{"id":96742,"date":"2019-12-22T15:21:44","date_gmt":"2019-12-22T22:21:44","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/?p=96742"},"modified":"2019-12-24T16:19:50","modified_gmt":"2019-12-24T23:19:50","slug":"erasing-the-eelam-victory-part-10a","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/2019\/12\/22\/erasing-the-eelam-victory-part-10a\/","title":{"rendered":"ERASING THE EELAM VICTORY Part 10A"},"content":{"rendered":"

KAMALIKA PIERIS<\/em><\/span><\/h2>\n\n\n

As Eelam war IV came to an end, the armed forces\nmoved onto Rescue, Rehabilitation and Resettlement. This essay is about the\nRescue.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

 From mid\n2008 civilians from LTTE controlled territory, were entering government\ncontrolled territory. They came in small groups,\nas well as large numbers, wherever and whenever possible. They escaped in the\ndaylight and at night. Sri Lanka army had provided night moves to help them get\nacross at night. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The\nbiggest escape came on 21 and 22 April 2009   when the LTTE embankments were opened up and\nthe hostages came streaming out. Before the day was over, army had rescued\naround 80,000 civilians. By following morning 174,564 more had come in.\nHundreds of LTTE cadres had  also dropped\ntheir weapons and joined the large crowd fleeing across the lagoon.  \u2018It\nwas like hitting a \u2018meevadaya\u2019, the army said later.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

On our\ntelevision screens, we saw them running eagerly towards the armed forces. We\nalso saw how the soldiers compassionately carried across the hostages who could\nnot walk and helped others who could.  The civilians were able to escape\nbecause of the assistance offered by Security Forces. Sri Lanka armed forces\ntook the lead role in this emergency humanitarian effort\u2019. This must be\nrecognized and never forgotten.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

All\nthose who crossed over to Government controlled areas received immediate care\nand attention. The army looked after them. As they came in they were given a\nbottle of water, and immediate medical attention. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Medical\nteams from the Sri Lanka Army Medical Corps looked at their health status.\nDehydration and hypoglycaemia were treated at the initial point of contact, and\nanyone with bleeding was given emergency treatment to arrest the flow of blood.\nNo distinction was made between civilians and combatants in the services\nprovided. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Those\nwith   injuries and illness were sent to\nmedical stations for treatment.<\/strong>\nEight Advanced Dressing Stations were established within 500 meters to 1\nkilometre of the front lines for minor surgical procedures. More complex\nprocedures were carried out at the five Main Dressing Stations established in\nthe army divisional headquarters area. Those with severe injuries were sent to\nhospitals at Vavuniya and Anuradhapura using helicopters. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The\nInternally Displaced Persons (IDPs) were then taken to registration centers and\nregistered with assistance of the Red Cross and UN agencies including UNHCR.\nThese were transit centers with medical, food, water, sanitation facilities and\nclothes. IDPs were processed and\naccommodated within 5-7 days.  A social\nprofile was prepared for each IDP, which included level of radicalization and\nsocio economic status. LTTE cadres who surrendered were taken to other centres\nfor further investigation and rehabilitation. Former child combatants were\nlooked after separately. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The\ncivilians were   then taken to the\nshelters prepared for them. Reception centres had been established and detailed\npreparations had been made beforehand. Government schools and institutions in\nVavuniya district with large buildings had been taken over  <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Gamini\nKeerawella observed that the government was able to absorb the initial shock of\nsatisfactorily providing shelters, water, medical care, food supply as well as\nidentification and registration of IDPs. This was a gigantic task, he\nsaid.  Around 300,000 civilians were\nrescued altogether.  This figure shows\nthe magnitude of the operation and the logistic support necessary. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

