{"id":49214,"date":"2015-11-07T15:57:21","date_gmt":"2015-11-07T22:57:21","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/?p=49214"},"modified":"2015-11-07T15:57:21","modified_gmt":"2015-11-07T22:57:21","slug":"churning-world-churning-sri-lanka","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/2015\/11\/07\/churning-world-churning-sri-lanka\/","title":{"rendered":"Churning world: Churning Sri Lanka"},"content":{"rendered":"

By Susantha Goonatilake<\/strong><\/em><\/span><\/h2>\n

A few days ago China\u2019s President Xi Jinping visited the UK. And the British media reportedthat the British leaders and itsestablishment: groveled , kowtowed\u201d (dana gahala vandinawa<\/em>, on bended knee), the USAlost its best friend to its rival\u201d, the 19th<\/sup> century Chinese humiliation by the British was now reversed\u201d and China was out to restore the prestige it lost 175 years ago\u201d to the British. These phrases describe the changing power relations between Britain and China.<\/span><\/p>\n

The Western media further noted that Britain had really rolled out the red carpet, the Chinese leaderwas driven in a gilded carriage,given a lavish banquet by the Queen where the Duchess of Cambridge\u2019s dress was red coloured – the Chinese colour of good luck, stayed at Buckingham Palace, addressed the British Parliament, and was constantly attended by the Queen or Prime Minister Cameron. And the Queen spoke of a UK-Chinese global partnership\u201d. Wow! Lecturing Britain, had calculated her wins and losses. (In parenthesis, one should note that our President Sirisena on his own visit to the UK gushed that the same Queen shook hands with him without gloves-I have seen her twice at close range shaking hands without gloves-and that Cameron had walked up to his car to greet him. This naivity – to put it mildly \u2013perhaps excusable of a newPresident).<\/span><\/p>\n

Now China\u2019ssense of earlier humiliation and today\u2019s confidence are because she, as observers have noted, sees herself as a civilisation state -having a continuous historical narrative from circa the 3rd<\/sup> century BCE. This continuity is provided by her majorityHan ethnic group which current research indicates is not genetically pure but mixed. Contributing to this civilisational whole are her three cultural strands Confucianism, Taoism and the foreign import Buddhism. China unlike recent western nation states,has therefore,a long-range view from its long historical memory.<\/span><\/p>\n

Midway between China and the UK, you find another country,Sri Lanka with a historical memory,also beginning around the 3rd<\/sup> century BCE. India\u201d named after what the West Asians calledthe land beyond the Indus, has on the other hand as 19th<\/sup> century British sneered,no continuous historical memory mostlyfables and myths like the Ramayana and the Mahabharata. In fact, India\u2019s early history was only recovered in the 19th<\/sup> and 20th<\/sup> century through British translations of Sinhalese chronicles. The carriers of our own continuous history, namely the Sinhalese, current research indicates, arealso but a genetic mixture, the result of various groups coming here and mixing. Although Sinhalese speak a North Indian dialect,they areby no means Aryan\u201d that invention of 19th<\/sup> century British. And we of course like the Chinese had been humiliated for five centuries ever since the barbarous Portuguese came.<\/span><\/p>\n

In recent years, both China and the UK (and India) have loomed large in Sri Lanka. China after the end of the war had helped develop Sri Lanka\u2019s infrastructure but indications are that the terms could have been better. In fact, one commentator noted that our foreign debt in 2010 was only 36% of GDP while this year, it is estimated to rise to 94%. Bottom line: we fought the war without much indebtedness but afterwards; especially through infrastructure developments due mostly to Chinese loans, our debt increased. We could have perhaps bargained better. And worryingly, there were some speculations that the huge Dubai accounts held allegedlyby a former top political family member could have been from some of the extra charges in these deals. Who knows?<\/span><\/p>\n

The war itself, as opposed to ethnic tensions, we should recall,was started by India creating and arming a number of Tamil groups in different parts of India- and an act of indirect invasion and cross-border terrorism. As we were winning the war, India and the UK,both behind-the-scenes and overtly, tried to stop us. In the war, a, there could indeed have been rights violations as of course, versus a is US you are a a a a little ladder state a mechanic a there is in every war. In India the disputed territory of Kashmir is a huge platform for human rights violations while her suppression of Punjab separatism was by any standard extremely brutal. And as for Britain (and of course the USA) her invasion of then peaceful Iraq cost about half a million deaths as did her other adventures in the Middle East. Today\u2019s international TV covers extensively these outcomesof imperial overreach. But there are no cries for accountability for these two rogue states. (Okay! Partial rogue.)<\/span><\/p>\n

