Midweek Review

Should Sri Lanka Neglect Latin America and the Caribbean?

Published

5 years ago

2020/08/19

By Dayantha Laksiri Mendis

Dayantha Laksiri Mendis was the former Director of the Bandaranaike Centre for International Studies (BCIS). He was also Ambassador to Austria and Permanent Representative to the UN in Vienna. He has worked and travelled extensively in Latin America and the Caribbean region as UN and Commonwealth Legal Expert/Adviser. At present, he is the Honorary Consul for the Republic of Guyana in South America. Latin America and the Caribbean is a neglected area in Sri Lanka’s foreign policy-making, academic research, and scholarship. The broad focus of this article is to give an overview of Latin America and the Caribbean. The narrow focus is to ascertain as to how Sri Lanka could improve relations with this region in a beneficial manner. This approach would be more relevant than a mere description of Latin America and the Caribbean, since Sri Lanka has recently decided to establish closer relations with this region for a variety of reasons.

First of all, it is useful to define the terms ‘Latin America’ and ‘the Caribbean.’ The term ‘Latin’ refers to those persons who speak the Spanish language, and thus the term ‘Latin’ refers to the Spanish speaking states in the Americas. The Caribbean has a different definition. It refers to independent and dependent territories in the Caribbean Sea. The independent states belonged to several ex-colonial powers such as Britain, France, and the Netherlands. These island states are also called the West Indies. However, in recent terms, with the birth of the Association of the Caribbean States (1994), the term ‘Caribbean’ is re-defined to include those countries which are abutting the Caribbean Sea in South America and Central America, in the same way as states belonging to the Indian Ocean Rim Association (IORAC) are determined.

Overview

A short overview by reference to the geography, history, and culture is necessary to understand the major issues confronting this region, before we consider their relevance to Sri Lanka.

Geographically the Latin American states spread from Mexico in North America to Argentina in South America. The land area exceeds 7.9 million square miles, and equals the landmass of Europe, and the US combined. In distance, it covers roughly an area from London to Cape Town. It is quicker to fly from Rio de Janeiro to Johannesburg than from Mexico City to Buenos Aires. This would demonstrate that Latin America and the Caribbean constitute a vast area.

It is important to note that Brazil is bigger than India in size, and Amazonia is the largest repository of biodiversity and constitutes the world’s largest ‘sink’ for carbon dioxide (CO2). The Galapagos is an off-shore island of Ecuador, where Charles Darwin wrote his famous book on The Origins of the Species to dispute the birth of homo sapiens to the horror of theologists.

Latin America can be further classified into several sub-regions such as the Andean States, Central American States, and Rio de la Plata. Similarly, the Caribbean can also be classified into Eastern, Western, Northern, and Southern Caribbean States. Eastern Caribbean is further classified into Windward and Leeward Islands. The Caribbean is now one of the most beautiful, up-market and popular tourist destinations in the world, with a galaxy of off-shore financial centres.

Historically, it must be emphasised that Latin American and the Caribbean civilisations were in existence before the arrival of Christopher Columbus to the New World over 500 years ago. In fact, the Mayans in Belize, Aztecs in Mexico, and the Incas in Peru had sophisticated civilisations. It is, therefore, a myth to say that Christopher Columbus “discovered” the Latin America and the Caribbean as if these civilisations and states were not in existence in the early 16th century. Since the conquest of these areas by the Spanish conquistadors and other colonial powers, the whole face of Latin America and the Caribbean changed rapidly. Approximately 14 million slaves from Africa, and later indentured labour from India, were shipped to this region for sugar and coffee plantation, and the original inhabitants of this region were decimated by the European powers, through the colonisation of the New World.

This region has contributed to the international community in literature, art, music, and sports in a substantial manner. In the arts—the famous Pablo Casals, Pablo Neruda, and the artist Pablo Picasso lived in Latin America. They have also produced a number of Nobel Prize winners. In sports, the West Indies, the former British Colonies in the Caribbean Sea dominated the game of cricket. Both Argentina and Brazil dominated the soccer scene. In music, the Latin American rhythms such as the Tango, Bossanova, Cha-cha-cha, Rhumba, and many other rhythms are popular in many parts of the world. The Calypso and Reggae rhythms, as well as the wonderful sonorities of the Caribbean Steel Drums, are taught and played in many Western capitals for the listening pleasure of millions of people throughout the world.

Relations with the US

This region cannot be fully understood without reference to the US. Since the promulgation of the Monroe Doctrine (1823), the US excluded any extra-hemispheric rivals from this region. It has followed a ‘hegemonic’ policy in the region in the Cold War period and interceded in the internal affairs of those states. It has sent troops to Dominican Republic, Panama, Nicaragua, Haiti, and Grenada in the recent past.