After\ninitial screening, all civilians not requiring medical treatment were sent to\nthe relief villages established by the Government of Sri Lanka at Menik\nFarm,  a sprawling 700-hectare site\noutside the northern town of Vavuniya. 100 acres of Menik farm was cleared by\nthe army for the purpose. Menik\nfarm was selected it was only 22 km away from Vavuniya town. The villages in Menik Farm were named   Anandakumaraswamy, Arunachalam, Kadirgamar\nand Ramanathapura.  262,629   IDPs\nwere accommodated there. Families\nwere kept together as far as possible.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Government\ntook responsibility for the management of the welfare villages and took full\ncontrol over all activities The Sri Lanka army saw to overall management\nsupervision and maintenance of security. Menik\nfarm was considered the world\u2019s largest camp for internally displaced people.\nAt its peak, it held 225,000 people. Rs 2777 million was spent on these relief\nvillages from 2009-2012 <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The\nvillages had schools, pre schools, healthcare centers, hospitals, community\nkitchens, tube wells, water tanks, shops, cooperatives, banks, post office,\ntelephones, libraries, children\u2019s parks and place of religious worship., Many organization and individuals from elsewhere in\nthe country spontaneously and overwhelmingly responded by making donations of\nwater, food and non food items but not the Tamils.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

A family\nfrom Adampan in Mannar had travelled, on the orders of the LTTE all the way to\nNanthikadal. On the way, family got split up. The survivors had later regrouped\nin Ramanathapuram in Menik Farm,  but one\nsister  had gone missing after they\ncrossed over.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Menik Farm closed in September\n2012. Several schools and hospitals which were located within Menik Farm were\nretained.  The government of Sri\nLanka   said its work at Menik Farm was\nwonderful. The west which had supported the civil war and deeply resented the\ndefeat, thought otherwise. This is what they had to say, as given in Wikipedia.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

 The Sri Lankan\ngovernment\/military describes the camps as “welfare centres” or\n“welfare villages” but the conditions imposed on the IDPs have\nprompted others, inside and outside Sri Lanka, to use other terms to describe\nthe camps, said Wikipedia. Western critics have described the camps as “prisons<\/a>”\nor “closed camps” because the IDPs were not permitted to leave the\ncamps.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Some, including the United Nations<\/a>\u2019 High Commissioner for Human Rights<\/a> Navaneetham Pillay<\/a>, have\ngone further and described the camps as “internment camps<\/a>”\nbecause the IDPs were not permitted leave the camps; access to the camps by\nindependent aid organizations, independent media, IDPs relatives and opposition\npoliticians is heavily restricted or denied completely; and the camps are\ncontrolled by the Sri Lankan military, continued Wikipedia.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Tamil activists have described the camps as “concentration camps<\/a>“, using an image of IDPs standing\nbehind barbed wire fences to liken the camps to the concentration camps of World War II<\/a> and Bosnian Civil War<\/a>, added\nWikipedia, helpfully. Indian and Tamil MPs, Catholic priests, academics, Permanent Peoples\u2019 Tribunal<\/a> based\nin Milan,  Booker Prize-winning author Arundhati Roy<\/a> and Noam Chomsky<\/a> as well\nas the Telegraph and Times newspapers also described the IDP camps as\nconcentration camps said Wikipedia.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The conditions imposed on the IDPs, the conditions inside the camps\nand the slow progress of resettlement have attracted widespread criticism from\ninside and outside Sri Lanka, went on Wikipedia. Shelters had been built from\ntarp and sticks. Much of the displaced civilians were often forcibly detained\nin camps lacking even the basic amenities.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The IDPs were not allowed to leave the camps initially. Human rights<\/a> groups\nbelieve that this effectively meant that the IDPs were being detained\nindefinitely without charge or trial, in contravention of international law<\/a>  continued Wikipedia, citing ,\nnonsensically,  Articles 9 and 12 of the International\nCovenant on Civil and Political Rights<\/a>,  which \nguarantee the rights to liberty, freedom from arbitrary detention and\nfreedom of movement.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

