'The War on Terror' - from Birmingham to Batticaloa
-- S.M.M. Bazeer
"Radical Islamist extremists, often called
'fundamentalist', were US favourites in the 1980s, because they
were the best killers who could be found. In those years, a
prime enemy of the U.S. was the Catholic Church, which had sinned
grievously in Latin America by adopting 'the preferential option
for the poor', and suffered bitterly for that crime. The West
is quite ecumenical in its choice of enemies. The criteria are
subordination and service to power, not religion."
--- Prof. Noam Chomsky
George Bush & Co. do not have intellectual property rights
on the slogan 'War on Terror.' It was originally coined by Ronald
Reagan to focus his war of terror on Central America and the Middle
East. This long war has been ramified in different forms by his
successors. Maybe the new 'War on Terror' will soon spread all
the way to Eravur in Batticaloa in its search for Saddam Hussein!
From Birmingham to Batticaloa
In the late 1980s, the late Dr. Fareed Meeralebbe, the then Deputy
Minister and MP for Batticaloa district, pioneered a free housing
scheme for the Muslims among his constituents. During an official
visit to Iraq, Dr. Meeralebbe persuaded Saddam Hussein to help
the poor Muslims of his birthplace in Sri Lanka. The "Saddam
Hussein Village" was thus erected near the border between
Eravur and Thalavai. Coincidentally, in the late 1980s, a mosque
in Birmingham in England was also named after Saddam Hussein following
his generous donation towards its construction.
Almost two decades later, things have changed dramatically: Saddam
Hussein has been deposed and is being hunted down in the pursuit
of the 'War on Terror.' The coalition forces have not stopped
with Iraq. They have now forced the trustees of the "Saddam
Hussein" mosque in Birmingham to strike out the name of "Saddam
Hussein." In a context where the coalition has failed to
find either Saddam Hussein or the reputed Weapons of Mass Destruction
(WMD), they have turned to the symbolic destruction of Saddam
rather than the evasive man himself, commencing with the destruction
of his statues in Iraq and then the wiping out his name from a
Birmingham mosque.
Ranil Wickramasinghe has provided ultimate justification for
the war on Iraq, and sent out his response to George Bush's infamous
" You are either with us or against us" - Bush's ultimatum
for unity in the 'War on Terror." So with the US administration
in hot pursuit, this may soon force Ranil Wickramasinghe's government
to change the name of the Saddam Hussein village in Eravur as
it may seem downright anathema to Bush's allies.
Terror on the Saddam Hussein Village
The Saddam Hussein Village had become one of the targets of the
terror of the LTTE in 1990. Innocuous poor Muslims who were fast
asleep were brutally butchered by the Tigers without the sound
of a gun being fired, and the village still bears the scars of
the massacre. The villagers were terrorized, and had to evacuate
their houses and shelter in makeshift refugee camps in Eravur.
Until recently they have lived as 'internally displaced' people
together with those refugee populations who were expelled from
Rugam, Iluppatichenai, Kardiyanaru, etc. Ironically the LTTE,
the attackers of the Saddam Hussein Village, was itself later
designated as also a foreign terrorist organization in the US
by former Secretary of State Madeline Albright in October 1997,
a designation which has been renewed every two years ever since.
Muslim Radical Elements and the SLMC
In the early 1990s Kautilya wrote in The Island newspaper that
the international wave of Islamic fundamentalism was infiltrating
into Sri Lankan Muslim politics and he saw the SLMC as a party
in line with Iranian 'fundamentalism,' but this proved to be a
myth. The SLMC has never been a religious party as alleged by
the ultra-nationalists, despite the claim that their constitution
is derived from the Quran per se. It remains a political party
that is mainly concerned with winning elections. The question
of extremism has never arisen in the party, insofar as their supporters
mainly concern themselves with political concessions. The SLMC's
political beliefs are very middle-of-the-road, encompassing people
from Anandarajah (the SLMC Jaffna candidate in the 2001 General
Election) to Asitha Perera (former SLMC MP and confidante of Mr.