In the landmark Paramilitary Activities Case in 1986 (Nicaragua v. the US) the International Court of Justice (ICJ) held the mining of the Nicaraguan harbours and support to the Contras by the US was contrary to international law. The US continues to hold a tough stance on Cuba. It has passed the Helms-Burton Act to prevent other states from doing business with Cuba in regards to expropriated property4. However, at present, the most sensitive factor in US-Latin relations is the drug problem. The US holds a very strong position with regard to the extradition of traffickers. Nonetheless, the US is the driving force behind the economic expansion of this region through the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA), Caribbean Basin Initiative (CBI), and several aid programmes.

Major Issues

It is important to understand the major issues confronting this region, and how the region has dealt with these issues are of relevance to Sri Lanka. Firstly, the question of promoting economic development is of paramount importance. The debt crisis in Latin America in the 1970s and 1980s has created difficulties for this region and will continue into the new millennium. The Latin American debt crisis arose because this region was unable to pay their debts which they borrowed from foreign banks. As this crisis began to grow, countries like Argentina and Brazil were really affected as they had to pay at least 50% of their Gross Domestic Product (GDP) in servicing the debt. The Baker Plan (1986) and Brady Plan (1989) ameliorated this situation but the debt crisis still continues to be a major problem in this region5.

Another important issue is the shift from dictatorship to democracy. In most Latin American countries, there are no tin-pot dictators. Most have gone back to multi-party democracy through Presidential systems or the Westminster model.

Under Carlos Menon, Argentina has reverted to a Presidential system of government. Chile, Nicaragua and Panama have now established a democratic system of government. In most Latin American countries, democracy is the order of the day and dictatorships have taken a back-seat.

Finally, the viability of mini-states in the Caribbean is another major issue on the international agenda. After COVID, the mini-states are likely to suffer tremendously in the global economy. Previously, the Banana Issue has created huge trade disputes between the US and the European Union in regard to its preferential treatment. The viability of these states has been taken up at several Commonwealth Summits. A recent report on vulnerability by consultative groups of the Commonwealth Secretariat suggests many recommendations to overcome these difficulties.

Can we benefit from this region?

Sri Lanka can benefit a great deal from this region. The language barrier, lack of diplomatic representation, and geographic distance elude us from benefiting from this region in the following spheres.

Firstly, Latin America has taken a lead role in creating a ‘new platform’ to deal with the questions of globalisation and liberalisation of trade in a more effective manner at international fora. Jorge Castaneda’s initiative Alternativa Lationamericana provides a Latin answer to neo-liberalism. This initiative is of significant value to South Asia, and in particular to Sri Lanka, as we share similarities with this region

Secondly, the Caribbean experiment with off-shore financial services is relevant to Sri Lanka at this moment. It is indeed a success story. The Caribbean off-shore companies and banks have attracted high net worth individuals and corporate clients. It has created new employment opportunities and numerous benefits to a large number of Caribbean citizens. It is an experiment which can be copied easily, and therefore it has some value in making Sri Lanka an off-shore financial centre (OFC) in South Asia. If Sri Lanka can be developed as an OFC to India and other Asian states in the same way as Mauritius is to India, we can expect some offshore banks and trusts and offshore companies to establish offices in Sri Lanka to do business with other Asian giants especially in providing insurance and syndicated loans.

Thirdly, if Sri Lanka were to encounter difficulties of importing oil from the middle east countries, we may have to import oil from Latin America and Caribbean and our good relations with this region can help Sri Lanka to rely on them in a crisis situation. The Republic of Guyana is now emerging as a new oil producing country in this region.

Improving relations with this region

This is a neglected area in Sri Lanka’s foreign policy-making. Successive governments have failed to establish closer relations with this region. In this regard careful cost-benefit analysis should be undertaken in foreign policy making

Sri Lanka cannot afford to neglect this region since it provides a veritable avenue for export for manufactured goods, tea, coconut, cinnamon, and rubber products to Latin America, and precious stones especially to the Caribbean destinations, since these island states attract up-market tourist trade, through a network of cruise ships. India dominates the gem trade in the Eastern and Southern Caribbean. St. Maarten and Aruba are havens for gems and jewellery businesses and provide an avenue to market these products to high net-worth individuals. We have a comparative advantage in certain goods and services, too numerous to mention in specific terms in this short article. Hence, the selection of the appropriate countries for trade and diplomatic representation and penetration is of crucial importance.

It is also important to have closer relations, since any Sri Lankan who is vying for an international position in the future has very little chance to succeed without the support of this region. Almost, two decades ago, Judge Professor Christy Weeramantry, who was not a traditional diplomat, knew this too well in his election to the ICJ and worked extremely hard through expatriate Sri Lankans to win their support. On my invitation, he attended the Caribbean Heads of State Meeting in St. Kitts and Nevis and was able to form links with several Heads of State.

