Perhaps that is why the controlled-opposition lefty gets an op space, huh?
"The silence surrounding Sri Lanka" by Arundhati Roy | March 31, 2009
Arundhati Roy is a novelist based in New Delhi. She is author of "The God of Small Things," and a forthcoming book of essays, "Field Notes on Democracy."
Sri Lankan Tamil civilians arriving at a government-controlled area after fleeing territory controlled by the the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelan last week. (Reuters)
NEW DELHI
THE HORROR that is unfolding in Sri Lanka becomes possible because of the silence that surrounds it. There is almost no reporting in the international press - or in the mainstream media in India, where I live - about what is happening.
Strange; we have been getting daily articles in the Globe.
From the little information that is filtering through, it looks as though the Sri Lankan government is using the propaganda of "the war on terror" as a fig leaf to dismantle any semblance of democracy in the country and commit unspeakable crimes against the Tamil people.
Gee, where have we seen that before, 'eh, Amurkns?
The government is working on the principle that every Tamil is a terrorist unless he or she can prove otherwise, and civilian areas, hospitals, and shelters are being bombed and turned into a war zone. Reliable estimates put the number of civilians trapped at over 200,000. The Sri Lankan army is advancing, armed with tanks and aircraft.
Strange; newspapers told me it was about 100,000.
Meanwhile, there are reports that several "welfare villages" have been established to house displaced Tamils in the Vavuniya and Mannar districts. The Daily Telegraph in London reports that these villages "will be compulsory holding centers for all civilians fleeing the fighting." Is this a euphemism for concentration camps?
Mangala Samaraweera, a former foreign minister of Sri Lanka, told The Daily Telegraph: "A few months ago the government started registering all Tamils in Colombo on the grounds that they could be a security threat, but this could be exploited for other purposes like the Nazis in the 1930s. They're basically going to label the whole civilian Tamil population as potential terrorists."
More Nazi than Nazi, 'eh?
Given the government's stated objective of "wiping out" the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelan, this malevolent collapse of civilians and "terrorists" does seem to signal that the government is on the verge of committing what could end up being genocide. According to a United Nations estimate, several thousand people have already been killed. Thousands more are critically wounded. What we are witnessing - or, rather, what is happening in Sri Lanka and is being so effectively hidden from public scrutiny - is a brazen, openly racist war.
I could have sworn she was talking about Israel!
The impunity with which the Sri Lankan government is able to commit these crimes unveils the deeply ingrained racist prejudice that is precisely what led to the marginalization and alienation of the Tamils of Sri Lanka in the first place. That racism has a long history, involving social ostracization, economic blockades, pogroms, and torture.
Man, that describes Israel's treatment of the Palestinians to a tee.
The brutal nature of the decades-long civil war, which started as a peaceful, nonviolent protest, has its roots here.
They always do!!!
Why the silence? In another interview, Mangala Samaraweera said, "A free media is virtually nonexistent in Sri Lanka today."
Same in Zionist-controlled AmeriKa!
He described death squads and "white van abductions," which have made society "freeze with fear." Voices of dissent have been abducted and assassinated. The International Federation of Journalists accuses the government of Sri Lanka of using a combination of anti-terrorism laws, disappearances, and assassinations to silence journalists.
Wow, all things that my MSM news reports never even hinted at!
There are unconfirmed reports that the Indian government is lending material and logistical support to the Sri Lankan government. If this is true, it is outrageous. What about the governments of other countries? Pakistan? China? What are they doing to help or harm the situation?
Israel?
Related: Chinese billions in Sri Lanka fund battle against Tamil Tigers
In Tamil Nadu, India, the war in Sri Lanka has fueled passions that have led to more than 10 people immolating themselves. The public anger and anguish - much of it genuine, but some of it obviously cynical political manipulation - has become an election issue. It is extraordinary that this concern has not traveled to the rest of India. Why is there silence?
Given the scale of what is happening in Sri Lanka, the silence is inexcusable. More so because of the Indian government's long history of irresponsible dabbling in the conflict, first taking one side and then the other.
Oh MAN!!!!!
Several of us who should have spoken out much earlier, have not done so, simply because of a lack of information about the war. So while the killing continues, while tens of thousands of people are being barricaded into concentration camps, while more than 200,000 face starvation, and a genocide waits to happen, there is dead silence from this great country. It's a colossal humanitarian tragedy. The world must step in. Now. Before it's too late.
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I don't think they heard her; that op piece was over a month ago -- about the same time the Globe got into the act!!!!
"The agony in Sri Lanka
April 25, 2009
ONE OF THE WORLD'S longest, bloodiest conflicts is coming to a gruesome conclusion on the island nation of Sri Lanka. The United Nations estimates that some 6,500 civilians have died and 14,000 have been injured in the government's merciless offensive against the Tamil Tigers in the northeast of the country. The Obama administration and other governments, particularly India and China, should pressure both the Sri Lankan government and the Tigers to halt the fighting and permit trapped civilians to escape.
I'm waiting for the Globe editorial criticizing Israel in the same manner.
This sort of humanitarian intervention would be more likely to succeed if the interveners make it clear that Sri Lankan government officials and Tiger leaders will be held responsible for war crimes and crimes against humanity.
Again, waiting for the editorial calling for Israel's leaders (or America's and Britain's) to be held responsible for their war crimes.
Accounts from refugees leave little doubt that both sides have perpetrated such crimes. It was probably to hide those crimes that Sri Lankan President Mahinda Rajapaksa and Defense Minister Gotabahaya Rajapaksa, his brother, banned international aid groups and independent journalists from the theater of war.
And when Israel does it, Globe? You hear anything, readers?
At a time when 100,000 refugees need medical care, food, and shelter, and another 50,000 are under shelling in a five-square-mile war zone, the international community has proved impotent to live up to the UN's 2005 adoption of a "right to protect" civilians who are not protected by their government. UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon deserves credit for announcing Thursday that he was sending a humanitarian aid team to the war zone. "So many lives have been sacrificed," Ban said. "There is no time to lose." Welcome as the UN chief's humanitarian initiative must be, the sad truth is that it comes woefully late, after too much preventable human suffering.
Gaza, Palestine, Israel....
The Rajapaksa brothers have been able to get away with their no-quarter assault on the Tigers, with all the collateral damage that entailed, because they dressed it up as a war against terrorists. Their propaganda has been effective because it is grounded in a half-truth.
All right, that's it! The duplicituous chutzpah and hypocrisy is getting to me!
The Tigers have committed terrorist acts. But the overwhelming majority of the victims in the Rajapaksa brothers' war have been Tamil civilians. For more than a quarter century, successive Sri Lankan governments have refused to grant ethnic Tamils in the north and northeast of the country some form of autonomy or self-rule in a confederal state.
Israel, Palestine, and I'm tired of typing it.
The Tigers may be crushed in the next few days. But the anger and alienation of the Tamil minority in Sri Lanka is more acute than ever. The ultimate solution for Sri Lanka's communal conflict can only be political, not military.
Tell it to Israel, Zionist mouthpiece!
If the Tamil populace sees no hope for autonomy within Sri Lanka, it may come to demand a separate state - after all, the secessionist goal of the Tigers.
And the Globe dare criticize the Palestinians?
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