhala-Buddhists sole and exclusive claim to the whole of Ceylon. Before him the great Buddhist revivalist Anagarika Dharmapala (1864-1931), whose earlier name was Don David Hewavitarne took the name of Anagarika (in Pali meaning "the homeless one") and Dharmapala ( meaning "the guardian of the doctrine") in his book History of an Ancient Civilization (1902) wrote:
Ethnologically, the Sinhalese are a unique race, in as much as they can boast that they have no slave blood in them, and were never conququered by either the paga Tamils or European vanadals who for three centuries devastated the land, destroyed ancient temples, burnt valuable libraries, and nearly annihilated the historic race .... This bright, beautiful island was made into a paradise by the Aryan Sinhalese before its destruction was brought about by the barbaric vandals .... For the students of ethnology the Sinhalese stand as the representatives of Aryan civilization ...
This potent mixture of legend and superstition, passe off as historical fact, was nurtured, refined and exploited by successive Sinhalese political leaders who sought to perpetuate their rule over the Tamils.
THE SINHALA ONLY ACT OF 1956
As predicted with remarkable foresight by S.J.V.Celvanayagm in Parliament during the debate on Citizenship Bill ( 1948) the next blow was dealt to the Tamils when the Sri Lanka Freedom Party Government of Prime Minister S.W.R.D. Bandaranayake enacted Sinhala Only as the Official Language in June 1956. The enactment of this Act, quite contrary to the hitherto official policy of recognising both Sinhalese and Tamil as Official languages, made Tamils second class citizens in their country of birth overnight.
It was undoubtedly a betrayal of the two language policy of considering both Tamil and Sinhalese as official languages. Politically it was a master stroke by the majority Sinhalese to deprive jobs in the government and state corporations. The Tamils were humiliated to a degree that left generations of Tamils to feel socially as outcasts and politically second class citizens.
Phillip Gunawardene, a Minister in Bandareanayake's government and a vocivorous champion of Sinhal Only told Parliament:
"We are completeting by this (Sinhala Only) Bill an important phase in our national struggle. The restoration of the Sinhala language to the position it occupied before the occupation of this country by foreign powers, marks an important stage in the history of the development of this island" (Hansard, 14th June 1956)
The peaceful Satyragraha by the Tamils to protest against the Sinhala Only language policy at Galle Face Green overlooking the Parliament in Colombo was broken up by Sinhalese hoodlums. This was followed by Island wide riots in which hundreds of Tamils lost their lives and property worth millions destroyed. The 1956 riots was the beginning of a series of racially motivated Tamil pogroms by Sinhalese covertly encouraged by successive governments and overtly supported by the security forces. These pogroms with increased ferocity and venom were repeated in 1958, 1961, 1977, 1979, 1981 and 1983.
In July 1957 Mr.S.W.R.D.Bandaranayake signed a pact with Mr.S.J.V.Chelvanayagam, popularly called the Bandaranayake- Chelvanayagam pact, of the Tamil Federal Party giving a measure of regional autonomy in spheres of land, language, education, etc. But the pact was torn apart by Mr.Bandaranayake under pressure from Sinhalese-Buddhist chauvinists. Foremost among them was no other than Mr.J.R.Jayawardena of the United National Party who undertook a march to Kandy in protest. A similar Pact signed by Mr.Chelvanayagam with Mr.Dudley Senanayake in 1965 too met the same fate.
A non-violent Satyragraha campaign launched by the Tamil Federal party in the northern eastern provinces which paralysed civil administration was ruthlessly broken-up using the army. This army is dominated by the Sinhalese (99%) and continued to be used as an instrument of state terrorism to this very day. The entire security forces now number over 100,000 and heavily armed with modern military hardware, fighter bombers, helicopter gun- ships,tanks, armoured vehicles, naval patrol boats etc. The government of Sri Lanka is currently spending upto 20% of the state budget to maintain it.
In 1970 the government of Mrs.Srimawo Bandaranayake (widow of Mr.S.W.R.D.Bandaranayake) rubbed salt into wounds by introducing the notorious "Standardisation" of education. This discriminate policy required higher marks from Tamil students for University admissions visas adopted which removed even the meagre safeguards [(Section 29 (2) (b) & (c)] contained in the Soulbury constitution. This infamous constitution, ironically authored by a Troskite (4th International) Minister in Mrs.Bandaranyake cabinet created the conditions for the political alienation of the Tamils and a deep wedge between the two nations. The constitution incorporated the Sinhala Only Act as part of the constitution and enthroned Buddhism as the foremost religion to be fostered by the state. Amendments moved by the Tamil Federal Party to the draft constitution demanding a federal constitution and parity of status for Tamil along with Sinhalese were defeated by the government. In protest the Federal Party withdrew from further deliberations of the Constituent Assembly and boycotted same. As a mark of protest Mr.Chelvanayagam resigned his seat in Parliament and challenged the government to hold an election to test the acceptability of the new constitution. He simultaneously sought a mandate from the Tamil people mandate for the restoration of the defunct Tamil state. No elections were held till January, 1975 and Mr.Chelvanayagam won the by-election against a government supported candidate with a huge margin of 16,000 votes.