It is axiomatic that Sri Lankas relations cannot improve without adequate diplomatic and trade representations. It is unfortunate we have Ambassadors in Brazil and in Cuba and the Honorary Consuls in some Latin American and Caribbean countries. Cuban representation is for political rather than economic reasons, but this Embassy can be upgraded with proper accreditation to establish better relations with the neighbouring English-speaking Caribbean countries in the region. In the long run, Cuba might be the number one tourist destination for North American tourists, and therefore we must get prepared to build good economic relations with Cuba, as the sale point for some of our goods to the tourists who may arrive from North America. It is unclear as to why the Caribbean states are served from the Sri Lankan Embassy in Washington DC and New York and not from Havana, Cuba—the heart of the Caribbean.

Recently, Sri Lanka obtained Observer status in the Organization of American States (OAS). It is a step in the right direction. It is also useful for Sri Lanka to join the Association of Small Island States (AOSIS) at least as an observer to improve relations with small island states in the Caribbean.

It is impossible to improve relations with this region without a good knowledge and understanding of Latin America and the Caribbean. Sri Lanka needs to send ambassadors who can speak the language and understand the culture of Latin America and the Caribbean to maximise the benefits and good relations with this region

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Midweek Review

Pahalgam massacre, Indian denial of Trump claims and Sri Lanka’s triumph over LTTE

Published

24 hours ago

2025/05/21

Sahan Weerasooriya

Field Marshal Sarath Fonseka, Admiral of the Fleet Wasantha Karannagoda, and Marshal of the Air Force Roshan Goonetileke, at the war heroes' commemoration at the Battaramulla 'Ranaviru' monument on Monday (19) evening. They stand with President Anura Kumara Dissanayake who attended the event following severe criticism of his earlier decision to skip it. Fonseka, Karannagoda and Goonetileke led the combined armed forces campaign to finally crush the LTTE in the battlefield. Wartime Defence Secretary Gotabaya Rajapaksa played a significant role in Sri Lanka's triumph over terrorism. (Pic courtesy PMD

There hadn’t been a previous instance of India having to contradict a sitting US President, literally, to his face. But, the swift Indian rejection of President Donald Trump’s offer to mediate in the renewed Indo-Pakistan conflict over flashpoint Jammu and Kashmir underscored India’s longstanding national policy that Kashmir wouldn’t involve any third party, under any circumstances.

US President Donald Trump’s claim that he warned both India and Pakistan that there would be significant increase in trade if they agreed on an immediate ceasefire was rejected by India. Pakistan appreciated the US President’s initiative.

Responding to Indian Premier Narendra Modi’s strongly worded statement on May 12, Pakistan, while declaring its backing for a “peaceful resolution of the Jammu and Kashmir dispute, in accordance with the UN Security Council resolutions and the aspirations of the Kashmiri people, reiterated their support for President Trump’s efforts aimed at the resolution of this dispute, which remains a source of instability in South Asia.”

For whatever reasons, Modi wanted to be in the high company of white Western powers and jumped headlong into being a member of the US-led quad to rub it into China without realising that the West only wanted to use India against Beijing and there was no quid pro quo in the event of an unforeseeable need for help by New Delhi. Had he not been so cussed to Chinese, Beijing would have been a friend- in-need whatever their differences of the past.

India, however, was explicit in its response to President Trump’s cheap shot that he brokered a ceasefire between India and Pakistan. In the wake of the humiliating Indian rejection, the US was compelled to call for direct communication between India and Pakistan.

In spite of the Indian blunt denial, President Trump, like so many of his other wild claims in recent weeks, on how he has got lucrative trade deal offers from many countries advantageous to Washington, reiterated his preposterous claim with regard to the ceasefire, nuclear escalation and trade when he addressed the US military, based in Qatar. India, in no uncertain terms, has denied President Trump’s repeated claims of nuclear escalation.

Close on the heels of the now-rejected claims regarding the ceasefire, nuclear escalation and increased trade, President Donald Trump again surprised India with another unsubstantiated declaration when he asserted, at a business forum in Qatar, that India had offered the United States a trade deal with “literally zero tariffs”.

Responding to President Trump’s claim, Indian External Affairs Minister S. Jaishankar declared that the ongoing negotiations were complex and far from final. Having to contradict a sitting US President is no easy task.

If India found the US propagating a narrative of its own problematic to counter, one can understand Sri Lanka’s plight in countering Western propaganda projects targeting it. But, India, unlike Colombo, swiftly and decisively set the record straight thereby prevented the US from disseminating a false narrative.

