{"id":49992,"date":"2015-12-05T14:56:37","date_gmt":"2015-12-05T21:56:37","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/?p=49992"},"modified":"2015-12-05T14:58:09","modified_gmt":"2015-12-05T21:58:09","slug":"britains-double-standards-over-prabhakaran-commemoration","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/2015\/12\/05\/britains-double-standards-over-prabhakaran-commemoration\/","title":{"rendered":"Britain\u2019s double standards over Prabhakaran commemoration"},"content":{"rendered":"

by Rajeewa Jayaweera\u00a0Courtesy Island<\/em><\/span><\/h2>\n

Shortly before 11 PM on Wednesday evening, after a debate lasting over 11 hours in the British House of Commons, the Speaker announced “397 for the Ayes and 223 for the Nays. So the Ayes have it.” Prime Minister David Cameron (DC), in his address had forcefully stated his case for the need to “use all force against the woman raping, Muslim-murdering medieval monsters of IS”, who he warned were a “death cult” that was “plotting to kill us and radicalise our children right now”. Sixty six Labour MPs voted with the government. Within 57 minutes of the announcement, the first two RAF Tornado jets of the six based in Cyprus were dropping their bomb loads over ISIL territory. DC had finally got his war. Two more Tornados and six Typhoons are due to boost RAF\u2019s fleet in Cyprus shortly.<\/p>\n

DC\u2019s 36 page memo justifying his case to take Britain to war is being compared to Tony Blair\u2019s notorious \u2018dodgy dossier\u2019 justifying Britain\u2019s war with Iraq in 2003, when he claimed Iraq possessed WMDs capable of reaching London within 45 minutes after launch. ISIL controlled area in Iraq and Syria is similar in extent to England and Scotland. It has around 30,000 fighters. DC\u2019s memo outlines the need to destabilize ISIL\u2019s military and economic capabilities through aerial bombardment but falls short of a second phase of \u2018boots on the ground\u2019, so necessary in such operations. Britain and its allies have learnt its lessons in Afghanistan, Iraq and Libya. DC\u2019s plan is to assign that part of the task to around 70,000 Syrian opposition fighters on ground, who he claims “do not belong to extremist groups”. However details were rather vague. He did not elaborate who these groups, if they could be moulded into a small but efficient fighting force and if they were up to the task of evicting ISIL\u2019s fighting formations. It is not a secret that groups opposed to Syrian President Assad\u2019s rule are varied and divided amongst themselves. Assuming these groups are able to take over from a defeated ISIL, there is no guarantee they would not split into different groups fighting amongst themselves similar to the current situation in Libya.<\/p>\n

What triggered the Russian bombardment of ISIL was the downing of an aircraft full of Russian holiday makers returning to Russia from Egypt. What triggered French President Fran\u00e7ois Hollande to commence a merciless campaign of aerial bombardment was the killing of 130 French citizens in Paris on 18 November. He even buried his differences with Russia\u2019s President Putin and travelled to Moscow to obtain the latter\u2019s support to form a grand coalition to fight ISIL. An opinion poll survey conducted in UK by ComRes confirmed that 60% in the UK after the Paris massacre favoured British military strikes in Syria, giving DC a golden opportunity to obtain parliamentary approval to send in the RAF which he failed previously.<\/p>\n

It is relevant to compare the present blood lust of the British and French governments for ISIL in light of the non-stop mantra \u2018negotiate a peaceful settlement\u2019 preached to GoSL during its conflict with LTTE terrorists. It is relevant to question the justification for British and French refusal to sell weapons to Sri Lanka to fight terrorism. It is relevant to question the attitude of both British and French governments during days when bomb explosions resulted in more than 130 dead on several occasions. It is relevant to question the hurried visit to Sri Lanka by Foreign Secretaries of Britain and France, David Miliband and Bernard Kouchner in late April 2009 to press GoSL for a humanitarian truce and permit the LTTE leadership trapped inside a few square kilometres to be evacuated. It is relevant to question both Prime Minister Cameron and President Hollande if they would permit a humanitarian truce to evacuate ISIL leadership, should they ever be surrounded and trapped.<\/p>\n

On Friday, 27 November, a rally was held at the Wembley Arena in London to commemorate the life of Prabhakaran. It had over 20,000 participants. From their appearance and attire containing maps of the North and East of Sri Lanka identified in yellow as Eelam, it was obvious they were members of the Tamil diaspora in UK. Cleverly designed flags depicting the Tiger head, sans rifles to overcome British law were on display.<\/p>\n

Did not the British authorities who granted approval for the event realise the purpose of this rally? Did the British security establishment, currently in the highest state of alert forget that Prabhakaran, whose life was being commemorated was the dead leader of LTTE proscribed in UK since 2000 and one of the most ruthless terrorist organizations in the world till six years ago.<\/p>\n

The act of permitting a rally in London to commemorate the life of Prabhakaran is similar to permitting a group of former Iraqi Baathists to commemorate the death of Saddam Hussain in London, or a group of Al Qaeda supporters to commemorate the death of Osama bin Laden in London.<\/p>\n

Notwithstanding Britain\u2019s claim of a tolerant, inclusive and enlightened society, needless to say approval for such events to be held in London would not have been received. One wonders if in the eyes of the British government, Prabhakaran is considered less evil than Saddam Hussain or Osama bin Laden? Or, is it the power of the block vote and political donations which makes the difference?<\/p>\n

The present administration in Sri Lanka has de-proscribed many diaspora organizations and individuals which is essential for reconciliation. However, it is hoped de-proscription has been carried out after a thorough investigation into each organization \/ individual and not haphazardly to suit political agendas of individual Ministers. It is also hoped the present administration who claim to have reset relations with the west, especially with USA and UK would take up the issue with British authorities in an appropriate manner.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

by Rajeewa Jayaweera\u00a0Courtesy Island Shortly before 11 PM on Wednesday evening, after a debate lasting over 11 hours in the British House of Commons, the Speaker announced “397 for the Ayes and 223 for the Nays. So the Ayes have it.” Prime Minister David Cameron (DC), in his address had forcefully stated his case for […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[12],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-49992","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-forum"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/49992","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=49992"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/49992\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=49992"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=49992"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=49992"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}