Kumar Sangakkara chosen by Wisden as Leading Cricketer in the World plus One of Five Cricketers of the Year for 2011

Sri Lanka’s Kumar Sangakkara has been chosen as both one of the Five Cricketers of the Year and the Leading Cricketer in the World for 2011 in the 2012 edition of Wisden Cricketers’ Almanack, it was announced on Wednesday.


The 34-year-old Sangakkara, one of the outstanding batsmen of his generation and for much of his career a top-class wicketkeeper as well, became the first man to receive both awards since Wisden, ‘cricket’s bible’, started naming a leading cricketer of the year in 2004, Times of India reported.


In 2011, no-one else came close to the 2,267 runs Sangakkara scored in all international cricket, and he is now the only man to have topped 1,000 runs in Tests and one-day internationals in a single year on three separate occasions.


The left-hander also captained Sri Lanka to the World Cup final, where they were beaten by co-hosts India in Mumbai.


Off the field, he also received worldwide praise for giving a deeply heartfelt MCC Cowdrey Lecture at Lord’s which caused shockwaves in his homeland when he called for the end of political interference in Sri Lankan cricket.


Sangakkara’s career Test record of over 9,000 runs in 108 matches with 28 hundreds at an average of nearly 55 stands comparison with all but a handful of cricket’s greatest batsmen.


Wisden, published every year since 1864, is widely regarded as cricket’s leading reference work.


The Five Cricketers of the Year, chosen solely by the editor of Wisden — the 2012 edition is English cricket journalist’s Lawrence Booth’s first as editor — is an award that dates back to 1889.


Among the other four recipients for their performances in 2011 were the England Test duo of run-hungry opener Alastair Cook, who made 294 against India at Edgbaston, and pace bowling all-rounder Tim Bresnan, yet to be on the losing side in a Test match.


Lancashire captain Glen Chapple was also honoured after leading the Old Trafford-based club to their first outright County Championship title in 77 years, as was fellow seamer Alan Richardson, who took 73 First Division wickets to help Worcestershire avoid relegation.


No one can be chosen as one of the Cricketers of the Year, based primarily on a player’s influence upon the previous English season, more than once

Distancing from Congress and BJP

THE communists in India have preferred strategy to ideology. The occasions have been few, but they have regretted them. At the time of independence, they supported the demand of partition. Subsequently they admitted that they wrongly backed the Muslim League which represented Muslims alone. Marxism, they woefully recalled, demanded a secular approach.


At a congress in Kerala this week, the communists have departed from their vehement opposition to the BJP and instead support the party if the Congress faces the prospect of defeat. The communists have put the BJP and the Congress at par. They have even said that they would not side with the Congress to swell its strength to defeat the BJP which till yesterday represented the communal forces inimical to national interest.


The communists are justified in attacking the Congress for the scams which have cost the public exchequer billions of rupees. The communists are also correct in averring that the Congress has done little to improve the lot of minorities. But where they go wrong is when they put the two parties on the same footing. The Congress, with all its faults, has never propagated against secularism, nor has it accepted the guidance of a body like the RSS which stands for Hindu Rashtriya.


The Congress can be apportioned blame for diluting the principles of pluralism and liberalism. But the BJP has never claimed to be pursuing them. Its credentials have never been liberal from its very birth, when it was called the Jana Sangh. However, it is heartening to know that the communists will not have anything to do with the Congress.


Yet, they must admit that they have been guilty of giving the Congress the veneer of being progressive, whether it was the government of Mrs Indira Gandhi or that of Prime Minister Manmohan Singh. The Communists were partners in the first UPA (United Progressive Alliance) government. The Marxists saved it from defeat in parliament several times.


What will the communists do now when the Special Investigation Team (SIT), appointed by the Supreme Court, has exonerated Gujarat chief minister Narendra Modi from the charge of planned killings of Muslims in the state? True, though one member of SIT Ramachandran has not absolved Modi, the majority has given the clean chit. The state elections are due this year. Surely, the communists are not going to pull their punches because their criticism may help the Congress.


The entire strategy of communists is faulty. It cannot afford to stay silent on matters like communalism even if the beneficiary is the Congress. And how can a responsible party like that of the communists allow the Congress to get away with the murders of Sikhs in Delhi? The state machinery was used to connive at the murders as the Modi government did in Gujarat. The communists have to stand by the victims and the minorities without caring whether the Congress is defeated or the BJP wins.


The communists are on a strong ground when they talk about a democratic alternative. But the problem with them is that they always want to dominate the formation. And seldom do they see beyond the existing regional parties which are parochial, casteist and even communal.  These parties have failed to deliver justice in their own state as they have neither the cadres nor convictions to meet all-India challenges. How can they become an alternative?


The communists have to shed their pride and prejudice to work with the grassroots activists who are spread all over the country. Their ideology is also pro-left but they are not dogmatic or rigid. They find a common denominator among themselves to work together. But they do not compromise with communal casteist elements at any cost. The communists’ willingness to shake hands with the BJP may come in the way of joint action which the activists are proposing to initiate.


Postmortems by the Congress and the BJP of reverses in UP election have not made them any wiser. They are stuck to their old thinking that some rebels cut into the official candidates’ votes or that the party wrangling were responsible for defeat. There are at best rationalizations by the two parties to sustain hope among their followers. The fact is that both parties have lost their way and do not know the direction.


Neither the Congress nor the BJP realizes that they are increasingly becoming irrelevant and look like the once-upon parties. Their statements and activities suggest that they have nothing new to offer. They go on indulging endlessly in the same slogans, the same exhortations and the same promises. The UP election, and the one held earlier in Bihar, have proved that the voters find regional parties closer to their heart and more familiar with their aspirations.


The biggest thing which has hit the two is the voters’ doubt about their integrity. They find them mixed up with the mafias and underhand deals. Manmohan Singh’s regime has been full of scams. A new one appears even before the old one recedes into the background. The BJP’s corruption in Karnataka, both economic and moral, is a continuing saga. One party blames the other but both of them, more so the Congress, are mired deep in corruption and black money. The 2G spectrum scam has reached the countryside as the Bofors gun scandal did.  