The Indian High Commission in Colombo recently reacted strongly to the Tribune report, headlined “India removes its top military spy after RAW leaks”, reproduced in the May 05 edition of The Island. Having faulted The Island for carrying the said factually incorrect news item on page 02 without a fact check, the Indian HC reminded us of the devastating 2019 Easter Sunday carnage here caused by terrorism. As expected the Indian HC statement made no reference to terrorism caused by India in Sri Lanka in the early ’80s. Terrorism sponsored by India bled Sri Lanka till May 2009.

India, too, paid a heavy price. The Indian-led destabilisation project almost overwhelmed Sri Lanka. India simultaneously conducted a proxy war while spearheading high profile diplomatic efforts meant to advance its own interests. The Indian intervention here in the ’80s should be examined keeping in mind their extremely close relationship with the then Soviet Union.

Universities of global terrorism

Prime Minister Modi’s May 12th address to the nation explained India’s stand on Pakistan vis-à-vis what he called terrorism. The Pahalgam massacre carried out on April 22, 2025, brought the country together and the armed forces were authorised to wipe out terrorist infrastructure in Pakistan.

Prime Minister Modi declared: “Terrorist bases, like Bahawalpur and Muridke, are universities of global terrorism. The big terrorist attacks of the world, be it 9/11, be it London Tube bombings, or the big terrorist attacks which have happened in India in the last many decades their roots are somehow connected to these terrorist hideouts. The terrorists had wiped out the Sindoor of our sisters and India responded by destroying their terrorist headquarters. More than 100 dreaded terrorists have been killed in these attacks by India. Many terrorist leaders were roaming freely in Pakistan for the last two and a half to three decades who used to conspire against India. India killed them in one stroke.”

Of course there was no reference to Sri Lanka. The English rendering of the Indian leader’s original speech, made in Hindi, conveniently left out Sri Lanka though there cannot be a better example than Sri Lanka to highlight the successful eradication of terrorism here through military means.

Modi joined the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) in 1987, the year India forced Sri Lanka to accept the deployment of the Indian Army here. One of the key objectives was to supervise the swift disarming of separatist Tamil groups that were fully sponsored by them. The Indian destabilisation project was meant to compel Sri Lanka to forgo its right to deal with terrorists militarily. A case in point is the Indian demand to call off ‘Operation Liberation’ aimed at clearing Vadamarachchi. India deployed its Air Forces across the Palk Straits in late June 1987 to rescue Prabhakaran and finalise an agreement that suited their overall objectives. Five years later Prabhakaran ordered the assassination of Congress leader Rajiv Gandhi who deployed the Indian Air Force to save Prabhakaran from certain death at the hands of the Sri Lanka Army. Had that happened, the India-created terrorist project could have collapsed. Thousands of lives, including that of Gandhi, and over 1,300 Indian soldiers, could have been saved and a sea-borne attack on the Maldives wouldn’t have materialised.

Premier Modi, too, contradicted President Trump’s claims of direct US role in the halt to Indian offensive action. Modi declared that the suspension of their retaliatory action was the result of the Pakistan Army reaching out to the Director General of Military Operations (DGMO), India.

Premier Modi’s declaration that their greatest strength is India’s unity against all forms of terrorism. “This is certainly not the era of war but this is also not the era of terrorism. Zero tolerance against terrorism is the guarantee for a better world.”

Obviously that hadn’t been India’s position during the Congress reign in the 1980s. India owed Sri Lanka an apology, at least now. Modi’s India should set the record straight, particularly against the backdrop of Western powers pursuing an anti-Sri Lanka campaign.

The anti-Sri Lanka project has taken a new turn with the unveiling of the Tamil genocide monument in Brampton, Ontario, Canada. The monument is widely reported to have been dedicated to the memory of Tamils killed in the war. The unveiling of the monument coincided with the preparations for commemorative events to mark, what the interested parties called, the Mullivaikkal massacre – 40,000 according to the highly exaggerated hatchet job of the UN Secretary General’s Panel of Experts (PoE) that inquired into military operations conducted in the Vanni theatre.

A section of the media quoted Mayor of Brampton Patrick Brown as having told the monument unveiling ceremony: “Genocide deniers, you are not welcome in Brampton, you are not welcome in Canada. Go back to Colombo.” Brown surely knows how to inspire Tamils living in his area. The Canadian media reported that about 12,000 Canadians of Sri Lankan origin live in the Brampton area.

Canada has some nerve to rake up such unsubstantiated claims against Sri Lanka despite so much innocent blood of natives there on its own hands from its colonial past. Even if we just go back to as recently as the mid-1990s when a growing outcry there forced them to close down for good church-run schools after finding remains of several thousand native children in unmarked graves on grounds of those schools that were used to ‘civilise’ them.