Ashraff). The formation of the NUA, along with Mr. Ashraff's last
statement that he was bidding farewell to the SLMC, indicated
that he needed a non-racial national political party as an alternative
to the SLMC.
Like his late leader, Mr. Hakeem has also never wanted to promote
the emergence of extremism among Muslims. They have been most
conscious of what happened to Tamil leaders at the hands of their
own youths who took up arms. There may be any number of political
gimmicks in democratic politics, but things usually turn sour
when there is an element of militancy among the communities who
would favour armed struggle. The SLMC had been always cautious
about their own survival. They have given religious flavour to
their election propaganda as a ploy to bag votes but would never
dare promote such a phenomena. Mr. Rauff Hakeem publicly condemned
the Taliban as fanatics. Moreover, the leaders of the SLMC address
their supporters as 'Poralikale' (fighters) in order to arouse
them as kind of 'fighters' in their election contests. Their contests
have nothing to do with arms, but with bunkum. Nevertheless, it
has also a history of intimidating their political opponents in
an 'undemocratic' way through the use of their local hooligans.
Unfortunately the recent communal disturbances between the Tamils
and Muslims have created a breach, and the Muslims tend to believe
that they are helpless. In the absence of strong local or national
Muslim political leadership, they may gain tendencies to call
themselves "Osama Group" or some other name identifiable
with extremism, without actually having any links to international
organizations of such calibre. This radicalism may gain ground
in a time of oppression. Interestingly, terrorism experts like
Rohan Gunaratne may find a new niche for his research to propound
his theory of "Osama's links in the East." Maybe he
could have gathered some clues if he had been to the Eastern Province
during the last election, when Segu Dawood, the SLMC candidate,
and his minions were freely distributing T-shirts with Osama's
portrait to entice voters at the time of the Afghan War in 2001.
As a political gimmick, he portrayed his supporters as followers
of Osama bin Laden, who they would have never heard of prior to
September 11th. This type of idiotic exposure of innocent Muslims
may well fuel tales of extremism.
Security Situations of the Muslims Since the Tamil Struggle
During the eighties, the UNP government established many paramilitary
units, including the now notorious 'Home Guard' units. These units
were purported to provide security to Sinhala and Muslim border
villages but mainly served to unleash counter-terror on Tamil
villagers. JR and his successor's government exploited the volatile
security situation of the Muslims to recruit youth to form Home
Guard units. However, this move was not supported by many Muslims,
and in fact, some Muslim youths even joined the LTTE in the late
1980s. Then there was a series of attacks on Muslim Home Guards
in some parts of the East in 1987. The LTTE issued the following
statement:
"The Muslim people clearly understood the LTTE's position
and supported us. Increasingly large numbers of Muslim youths
joined our liberation organization on whose representation, insistence
and active participation the LTTE was compelled to launch attacks
on this armed Muslim home guard's group killing 30 of them on
the 30th December 1987 at Kattankudy and another 9 of the same
home guard groups at Oddamavadi in November 1997. The LTTE has
also banned the EPRLF and TELO as these groups are also engaged
in treacherous activities to create tension and division among
the people, for their own ends." (LTTE statement, 2 January
1988) Ironically all these groups have now united under the TNA
and have accused the Muslims of extremism so as to force them
to fall in line with the LTTE.
However, the security of the Muslims became a major question
after the LTTE began carrying out massacres against Muslims in
the East and began kidnapping numerous Muslim individuals in the
period between 1987 and 1990. Those Muslim youths in the LTTE
deserted when they found out that their own people were massacred
in 1990. History has repeated itself. The recent disturbances
between the Tamils and Muslims have once again raised the question
of Muslim security. As far as the politicians and the government
are concerned, police recruitment may be an alternative solution
for them to avoid such an emergence of militancy among Muslims.
Thus they can easily recruit poor Muslim youth who have no choice
of easy employment other than joining the police force. The Muslim
parliamentarians will also bag more votes as job providers. But
everybody should bear in mind that the bottom line is that the
Muslims are extremely concerned about their security as they have
been persecuted by Tamil militias in the North and East for more
than two decades.