In 1975 confronted with the steadily mounting national oppression, frustrated with the failure of the democratic political struggles, the Tamil national parties converged into a single movement (The Tamging the constitution into operation either by peaceful means or by direct action or struggle"
In the elections that followed the TULF received an overwhelming mandate having won 18 seats out of 24 contested. By fortuitous circumstances the TULF also emerged as the official opposition in Parliament. Unfortunately this was also the undoing
of the TULF since Mr.Amirthalingam, the leader of the TULF, came to be more delighted in his new role as the Leader of the Opposition than leader of a movement committed to win liberation through peaceful means, direct action or struggle. Mr.Amirthalingam started talking about an alterative to the Eelam demand and eventually settled down for District Development Councils. This experiment failed in the face of a chauvinistic and intransigent cabinet. In any case the Tamils felt that the DDC was a sop and the Tamil leadership have been taken yet again for a ride by crafty Sinhalese politicians, specially Mr.J.R.Jayawardena, Prime Minister and later President of Sri Lanka.
In 1978 yet another Constitution was enacted which tightened the enslavement of the Tamils further. The TULF like in 1972 walked out of the constitution assembly and took no part in its deliberations.
In 1979 the Sri Lankan government enacted the notorious Prevention of Terrorism Act to cope with the growing militancy, notably of the Liberation Tigers. This act and the subsequent crack down by the army of Tamil youths made the situation worse and confirmed the fears of the Tamils that the Sinhalese government was hell bent to exterminate them. The racial riots of 1977 and 1979 poured oil on already burning fire.
From 1979, because of the Sinhalese army occupation of Jaffna and the state terrorism let loose on the people, hostility began to grow and the emotional division between the Sinhalese and the Tamils became more acute. A group of highly organised young Tamil militants, first calling themselves the New Tamil Tigers and later The Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam in 1976 emerged to confront the government terrorism by bearing arms.
In July, 1983 the Tamil Tigers ambushed a convey of Sinhalese army in the north and killed 13 Sinhalese soldiers. This ignited another Tamil Pogrom surpassing all the previous ones in its intensity and destruction of life and property. A panicked government of Mr.Jayawardena at the growing militancy of the Tamils and the cry for separation sought to defuse the situation by the 6th amendment to the Constitution by compelling all office holders, including Members of Parliament, to take an oath of allegiance to the unitary constitution. Unable to comply with this forced allegiance the TULF boycotted the parliament and later lost their seats. With the forced political exile and eventual marginalization of the moderate leadership of the Tamils by the constitutional amendment, the Tamil militant groups, notably the Tigers gained ascendancy. Today LTTE is the undisputed and authentic leaders of the Tamil people in the vanguard of the national liberation war.
The many battles and the recent fighting at Elephant Pass which assumed all the hallmarks of a conventional war between the Tamil Tigers and Sinhalese army had established the fact that there are not only two separate nations but two separate armies as well.
Tamil Eelam - Introduction
The Tamil people of the island of Ceylon (now called Sri Lanka) constitute a distinct nation. They form a social entity, with their own history, traditions, culture, language and traditional homeland. The Tamil people call their nation 'Tamil Eelam'.
As a nation, Tamils have the inalienable right to self-determination, a universal principle enshrined in the U.N. Charter that guarantees the right of a people to political independence.
Apart from the right to self determination, the Tamil Eelam may also be justified in terms of international law under the concept of reversion of sovereignty and the concept of effectiveness.
Before a succession of western nations (including the Portuguese, Dutch and the British) ruled the island, there were two distinct kingdoms on the island, the Tamil Kingdom in the north and the Sinhala kingdom in the South.
For ease of administration, the British amalgamated the two distinct nations into a single entity with its capital in Colombo. The British gave Ceylon independence in 1948, handing over control of the entire island to a Sinhalese government, based in Colombo, which renamed the island Sri Lanka.
The Sinhala state's oppression of the Tamil people began in various forms almost immediately, attacking everything that defined the Tamils as a nation.
A series of laws that discriminated against Tamils were implemented. These included making Sinhala, instead of English, the only official language of the country, i.e. Tamils could not be employed unless they learnt Sinhala. The educational structures were altered to restrict Tamil admissions to higher education. Investment in Tamil areas was minimised.
Recruitment of Tamils into the security forces was restricted. The Sri Lankan security forces are almost exclusively Sinhalese. The security forces have been responsible for and continue to carry out human rights abuses and atrocities against Tamil civilians on a genocidal scale.
Sinhala colonisation of traditional Tamil areas was started in the fifties, and was intensified in the eighties with the security forces wiping out Tamil villages and replacing them with Sinhala settlements. Colonisation continues unabated.
Anti-Tamil rioting, with the active participation of the Sri Lankan security forces, has claimed thousands of Tamil lives. Thousands more suffered torture and rape.
As the Tamil people sense of helplessness deepened, Tamil politicians advocated a separate Tamil state. In 1977, the Tamil United Liberation Front resolved in its Vaddukoddai Resolution to campaign for political independence on the basis of the Tamil nation's right to self- determination.
At the general elections of 1977, the TULF demanded a clear mandate from the Tamil people to launch a national campaign to establish the sovereignty of the Tamil homeland. These elections were effectively a referendum the Tamil speaking people voted overwhelmingly in favour of secession.
The Tamil call for independence was met by island wide anti-Tamil rioting. The Sri Lankan government forced all elected MPs to take an oath that they would not seek a separate state.
With all democratic ways to achieve equality having failed repeatedly, an armed struggle for independence began, led by the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE). International Law recognises that the armed resistance of the Tamil people to Sri Lankan rule is lawful and just.
Today, the LTTE has evolved into a military and political organisation representing the aspirations and hopes of the Tamil people.
The island of Sri Lanka, then known as Ceylon, was ceded to the British Crown in 1802 by the Treaty of Amiens of that year. The map of Ceylon attached to the Treaty of Amiens call the Arrow Smith Map of Ceylon depicts the Island of Ceylon as two (if not three) different countries- a Tamil country composed of the Northeast and a Sinhala country composed of the South West and central parts.