Both  parties need to have something like the Kamaraj Plan. In 1963, when Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru wanted to get rid of his critics in the wake of the debacle at the hands of China, he used Congress president K. Kamaraj’s proposal to force the ministers leave their cabinet berths and work in the organization. It was like Mao’s cultural revolution to let ministers and top bureaucrats soil their hands by working in the countryside. Both parties have mostly the same faces for many years. A Kamaraj plan may cleanse the stables of the parties and throw up new faces as well as ideas.


Yet an overhauling alone will not do. The parties have to change their support to the governments’ lassie fare policies. The BJP openly favours economic reforms which have been detrimental to the people of country. The communists have also extended their support to a few. The result is that the rich have become richer and the poor poorer. The criticism by the BJP on price rise or anti-poor has no meaning when the party arrays its support behind the Congress to have disastrous bills passed. What comes out is that the BJP and the Congress are the two sides of the same coin.

J’LALITHAA WITHDRAWS MP FROM PARLIAMENTARY DELEGATION’S VISIT TO SL

Criticising the joint parliamentary delegation’s proposed visit to Sri Lanka as a tourist visit conducted by the Sri Lankan government to help form a favourable opinion for itself, AIADMK general secretary and Chief Minister J Jayalalithaa announced on Wednesday that her party would not be represented in the team as initially agreed.

A 15-member all-party delegation of MPs from both Houses of Parliament led by Opposition Leader Sushma Swaraj are to visit the island nation from April 16-21 to see for itself the condition of the Sri Lankan Tamils. The AIADMK had initially agreed to send Rajya Sabha member A William Rabi Bernard as its representative.

When it was first proposed, Jayalalithaa said in a statement on Wednesday, the party was under the impression that the MPs will be able to interact with the Lankan Tamils now held within the camps for IDPs (internally displaced persons) and learn about their situation directly.

“However, the communication from the Ministry of External Affairs said there was no opportunity to speak to the affected Tamils to learn the problems faced by them. From the itinerary, it seems importance was given only to the meetings with Lankan government representatives and official feasts,” she said. “This tourist visit...seems to be tailored to form an opinion in favour of the Lankan government,” she charged.

Also, she added, there were no journalists, human rights activists or independent monitors in the team, which added to the suspicions. (IndianExpress)

Strategic reasons behind India supporting the Resolution on Sri Lanka at the UNHRC

by P.S.Suryanarayana


Abstract:


A comprehensive calculus of ethnic, political, and strategic factors has shaped India’s firm vote against Sri Lanka at the United Nations Human Rights Council on 22 March 2012. In a broad sense, India has cast a Diaspora Vote, which is compatible with the so-called ‘Indira Doctrine’ of the 1980s.


However, New Delhi, by casting its lot with the United States and by being the lone Asian voice against Sri Lanka on this occasion, has charted a newly interesting and uncharted course in foreign policy.


Introduction: ‘Indira Doctrine’


By the logic of the long-forgotten ‘Indira Doctrine’, India’s latest decisive vote against Sri Lanka at the United Nations Human Rights Council (UNHRC) makes a lot of sense.


In the early 1980s, the then Indian Prime Minister, Indira Gandhi, frequently expressed proactive concern over developments in the country’s neighbourhood. She was concerned that those developments might hurt the interests of India or the sensitivities of its ethnic groups.


No definitive foreign policy pronouncement on those lines was made, although her first comments were directed at Pakistan which was facing a gathering storm of political protest by the Movement for Restoration of Democracy (MRD). Led by Benazir Bhutto, the MRD was at the time campaigning against the then Pakistani military dictator Zia ul Haq.


Regardless of whether or not Indira Gandhi’s comments catalysed the MRD’s campaign, her statements came to be categorised as ‘Indira Doctrine’ in some quarters (and not in her political circles). The so-called ‘Indira Doctrine’ was not the Indian equivalent or version of Washington’s old Monroe Doctrine of hegemony. In today’s political idiom, the ‘Indira Doctrine’ or at least some aspects of it can perhaps be described as a ‘Diaspora Doctrine’.


Surely, New Delhi’s latest vote against Colombo in the UNHCR has not been portrayed by the present Indian Government as a revival or reaffirmation of the ‘Indira Doctrine’. But India’s championing of the “rights” of the minority group of Sri Lankan Tamils in the current situation in that island-republic can be characterised as a Diaspora Vote. It is too early to judge whether a Diaspora Vote in general and, more specifically, this particular one will enhance India’s enlightened national self-interest.


Viewed from another angle, New Delhi’s latest vote, which tilted the political scales (not the voting trend) against Colombo on 22 March 2012, smacks of a double standard in India’s own human-rights diplomacy. The vote against Sri Lanka was adopted by a majority of 24-15, with eight countries abstaining. With a total of 23 countries not having placed Colombo in the dock, as it were, there was a difference of just one extra vote against Sri Lanka in purely political (not numerical) terms. In this situation, the anti-Colombo vote by India, Sri Lanka’s closest neighbour in terms of both civilisation and geography, acquires unusual political importance.


‘Double-Standard Diplomacy’


Contrary to the calibrated enthusiasm with which New Delhi has now voted against Sri Lanka in the UNHRC, India had in the past successfully opposed being pushed into the UN dock on a human rights issue at home. Surely, the current Sri Lankan case and a past Pakistani move against India on the human rights front are not comparable in humanitarian and political terms.


A walk down the memory lane is, therefore, necessary to understand the argument about India’s current ‘double-standard diplomacy’. In 1994, Benazir Bhutto, by then Pakistan’s Prime Minister, moved heaven and earth (metaphorically) to try and get a vote passed against India in the UN Human Rights Commission (the current UNHRC’s predecessor). Her government’s campaign was rooted in the allegations that India was violating the human rights of Muslim “freedom fighters” in the Kashmir valley.


