Sri Lanka conflict: ICRC footprint

For some strange reason Sri Lanka never asked the international community to examine a report released by the UN Country Team that dealt with the situation in the Vanni from Aug 2008 to May 13, 2009. That report, prepared with the help of the ICRC and the national staff of the UN and NGOs, placed the number of dead during this period at 7,221 and wounded 18,479 (both civilians and LTTE). The UN findings contradicted the Report of the UN Secretary General’s Panel of Experts (PoE), which was more like a handpicked kangaroo court out to hang Sri Lanka on Accountability (section 134). As to how it plucked the figure of an estimated number of dead at 40,000 civilians (section 137) out of nowhere, when Amnesty International placed the number of dead at 10,000, is anybody’s guess.

By Shamindra Ferdinando

‘Humanity in War: Frontline photography since 1860’, an ICRC publication that dealt with wars and conflicts, included two photographs of Sri Lanka’s war against separatist terrorists.

The Island recently received a 247-page book from Ruwanthi Jayasundare, Head of Communication at the International Committee of the Red Cross – ICRC, Colombo. One of the pictures taken in 2007, in the eastern Batticaloa district, depicted the scene in a camp for the displaced.

Dominic Sansoni captured that scene at a time the military had been making steady progress in the Eastern theatre of operations where major battles erupted in August 2006. Incidentally, Dominic is the son of the late Edward Claude Sansoni (18 November 1904 – 1979), the 32nd Chief Justice of Sri Lanka, then Ceylon. Justice Sansoni, during his retirement, also presided over a Presidential Commission of Inquiry that looked into the incidents which took place between 13th August and 15th September 1977, soon after the UNP was swept into power with a record 5/6th majority in Parliament, and findings of that Commission, released in 1980, might be a dispassionate eye-opener to the roots of the ethnic conflict.

The other picture (published in this page) that had been taken by Alfred Grimm, for the ICRC, in 1991, at an undisclosed location, illustrated the severe difficulties experienced by the military on the northern front.

Having lost the overland Main Supply Route (MSR) to the Jaffna peninsula to the LTTE, the year before, within months after the Indian Army completed its withdrawal in March 1990 (July 1987 to March 1990), the Army had to depend on the ICRC to arrange transfer of bodies of officers and men killed in action from LTTE-held areas to government controlled regions in the North and East.

That pathetic picture of coffins placed on a dilapidated jetty before being loaded to a vessel carrying the ICRC flag aptly reflects the much repeated adage that a picture paints a thousand words. A senior retired Navy officer asserted that the picture could have been taken at the Point Pedro jetty that had been under LTTE control at that time. Obviously, the ICRC preferred to use PPD to please the LTTE as the neighbouring Kankesanthurai harbor had been under Navy control throughout the war.

In some instances, the LTTE refused to arrange the transfer of bodies overland. Instead, the group insisted on the ICRC’s involvement as part of its overall strategy meant to humiliate the military, struggling to cope with the onslaughts.

Alfred Grimm’s still image explained the developing precarious situation in the northern theatre of operations, at that time, in the wake of the Army losing all detachments north of Vavuniya, right up to Elephant Pass, on the Kandy-Jaffna A 9 road. It would be pertinent to mention that the Army had to launch the largest single amphibious operation ‘Balawegaya,’ in 1991, to thwart an LTTE attempt to overrun the Elephant Pass base after laying siege to it. There hadn’t been such a large operation until the combined armed forces brought the war to a successful conclusion on the banks of the Nanthikadal lagoon in 2009.

In the Jaffna peninsula, the entire military deployment was restricted to the Palaly-Kankesanthurai sector and the Jaffna Fort at a time the international community believed the LTTE could ultimately overwhelm the government forces. Having been in touch with the ICRC since its initial deployment here during the late President Ranasinghe Premadasa’s tenure (1989-1993), the writer felt the Geneva-headquartered organisation, too, believed the LTTE couldn’t be defeated militarily by our security forces.