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In an oft quoted minute, Sir Hugh Cleghorn wrote in June 1799 to the UK Government:
"Two different nations from a very ancient period have divided between them the possession of the Island. First the Sinhalese, inhabiting the interior of the country in its Southern and Western parts, and secondly the Malabars who possess the Northern and Eastern Districts. These two nations differ entirely in their religion, language and manners." (Malabar meaning Tamil).
Also an illustrious Chief Justice, Sir Alexander Johnstone wrote on 01.07.1827 to the Royal Asiatic Society of Great Britain and Ireland thus:
"... I think it may safely be concluded both from them and from all the different histories which I have in my possession, that the race of people who inhabited the whole of the Northern and Eastern Provinces of the Island of Ceylon, at the period of their greatest agricultural prosperity spoke the same language, used the same written character, and had the same origin, religion, castes, laws and manners, as that race of people who at the same period inhabited the southern peninsula of India..."
The Cleghorn Minute of 1799 and the Arrow Smith Map of 1802 are official proofs that the Island of Ceylon consisted of two separate countries. We quote Sir Alexander Johnstone's letter merely to show to what conclusions even a Chief Justice had come to on the basis of evidence he had.
It is important to remember that the British Government became masters of the whole island only after the fall of the Kandyan Kingdom in 1815 and the Vanni Chieftains in 1818 and looked at this Island from the distant West as a geographical unit and not as political or national states.
It was only in 1833 that the administration was unified under a single machinery. It would be appropriate here to mention that though the British Government unified the administration in 1833 it incorporated the different native administrative structures that existed earlier, with the Kachcheri system which it introduced. This shows that the British did not want to make a break with the past. Local and customary laws were allowed to govern relations amongst members of the community. The Roman Dutch Law, introduced by the Dutch in the maritime areas, was continued as the common law of the Island. This is very instructive. No system of law that existed before the RDL could cover the entire Island. This is again testimony to the fact that the Island was not one country.
The new class of English-educated elite could not bridge the differences between the two peoples in the Island and convert them into a homogenous single nation. In our view this is an impossible task.
The proceedings before the Donoghmore and Soulbury Commissions are an eloquent testimony to the failure of attempts to create a homogenous single "Ceylonese" nation. Needless to say with the departure of the British in 1948 the Tamils in this Island were left to the mercies of the Sinhalese, thanks to the inequitable constitution that was adopted. It is also relevant to mention that Lord Soulbury who headed the last Royal Commission on constitutional reforms, regretting, said that, had he had the experience which he later acquired in regard to the affairs of Ceylon, the would have made other recommendations.
Apart from incorporating the native administrative system of the different areas into the Kachcheri system introduced by the British, they were careful not to disturb the existing power balance between the different racial groups. In the Legislative Council membership was based on communal representation and there was an agreed proportion between the Sinhalese and the Tamils. Over the times this was changed and during the days of the Legislative Council (1924 to 1931) the proportion between Sinhalese and Tamils was 2:1. There were 16 Sinhalese members to the 8 Tamils. Further, the representation in the legislature was subject to the Devonshire formula that no single community should be in a position to out vote all the others combined.
The Donoughmore Constitution, for reasons best known to itself, made a declaration that territorial representation promoted national thinking but community based representation promoted thinking along communal lines. Very curiously Governor Sir Andrew Caldecot and the Soulbury Commissioner, as well as the Colonial Office, thought in identical terms. They gave no explanation for dropping the clearly enunciated Devonshire formula adopted fro multiracial colonies as well as proportional representation agreed to between the Sinhalese and the Tamils.
However, upon independence in 1948, the British Government did persuade the Sinhalese only Board of Ministers to accept the principle of a non-discrimination clause in the Constitution. Accordingly Article 29 of the Soulbury constitution granted powers to the Parliament to make laws for peace, security and good Government and specifically denied capability to the Parliament to make laws discriminatory to, in favour of or adverse to any one community which were not equally applicable to the other communities.
This provision in the Constitution was accompanied by a solemn assurance from the floor of the House by the then undisputed leader of the Sinhalese, the late Rt. Hon. DS Senanayake, that no harm would befall the Tamils by their joining the Sinhalese in working the constitution.
The Privy Council had held that this Article 29 was an entrenched clause and rendered the constitution and not the Parliament sovereign. This provision together with the assurance by Rt. Hon. DS Senanayake, makes the polity of the Dominion of Ceylon a conditional polity. The condition is obviously an assurance of the ethnic majority that they will not avail themselves of the numerical superiority to discriminate against the Tamils.
However on innumerable occasions this condition was violated and serious acts of discrimination did take place. That definitely gives the junior partner, the Tamils, the right to opt out of the polity.
Be that as it may, in 1970, an ingenious device was resorted to deprive the Tamils of the constitutional safeguards and the characteristics of the conditional polity. Three Sinhalese political parties acting in coalition called upon the people to give them a mandate (in the 1970 General Elections) to scrap the dominion polity and create a brand new Republic of Sri Lanka. Of course the response of the voters to the call for a mandate was magnificent but only from the seven Sinhalese provinces.
The voters of the Northern and Eastern Provinces summarily rejected the call for a mandate. The voting figures are given below:-
The Response for the call for the mandate-General Elections-1970
Northern Province (13 electorates)
Total votes polled 334,360
Votes granting mandate 16,179
Eastern Province(9 electorates, 11 seats)
Total votes polled 342,518
Votes granting mandate 79,323*
Total of total votes polled 676,878
Total of votes granting mandate 95,502
Percentage secured for the mandate 14%
* includes Sinhalese voters who were brought into colonization schemes after 1948.