The Information War
The Tamilnet website has been waging an anti-Muslim propaganda
war for quite a long time without contemplating the possible consequences.
A few months of the official cessation of hostilities brought
about hostilities between the Muslims and Tamils, when leaders
like Karikalan openly accused the late SLMC leader, as Minister
of Ports, of stockpiling arms in the Muslim villages. The Tamilnet
has always been the primary source for spreading canards about
Muslims. The Tamil Guardian (London, 13 February 1999) reported,
"There are several Islamic fundamentalist groups active in
the East that are agitating for the strict implementation of Islamic
Law." The Tamilnet has always been the source of information
to the international Tamil media. In or around July 2002, the
Tamilnet accused, among other things, that the Muslims of Valachenai
had kidnapped a Tamil woman; and when this turned out to be a
media mockery, they never apologized to the Muslims. This website
has masterminded a series of anti-Muslim campaigns at times of
interracial mix-ups and violence.
There has also been deliberate attempts by other Tamil media
and politicians to belittle the Muslims' radical points of view,
their aspirations and even their demonstrations. It was unfortunate
that Eelanadu (10-16 January, 2003) highlighted such a fear of
Muslim "extremism" in line with the major southern Sinhala
news media. This was also reflected in the speeches of the President
and the former Foreign Minister Kadirgamar. We have also seen
how antagonistic Joseph Pararajasingham is towards the Muslims
of the East. During the recent 2001 Valachenai violence he alleged
that those who were against the legitimate rights of the Tamils
being realized through the peace process, "..were systematically
instigating armed Islamic extremists to attack Tamils and create
general violence in the East" (Tamilnet, 27 June 2002). He
has never blamed the Tigers whenever they have systematically
violated the human rights of Muslims. Ironically it was around
this time that Suda Ramachandran wrote in the Asian Times: "The
Eastern Tigers are opposed to negotiations, and whether the LTTE's
eastern cadres are fuelling the violence is a moot point."
It has been the history of the Eastern Tiger leaders and their
mouthpiece Mr. Pararajasingham, who, unlike the leaders of the
North, have raised the temperature in the confrontation between
the Tamils and Muslims.
Preparing a Case for the 'War on Terror'
Misinformation is another form of war, and is aimed at sanctifying
one community and vilifying the other when concerns are raised
for social justice and political rights. It seems that the way
in which the government, the major national parties and the LTTE
portray a handful of belligerent Muslims in the East as 'extremists'
is paving the way for the preparation of a case for war in the
name of 'extremism.' This is how the Sinhala government has unwittingly
promoted extremism among the Tamils by the suppression of their
legitimate political rights, but there now appears to be a coalition
between the government and the LTTE against the Muslims. In the
context of the globalization of the 'War on Terror,' the LTTE
could well infringe the rights of the Muslims in the guise of
exterminating extremism, calling it a 'Crackdown on Muslim Extremists.'
It appears that war has not ended in Sri Lanka. As they say in
Tamil, "Although the rain has ceased the drizzling has not."
In Sri Lanka, on the one hand, a historic ceasefire between the
Tigers and the Government has been achieved; and, on the other
hand, a confrontation between the Muslims and Tamils has been
triggered off in the form of racial tension and violence. There
are also warnings from the Tigers and counterblasts from the People's
Alliance and the JVP. Would it not be politically apt to say in
the words of Plato that "only the dead have seen the end
of war," if there was no end to conflicts between the Tamils
and the Muslims.
Hindsight in Three Dimensions
This is the time for stopping the clashes between the Tamil-speaking
communities of the North and East in light of the lessons of the
Northern Ireland Peace Agreement.
To put an end to confrontation between the Tamils and Muslims
and bring on a lasting solution, we need to learn from our past
as well.
"The tragedies of the past have left
a deep and profoundly regrettable legacy of suffering. We must
never forget those who have died or been injured, and their
families. But we can best honour them through a fresh start,
in which we firmly dedicate ourselves to the achievement and
reconciliation of, tolerance, and mutual trust, and to the protection
and vindication of human rights of all." (Declaration of
Support -- Northern Ireland Peace Agreement)
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