Opposing the Pakistani move, India launched a diplomatic counter-offensive. During that battle of wits, Pakistani and Western diplomats told this writer, then in Islamabad as an Indian journalist, that China and Iran were still keeping Pakistan guessing whether they would at all vote against India.


In the end, China and Iran influenced Pakistan into abandoning its quest for an anti-India vote. Benazir Bhutto was stopped in her tracks. Significantly, the Pakistani move against India had coincided with the efforts by Beijing and New Delhi to think out of the box and think of peace and tranquillity along their disputed border.


Unsurprisingly, therefore, China’s willingness to give India the benefit of the doubt was partially traceable to a new spring in their relationship at that time. As for Iran, India found it necessary to try hard before succeeding.


A Strategic Calculus and a Risk


Human rights diplomacy and strategic diplomacy may not always go together. However, it is evident that India has now jockeyed for possible but not guaranteed ‘strategic gains’ from the United States (US) in the regional and global arenas. This explains, at least partially, India’s agonised but firm choice of joining the beeline behind the US in its single-minded targeting of Sri Lanka on this occasion.


Washington’s current calculations against Colombo are a different story altogether. In sailing along with the US, New Delhi has, therefore, reckoned with or simply discounted the hazards of isolating itself in the South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation (SAARC) and also in India’s extended neighbourhood.


In the light of such a range of insightful standards, the domestic compulsion of coalition politics, which is generally believed to have influenced India’s Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, cannot fully explain its latest vote at the UNHRC.


Widespread is the perception that Singh has had to dance to the tunes of a crescendo of pro-Sri Lankan Tamil sentiment in the southern Indian state of Tamil Nadu. Conspicuous in this context is the parliamentary support that Singh’s coalition government at the pan-India level receives from the Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (DMK) party of Tamil Nadu. Moreover, the ruling party in Tamil Nadu, led by J Jayalalithaa of the All India Anna DMK, did urge the Singh coalition, which does not include her party, to support the US-sponsored resolution against Sri Lanka. Such political peer-pressure on Singh can partially explain India’s voting choice – but only partially so.


More significantly, the other India-relevant factors rooted in the politics of this resolution are too weighty to be missed. It will, therefore, be a superficial exercise to see the Indian vote entirely under the prism of Singh’s domestic political compulsion.


The relevant UNHRC Resolution is believed to be aimed at promoting reconciliation between Sri Lanka’s majority Sinhala population and the island-country’s minorities, including the Sri Lankan Tamils. South Indians – the people of Tamil Nadu in particular but also those of Andhra Pradesh, Kerala, and Karnataka – share the Dravidian ethnic identity with the Sri Lankan Tamils. While Sri Lanka’s Sinhala majority, too, has deep links of history and civilisation with India, this aspect has not had commensurate salience in the contemporary narrative of the relations between the two countries.


It is noteworthy in this sub-context that the relevant UNHRC Resolution makes no direct mention at all of the minority rights of Sri Lankan Tamils by name. Nor is the resolution explicit about another key issue: the alleged extra-judicial killings of the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) activists during Sri Lanka’s recent military triumph in an anti-terror war.


This particular micro-aspect can be explained by the fact that the wider international community saw, and continues to see, the LTTE as a notorious terrorist outfit. The LTTE’s colours are no different in Official India’s view. Interestingly, the now-slain LTTE leader, Velupillai Prabakaran, had told me in the 1980s that he would not become a slave of India in any situation (quoted in The Peace Trap authored by this writer at that time).


UNHRC’s Concerns and Call


The three essential elements of the relevant UNHRC Resolution are:


(1) the Council’s “concern that the report of the Lessons Learnt and Reconciliation Commission of Sri Lanka [LLRC] does not adequately address serious allegations of violations of international law” by the victor, Colombo;


(2) the Council’s “call” that the Sri Lankan Government “implement the constructive recommendations made in the report of the [LLRC] and … take all necessary additional steps to fulfil [Colombo’s] relevant legal obligations and commitment to initiate credible and independent actions to ensure justice, equity, accountability and reconciliation for all Sri Lankans; and


(3) the move by the UNHRC to “encourage the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights and relevant special procedures mandate holders to provide, in consultation with and with the concurrence of the Government of Sri Lanka, advice and technical assistance on implementing the above-mentioned steps”.


Inherent in this long-winded language of the UNHRC are two defining interpretations of this resolution.


First, the Sri Lankan Government, often seen outside as an overwhelmingly Sinhala-dominant executive, has been censured for not having moved towards ensuring post-conflict reconciliation among all communities in that country.


The second and no less important interpretation flows from India’s strategic calculations in having succeeded in amending the original draft to make it more balanced with reference to Colombo’s sovereign rights.


It is true that India’s intervention has not diluted the originally intended censure of the Sri Lankan Government. The absence of a direct reference to the Sri Lankan Tamils as the group in dire need of a healing touch from Colombo can only be seen by the Sri Lankan authorities as a matter of cold comfort.


However, such an explicit omission by the UNHRC does not lend decisive credence to the commonplace theory that Singh has pursued a purely domestic political agenda. The reasoning on these lines helps open up the window on New Delhi’s strategic calculations, which override the political irony of India being the lone Asian voice against Colombo in the UNHRC at this time.


New Delhi has in fact sought to stamp its strategic authority on India’s perceived sphere of influence – South Asia. In the process, New Delhi may have to pay a diplomatic price for being the solitary opponent of Colombo among the eight South Asian and East Asian members of the UNHRC. Of course, this scenario will become a reality only if India comes to be seen as an uncritical camp-follower of the US over the long term.


Defining India’s Diaspora Vote


However, New Delhi cannot also afford to discount the line-up of the UNHRC members from South Asia and East Asia who chose to differ with India on the current human rights situation in Sri Lanka. Significantly, Bangladesh and Maldives – both SAARC members like India and Sri Lanka – voted against the US-sponsored resolution and, therefore, in favour of Colombo.