It was a Constituent Assembly which did not have the support of the Tamil people, and from which the representatives of the Tamil people walked out, which enacted the autochthonous Republican Constitution of 1972. It was a constitution which has no legal continuity with the past. The Tamil nation did not consent to its enactment. Once there is a break in legal continuity the sovereignties of the inhabitants of the Island until then under eclipse so to speak, appear once again. Hence the sovereignty of the Tamil nation which was ethnically, geographically and linguistically separately identifiable and distinct, revived. The legal and constitutional deficiencies in Sri Lanka's claim to encompass the North and East should now be apparent. Sri Lanka is no successor to the earlier polities of the British dominion. Sri Lanka was constituted without the authority of the people of the North and East.
The alleged territorial jurisdiction and sovereignty for the whole Island claimed by the Sri Lankan Government are constructed on a false premise. Sri Lanka has no legitimate or legal claim to encompass the North and East, the homeland of the Tamils-Tamil Eelam. Historically the territory called Jaffna Patam that belonged to the Tamil Nation lay in the northern and eastern portions of Ceylon form the limits of Puttalam and Mannar to the Kumbukkan Oya.
In his July 1983 Report on 'Ethnic Violence, the Independence of the Judiciary, Protection of Fundamental Rights and the Rule of Law in Sri Lanka-Fragile Freedoms?' Mr. Timothy J. Moore, M.P. of the Australian Section of the ICJ commented:
'The proponents of Tamil Eelam argue that the northern and eastern provinces of Sri Lanka coincide with the historic boundaries of the kingdom of Jaffna and argue a case that seeks to establish that sovereignty over these territories was never ceded to any conqueror and that, even if such concession had been made at any time in the past, the unilateral renunciation of links with the United Kingdom which took place at the assumption of office by the government of Mrs. Srimavo Bandaranaike in 1972 resuscitated the Tamil sovereignty which had merely laid dormant until then... In the abstract theory of international law, it would appear that the Tamils have at the very least, an arguable case, and possibly a sustainable one.'
It is our submission that the Government of Sri Lanka is suffering from want of legitimacy over the northern and eastern provinces and the ongoing war is one born out of the legitimacy crisis. So it is our submission that liberal and democratic forces of the world must begin to realise the incompatibility of keeping the Tamil nation and the Sinhalese bound together and accept the position of the Tamils and decide to de-recognise the northern and eastern provinces as part of Sri Lanka. In the circumstances, the insistence by certain sections of the international community on 'unity, sovereignty and territorial integrity of Sri Lanka' is untenable and works against the legitimate aspirations of the Eelam Tamil Nation.
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Tamil Eelam demand in International Law
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• 1972 republican constitution repealed safeguards
• Radicalisation of struggle
• Demand for Eelam
• 1977 general election mandate
• Tamil nation born out of oppression
• International Law supports Tamil demand
• Practical need for constitutional formula for secession
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The Tamil Eelam concept first came into political currency in 1959, when in the aftermath of the 'Sinhala-only' official language law of 1956, the 1958 abrogation of the 'Bandaranaike-Chelvanayakam Pact', the Sinhalese riots of 1958, the 'Emergency-1958', the stationing of a permanent army unit in Jaffna and the detention and incarceration of all Tamil F.P.M.Ps in 1958, C. Suntheralingam M.P. for Vavuniya formed the Eela Tamil Ottrumai Munnani (Unity Front of Eelam Tamils) and called for a 'Eela Tamil struggle for independence'.
In a booklet, published the same year, Suntheralingam wrote:
"In the history of Ceylon.. the Eela Tamils never lost their kingdom entirely, except for two short periods of 16 and 6 years, while for much longer periods Tamil kings have ruled over all Ceylon, history is repeating itself and must indeed repeat itself, adapted to modern conditions. When dharma decays and adharma prospers providence intervenes to destroy the wicked and to protect the weak. That ear has dawned once more in Ceylon, Will the Ela Tamils in this hour of danger and disaster to their nation, show their worth and their valour? Will they do their duty, unite as brothers... and join in the Eela Tamil struggle for independence?"
Suntheralingam's call for the struggle for the independence of Eelam made in 1959, did not strike any responsive note or popular interest among the Tamils in the sixties.
1972 republican constitution repealed safeguards
It came into public focus when a feeling of the irrevocable end of the road came into the minds of the Tamils when the United Front government under Prime Minister Sirimavo Bandaranaike, in 1972 repealed the independence constitution. With the repeal went the entrenched and inviolate section 29 anti-discriminatory safeguards, which the Privy Council in 1964 stated was "the solemn balance of rights between the citizen of Ceylon, the fundamental condition on which inter se they accepted the constitution and are therefore unalterable under the constitution."
The Republican constitution, which replaced the independence constitution, consolidated in constitutional provisions all the gains the Sinhala-Buddhists had made in asserting their supremacy and so excluding the Tamils from any power sharing.
It emphasized the rejection of Tamil demands for federal autonomy, regional devolution of powers, and Tamil as the official language of north and east, in these provisions: "The Republic of Sri Lanka is a Unitary State"(Art 2), "The National State Assembly may not abdicate, delegate or in any manner alienate its legislative power, nor may set up an authority with any legislative power, other than the power to make subordinate laws" (Art. 45(1)),"The Official Language of Sri Lanka shall be Sinhala as provided by the Official Language Act. No. 33 of 1956" (Art. 7) and "The Republic of Sri Lanka shall give to Buddhism the foremost place and accordingly it shall be the duty of the state to protect and foster Buddhism" (Art. 6).
