The Reign of Terror

[akootha]

The Reign of Terror

 

The Justice and Peace Commission of the Catholic Diocese of Jaffna would like to bring to the attention of the peace and freedom-loving people, the fact that people in the North of Sri Lanka continue to be tormented by ‘State Terrorism’. Of late the situation has worsened. Since November 2012 the repressive measures of the Sri Lankan government unleashed on the people, and the arbitrary arrests of the Jaffna University students and other youngsters, have reached new heights.
 

We have earlier pointed out four months back that the lasting peace we longed for still remains elusive, and that the measures taken by the Sri Lankan Government do not in any way help to bring about this peace. The present developments indicate that the peace-loving people are on the verge of total despair, and we have no hesitation in presenting the current situation now as a ‘Reign of Terror’.
 

Three episodes that look place in November 2012 brought about a deterioration of the general situation, and these cause concern and worry for us and for our people. These are the following:
 

1) During the last week of November the Hindus celebrate a special festival of lighting lamps (Vilakkeedu) when they light small lanterns in their temples and in their houses. This year (2012) this specific festival coincided with the Heroes’ Day of the LTTE. Well in advance the Hindu authorities had explained this to the Police, and the Senior Police Office in Jaffna (S.P.) had given permission to the Hindus to light the lamps and go ahead with the celebration. With such assurance the Hindus went on with their celebration lighting the lanterns only to be interrupted by the security forces who ordered them not to do so. In some places some ‘unidentified men’ came on motorcycles and ordered the people to put off the lanterns and threatened them.
 

2) On 27.11.2012 there was an unusually heavy concentration of the security forces around the Jaffna University premises, as November 27th used to be the day the LTTE remembered the dead during the past 30 year war. The security forces suspected that the university students would light some lamps to remember the dead in the war. Hence in the evening the security forces barged into the campus and entered the hostels of boys and girls causing pandemonium and damage to things and furniture around. The students were threatened not to have any kind of commemoration for the dead.
 

The following day (28.11.2012) the students organized a peaceful protest against the unauthorised entry and the high-handed behaviour of the security forces. As a sign of the curtailment of their freedom of expression the students had tied their mouths with black bands and were getting ready to march with placards out of one gate of the campus and re-enter by another gate. As the students started their march in a peaceful manner the security forces pounced on them and violently put down the protest, injuring a number of them. About 20 of the students had to be rushed to the hospital.
 

One of the photographs taken during this melee, which appeared in the newspapers the following day, was expressive of the barbarity of the attack on the unarmed students. It showed that one student with his mouth tied with a black band had tripped and fallen, probably while running for safety. This student who was flat on the ground was surrounded by three policemen armed with clubs. These policemen were beating the student simultaneously with their boots and their clubs.

 

The media men who came to the spot were also beaten up. The local M.P., Mr. Saravanbavan came to the spot and when he was trying to tell the security forces to exercise restraint, he was abused and intimidated. The windscreen of his vehicle which had been parked where the army was, was also smashed.
 

3) The aftermath of the campus incidents is still more disturbing and sending shock waves around, causing panic. Soon after the quashing of the peaceful demonstration of the campus students with an iron hand, four of the university students were arrested and taken to Vavuniya for questioning. In the following days some more university students and some more youths in the Jaffna peninsula were arrested. As days passed by more arrests were made, and on the 10th December the number of those arrested, students as well as others, had soared up to 45. Some of those who were arrested are the youths who have gone through a period of rehabilitation due to their alleged involvement with the LTTE. All these youngsters are being held in detention under the draconian Prevention of Terrorism Act (PTA). Hundreds of such youngsters who are now living normal lives with their families are very much disturbed by these arrests.
 

 

 

Lessons Not Learnt
Taking into account the above developments here, we feel that no lessons have been learnt from the serious mistakes of the past governments, due to which hundreds of thousands of precious lives have been lost. The use of violence to put down the peaceful Satyagraha demonstration on the Galleface Green by Mr. S.J.V. Chelvanayagam when the ‘Sinhala Only’ law was passed, led to the birth of Tamil militancy. We are very well aware of the cost of this by way of hundreds of thousands of lives. Now what happened in the Jaffna University is completely unwarranted and the Sri Lankan Government seems to be igniting another cycle of violence.
 

We have quite justifiable fears for the safety of the dozens of youths who are being detained in Vavuniya for questioning under the PTA. Not even six months have passed since the torture and killing of two Tamil political prisoners who were in Vavuniya (Nimalaruban and Dilruksan); we have not heard of any action taken against the jail guards and other officers in the prisons who were involved in the torture and killing of these youths. The longer these people are kept in detention, the more risks they are exposed to their lives.

 

The findings of the recent U.N. reports on the last days of the war in Sri Lanka not only brought to light the fact the U.N. had failed miserably in not giving adequate protection to the civilians, but also laid bare the real face of the Sri Lankan security forces. Some of the most powerful and influential countries which have supported the Sri Lankan government to win the war against LTTE have begun to realize that there had been large scale human rights violations, violation of internationality accepted norms of treating the surrendees fairly, breaking of promises given (e.g. promises not to use heavy weapons and not to attack civilian targets), protracted delay in tabling a meaningful solution package to the ethnic problem, etc., show that even after such
heavy loss of lives and property, the International Community is still not able to take a firm decision. The U.N. and the powerful countries merely express their concern and worry over the developments here. This kind of expression of disapproval does not go far enough and the plight of the minority Tamils remains the same.
 

The international community should realize that the current situation which is volatile cannot be remedied by local public protests, protests by local M.P’s, newspaper condemnations, etc. as the past experiences show. There is an urgent need for some firm action to be taken by the U.N. and the international community to stop another cycle of violence and large scale loss of innocent lives.
 

Rev. Fr. S.V.B. Mangalarajah
Chairman
Justice and Peace Commission of the Catholic Diocese of Jaffna
11.12.2012