Fresh hope for healing

International human rights organisations’ initial reaction to the long-awaited report by Sri Lanka’s Lessons Learnt and Reconciliation Commission was one of rejection. Some even called it a whitewash, following the release of the report on Friday. 

It was always clear, however, that the Sri Lankan government, bullish after its crushing victory over the hitherto invincible LTTE, would not pursue the theme of war crimes to its own detriment, either as reparation for offences committed or in response to international demands led by the UN. As revealed by Wikileaks, US Ambassador Patricia Butenis had penned a memo to her government to the effect that it was not reasonable to expect a sitting government to self-indict itself.

In the circumstances, it is no surprise that the response of human rights organisations to the LLRC report should be critical. Their focus was on accountability for the myriad tragedies that occurred in the course of the war, especially its brutal end phase, and their target has been the government leadership that ran the war machine. The LLRC was not the mechanism to provide the answers they were looking for, as they themselves pointed out at the very outset of the Commission’s establishment when they refused to engage with it at all.

 

DIFFICULT TASK

The LLRC undoubtedly faced a difficult task. The commissioners were appointed in the shadow of the controversial end to the 30-year war that brought massive suffering and loss to its people. On the one hand, the end of the war had brought with it the charges of large-scale human rights violations and war crimes that some were insisting amounted to genocide. On the other hand, there was palpable relief in nearly all of the country except perhaps in those places where the last battles were fought, that the war had finally ended and with it the terrorism, counter-terrorism and bombings that had spanned the previous three decades. The commissioners themselves spent several months hearing more than 1,000 personal testimonies, and coming face to face with war victims.

Leading Sri Lankan intellectuals and think-tanks also came before the Commission to give it their opinions from opposing perspectives. The biggest challenge to the commissioners would have been to decide whether or not to accept the assurances of the government that had appointed them. In their report the commissioners made a fundamental concession to the government. They accepted the government’s position that “the military strategy that was adopted to secure the LTTE-held areas was one that was carefully conceived, in which the protection of the civilian population was given the highest priority.”

Whatever are the stated ideals in the conduct of the war, the reality was bound to be different. In the context of a fight to the death it is very difficult to find out after the event what really happened and why it happened the way it did. 

The government position has always been that the LTTE used civilians as cover to attack and provoke the Sri Lankan forces, and it is established that they held virtually the entire civilian population hostage as human shields. Nevertheless the LLRC has called for inquiries into these incidents that would grant redress to victims and instill confidence in the reconciliation process.  In the case of the video aired by Britain’s Channel 4 video showing footage of apparent battlefield executions of prisoners and of possibly raped and executed women prisoners, the LLRC has called for an independent investigation. In the event that the video is authenticated, it has also called for the “the investigation and prosecution of offenders, as these are clearly illegal acts.”

 

POLITICAL SOLUTION

From an international human rights point of view the most critical issue facing Sri Lanka seems to be that of human rights violations and war crimes and fixing the responsibility on the government leadership. However, from a Sri Lankan point of view the more important issue is addressing the root cause of the war and questions of good governance. It is unfortunate that on numerous occasions, government leaders have said that with the end of the war has come peace, and with peace what is needed is economic development and nothing more. When pressed regarding a political solution, the response of our leaders has been that the demise of the LTTE makes reform unnecessary. 

It is on the issue of a political solution for Tamil grievances that the LLRC has made its most commendable stand against the government. 

The LLRC placed the blame for war on both the Sinhalese and Tamil political leaderships of the past. It stated that “The conflict could have been avoided had the Southern political leaders of the two main political parties acted in the national interest and forged consensus between them to offer an acceptable solution to the Tamil people.  Tamil political leaders were equally responsible for this conflict which could have been avoided had the Tamil leaders refrained from promoting an armed campaign towards secession, acquiescing in the violence and the terrorist methods used by the LTTE against both the Sinhala and Tamil people…”

The Commission also states that “leaders of all sides should reach out to each other in humility and make a joint declaration, extending an apology to innocent citizens who fell victim to this conflict, as a result of the collective failure of the political leadership on all sides to prevent such a conflict from emerging”. It also calls for an outlawing of the “hate speech” that led to communal disharmony and urged religious leaders and civil society to work towards forgiveness, compassion, reconciliation and healing.

Much of what the LLRC says is not new, but the thoughts and ideas that the LLRC report expresses came from Sri Lankans who made their submissions before it, but whose voice has been drowned out in the nationalism of the post-war period. The LLRC has taken this collective experience and insight and reaffirmed it at a time when the country has taken the wrong track in seeking to rebuild post-war Sri Lanka while simultaneously retaining and even strengthening the institutions and practices of the war period. 

The LLRC report reflects a shift of thinking that calls for a break with that past if Sri Lanka is to learn its lessons well and achieve reconciliation between its people of diverse communities.