To underscore the rejection of the Republican constitution by the Tamils and in response to the mounting clamour from them to back Tamil equality or withdraw from the unitary state, Chelvanayakam, the F.P leader resigned his seat in the House and demanded a by-election to test the acceptability of the new constitution by the Tamil people. On winning the by- election held more than two years later, Chelvanayakam declared:
"Throughout the ages the Sinhalese and Tamils in the country lived as distinct sovereign people till they were brought under foreign domination. It should be remembered that the Tamils were in the vanguard of the struggle for independence in the full confidence that they also will regain their freedom. We have for the last 25 years made every effort to secure our political rights on the basis of equality with the Sinhalese in a united Ceylon. It is regrettable fact that successive Sinhalese governments have used the power that flows from independence to deny us our fundamental rights and reduce us to the position of a subject people. These governments have been able to do so only be using against the Tamils the sovereignty common to the Sinhalese and the Tamils. I wish to announce to my people and to the country that consider the verdict at this election as a mandate that the Tamil Eelam nation should exercise the sovereignty already vested in the Tamil people and become free. On behalf of the Tamil United Front, I give you my solemn assurance that we will carry out this mandate."
Radicalisation of struggle
With Prime Minister Mrs. Bandaranaike and her United Front Ministers constitutionally defining the exclusion and separateness of the Tamil people and holding them subjugated in their own Tamil territory by the use of coercive force, Tamil politics became radicalised by the intervention of the young Tamils who suffered incarceration and torture and had been released from police detention without any charges.
Demand for Eelam
Amidst the fast growing insecurity for the Tamils, the Tamil political leadership formed the Tamil United Liberation Front (TULF) in 1976, and at its inaugural convention, presided over by Chelvanayakam resolved to restore and reconstitute the state of Tamil Eelam. Their resolution stated.
"The first National Convention of the Tamil Liberation Front, meeting at Pannakam (Vaddukodai constituency), hereby declares that the Tamils of Ceylon, by virtue of their great language, their religions, their separate culture and heritage, their history of independent existence as a separate state over a distinct territory for several centuries till they were conquered by the Armed might of the European invaders and above all by their will to exist as a separate entity ruling themselves in their own territory, are a nation distinct and apart from the Sinhalese and their constitution announces to the world that the Republican constitution of 1972 has made the Tamils a slave nation ruled by the new colonial masters, the Sinhalese, who are using the power they have wrongly usurped to deprive the Tamil nation of its territory, language, citizenship, economic life, opportunities of employment and education and thereby destroying all the attributes of nationhood of the Tamil people. And therefore... this Convention resolves that the restoration and reconstitution of the Free, Sovereign, Secular, Socialist State of Tamil Eelam based on the right of self-determination inherent in every nation has become inevitable in order to safeguard the very existence of the Tamil nation in this country."
1977 general election mandate
At the 1977 general election, the TULF went to the Tamil people seeking a mandate from them to establish an independent State of Tamil Eelam. Its election manifesto stated to the Tamil people:
"What is the alternative now left to the nation that has lost its rights to its language, rights to its citizenship, rights to its religions and continues day by day to lose its traditional homeland to Sinhalese colonization? What is the alternative now left to a nation that has lost its opportunities to higher education through "standardization" and its equality in opportunities in the sphere of employment? What is the alternative to a nation that lies helpless as it is being assaulted, looted and killed by hooligans instigated by the ruling race and by the security forces of the state? Where else is an alternative to the Tamil nation that gropes in the dark for its identity and finds itself driven to the brink of devastation?
"There is only one alternative and that is to proclaim with the stamp of finality and fortitude that we alone shall rule over our land our forefathers ruled. Sinhalese imperialism shall quit our Homeland. The Tamil united Liberation Front regards the general election of 1977 as a means of proclaiming to the Sinhalese Government this resolve of the Tamil nation...Hence the TULF seeks in the general Election the mandate of the Tamil Nation to establish an independent, sovereign, secular, socialist State of Tamil Eelam that includes all the geographically contiguous areas that have been the traditional homeland of the Tamil-speaking people in the country.
"The Tamil nation must take the decision to establish its sovereignty in its homeland on the basis of its right to self-determination. The only way to announce this decision to the Sinhalese Government and to the world is to vote for the TULF. The Tamil-speaking representatives who get elected through these votes while being members of the National State Assembly of Ceylon, will also form themselves into the National Assembly of Tamil Eelam which will draft a constitution for the state of Tamil Eelam and establish the independence of Tamil Eelam by bringing that constitution into operation either by peaceful means or by direct action or struggle."
The Tamil people voted in their thousands in the 1977 election and returned 17 TULF Members throughout the north and east. They voted for them primarily as their representatives to the promised proposed National Assembly of Tamil Eelam, which would draft a constitution and "establish the independence of the Tamil Eelam."
Tamil nation born out of oppression
Tamil separatist nationalism was born of subjugation and oppression and as resistance to it. That nationalism of an oppressed nation cannot be contained by repression and force but will have to flower and consummate in the birth of the new nation-state. The attempts of the Sri Lankan government and its repressive agents to oppress, terrorise and drive the Tamil people as refugees will prove to be ineffectual. The earlier this is realised the better it is for future understanding as equal friends of neighbouring sovereign states.
When the past determinations have brought about the present oppressive system, the future is certainly not going to be within the past or present.