Tamil victims

Those who propagate the lie about deliberate massacre of Tamils during the last phase of war that was brought to a successful conclusion on May 18, 2009, conveniently forget that India launched the Sri Lanka terrorism project way back in early ’80s. Over the years various interested parties, both here and abroad, gave unsubstantiated claims regarding the number of dead. But their focus was always on those killed fighting for the LTTE. Let us remind the likes of Patrick Brown who spotlighted the fact that thousands of Tamils were killed by Tamils fighting for supremacy in the Northern and Eastern regions during the conflict.

(1) Members of various Tamil terrorist groups killed in intra-group fighting.

(2) Those killed in fighting between/among Tamil groups sponsored by India

(3) Members of Tamil groups killed in fighting Sri Lankan military and police

(4) Tamil youth killed during weapons training in India and transfer to and from Tamil Nadu via sea

(5) Terrorists killed by rival groups during their stay in India. The killing of 13 Sri Lankans, including EPRLF leader K. Padmanabha in Madras (now Chennai) in June 1990, about three months after the Indian military pulled out from Sri Lanka, exposed New Delhi’s failure to neutralise the LTTE. Their next major target was the assassination of Congress leader Rajiv Gandhi in the following year.

(6) LTTE terrorists killed by the Indian military in the Northern and Eastern regions

(7) LTTE terrorists killed during confrontations with the Indian Navy/Coast Guard

(8) Members of PLOTE (People’s Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam) killed by Indian forces deployed to avert Sri Lankan terrorist attack on the Maldives

(9) Tamil National Army (TNA), a group that had been hastily established by India ahead of the Indian military pullout from Sri Lanka in early 1990 to protect the EPRLF puppet administration, suffered significant loss of life as a result of LTTE operations facilitated by Sri Lanka. That was the period, May 1989 to June 1990, when slain President Ranasinghe Premadasa played ball with Velupillai Prabhakaran

(10) LTTE cadres killed on the orders of Velupillai Prabhakaran. Gopalswamy Mahendraraja alias Mahattaya, whom the writer met at Koliyakulam, near Omanthai, in early January 1990, was the senior most LTTEer executed on the orders of Prabhakaran. Having accused Mahattaya of betraying the LTTE’s cause to India, Prabhakaran demanded his surrender and carried out his execution.

(11) Indian law enforcement authorities killed those who had been involved in the heinous LTTE plot to assassinate Rajiv Gandhi in May 1991. Those who had been demanding justice for Tamils killed during the conflict do not talk of members of that community who perished in India following Gandhi’s assassination.

(12) Tamils who paid the supreme sacrifice fighting for the Sri Lankan government.

(13) Deaths among the LTTE fighting cadre following the breakup of the group in 2004 that eventually paved the way for the armed forces’ success in the north.

(14) The LTTE deployed thousands of children for combat. The number of children killed due to battlefield deployment remains unknown. Those who shed copious tears for terrorists must be reminded that until the Sri Lankan military eradicated the LTTE, Velupillai Prabhakaran continued the despicable practice of forcible recruitment of children.

Elimination of Tamil political leadership

The Tamil Diaspora believe that the world can be deceived with the blatant lie that all Tamils who had been killed during the conflict were civilians. If their lies were accepted, people from the moon must have fought for the LTTE.

There is no doubt that Tamils – men, women and children who had nothing to do with the LTTE or other Tamil terrorist groups that entered the political mainstream during President Ranasinghe Premadasa’s tenure – perished in government military action. There had been serious human rights violations. There is no point in claiming ‘zero’ casualties. That claim is stupid and the government shouldn’t have resorted to such foolish propaganda projects.

Immediately after the government declared victory over the LTTE on May 18, 2009, it should have tendered an apology to the innocent Tamil speaking people killed due to military action. The government should have explained the efforts made over the years to reach a consensus with Tamil terrorist groups with the direct involvement of India. Unfortunately, the war-winning government pathetically failed in its responsibility. President Mahinda Rajapaksa gravely erred in his refusal to make representations to the UN PoE. Had that happened, Sri Lanka could have explained the circumstances leading to the war in August 2006 and avoided falling victim to hatchet jobs done by UN bodies in support of Western agendas.

Those who had been propagating Tamil genocide narrative deliberately forget how the LTTE and other Tamil groups killed elected representatives of Tamil speaking people. They should be ashamed for playing politics with slain Tamil politicians. Have you ever heard of LTTE sympathisers questioning the assassination of Tamil political leader and former opposition leader Appapillai Amirthalingam along with ex-Jaffna MP Vettivelu Yogeswaran on July 13, 1989 at a rented house in Colombo 07.

Yogeswaran’s wife, Sarojini was shot five times at her residence near Jaffna on May 17, 1998. The LTTE assassinated her because she accepted the post of Jaffna Mayor. The LTTE killed indiscriminately. Sarojini Yogeswaran was killed as the LTTE couldn’t stomach Sri Lanka’s efforts to restore normalcy in the Jaffna peninsula.