Moreover, Indonesia, Philippines (quite often a supporter of the US), and Thailand – all three from the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) – favoured Sri Lanka. No less significantly, Malaysia, an ASEAN member with an ethnic-Indian minority, abstained from voting on this anti-Colombo resolution. Abstention was indeed an option which was open to India too.


China from East Asia and Russia from Eurasia – both veto-empowered permanent members of the UN Security Council – turned their faces against the US, another unique power at the United Nations. In a sense, there is nothing very unusual about such an adversarial line-up of the US on one side and China as also Russia on the other, especially on the issue of state-sovereignty over human rights. Nevertheless, what is noticeable is that India stands isolated from, or stands alone among, the UNHRC members from the South Asia-East Asia-Eurasia arc.


A logical question, therefore, is: Why has India chosen to vote against Sri Lanka, a fellow-democracy with some ethnic diversity?


Two of India’s strategic objectives, which define its latest Diaspora Vote, can be discerned behind the diplomatic scenes.


The first strategic objective, which India has achieved in this context, is to set a precedent of an explicit norm for any future international vote on the human rights situation in any country. The US, in its original draft against Sri Lanka at this time, wanted the UNHRC to “encourage the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights [UNHCHR] … to provide, and [encourage] the Government of Sri Lanka to accept advice and technical assistance”.


An uncontested version in the public domain is that it was at India’s intervention that the substantive wording of this operative passage was altered to give Sri Lanka the elbow room to refuse to play ball with the UNHCHR. The relevant passage, as finally passed, reads as: … to “encourage the [UNHCHR] to provide, in consultation with and with the concurrence of the Government of Sri Lanka, advice and technical assistance”.


Now, the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights cannot at all hope to ‘set right’ the situation in Sri Lanka without its government’s explicit concurrence. By ‘engineering’ this, India has clearly sought to stamp its strategic authority as a norm-formulator in South Asia, at least in respect of some issues.


However, a related question is: Why has the US winked at India’s sleight of hand in enshrining this ‘non-intrusive’ provision? At one level, the elbow room, which Sri Lanka has been given now, is in any case available to all sovereign states under international law and the UN Charter. At another level, it is also evident that the US will, therefore, continue to “impose pressure” (China’s words) on Sri Lanka for strategic purposes.


Closely related to this aspect is India’s second strategic objective in voting with the US now. For a variety of reasons outside the scope of this analysis, India has in recent times ceded considerable space to China, in terms of diplomatic and strategic influence, in Sri Lanka. And, in a recent ISAS Interview, India’s External Affairs Minister S M Krishna steered clear of saying whether New Delhi would or would not seek commercial and naval access to the Sri Lankan coastline to match China’s presence at Hambantota.


In these circumstances, India’s new closeness to the US on Sri Lankan affairs will be fully explored by both New Delhi and Washington for mutual gain, especially if the need arises.


Conclusion: A Critical Moment


Viewed differently, India’s latest decision to vote against Sri Lanka, despite Colombo’s closeness to China, is seen by some observers as a sign of New Delhi growing out of its Beijing-fixation in South Asia. Regardless of any such perspective, India cannot afford to discount the current and potential roles of both China and the US as major players in South Asia.


Overall, it will be interesting to watch whether Sri Lankan President Mahinda Rajapaksa would make any new strategic move to contain the fallout of Colombo’s latest setback at the UNHRC. What he needs most is to retain optimism as a politician. During his recent visit to Singapore, Rajapaksa did indicate that he saw himself as an optimist-politician who would be willing to weather political storms without getting disheartened.


While in Singapore, Rajapaksa made no secret of his belief that his administration’s overtures to the Sri Lankan Tamils had not received a matching appreciation from the wider international community. He also appeared keen to let the world take a dispassionate look at his administration’s ongoing efforts to reach out to the Sri Lankan Tamils, Muslims, and other minorities. It is now up to him to face this new challenge (or crisis, as some would say) as he deems fit.


Mr P S Suryanarayana is Editor (Current Affairs) at the Institute of South Asian Studies (ISAS), an autonomous research institute at the National University of Singapore. The views expressed are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect those of the institute.

We must implement comprehensive action program that is not restricted to conditions laid down in UNHRC Resolution only

By Victor Ivan

It is correct for Sri Lanka to express its protest against the US sponsored United Nations Human Rights Council (UNHRC) Resolution against Sri Lanka. Yet, the government had apparently failed to mobilize the protest move in a manner conducive to safeguarding the dignity of the country.

The government’s approach has resulted in causing considerable damage to the good image of the country. The heated debate that was launched against the decision of the UNHRC was eventually brought to a climax with the Minister Mervin Silva suddenly entering the limelight assuming the anchor role of the protest move.

The sentiments generated in the world community by the public utterances made by the Minister Mervin Silva claiming the responsibility for the assault on Poddala Jayantha that forced the latter to flee the country and his assertion that he would not hesitate to punish even others who made representations at the UNHRC against Sri Lanka can in no way be considered beneficial to the country. These utterances no doubt have portrayed uncivilized imageries about Sri Lanka in the minds of the international community.

Similarly, there is no possible justification for a team of Sri Lankan human rights activists to testify before the UNHRC supporting the alleged human rights allegations against Sri Lanka, particularly when the human rights issue has become a crucial issue which may have deeper and more far reaching repercussions on the future of the country.

Yet, the policy adopted by certain TV channels controlled by the government targeting these activists has been extremely unreasonable. It created a fertile ground to provoke these activists. The verbal assaults on them were conducive to kindling hatred in them. Obviously, the injurious criticisms levelled against them would not have contributed to create a good feeling about the country in the minds of the listeners, particularly when this process entered the arena of world news

The clarification of the government’s policy in regard to the Resolution that was adopted by the UNHRC now remains most significant and crucial. In the immediate aftermath of the adoption of the Resolution, the reactions of the government leaders were hostile and emotional; this trend now seems to be slowly changing. They appear to be returning to their proper senses and viewing it more objectively.