On 1 December 2009 the camps were opened up, giving the IDPs limited\nfreedom. The IDPs could leave the camps for up to 15 days after giving their\ndetails to the authorities but they would have to return to the camps on a\nstipulated day. Some IDPs could leave the camps permanently but would have to\nreport to the police regularly. The Sri Lankan military has threatened to\n“track down” IDPs who don’t return to camps or report to the police.\nThe camps are being described by some as “open prisons” because of\nthese strict conditions imposed on the IDPs, said Wikipedia. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Access to the camps by independent media is heavily restricted. When\nthe media are allowed into the camps they are monitored by the military and all\ncontact with the IDPs is filmed by the military. Access to the camps by the\nIDPs’ relatives is also heavily restricted   \nWikipedia went on. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Initially the Sri Lankan military denied all access to the camps by\nNGOs. This was later relaxed after pressure was exerted by the international\ncommunity. Many local and international NGOs now work in the camps but they\ncontinue to report problems with access. However, human rights groups and\nothers who wish provide advice to the IDPs were denied access said Wikipedia. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Menik Farm site is very prone to flooding because it lies on low\nground near a number of rivers and streams including the Aruvi Aru<\/a>\n(Malvathu Oya). In August heavy rains flooded the site, causing heavy damage to\nthe tents housing the IDPs and sending raw sewage into the camps and the rivers\nproviding drinking water. There is widespread concern that the north east monsoon<\/a> season\n(October to March) will flood the site.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

By the end of September 10,000 IDPs had been identified as having some\nlinks to the Tamil Tigers. This includes not only former cadres but also their\nrelatives, those who worked in the Tigers\u2019 civil administrative structures and\nanyone believed to be a supporter or sympathizer of the Tigers They have been\nmoved to separate camps.  The Red Cross<\/a> and UN\nhave been denied access to them. Many of those being detained as Tamil Tigers\nare children,  said Wikipedia adding\nthat  In June 2011, government claimed\nthat all former female LTTE combatants were released. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The play \u2018Dear Children, Sincerely\u2019 \nis a play  first performed in 2015\n, in Colombo. It was commissioned by Office of National Unity and\nReconciliation (ONUR)  and funded,  inter alia,  by the Neelan Thiruchelvam Trust and  the Embassy of  Switzerland. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

This play had added a new scene into \nit when I saw it again in 2017, \nScene 7  \u2018the story of Menik Farm\u2019\n. The programme note  spoke  of the \u2018infamous Menik farm  which not many  saw\u2019. This farm, said the programme note,\nsplit the  experience of the end of the\nwar into two isolated camps,  victors\nand  victims.  This reinforces, at the level of theatre, the\nnotion put  forward by the Tamil\nSeparatist Movement , once the war ended, that the public in the north were\n\u2018innocent  victims\u2019 who had nothing to do\nwith the war.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The inspiration for the scene, said the programme note,  came from an old lady who was displaced at 90\nyears of age at Menik Farm. This scene was based on a poem written by one of\nthe persons interviewed by the project. She had visited the camp and worked\nwith the people there and the poem was based on the many conversations she\nhad  with them.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Scene 7 condemned Menik farm as an awful, diabolic  place. \nChildren died there and  IDPs\ndisappeared, never to be seen again. \nScene 7 was delivered as a monologue. Repeated reference to  \u2018sweet smelling jasmines \u2018 and the inclusion\nof hymns in Tamil were the main artistic devices used. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

 Some of the data in this\nessay  is taken from  Ministry of Defence report\u201d Sri Lankan\nHumanitarian Operation, Factual Analysis\u201d (2011) . The full text could be found\nat  http:\/\/slembassyusa.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011\/08\/Sri-Lankan-Humanitarian-Operation-Factual-Analysis.pdf<\/a>  ( continued) <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

KAMALIKA PIERIS As Eelam war IV came to an end, the armed forces moved onto Rescue, Rehabilitation and Resettlement. This essay is about the Rescue.  From mid 2008 civilians from LTTE controlled territory, were entering government controlled territory. They came in small groups, as well as large numbers, wherever and whenever possible. They escaped in […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":true,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[104],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-96742","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-kamalika-pieris"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/96742","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=96742"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/96742\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=96742"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=96742"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=96742"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}