Many people tend to forget that the Jaffna peninsula and the nearby islands were brought under government control in 1995 during Chandrika Bandaranaike Kumaratunga’s tenure as the President. The TULF decision to contest the Jaffna Municipal Council election on January 29, 1998, infuriated the LTTE. The TULF’s move weakened the LTTE’s position. Political process always frightened the LTTE.

The writer covered the Jaffna district local government elections conducted on January 29, 1998. The TULF contested only the Jaffna MC and Waligamam (north) Pradeshiya Sabha out of 17 local government authorities

Those who organised high profile events in honour of the LTTE dead must make a genuine effort to identify and formulate a list of Tamils – members of rival groups and politicians killed during the conflict. And a separate list of forcibly conscripted children. If Brampton Mayor Patrick Brown is so concerned about Tamils, he can easily check why those 12,000 Sri Lankan Tamils ended up in his area. Did they flee Sri Lanka armed forces, Indian military, or the LTTE? An attempt should be made to identify those who had fought for the LTTE or other Tamil groups living therein.

‘Forgotten Sri Lanka’s exiled victims’

Those who had been accusing Sri Lanka of, what they called, enforced disappearances during and after the conclusion of the war in May 2009, refuse to acknowledge thousands of ex-terrorists (of LTTE and other groups) who live overseas. Refusal on the part of Western governments to share information with Sri Lanka has deprived the country of an opportunity to address accusations of disappearances.

Sometime ago, an expensive survey carried out by the International Truth and Justice Project (ITJP), affiliated to the Foundation of Human Rights in South Africa, revealed ex-LTTE cadres taking refuge in western countries. The survey was titled ‘Forgotten Sri Lanka’s exiled victims.’

The release of the report in June 2016 coincided with the commencement of the on-going 32 sessions of the Geneva-based United Nations Human Rights Council (UNHRC). The report inadvertently revealed the existence of clandestine networks, facilitating Sri Lankans of Tamil origin, including former members of the LTTE, reaching Europe, through illegal means.

The study disclosed that LTTE personnel, including those who had been with Shanmugalingam Sivashankar alias Pottu Amman’s dreaded intelligence service, had secured citizenship in European countries, including the UK.

The report dealt with information obtained from 75 Tamils, living in the UK, France, Switzerland and Norway. Almost all of them had fled Sri Lanka after the conclusion of the war, in May, 2009. The vast majority of interviews had been conducted in London. However, an ITJP bid to include some of those ex-LTTE cadres, based in Germany, had gone awry. The report claimed that the targeted group declined to participate in the process, in protest against the role of the international community in supporting the transitional justice process in Sri Lanka.

Surprisingly, ITJP hadn’t bothered about those who took refuge in India during the conflict and post-conflict period.

A group of human rights experts, international prosecutors, investigators and transitional justice experts, who had previously served the United Nations (UN) International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY) and the International Criminal Court (ICC), produced the report under the guidance of Yasmin Sooka, one of the three persons on UNSG Ban Ki-moon’s PoE on Sri Lanka. Sooka teamed up with Marzuki Darusman and Steven R. Ratner to produce a Report of the Secretary General’s Panel of Experts on Accountability in Sri Lanka. Sooka functions as the executive director of the Foundation as well as ITJP

According to the report: “She is a former member of the South African & the Sierra Leone Truth and Reconciliation Commissions and was a legal advisor to Ban Ki-moon on Sri Lanka. She was the Soros inaugural Chair at the School of Public Policy and recently sat on the Panel investigating sexual violence by French peacekeeping troops in the Central African Republic.”

The writer sought a clarification from UNSG’s deputy spokesperson, Farhan Haq, regarding Sooka’s tenure as a Legal Advisor to UNSG on Sri Lanka. The Island received the following response from Haq: “Yasmin Sooka has been on high level panels, including on Sri Lanka, but she has not been the legal adviser to the Secretary-General.”

Unfortunately, Sri Lanka never really bothered to conduct a comprehensive investigation into unsubstantiated allegations taking into consideration all available facts. Thereby Sri Lanka deprived itself an opportunity to set the record straight, even 17 years after the conclusion of the conflict.

Wartime GoC of the celebrated 58 Division Shavendra Silva, who retired on Dec. 31, 2024, after serving the military for over four decades on the eve of 16th anniversary of triumph over the LTTE, squarely blamed successive governments of failing to counter war crimes accusations. In his exclusive interview with Derana anchor Chathura Alwis the Gajaba Regiment veteran held the governments, including the war-winning Mahinda Rajapaksa administration, of failing to clear the armed forces of false allegations.

Isn’t it an indictment on the entire political party leadership of this country?