The Interim Secretariat for Truth and Reconciliation Mechanism (ISTRAM), busy in building required legal and policy framework, operational procedures and guidelines for the proposed Commission for Truth, Unity and Reconciliation (CTUR), should examine the gradual development of the conflict in proper context to ensure a precise narrative.

Fifteen years after the end of the conflict, ISTRAM faces a daunting task, especially against the backdrop of various interested parties seeking to influence the overall process. The crux of the problem is, in the absence of a proper government strategy, all stakeholders seemed to be bent on holding the military and police responsible for alleged atrocities perpetrated during the conflict, while numerous wily deadly acts, committed by terrorists, are hardly ever mentioned, even though even the US Federal Bureau of Investigation called the LTTE the most ruthless terrorist organisation.

Canada, playing politics with voters of Sri Lankan Tamil origin, has, without any inquiry whatsoever, blindly declared that the country committed genocide during the conflict All major political parties there have bent backwards to appease the Tamil electorate and they are going to increase pressure on Sri Lanka as the next Canadian federal election approaches. The election is scheduled for Oct 20, 2025, or before, and already the Tamil electorate is exploiting the situation to tarnish Sri Lanka even more with their wild allegations that are lapped up by Canadian politicians with an eye on Tamil votes.

The recent attack on Canadian Tamil Congress (CTC) office, in Canada, by obvious terrorist sympathisers, for them having been part of a Tamil Diaspora team that met former President Mahinda Rajapaksa, and continuing controversy over a statement attributed to incumbent Canadian High Commissioner here, Eric Walsh, by the President of the Canada branch of the Tamil National Alliance (TNA), over the Himalayan Declaration, propagated by the Global Tamil Forum (GTF), underscored how important the Tamil Canadian vote is for unscrupulous politicians.

The recent declaration by Canada’s Conservative Party leader, Pierre Poilievre, that he would take Sri Lanka to the International Court of Justice (ICJ) and appoint lawyers to pursue charges against “accused” war criminals in the International Criminal Court (ICC), should be examined against above apt background.

Obviously, most of these people are only out for revenge from those who defeated LTTE terrorism, in the battlefield, and not reconciliation by any stretch of the imagination, as happened in South Africa, where despite white rulers having treated blacks worse than animals under apartheid rule, the black and other oppressed people there were willing to forgive and forget things done to them far worse than anything that happened in Sri Lanka.

Premadasa invites ICRC

Let us examine the deployment of ICRC here in late 1989. By then, the JVP terror campaign had run out of steam. A few months after the arrival of ICRC here, the Army captured and executed JVP leader Rohana Wijeweera. At that time, the Indian Army, too, was deployed in the North East and controversy was brewing over President Premadasa’s declaration that India should immediately call off its Sri Lanka mission.

President Premadasa invited the ICRC to meet humanitarian needs caused by the second JVP terrorist campaign and equally murderous government response to it at a time President Premadasa was having a honeymoon (May 1989-June 1990) with Velupillai Prabhakaran.

Just months after the ICRC’s arrival, the government eradicated the JVP, but fighting erupted in the north in June, 1990, paving the way for the group to expand its operations to cover the entire country. The ICRC deployment covered the area under government control as well as the LTTE-held area. The ICRC played a significant role with President Premadasa’s government in disarray in the wake of the LTTE’s resumed violent campaign to divide Sri Lanka was making rapid progress.

By then the Indian Army had left our shores following a spat between President Premadasa and then Indian Premier Rajiv Gandhi.

A case in point is the ICRC’s high profile intervention to declare a demilitarised zone in the area covering the Jaffna Fort and the Jaffna hospital in the last week of July 1990, several weeks after the LTTE launched Eelam War II. The LTTE made repeated attempts to overrun the isolated Jaffna Fort, at that time held by the Sixth battalion of the Sinha Regiment. The ICRC pushed for a tripartite agreement involving the government, the LTTE and the ICRC on the basis that such an understanding could prevent the battle for the Dutch-built Jaffna Fort from jeopardizing the lives of those seeking treatment at the premier medical institution in the peninsula, as well as its staff.