We must not forget that it might lead to a great catastrophe unless the situation is reviewed calmly and objectively and bring the emotional reactions under control. Failure to manage this crisis appropriately might even result in the country being thrust into an enormous blood bath again at some point of time.

It might even create a situation which is conducive to dividing the country in the absence of a Prabhakaran. If Sri Lanka fails to adopt an intelligent and diplomatic approach on this issue, the country might ironically be confronted not with the Western countries led by the USA, but by its immediate neighbour, India which is emerging as super power in addition to being the regional power

The foreign policy of the present government seems to be based on the assumption that the balance of power is currently shifting to the advantage of an alternate camp led by China and to the disadvantage of the Western camp which is led by the USA. In the circumstance, it can be presumed that certain theoreticians who are close to the ruling party may have ingested the Rajapakse government with the notion that there was no need for Sri Lanka to maintain a close cooperation with the Western power bloc led by the USA. There may be some truth in this proposition which appears to be revolutionary in its approach. But viewed from a holistic angle it cannot be treated as being a correct approach.

Despite there being an element of truth in the assertion that there has been a relapse in the strength of the western power bloc led by the USA, it cannot, however, be presumed that there would be a rapid change in the balance of power soon. On the other hand, this approach emphasizes China as the only alternate power that is emerging; it has completely ignored the importance of India in this process. In the present context, it is a fact that China is extremely powerful.

Similarly, India has also entered into the path of acquiring the status of being a super power. In this power contest between China and India, India appears to be acquiring more benefits that surpass those of China.

Though China remains the most populated country at present, the future population forecasts predict that India will surpass China in the next three decades and become the most populated country in the world. Further, at the end of the next two decades, the demographic character of the two countries will change drastically with China having a larger share of elderly population and India representing a larger share of the younger population.

In view of the fact that China has invested its surplus gains in the USA and the Western countries, any likely depression in the West will inevitably have a destructive impact on China. China is primarily involved in producing goods for foreign markets while India is still more engaged in producing goods mainly for its domestic market than for exports. India therefore, has a greater potential for endurance in the event of an economic slump than China.

Moreover, India has a strong democratic system of government which is flexible and capable of facing any internal crisis. On the contrary, China has a communist dictatorship based on coercion and arbitrary force of power. In proportion to the increase in the per capita income in China, the aspirations of the Chinese people in acquiring democratic rights too, might go up. Under those circumstances, the political unrest that is likely occur at any point of time can prove to be an important factor undermining the political stability of China.

There is another important consideration that we must not overlook; in the event of a shift in the world power that is at present being held by the USA and its Western allies, it is more likely that they would cooperate more with India than with China. This is because India, more or less shares the same or similar values that the USA and the Western countries uphold. In managing the present crisis, Sri Lanka obviously has failed to recognize this fact in its correct perspective and the position that India enjoys in a likely shift of balance of world power.

This does not imply that Sri Lanka should get closer to India abandoning China which has always extended its support to us. Instead, we must give due recognition to the importance of the Indian factor and adopt a balanced policy of reinforcing Indo-Lanka ties whilst at the same time retaining the relations that we have developed with China. As a country, we must take cognizance of the fact that we are compelled to live at the edge of India and not that of China. On the other hand, we must not overlook the fact that there is an ethnic community living in Sri Lanka, about which South India is extremely sensitive.

The geographical location of Sri Lanka is an important factor that aggravated the crisis the country is faced with. It is located on a major sea route of strategic importance. It is because of these factors that Sri Lanka has become a specific focus in the context of international geo- politics. Sea freight constitutes a major share of the international goods transportation today. Obviously, Sri Lanka does not seem to have given due consideration to these factors in formulating its foreign policy.

As a country, there is no need for us to stoop down before any force, however powerful it may be. Yet, we must be mindful of our limits when we attach importance to ourselves and in our dealings with the other countries. If we forget our limits, invariably we may end up in a situation analogous to what happened to the frog which bloated itself out of proportion. We must bear in mind that we do not have the strength to defeat the world powers just because we have been able to defeat Prabhakaran.

National Sovereignty is a political concept to which we attach utmost importance. It implies the authority that the state enjoys in managing its affairs both internal and external. It embraces the discretion and the right of the state in determining the affairs of every sphere of governanance which include political affairs, formulation of laws, social organization, system of governance, economic development, foreign trade and foreign affairs in a manner as it thinks fit and without being subjected to and dictated to by any foreign authority.

However, the national sovereignty of a country is not an absolute notion. It is a relative issue. The world consists of not just one country; it is a conglomeration of hundreds of independent countries. Just as much as the group impacts on restricting the individual freedom within permissible limits, the conglomeration of national states equally impacts on limiting the sovereignty of the national states.

Sri Lanka is an independent and sovereign country. But at the same time it has to forego its sovereignty to a certain degree by virtue of being a member country of the UN. This is not a situation unique to Sri Lanka only. It is an inherent situation shared by all nations which are members of the UN. Though we have a right to manage our national affairs at our discretion, we are at the same time legally bound by international law to abide by the agreements that we have entered into with the UN in managing these affairs and safeguarding certain morals and ethical standards.

The UN is not an infallible institution. There are many instances where it has not delivered justice fairly and equally for its members alike. There were several occasions where it had adopted a dual policy, one favouring the powerful countries and one discriminating against the weaker nations. Yet, merely because of these drawbacks in the system, we cannot afford to ignore its authority. We do not have the ability to do so. We cannot afford to resign from the UN and maintain an isolated existence. We must take due cognizance of these realities while addressing the present crisis that the country is compelled to face.