In the face of early repression, the Liberation Tiger movement was born to resist that repression (see below- note 1), and as state repression took genocidal proportions (see below -note 2) the Tiger guerrilla strategy was supplanted by the Tiger regular army to defend the Tamil people and their homelands and achieve Tamil freedom.
International Law supports Tamil demand
The UN international Convention on the Elimination of all forms of Racial Discrimination (G.A. Resolution 2106 of 1966) defines "racial discrimination" as any distinction, exclusion, restriction or preference based on race, descent, colour, or national or ethnic which has the purpose or effect of nullifying or impairing the recognition, enjoyment or exercise, on an equal footing, of human rights and fundamental freedoms in the political, economic, social, cultural or any other field of public life"
The whole of the Sri Lankan state system- political, economic, social, cultural, educational, and every other field of public life is based upon the racial discrimination of the Tamil people. Sri Lanka is a state violative of the UN charter obligations and provisions on human rights.
The UN Declaration on the Granting of Independence to Colonial Countries and Peoples (G.A. Resolution 1514 of 1960) states that "the process of liberation is irresistible and irreversible and all people have an inalienable right to complete freedom, the exercise of their sovereignty."
In this Resolution, The General Assembly proclaimed "the necessity of bringing to a speedy and unconditional end colonialism in all its forms and manifestations."
The Declaration stated:
"The subjection of peoples to alien subjugation, domination and exploitation constitutes denial of fundamental human rights, is contrary to the Charter of the UN and is an impediment to the promotion of world peace and co-operation."
The UN International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (G.A Resolution 2200 of 1966, ratified by the Sri Lanka government in June 1980) in Article 1 states:
"All peoples have the right of self-determination. By virtue of that right they freely determine their political status and freely pursue their economic, social and cultural development."
And Article 3 states:
"States Parties to the present Covenant.. shall promote the realization of the right of self-determination and shall respect that right".
The Tamils are seeking precisely this right to self-determination to which they are entitled according to this UN Covenant, which the Sri Lanka government by ratifying has agreed to promote its realization.
The UN Declaration on the International Status of "peoples" and their Right of Self-Determination (G.A. Resolution 2625 of 1970) states:
"The establishment of a sovereign independent state, the free association or integration with an independent state or the emergence into any other political status freely determined by the people constitute modes of implementing the right of self-determination by that people".
The Sri Lanka government has not simply been against but openly oppressive of the Tamil people, as a nation and its political, economic and ethno-cultural interest and advancement. As such the Sri Lanka Tamils have no state and are seeking to create their own sovereign state of Eelam in their own homelands based on their right to self-determination.
They proudly announced their desire for self-determination at the 1977 general election and their political right and their resolve for self-determination must be recognized and supported by the UN and Member States.
The Tamil freedom fighters today assert and bear arms in pursuance of their internationally recognized right to self-determination.
Practical need for
constitutional formula for secession
In practical terms, what is now necessary is a constitutional formula for secession.
In this, the Tamil people need the help of the international community, as the oppressor does not recognize its own international obligations. Otherwise, the state of international relations would be seen to one of paralysis and bankruptcy, the inaction dictated by out-dated clichés of 'Internal affairs', 'territorial integrity', 'national unity', etc.
To avoid further unnecessary violence, turmoil and loss of lives, on both sides, it is the right and the duty of the UN and Member-States, to intervene in recognition of their own obligations and the right of the Tamil people to self-determination.
Secession to day to the Tamil people is not a matter of choice but one of ineluctable necessity for Tamil national self-preservation. "Territorial separation when demanded by cohesive groups with a strong sense of separate identity is essential for human dignity." (Suzuki, Self-determination and World Public Order, 16 Va. Journal of International Law, 779-862 (1976)).
The UN Declaration on the principles of Equal Rights and Self-Determination (G.A. Resolution 2625 of 1970) gives the right of self-determination to peoples within existing independent states when government fail to "conduct themselves in compliance with the principles of equal rights" and when the state does not "represent the whole of the people belonging to the territory without distinction as to race, creed or colour."
Internal violence has many a time threatened international peace and it must be avoided by the timely intervention of the international community.
Henkin, Pugh, Schachter and Smit, the eminent American professors, in their treatise on INTERNATIONAL LAW set down the present practice of States in regard to demand for secession:
"Demands for territorial separation or autonomy will continue to be made, and under the pressure of particular circumstances they may be supported by external states and by international organizations" (p.212).
Professor Robert Jackson of All Souls College, Oxford, in his study of South-Asian Crisis (Bangla Desh) of 1971, concluded with these words:
"The main lesson of the South-Asian Crisis of 1971 was that the working out of historical antagonisms may prove too strong a force for the diplomacy of the great powers to arrest. The appropriate conclusion may be that it is unwise to invest too heavily in the preservation of states-systems whose future is cast in doubt by the operation of local forces."
The particular justifiable circumstance of the Tamil peoples separationist demand is that it developed out of the dynamic of national oppression and resistance and has generated its own momentum and it perceived solution. It is a national liberation sui generis and in the words of David Selbourne of Ruskin College, Oxford, it is "a true national question, if ever there was one."
There is need for enlightened and progressive realization that self-determination necessarily involves attack on existing union, territorial unity and state sovereignty.
But that is for the higher cause of human liberation, human rights and human dignity. The existing state structure cannot be regarded or defended as permanent and immutable in the face of internal colonialism, racial subjugation, genocidal repression, organized programs and massacres of a nation of people. The liberation force of Tamil separatism seeks to achieve for the oppressed and enslaved Tamil people what liberation movements the world over achieved for their people from overseas colonialism. It can be furthered by early recognition and support of Tamil peoples right to secede on the basis of self-determination to establish the state of Tamil Eelam in their own homelands of the north and east Sri Lanka in order to promote, protect and safeguard their life, liberty and pursuit of happiness.