However, the audacious LTTE disregarded the ICRC. Prabhakaran sensed an impending significant battlefield victory. The LTTE fought hard to force the beleaguered troops to surrender. Finally, President Premadasa authorised the military to break the siege on the Jaffna Fort. The ICRC hadn’t been happy with that move but what no one really anticipated was Premadasa’s government quirky decision to vacate the Jaffna Fort two weeks after having ended the siege at great cost. Nearly 50 officers and men made the supreme sacrifice and over 100 were wounded in that operation to break the siege. Did they die in vain? What made Premadasa to vacate the Jaffna Fort in late Sept 1990? The Army moved to Jaffna Fort in 1985 as Indian trained terrorists intensified attacks in the Jaffna peninsula. Don’t forget half a dozen terrorist groups, including the LTTE operated at that time.

By the time of Eelam war 11 entered its fourth year in 1993, the ICRC had quite a substantial presence in the North-East.

ICRC negotiating for policemen’s release

The LTTE massacred several hundred policemen after they were ordered to surrender to the Tigers by President Premadasa’s government. However, some of them, approximately 50, including several Tamil law enforcement personnel, were held in detention camps in the north. Some of them were lucky to communicate with their families, through the ICRC.

Dominique Dufour, who succeeded ICRC head in Colombo, Wettach Pierre ,in late 1992, on a number of occasions provided useful information regarding policemen in captivity. Dufour was willing to be quoted and once explained to the writer, at his Colombo office, the ICRC’s efforts to help the detained men communicate with their loved ones against the backdrop of disagreement between the LTTE and the government regarding the families visiting the captives. During Wettach Pierre’s tenure, the ICRC made a determined bid to take families of captives to the north in a ship. According to Dufour, there had been 39 policemen and one soldier (Languishing in Tiger captivity: The forgotten 39, The Sunday Island, Oct 11, 1992).

The ICRC’s role here should be examined, taking into consideration Sri Lanka’s readiness to secure assistance provided by the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) and Medecins Sans Frontieres, in addition to several other relief organisations. The UNHCR launched its mission here in 1987, two years before the arrival of the ICRC on the invitation of President Premadasa. The MSF first positioned personnel here in 1986, the year before the signing of the Indo-Lanka accord that paved the way for the deployment of the Indian Army. The MSF called off its Sri Lanka mission in March 2004 in the wake of the signing of the secretly arranged Ceasefire Agreement between Sri Lanka and the LTTE by the Norwegians. It was signed by then Premier Ranil Wickremesinghe without the approval of President Chandrika Kumaratunga, even though she was the Commander-in-Chief of the armed forces. But, the MSF returned nine months later, after the tsunami disaster struck Sri Lanka, and remained till the end of 2005.

The MSF re-deployed in the war zone in 2007 and remained here till 2012. On the part of Sri Lanka, there had never been an effort to block foreign assistance reaching the Tamil community in the North-East. In fact, successive governments went out of their way to ensure the supplies reached civilians though they knew the LTTE siphoned a significant portion of the relief sent.

ISTRAM must be aware of ground realities in those days – one such instance had been the UNHCR’s efforts to arrange food convoys across the Jaffna lagoon, using the Sangupiddy ferry.

The then UNHCR’s senior protection officer in Colombo, Dr. Peter Nicolaus, explained to this writer their negotiations with the LTTE to open a supply route, via the Jaffna lagoon, at that time the scene of frequent clashes between Sea Tigers and Navy patrols launched from the Nagathivanthurai naval detachment. The Sunday Island received a briefing after Dr. Nicolaus and UNHCR’s regional legal advisor Bo Schack on Dec 09, 1992, discussed the issue with Anton Balasingham, the LTTE’s theoretician and Yogiratnam Yogi in Jaffna (Major role for international relief organizations in NE war, The Sunday Island, January 3, 1993).

None of those shedding crocodile tears for the Tamil community today dared at least to appeal to the LTTE not to block food convoys. Instead, they cooperated with the LTTE efforts to compel the military to give up control over civilian entry/exit points, namely the Elephant Pass causeway, the Sandupiddy-Pooneryn ferry, Kilali route and Kombadi and Orriyan points.