Of the various agreements Sri Lanka has entered into with the UN, the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights can be described as being the most important and powerful commitment. It is concerned with the policies to be complied with by Sri Lanka as a member country in respect of the rights of the people living in the country. It safeguards the right of the people of the member countries to live, right to be free from slavery, equality before the law, right to a fair trial, right to assembly, right to travel, right to privacy, right to be prevented from arbitrary arrest and right to expression

It is natural that the world powers were surprised to see the total defeat of the LTTE which remained a ruthless terrorist outfit of the first order, by the security forces of Sri Lanka. The pro LTTE Tamil Diaspora was shocked to see this unexpected defeat. It is also natural for the international community to look at the government of Sri Lanka and its security forces with a certain element of suspicion

The government of Sri Lanka and its security forces won this war keeping them to acceptable civilized norms of warfare. Obviously, it was not pursued beyond the object of defeating terrorism. It was never turned into a campaign of taking revenge against the Tamil people. There might have been isolated incidents of excesses on the part of the security forces, but the volume of such errors was rather negligible compared to the magnitude and enormity of the war.

The most important thing has been that the USA had followed the last phase of the war through satellite technology. Despite the government successfully defeating the LTTE through a military offensive, it did not have an effective strategy to counter allegations which were likely to be raised by international circles through respective committees of the UN or the General Assembly. In these circumstance, one could argue that an assessment of the damages caused by the war should have been made. However, what the UNHRC has done to Sri Lanka cannot be justified since the war it self was not illegal.

The government obviously has failed to fulfil this requirement. In the modern world, it is natural for the international circles to raise questions whenever a war is concluded in any part of the world. Specially, it was not unnatural for the Tamil Diaspora which is extremely strong, active and sympathetic towards the LTTE to raise issues in this respect. The government was unable to foresee this threat and launch an effective and practical propaganda campaign to face the situation.

It is also natural for the UN to raise questions in this regard. We should not have been oblivious to the fact that the UN constitutes the main body of international governance. The government should have adopted diplomatic and logical approaches in responding to the questions raised by the UN rather than letting emotions and anger hold sway. But what Sri Lanka has done is the exact opposite of that.

Soon after the war came to an end, the pro LTTE Tamil Diaspora and some Western countries made serious allegations against Sri Lanka. A large section of the world community viewed them with a sympathetic eye on Sri Lanka. In 2009, when the pro LTTE alliance demanded the UNHRC to appoint an international commission against Sri Lanka, 32 member countries (62 percent) out of 47 members of the UNHRC came out in support of Sri Lanka to defeat the demand.

However, Sri Lanka was unable to consolidate and strengthen this positive international support which it mustered in 2009 to its advantage. Instead of adopting a consistent policy of enlightening the friendly countries and consolidating their alliances, the government abandoned the campaign completely until the US brought up the Resolution once again in 2012. By that time the horse had already left the stable.

It is a fallacy to say that Sri Lanka was defeated by only one vote. 24 countries voted for the Resolution proposed by the US while only 15 countries voted against it. 8 countries abstained from voting. From 2009 to 2012 Sri Lanka had lost 17 votes. This reflects that there has been a significant drop in the number of countries that were supportive to Sri Lanka. We have desperately failed to retain the favourable position that we commanded in 2009.

This pathetic situation is a direct consequence of the inability of Sri Lanka to adopt a proper vision or an organized campaign subsequent to the defeat of the LTTE to face the propaganda war that was launched in the international arena by the LTTE sympathizers. For this the Government in general and both the Minister of Foreign Affairs and the Foreign Ministry should be held responsible.

Adopting a pragmatic approach in responding to allegations and pursuing arguments and dialogues with the UN in a spirit of diplomacy remains the main responsibility of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. Yet, it did not adopt a policy that would have resolved this issue amicably. Instead, the policy adopted by the Minister of Foreign Affairs and his Ministry has aggravated the problem beyond its legitimate proportions.

In fact, we must appreciate that the Ministry of Defence accomplished its duties and responsibilities well when the military offensive was launched against the LTTE. On the contrary, the Minister of Foreign Affairs has failed to perform his duties and responsibilities satisfactorily in confronting the propaganda war that emerged subsequently, in the international arena with the backing of the western countries. Under the circumstances, despite Sri Lanka being able to win the war against the LTTE led by Prabakaran, it can be presumed that it has lost the propaganda war launched by the Tamil Diaspora sympathetic to the LTTE.

The most important thing that should be borne in mind is that the Resolution proposed by the US against Sri Lanka, remained an American proposal only till March 22 and since then it has ceased to be an American Resolution. Since March 22 it has acquired the status of a UN Resolution. It is no longer an American product but a UN Resolution. Therefore there are three options open to Sri Lanka in this crisis. They are as follows;

1. Reject the Resolution

2. Implement the Resolution

3. Implement a comprehensive program of action without restricting it only to the conditions laid down in the Resolution.

The first option can be described as self destructive and suicidal. It may even lead the country to a blood bath again and even a division of the country in the absence of a Prabhakaran.

There is nothing wrong in the second option. But it lacks creativity. It might appear as something is being done because of the external pressure and not in good faith and genuine concern for resolving the problem.

The third option is conducive to building a new and a strong image for the country. It will take the problem as a whole and offer an inclusive and holistic approach to finding a sustainable and far reaching solutions to many issues rather than finding piecemeal remedies for only certain aspects of it.

It will prove to be a creative approach which is not restricted only to this crisis. Rather it will take both the present political system and the current crisis together as a common program in a bid to reshape and recreate the state of Sri Lanka in a new mould.

Such a programme cannot be implemented only by the government. All opposition parties also should join hands with the government. No one should be excluded and all made stakeholders in this endeavour. In my view, the third option remains the best.

