Author: Chandrika Bandaranaike
Kumaratunga
Publication: International Herald
Tribune, UK
Date: November 8, 2001
Terrorism is, sadly, no stranger
to Sri Lanka. We know it well.
On Oct. 7, while American-led forces
were making their final preparations to deliver the first strikes in the
new world war against terrorism, the armed forces of my country were bracing
for further attacks by terrorists who have killed 64,000 Sri Lankans in
18 years.
The people responsible for this
slaughter are the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam, known as the Tamil
Tigers, ethnic extremists based among the Tamil population in the northernmost
part of the country. Among their victims have been 10,000 Tamils. Like
all fanatics, the Tamil Tigers, whose armed cadres number no more than
1,500, are pitilessly indiscriminate.
Unfortunately, we are also well
acquainted with the more recent madness of the suicide bomber. Experts
on terrorism believe there have been as many as 160 suicide bombings by
the Tigers in recent years.
My government was quick to offer
its full support to President George W. Bush and Prime Minister Tony Blair
in their efforts to unite the world against terrorism. We appreciate the
strong determination of the United States and Britain to make a measured
but decisive response to the terrorist attacks in New York and Washington.
Like practically all Sri Lankans,
my family has been shadowed by terrorism. Both my father, the prime minister
of Sri Lanka, and my husband were killed by extremist fanatics. Two years
ago they came for me.
While I was campaigning in 1999
for reelection, a woman came within a few feet of me and detonated explosives
wrapped around her waist. On that occasion I was lucky; I lost only an
eye. Others were not - 26 people, including several members of my personal
team, lost their lives, and many more were injured.
Sri Lanka's population is approximately
that of metropolitan New York, 19.5 million. Our blood has been shed not
in a horrific onslaught, as in New York, but in many small cuts - six here,
19 there, 52 in some other place. This violence has become a plague that
infects my people and corrodes our national life.
The cost to our national development
and the advancement of our people of whatever ethnic background or religious
persuasion - Sin-halese, Tamils, Muslims, Hindus - has been considerable.
We must, for example, spend more and more on security, which reduces what
we should be spending on our schools, hospitals and roads.
Nevertheless, we have succeeded
in keeping Sri Lanka open for business. We have continued to attract foreign
investment and tourism, albeit at far lower levels than our economy would
warrant under normal conditions.
The tragic irony of the events of
Sept. 11 is that it now seems possible that the Tamil Tigers will be cut
off from the millions of dollars raised in North America every year to
prosecute their atrocities against the civilian population of Sri Lanka.
I applaud the recent decision of Secretary of State Colin Powell to renew
the designation of the Tamil Tigers as a terrorist organization.
The elimination of supportive financial
systems on which terrorism depends must be a global undertaking. Sri Lanka
is proud to have ratified the International convention for the Suppression
of Financing of Terrorism, adopted by the UN General Assembly inn December
1999. We hope for the widest possible participation in international efforts
of this kind.
I have called on my fellow heads
of government in the other 53 nations of the Commonwealth to join me I
condemning terrorism in all its forms in committing themselves to all measures
necessary to its eradication, and in pursuing all democratic options for
the resolution of genuine issues of contention. Together we make up nearly
one-third of the world's population, including millions of peace-loving
Muslims.
The principal lesson that democratically
elected governments have learned from the events of Sept. 11 is this: that
the fight against terrorism can no longer be conducted piecemeal, or be
hobbled by the moral relativism that has bedeviled their efforts for so
long. You are either for or against terrorism.
(The writer is president of Sri
Lanka. She contributed this to The Washington Post.)