The cynical reasons are not far to seek. One of the most brutal countries, Saudi Arabia has been proposed to the UNHRC by Britain. Saudi Arabia as well as other Middle East states in the semi desert areas including Jordan were created by Britain and the West in the 20th<\/sup> century. Time magazine once revealed that the former King Hussein of Jordan in his 46-year rule was on the pay of the CIA. And Jordan\u2019s own CIA clone is a brutal organisation and no paragon of human rights. And from this illustrious Jordan Royal house comes also Prince Zeid, head of the UNHRC,strong advocate of the International Criminal Court ICC and the presumed judge and arbiter on what happened during our war. The grander advocate of human rights, the USA is not a signatory to the ICC. In fact, as Bernie Sanders a leading Democratic candidate to become the US President, points out there are more prisoners in the US than in China with about five times the US population. This example of misreading of the US reality is a counter tothe US\u2019s self-delusion of a non-existentAmerican exceptionalism\u201d.<\/span><\/p>\n

These differentglobal threads have now come to a juncture in Sri Lanka. While the British were kowtowing to China to get investment, so was backward India appealing for investment whenXi visited India. India did not get big Chinese investment and during Xi\u2019svisit, China in a show of force amassed troops at its disputed Indian boundary, a boundary drawn by the colonial power. In 1962,India had lost its only war with China and comparisons between the two indicate that India is no serious rival. An indirect outcome of India\u2019s defeat in 1962 was that separatism was banned in India, most notably in Tamil Nadu.<\/span><\/p>\n

But India has Sri Lanka to squeeze. And we gave the excuse when we allowed in Chinese submarines and our ambassador was berated in no uncertain terms. LikeXi in the UK, we also had our Parliamentary moment when Modi addressed our Parliament. As regional bully, he lectured to us on how we should govern ourselves. Forgotten were the uncleanliness and mass poverty in India. And in the meantime,Modi ran away totally with the soft power Buddhist option distortingin the process,the Buddhist message which India had forgotten. India considers Buddhism as part of Hinduism. And Sri Lanka, theoldestcontinuous Buddhist heritage in Asia, had ignored the Buddhist soft power possibilities in international relations.<\/span><\/p>\n

After berating the Chinese for nearly one year, reality has dawned on the current Sri Lanka rulers.Finance MinisterRavi Karunanayake, Defence SecretaryKarunasena Hettiarachchi andRauff Hakeem were all pleading for China to come back and invest. And China was playing hard to get.<\/span><\/p>\n

The Geneva resolution jointly sponsored by us was directly reminiscent of the infant King Dharmapala handing over our kingdom to the Portuguese. But our Parliamentary gentlemen were no infants. During the recent General Election, a section had shouted them hoarse supporting a nationalist perspective. And now,throwing all that aside, they were kowtowing to the privileges of being a Minister. This was no parallel with the situation when JR with Indian gunboats outside and overflying aircraft had to give in to the 13th<\/sup> amendment. Under pressure, he forced his parliamentarians to vote but said he will campaign for the nation in the proposed referendum.<\/span><\/p>\n

But the current lot does not require any pressure; they prostitute themselves willingly, discarding any ideology. The best illustration of this is seen in the book bythe pro- JHU, Asoka Abeygunawardana titled TheRevolution of the Era\u201d which describes how key JHU personnel conspired to bring down MR. And these were the very people who voted enthusiastically for the 18th<\/sup> Amendment which gave MR unprecedented powers. And these were the very ideological people who came to power stating that they wanted to carry the torch of the venerable Soma, were against their own leader SL Goonasekara as he had once been a Christian, had carried on fasts against unethical conversions and had in their own admission supported the awful BBS. And till the last moment, they were all unquestioning supporters of MR. And what today of the seeming lionMR? And what of the government of the SLFP et cetera that replaced his?<\/span><\/p>\n

MR has pushed himself into near silence as financial and other accusations like the misuse of government resources in elections are piled up. Most shamefully, during thethree-day parliamentary debate on the Geneva resolution,Rajapakse remained silent.The spokesman for the SLFP dominated government that replaced him gives press conferences behind a rainbow background- not the SLFP blue or coalition blue-red. And from where distant land did this foreign rainbow come here? From the Western gay community, from the increasingly corrupt South Africa?<\/span><\/p>\n

Leaders, what leaders?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By Susantha Goonatilake A few days ago China\u2019s President Xi Jinping visited the UK. And the British media reportedthat the British leaders and itsestablishment: groveled , kowtowed\u201d (dana gahala vandinawa, on bended knee), the USAlost its best friend to its rival\u201d, the 19th century Chinese humiliation by the British was now reversed\u201d and China was […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[72],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-49214","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-susantha-goonatilake"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/49214","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=49214"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/49214\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=49214"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=49214"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=49214"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}