Eulogising Lester James Peries

LJP, the greatest living Asian filmmaker, one of the greatest in the world, is the undisputed – but eminently disputable – Father of the Sinhala Film. I have before me as I write a newspaper clipping from the Ceylon Daily News which I have preserved from 1956. It is titled: The "Sinhalese Film is Born". It is a review of LJP’s first film Rekawa by M.De S i.e. the redoubtable journalist Mervyn De Silva. A critic who could be vitriolic if necessary, he was not wont to issue certificates lightly. To set the record straight, the first (silent) Sinhala film (called Rajakeeya Wickramaya) starring N.M. Perera (yes, the one and only political double-doctor Nanayakkarapathirage Martin Perera, then aged 20 and stunningly good-looking) had been filmed in 1925. The first Sinhala talkie (Broken Promise), chronologically the third Sinhala film, had come out in 1947. Serially LJP’s Rekawa was the 41st Sinhala film. Yet M.De S, put his reputation on the line and publicly proclaimed that with the arrival of Rekawa, "The Sinhalese film is born". In order to justify his seemingly outrageous arithmetical howler M.De S first identified "pictures in motion" as the medium of the art of the cinema, the technical instrument of which is the camera. Next, he dismissed all Sinhala films produced before Rekawa as nothing other than photographed (decadent) theater. "Rekawa, on the contrary" argued M.De S "does justice to the essential nature of the cinema". Then came his final ultimate judgment on Rekawa: "It is, I repeat the first Sinhalese film".


Visionary


However that may be, by way of preparation for writing this eulogy, I thumbed once again through the fascinating book "Lester by Lester as told to kumar de silva" published in 2007. Even on re-reading, the book proved unputdownable. The blinding clarity of LJP’s unadorned, straightforward prose takes my breath away. Frank and drily witty, a playful intelligence pervades his commentary on his 20 films. Truly, if LJP had not become the Father of the Sinhala film, his claim to fame would have been as Sri Lanka’s finest stylist in the English language. Fortunately for Sinhala cinema, the temptation of the camera triumphed over the lure of the pen. He had a clear vision of the future of the Sinhala cinema: "The future of our industry will depend upon the extent to which we use the stories which are rooted in our own soil; stories which portray our own people, their hopes, their fears and aspirations, and in our own beautiful landscapes and settings. Our film can never be called truly Sinhalese until all the pernicious foreign influences which have dominated them are ruthlessly stamped out…" He has freely admitted that "there was a nationalist feeling behind my thinking which I think motivated me." Which proves that you can genuinely serve your country and your people even if you are "English only" in practical life.


Paternity


It should be noted that LJP, the first and possibly the last true gentleman (in the original English sense of the word) in the world of Sinhala film, has never claimed paternity of the Sinhala film. His acute brain apprehends the reality that in those far-off, pre-DNA days paternity (unlike maternity which is a palpable fact) would always be a theory. After all, conventional wisdom is, "mama’s baby, papa’s maybe!". The paternity of the Sinhala film has been thrust upon him, and the good Samaritan he unfailingly was and is, he is left holding the baby. In that context, it will not pass unnoticed that the opening sentence of this eulogy forthrightly declares that LJP’s fatherhood of the Sinhala film is "eminently disputable". How come? you will ask. Well, it’s like this. By self- proclamation LJP is "an Anglo Saxon, English oriented person". He was born (on 5 April 1919) and bred in an out-and-out Roman Catholic family. Culturally, he was anglicized to his teeth under the beneficent influence of his cricket-playing, horse-betting, Edinburgh-educated western doctor (Dr. James Francis Peries) who was totally anglophilic. Says LJP of his father: "All his life my father never spoke one word of Sinhala to us". LJP himself speaks of his "love for the English language". His mother – Anne Gertrude Winifred – had been the first girl from St. Bridget’s Convent to pass the Senior Cambridge Examination. LJP’s only use of the Sinhala language was to talk with his paternal grandmother who spoke only Sinhala. Having gone to London in 1945 when he returned home from England after 7 years his language ability in Sinhala had been "almost non-existent". To crown it all he had married an English woman. Given this background, LJP himself was acutely aware of what he called these "severe disqualifications" for siring the Sinhala Film. To this day LJP, although sensitive to the emotional nuances of the Sinhala language has barely spoken in Sinhala in public. It is as though he wanted to make a certain point beyond any manner of doubt. The point as he put it is that "language was the last thing one needed to make a film. One does not make films in Sinhala or Tamil, but in the language of cinema".


Language Resource Persons


It is true to say that LJP Sri Lanka’s avant-garde film maker is a born storyteller. "I have no problems at all with storytelling. Creating stories is the least of my problems… Deep down my feelings for cinema was not so much for documentaries as for fiction". And so it came about that his 20 films from Rekawa (The Line of Destiny, 1956) to Ammawarune (Elegy for a Mother, 2006) are all marvelous stories. Remembering his "severe disqualifications" he hit upon a surefire method of choosing good stories for his films. Everywhere men and women are not only members of the species called Homo sapiens with species-specific characteristics, but also products of their particular environment and nurture. They are, indeed, "abstracts and chronicles" of the places they were born; the homes in which they grew up and learnt to walk, the games they played as children, the food they ate, the schools they attended, the books they read, the music they listen to, the songs they sang, the gods they believed in and the old wives’tales they heard. As the language resource persons for his films LJP turned to the nation’s most literate people like Martin Wickramasinghe, G.B. Senanayake, Karunasena Jayalath, Eileen Siriwardhane, Regi Siriwardane, Tissa Abeysekera, Somaweera Senanayake and A.J. Gunawardena. For good measure he also used Leonard Woolf and Anton Chekhov. The truth is that understanding the language of cinema as he did, LJP could have made authentic Sinhala films even with double Dutch. The stories he himself created such as Rekawa, Sandeshaya, Delowak Athara and Ammawarune are superbly crafted. Indeed, by his own submission, LJP is a storyteller at heart, who tells his story with a camera.