[NOTES (1) The Tiger movement was born in 1972 and at the time of its formation it called itself 'The Tamil New Tigers'. Later, on 5 May 1976, the organization re-named itself the 'Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam'(LTTE). In an interview given by V. Prabhakaran, leader of the LTTE. to Anita Pratab, which appeared in SUNDAY (News Magazine of India of 11-17 March 1984), Prabhakaran said: "I originally formed the movement with a group of the dedicated youths who sincerely believed that armed struggle was the only way to liberate our people. I named the movement 'Liberation tigers' since the Tiger emblem had deep roots in the political history of the Tamils, symbolising Tamil patriotic resurgence. The Tiger symbol also depicts the mode of our guerrilla warfare."
(2) On 15th of July 1979, after enacting the prevention of Terrorism Ac t(far more draconian than the notorius Terrorism Act of South Africa) and having declared an Emergency in Jaffna and also having despatched the military to the Tamil north under the command of Brigadier Weeratunga, J.R. Jayewardene, the President of Sri Lanka gave a special directive to the Brigadier in these words: " It will be your duty to eliminate in accordance with the laws of the land the menace of terrorism in all it forms from the Island and more especially from the Jaffna District. I will pace at your disposal all resources of the state. I earnestly request all law-abiding citizens to give their co-operation to you. This task has to be performed by you and completed before the 31st December 1979." ]
The legitimacy of the armed struggle of the Tamil people
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Democracy may mean acceding to the rule of the majority, but democracy also means governments by discussion and persuasion. It is the belief that the minority of today may become the majority of tomorrow that ensures the stability of a functioning democracy. The practice of democracy in Sri Lanka within the confines of a unitary state served to perpetuate the oppressive rule of a permanent Sinhala majority.
It was a permanent Sinhala majority, which through a series of legislative and administrative acts, ranging from disenfranchisement, and standardisation of University admissions, to discriminatory language and employment policies, and state sponsored colonisation of the homelands of the Tamil people, sough to establish its hegemony over people of Tamil Eelam.
These legislative and administrative acts were reinforced from time to time with physical attacks on the Tamil people with intent to terrorise and intimidate them into submission. It was a course of conduct which led eventually to rise of Tamil militancy in the mid 1970s with, initially, sporadic acts of violence. The militancy was met with wide ranging retaliatory attacks on increasingly large sections of the Tamil people with intent, once again to subjugate them. In the late 1970s large numbers of Tamil youths were detained without trial and tortured under emergency regulations and later under the Prevention of Terrorism Act which has been described by the International Commission of Jurists as a 'blot on the statute book of any civilised country'. In 1980s and thereafter, there were random killings of Tamils by the state security forces and Tamil hostages were taken by the state when 'suspects' were not found.
The preamble to the Universal Declaration of Human Rights reads:
"Whereas it is essential if man is not compelled as a last resort to rebellion against tyranny and oppression, that human rights should be protected by the rule of law."
The rise of the armed struggle of the Tamil people constituted the Tamil rebellion against a continuing Sinhala oppression over a period of several decades. The gross consistent and continuing violations of the human rights of the Tamil people have been well documented by innumerable reports of human rights organisations as well as of independent observers of the Sri Lankan scene.
Walter Schwarz commented in the Minority Rights Group Report on Tamils of Sri Lanka, 1983
"...The makings of an embattled freedom movement now seem assembled: martyrs, prisoners and a pitiful mass of refugees. Talk of 'Biafra' which had sounded misplaced in 1975, seemed less unreal a few years later... As this report goes to press in September 1983, the general outlook for human rights in Sri Lanka is not promising. The present conflict has transcended the special consideration of minority rights and has reached the point where the basic human rights of the Tamil community - the rights to life and property, freedom of speech and self expression and freedom from arbitrary arrest have in fact and in law been subject to gross and continued violations. The two communities are mow polarised and continued repression coupled with economic stagnation can only produce stronger demands from the embattled minority, which unless there is a change in direction by the central government, will result in a stronger Sinhalese backlash and the possibility of outright civil war".
David Selbourne remarked in July 1984:
"The crimes committed by the Sri Lankan state against the Tamil minority - against its physical security, citizenship rights, and political representation -are of growing gravity.. Report after report by impartial bodies - By Amnesty International, By the International Commission of jurists, By parliamentary delegates from the West by journalists and scholars - have set out clearly the scale of growing degeneration of the political and physical well being of the Tamil minority in Sri Lanka... Their cause represents the very essence of the cause of human rights and justice; and to deny it, debases and reduces us all".
A Working Group chaired by Goran Backstrand, of the Swedish Red Cross at the Second Consultation on Ethnic Violence, Development and Human Rights, Netherlands, in February 1985 concluded:
"There was a general consensus that within Sri Lanka today, the Tamils do not have the protection of the rule of law, that the Sri Lankan government presents itself as a democracy in crisis, and that neither the government, nor its friends abroad, appreciate the serious inroads on democracy which have been made by the legislative, administrative, and military measures which are being taken. The extreme measures which are currently being adopted by the government inevitably provoke extreme reactions from the other side... The normal life of the (Tamil) population of the North has been seriously affected. People either have great difficulty or find it completely impossible to continue with their employment and there is a severe shortage of food and basic necessities Many Tamils are daily fleeing across the Palk Straits to Southern India. The continuing colonisation of Tamil areas with Sinhalese settlers is exacerbating the situation... and the country is on the brink of civil war."