Midweek Review

Jairam Ramesh’s “THE LIGHT OF ASIA: the poem that defined THE BUDDHA” – II

Published

24 hours ago

2025/05/21

Sahan Weerasooriya

(Continued from Monday 12th May 2025)

Light of Asia’s ‘stunning impact in Ceylon’ forgotten and the ‘Uncrowned King’ buried

One of the dozen of books that Nehru got from his father, when he was imprisoned in a Lucknow jail by the British in 1922, was a copy of The Light of Asia. Eighteen years later, in February 1940, Nehru himself sent his daughter (Indira), who was convalescing in a hospital in Switzerland, ‘Arnold’s two little books The Light of Asia and The Song Celestial’ to keep her company’. (The Song Celestial was Edwin Arnold’s 1885 English translation of the Sanskrit language ‘Bhagavad Gita’ or literally ‘Song of the Lord’. Arnold’s choice of ‘Celestial’ as an English equivalent to Sanskrit ‘Bhagawad’ in the title reflects his deep insight into the Hindu sacred text which, A.C. Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupada called, in 1984, ‘a definitive guide to the science of self-realization’.)

No doubt, The Light of Asia was Edwin Arnold’s most inspired poetic work. He drew upon many previously existing sources and his own personal interactions with the scholars as well as the ordinary people of India whom he loved. The inscription set up at the university chapel at Oxford where his ashes were deposited after his death contained the following information: Born June 10th, 1832, Died March 24th 1904. Newdigate Prizeman. (While a student at Oxford he won this prestigious prize for his poem ‘The Feast of Belshazzar’) These lines were inscribed there, too:

‘He found his sympathy with – Eastern religious thought

Inspiration for his great –

Poetical gifts.

’

Arnold had a strong moral character, a sharp intellect, a deep commitment to family and work, and meticulously cultivated social graces that enabled him to navigate interactions with people of high society as well as the common masses.That is why Jairam describes him as ‘a quintessential Victorian in every way’. He was a dedicated servant of the Empire, who was compassionate towards the subject people; he believed the British imperial system to be a protector and promoter of civilisation. A polyglot of rare ability, he was conversant in at least ten foreign languages (and indeed quite knowledgeable in some of them): Greek, Latin, Arabic, Turkish, French, German, Japanese (His third wife Tama Kurokawa, born in 1869 and hence less than half his age, was from Japan), Hebrew, Persian, Sanskrit and Marathi. Arnold’s remarkable multilingual capabilities stood him in good stead in serving the Empire in the cultural sphere through his translations between languages, thereby supporting mutual understanding among imperial subjects of different linguistic and religious cultures.

In a passing reference to Edwin Arnold’s The Light of Asia, reputed Indian historian A. L. Basham, in his 1954 book ‘The Wonder that was India’, mentioned that it was based on the Lalitavistara (a Mahayana Sutra in Sanskrit that describes the life of Gautama Buddha from his descent from Tushita heaven to his first sermon in the Deer Park at Sarnath near Varanasi or Baranas Nuwara as it is known among Sinhala speaking Buddhists. A different scholarly proposal mooted in 1960 was that Arnold’s principal source for his epic poem was Professor Samuel Beal’s translation of the Abhinishkramana Sutra (1875) combined with lesser borrowings from Spence Hardy and Arnold’s firsthand experience of Buddhism and his life in India. The year 1972 saw the emergence of yet another conclusion according to which he drew upon the knowledge he had gathered before 1879 by reading books, and also through his contact with sources of Theravada Buddhism in Ceylon (Sri Lanka).

There is lexical evidence of Arnold’s probable contact with Sinhala literary sources in the book. This is my supposition based on the fact that he was a language genius. Although Arnold had not been to Sri Lanka before 1886, he definitely had learned some Sinhala (though Jairam doesn’t mention this). When I read The Light of Asia as a teenager, I was fascinated by the fact that Edwin Arnold uses a few words of Sinhala (my native tongue) as substitutes for the Pali words which the context demands, for maintaining the metrical consistency of the lines, such as ‘sakwal’ or universes (for Pali ‘cakkavala’), ‘Seriyut’ (for the Pali name ‘Sariputta’) “Mugalan’ (for the Pali name ‘Moggallana’, ‘gow’ for Pali ‘gavuta’, and ‘dasa sil’ (for Pali ‘dasa sila). Jairam probably has no knowledge of Sinhala to have detected these Sinhalised Pali terms.

But Jairam’s apparent unfamiliarity with Sinhala has not been an impediment to his understanding of ‘the stunning impact in Ceylon’ that Arnold’s epic poem generated there, a mark of which was the annual ‘Light of Asia oratory contest’ for school children that had been conducted in Colombo for a long time. Incidentally, Jairam’s mention of this event brought to my mind the late Lakshman Kadirgamar. My article is a memorial tribute paid to him on the Vesak Day that, in Sri Lanka, fell on May 12, 2025. Though he was born into a traditional Christian family and had remained a Christian for most of his life until, in his senior years, he became an interfaith person who was, nevertheless, deeply inclined towards Buddhism (as his daughter Ajita says in her biography of her father ‘The Cake that Was Baked at Home’ (2015).