Plaudits


The fascinating story of how his 20 films were made is recounted in "Lester by Lester" and it would be an act of impertinent insolence on the part of an old medic like me to spoil the luminous clarity of his story by any commentary. In this eulogy written to celebrate the 93rd anniversary of a living master of the cinema let me simply say that by his ability to fuse mass appeal and stylistic mastery of his medium he has made Sinhala film an art form that people of this country have warmly embraced. It says something for the Father of the Sinhala film that he not only created the Sinhala film in 1956 in terms of theme, content, narrative style and mode of presentation but also succeeded in inducing in our filmgoers the capacity to respond sensitively to the art of the cinema. He himself took the art form to the highest possible levels. As Prof. Wimal Dissanayake, Sri Lanka’s internationally accomplished expert on the art of the cinema has judged: "LJP has garnered all the possible honors locally as well as the highest plaudits internationally".


Sumitra the Mother


By his own account LJP made his first film Rekawa "to do a simple village story". Because Sinhala culture is predominantly a Buddhist culture, a realistic film about a Sinhala village must surely give at least some inkling of its vibrant extant Buddhism. In Rekawa there isn’t a trace of Buddhism. Critics castigated him for this grave and glaring lapse. LJP, anglicized and Roman Catholic to the marrow of his bones, has simply ignored its existence. On the other hand, his last film Ammawarune is saturated with Buddhist sentiment. I believe that Sumitra Gunawardane who hails from the revolutionary Boralugoda Gunawardanes of Sithawaka and learnt cinema art in London and Paris and married LJP in 1964 unconsciously effected the phenomenal attitudinal transformation of LJP. She first met LJP in Paris in 1957 when he went there to organize the presentation of Rekawa at Cannes Film Festival. At that point she hadn’t even bothered to find out who LJP was. I believe that it was she who played the major role in helping LJP to discover his roots and regain his lost heritage necessary for siring the Sinhala film for the greater glory of the Sinhala cinema. So in a vital sense Sumitra Peries is truly the Mother of the Father of the Sinhala film.

Oil, Coal, Gas and Carbon: Fundamental Truths From Indigenous Peoples

Indigenous people know the reality of fossil energy.   The Shuar peoples of Amazonian Ecuador, under whose territories lie huge reserves of oil. Unlike those eager to find oil in their territories, have rejected exploration, they do not want to get rich on selling oil.  They have a saying “Oil’ represents the sprits of a long dead world, that we use to satisfy our greed for power and sacrifice and our children in return.” (CESR 1996).  Here lies a truth that cannot be escaped when looking at climate change.  But in this statement there also lies wisdom, a truth, which if appreciated will clarify the actions needed to address the spectre of climate change. Their wisdom is that, they are aware of the difference between the spirits of the living world and the dead.  They know that, asking for power from the spirits of the dead world has a great price, often they seeking the lives of our own children.


What does this dead and living world mean? Does it have any relevance in modern science?


Carbon that cycles through living systems represents a fixed proportion of the planetary carbon. This carbon called ‘biotic’ or living carbon has a very different makeup to other sources of carbon. The biotic carbon cycling in the planetary biosphere is measured in time cycles of thousands of years. This carbon is activated by the energy of the sun fixed by living things.  There is another pool of carbon, which is the ‘lithospheric’ or fossil carbon. This is carbon that once existed in the biosphere, but died and was buried underground where they reside for time periods measured in millions of years. This ‘dead’ carbon has no contact with the world of living carbon. Over geologic time vast quantities of carbon sequestered by living forms became fossilized and removed from the biotic/atmospheric cycles to become distilled as the ‘spirits of a long dead world.’


It is the failure to recognize the two significantly different pools of Carbon and their functions and values within the biosphere that has led to much of the confusion when considering the utility of biotic systems under the current rules that determine carbon markets.


Carbon from biotic pools can be accommodated under the current trading agreements, as they will help to slow down the turnover rate of carbon in the atmosphere.  Carbon from fossil pools can only be considered under the current trading regimes by technologies that curb emissions at the source or by a financial mechanism that accounts for the time differential between the two pools. In other words, carbon dioxide emanating from forest or other ecosystem destruction can be compensated for by planting trees at the current cost, but carbon dioxide emanating from the burning of fossil fuels cannot pay the same price to compensate.


It is now clear that fossil Carbon and biotic Carbon have extremely different sinks and need to be valued differentially when considering the impact on the global biosphere. While the carbon balance of the planet has been greatly modified by post-industrial human activity such as massive deforestation, it is the ‘fossil injection’ that introduces the disruptive, increasing, increment of ‘new’ carbon into the atmosphere.


These facts, underscore the great danger of accepting the consumption on fossil fuels as a tool for ‘development’. Once a nation or economy has become ‘fossil addicted’, they are willing to sacrifice their own well-being and the well-being of others to feed their addiction.


Here the sayings of the Shuar are pertinent. “Oil’ represents the sprits of a long dead world, that we use to satisfy our greed for power and sacrifice and our children in return.” The consequences of addicting ourselves to oil dependency, are already clear, the soaring price of living and the soaring rates of non-communicable (development) diseases, are clear indicators of the price that we and our children will have to pay.


Recognizing the distinction between fossil and biotic carbon and placing differential values on each, will go a long way to expose these addicted economies and assist nations such as ours to avoid the pitfalls.  The amount of oil, coal or gas required for the creation and operation of future ‘development’ projects should become basic criteria for acceptance or rejection of future ‘development’ projects.


Thus, in evaluating all ‘development’ proposals, it will be good to consider a caution expressed in all traditional societies:  ‘Oppose serving of the spirits of the dead’ (boothyas), or in today’s words, do not get trapped into the belief that the consumption of fossil energy and resources means development (promoted by modern boothyas),  Such actions will bring the spirits of the dead (fossil)  into our living world (biotic) and degrade the quality of life for our children most horribly ! Development diseases such as cancer, stress, lung diseases, heart diseases and diabetes have not only reached epidemic proportions but are now also reaching down to the children.  The rate of growth of these diseases amongst the younger segment of our population should create some national soul searching and response, Is this growth in fossil addiction the right development model for Sri Lanka ?