Senator A.L.Missen, Chairman, Australian Parliamentary Group of Amnesty International, expressed his growing concern in March 1986:
"Some 6000 Tamils have been killed altogether in the last few years... These events are not accidental. It can be seen that they are the result of a deliberate policy on the part of the Sri Lankan government... Democracy in Sri Lanka does not exist in any real sense. The democracy of Sri Lanka has been described in the following terms, terms which are a fair and accurate description: 'The reluctance to hold general elections, the muzzling of the opposition press, the continued reliance on extraordinary powers unknown to a free democracy, arbitrary detention without access to lawyers or relations, torture of detainees on a systematic basis , the intimidation of the judiciary by the executive, the disenfranchisement of the opposition, an executive President who holds undated letters of resignation from members of the legislature, an elected President who publicly declares his lack of care for the lives or opinion of a section of his electorate, and the continued subjugation of the Tamil people by a permanent Sinhala majority, within the confines of an unitary constitutional frame, constitute the reality of 'democracy', Sri Lankan style."
The reports speak for themselves and that which emerges is a chilling pattern of a forty year genocide attack on the Tamil people intended to subjugate them within an unitary Sinhala Buddhist state.
Karen Parker of the Non Governmental Human Rights Organisation, International Educational Development put it succinctly at the 42nd Sessions of UN Sub Commission on the Protection of Minorities.
"The Universal Declaration of Human Rights states that all persons, including members of minority groups, have the right to the full realisation of their human rights and to an international order in which their rights can be realised.
The Sri Lanka situation has shown that for the past forty years, the Sinhala controlled government has been unwilling and unable to promote and protect the human rights of the Tamil population, and the Tamil population has accordingly lost all confidence in any present or future willingness or ability of the Sinhala majority to do so. Are people in this situation required to settle for less than their full rights. Can the international community impose on a people a forced marriage they no longer want and in which they can clearly demonstrate they have been Abused?... We consider that in the case of Sri Lanka, 40 years is clearly enough for any group to wait for their human rights."
The inhabitants of the Northeast of the island of Sri Lanka constitute a 'people' and are thereby entitled to the right of self determination. Since it has been recognised that the exercise of this right is not designed to dominate others but rather to escape domination by others, the international community, through the General Assembly Resolutions on Friendly Relations Among States (Resolution 2625) and on Definition of Aggression (act 7) and 1977 Additional Protocol I to the Geneva convention of 1949 (Act 1 C4), declared that as a last resort armed struggle can be used as a method of exercising the right of self determination. The Sri Lankan governments use of force in denying the Tamil's right to self determination is in violation of Articles 1 (2), 1 (3), 2 (4) and 56 of the United Nations Charter.
The Tamil people have been subjected to brutal and crude personal psychological and institutional violence by the Sri Lanka government and its agencies. The Sri Lanka Government has built up a massive 70,000 member armed force constituted exclusively of Sinhalese and allocated immense funds for its support. The Tamils have resorted to arms to defend themselves and the war being waged by the Liberation Tigers is a defensive war. Unlike the measures adopted by the Sri Lankan government, this struggle is not aimed at domination; instead it serves to protect the sovereign identity of the Tamil people.
The armed struggle of the Tamil people is both just and lawful because the rule of law for the Tamil people had ceased to exist; because the Government of Sri Lanka had become a racist government; and because the oppressed people of that racist government were compelled to resort to arms to defend themselves against that oppression.
Based on reason and international law and coupled with the absence of any internal or external machinery to realise the Tamil right to self determination, the Tamils resistance evolved from peaceful agitation to armed struggle. As Professor Reisman of the Yale Law School states, "insistence on non violence and deference to all established in a ... system with many injustices can be tantamount to confirmation and reinforcement of these injustices. In some circumstances violence may be the last appeal.. of a group.. for some measure of human dignity.
The international community's recognition of a "People's" right to defend themselves and to use force to secure their legitimate political objectives is reinforced by the contemporary political discourse. The formation of armed forces by the Ukraine, Moldavia; Georgia and Armenia and the European Community's Peace plan for Yugoslavia's current crisis are all proof of the above mentioned proposition.
The legitimacy of the armed conflict of the people of Tamil Eelam was afforded open international recognition when the combatants in the armed conflict, participated in talks with a specially appointed Minister of the government of Sri Lanka at meetings convened by the Indian Government at Thimphu in 1985. It was a legitimacy which was reinforced in February 1987, by the United Nations Commission on Human Right when it adopted a resolution on Sri Lanka in which the armed conflict was discussed in terms of humanitarian law. Again, it was a legitimacy which the Indo Sri Lankan Agreement signed by the Prime Minister of India and the President of Sri Lanka in July 1987, recognised when it described the Tamil militant movement as 'combatants' in an armed conflict. Finally, in 1989/90, the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam engaged in direct talks with the government of Sri Lanka and were accorded recognition as combatants.
The statement made on behalf of the joint Front of Tamil Liberation Organisations at the Thimphu Talks in 1985 serves to underline the just and lawful nature of the struggle of the Tamil people:
"We are a liberation movement which was compelled to resort to the force of arms because all force of reason had failed to convince the successive Sri Lankan government in the past. Further under conditions of national oppression and the intensification of state terrorism and genocide against our people, the demand for a separate state become the only logical expression of the oppressed Tamil people. Our armed struggle is the manifestation of that logical expression."
The future of that lawful armed struggle clearly falls to be determined in the context of the security of the Tamil people and their right to self determination and these are matters for resolution across a negotiating table, not in vacuum.
benja0608@yahoo.com
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