The LTTE later informed the senior Jaffna-based UNHCR officer that food convoys couldn’t be allowed through Sangupiddy unless the government vacated the area to facilitate the international relief effort.

The government, if it is so keen to establish the truth should undertake a thorough examination of developments throughout the conflict.

The high-handed LTTE refused to drop its prerequisite (vacation of Pooneryn-Sangupiddy area by government troops) even after Western powers intervened. In Feb 1992 Dr. Nicolaus told the writer that UNHCR gave up their efforts, disclosing the UN organisation went to the extent of offering to send a delegation from Geneva or New York to Jaffna to discuss the issue at hand (Opening ‘safe passage’ to Jaffna peninsula: Despite appeals Tigers refuse to negotiate with UNHCR, The Island, February 18, 1993).

Later, the LTTE indicated its willingness to drop any perquisites for the opening of a safe passage and participate in negotiations. Dr. Nicolaus confirmed this development. However, at the end the ferry remained non-operational while the Navy and Sea Tigers battled it out in the Jaffna lagoon.

In early Nov 1993, the LTTE smashed through Pooneryn and Nagathivanthurai defences, thereby ended the siege on the Jaffna peninsula (Re-opening of Pooneryn ferry: Tigers drop Army pull-out call, The Island March 21, 1993). The Navy abandoned Nagathevanthurai.

ICRC’s role during Eelam War IV

Sri Lanka never made an honest attempt to build a proper defence against war crimes accusations. In the absence of a cohesive bi-partisan strategy on our part, those campaigning against the war-winning country built a strong case on the basis of repeating the widespread lies that Sri Lanka waged a war without eyewitnesses. Successive governments never bothered to at least examine how the wartime presence of major international NGOs and the UN could have easily countered those allegations as they bore witness as to how the war was conducted.

ISTRAM should examine all relevant factors, especially records of international NGOs and Indian medical teams deployed in the East during the last phase of the offensive against the LTTE on the Vanni east front. It would be silly to entirely depend on claims and allegations made by those who are still smarting from the battlefield defeat of the world’s most ruthless terrorist outfit with conventional fighting capabilities at the hands of the security forces despite overt and covert help extended to them by the West and Western-funded NGOs operating from Colombo. They literally built up the LTTE image to the level of invincibility.

Special attention should be paid to the World Food Programme (WFP) records and that of the ICRC as they proved the existence of a sea supply route to Puthamathalan, the last LTTE-held area in the Mullaithivu district. As soon as the land supply route to Mullaithivu had been closed due to intense fighting, the government, the ICRC and WFP launched an operation on February 10, 2009, to move supplies by sea and then use the same vessel to evacuate the wounded to Pulmoddai where they were handed over to the Indian medical team.

The final ICRC vessel reached Puthumathalan on May 09, 2009, just 10 days before Prabhakaran was killed on the banks of the Nanthikadal lagoon. Actually, the war ended on the previous day when the Army brought the entire Mullaithivu district under its control. Prabhakaran, his wife Mathivathani, daughter Duvaraga and younger son Balachandran had been hiding within the Army controlled area as the Army declared the war over. Prabhakaran’s eldest son Charles Anthony was killed in a separate confrontation just before the Army declared the end of war.

It would be the responsibility of ISTRAM to establish the total amount of food, medicine and other supplies moved to the LTTE-held area overland and by sea during January 1, 2009, to May 09, 2009. That would help establish how Sri Lanka allowed the international community to facilitate supplies, though there could have been shortcomings.

The ICRC (international staff) also had access to Puthumathalan until May 09, 2009 whereas the UN (international staff) maintained presence in the war zone till January 29, 2009, and those wounded civilians evacuated from Puthamathalan under ICRC supervision were handed over to Pulmoddai-based Indian medical team.

Unfortunately, Sri Lanka never argued its case properly before the international community. Let us hope ISTRAM succeeds in reaching consensus on the Sri Lanka narrative.