Ajita Kadirgamar mentions a little-known fact about her father’s school days at Trinity College, Kandy, which is that he took pride in having won the Light of Asia contest organised by the Colombo Young Men’s Buddhist Association as a student of that Christian school. She gives some information about the contest. The particular contest was inaugurated under the leadership of the then Governor of Ceylon Herbert Stanley in 1925 and was ‘dedicated to developing oratory skills in English and inculcating Buddhist ethics and values among the younger generation of the country’. The contestants were required to recite some verses from the Edwin Arnold classic ‘Light of Asia’ and give an explanation in English in their own words. “Thus”, Ajita adds, “one sees that LK’s great interest in Buddhism began while still a schoolboy and continued throughout his lifetime to be a topic close to his heart”. This interactional contact with The Light of Asia, as in the case of Swami Vivekananda, Anagarika Dharmapala, and many other renowned personalities of the past earlier mentioned in this article, must have had its characteristic developmental impact on the formation of Lakshman Kadirgamar’s noble personality. It was not for nothing that his schoolmates at Trinity called him ‘P of P’ ‘Personification of Personality’ as Ajita mentions in her book on her father. On his brutal assassination in 2005 at the age of 73, he came to be celebrated by journalists as ‘the Uncrowned King of Sri Lanka’, as the Editor of The Island newspaper eulogised him on his death in a front page editorial as another journalist named Arjuna Hulugalle later remembered in an anecdote (that Ajita records on pp.178-9). “To many he (Lakshman Kadirgamar) was also ‘the noblest son of Sri Lanka in recent times”, Arjuna Hulugalle added. That exalted image of Kadirgamar epitomises the influence that The Light of Asia had on the thinking minds of the culturally literate intelligent Sri Lankan youth of his time.

Ajita also records something that she heard from Ajith Samaranayake, a veteran journalist and newspaper editor (who was himself no more among the living at the time she was writing ‘The Cake that …’) about her father’s humility and generosity. Samaranayake was one of the journalists included in the entourage that accompanied Kadirgamar on his first official tour abroad as the newly appointed Foreign Affairs Minister in president Chandrika Bandaranayake’s government in 1994. They were on a visit to India. Kadirgamar was accommodated in the Hyderabad House, the Government of India’s State Guest House, along with High Commissioner for India designate Mangala Moonasinghe, and Jayantha Dhanapala (formerly of the UN, and later to become the Secretary General of the Peace Secretariat). Kadirgamar arranged for the journalists also to be accommodated and to have their meals in the same hotel. What was more, on his express request, the Indian government put an Air Force helicopter at their disposal for visiting sacred sites associated with the Buddha, including Buddhagaya (Bodh Gaya). This was a double privilege (as Ajita says) for the state visitors from Sri Lanka, for Mangala Moonasinghe was a descendant of Anagarika Dharmapala, well known in Sri Lanka and other Buddhist countries like Burma (Myanmar), Thailand, China, Japan, etc., for having made concerted efforts with the help of the likes of Sir Edwin Arnold to reclaim the sacred Buddhagaya site for the global Buddhists.

In fact, The Light of Asia author was the virtual progenitor of the very idea of reclaiming Bodh Gaya for world Buddhists. The famous Panadura Vadaya (Panadura Debate) between some members of the local Christian clergy and some Buddhist monks in 1873, in which the leading debater on the Buddhist side, a learned Buddhist monk by the name of Migettuwatte Gunananda Thero, well versed in English and Latin, in addition to Sinhala, Pali and Sanskrit, who, with his advanced knowledge of Buddhism and the Bible, and his superior oratorical skills, convincingly beat his Catholic opponents. The news of the debate was widely reported in newspapers circulated in Europe and America. This drew the attention of orientalist scholars and theosophists in the West like the American Colonel Henry Steel Olcott (a veteran of the American Civil War of 1861-65), Madame Blavatsky, and others, to the fact that Buddhist monks were challenging intrusive anti-Buddhist Christian missionary activity in Ceylon (Sri Lanka). The arrival of Olcott, Blavatsky, and others in Ceylon in 1880 and their passionate activism accelerated the pace of the burgeoning local Buddhist revivalist movement. Sixteen-year-old David Hewavitarana joined them, originally as their translator. In 1885, David changed his name to Dharmapala and took the Buddhist religious vow of ‘homelessness’ with his parents’ permission and became known as Anagarika Dharmapala (Dharmapala the Homeless). (To be concluded)

by Rohana R. Wasala