Foreign Affairs Committee on March 30th, 2009

[Bernard Patry, Liberal, Pierrefonds—Dollard, QC]

Thank you.

[The Chair, Conservative, Kevin Sorenson]

Thank you.

We'll move to Mr. Crête.

Can you hear now, Mr. Weerasinghe?

Yes? Okay.

[Paul Crête, Bloc, Montmagny—L'Islet—Kamouraska—Rivière-du-Loup, QC]

The situation in Sri Lanka is very complex and the conflict is probably quite hard to defuse. However, do you see any other solution to this problem, other than the elimination of one of the two parties?

[Mahinda Gunasekera]

Pardon me. I'm sorry, but I didn't have English interpretation.

[The Chair, Conservative, Kevin Sorenson]

The question is this: is there any way to see closure to the situation in Sri Lanka without the annihilation of any one of the parties?

[Asoka Weerasinghe]

I cannot see coming to any conclusion without getting rid of the LTTE, but there are moderate Tamils, and actually politicians, who are in right now in.... The Jaffna minister is a Tamil. Douglas Devananda was a former terrorist. He's in the cabinet. There are other moderate Tamils who are leaders of some of the parties, such as PLOTE and TELO, and there's Anandasangari of TULF. They are all waiting to take up the job, actually, and come to some conclusions with the Government of Sri Lanka.

So there are moderate Tamils--as long as they have not been wiped out or snuffed out, too, like the other moderate Tamils--who would work for peace.

[Paul Crête, Bloc, Montmagny—L'Islet—Kamouraska—Rivière-du-Loup, QC]

If the Tamils reject the utilization of violence, are you able, in spirit, to accept that they may have the political right to have a different country, to have a different way of doing things, and to separate the two parts of the country? Are you able to accept that if they accept not to utilize violence?

[Mahinda Gunasekera]

I don't think the people of Sri Lanka would be agreeable to breaking up their country. That won't be negotiable. Certainly they will be brought in, and they have a place even today. A majority of the Tamil people live among the Sinhalese and the Muslims. Only a very small minority was being kept by the Tiger forces, the Tamil Tigers. A lot of people moved out of Tamil Tiger-controlled areas to the government-controlled areas. Even in the city of Colombo, today the largest population is from the Tamil community; next come the Moors. The Muslims who are also a minority--they are the second largest--and the Sinhalese form the fewest number of residents in the capital city. So there is no problem with people living together.

What we as expatriates proposed was to share power at the centre, give them a role in the day-to-day government--that's what they said they did not have previously--and also devolution to a certain extent, like the district council at the district level. In addition to that, there is a belief...there is a Panchayati system in India whereby they empower the people at the village level. Most often, the central government and regional governments neglect the people at the grassroots, at the village level. That is to empower them to adopt the Panchayati system to devolve power to districts and bring in all the minorities, give them a role in government at the same time.

[Paul Crête, Bloc, Montmagny—L'Islet—Kamouraska—Rivière-du-Loup, QC]

A previous witness said even if the government wins the battle, there will be problems with terrorist action or other actions for 15 to 20 years. Do you believe that will be the reality? If it is, are some other solutions possible?

[Mahinda Gunasekera]

I don't believe that. An international committee kept saying earlier it is an unwinnable war; you cannot defeat the Tigers. Within the space of two years after the Tigers launched their final war for liberation, the government retaliated when they cut off water to the farmers in Maavilaru. From that point, the Tigers have been retreating. Today the government has recovered all its usurped territory.

[Asoka Weerasinghe]

One more point is that Karuna, or the second in command of the LTTE, who was the commander of the eastern province, packed up terrorism in 2004 and became a democrat. Today, after five years he's in the cabinet and is the minister of national integration. He's now working with other Tamil parties to see what can be done. He more or less said this is dumb. They'll never have a separate state either. After so many years of fighting, he's now a democrat. That's the way it goes. I can see that happening.

[Paul Crête, Bloc, Montmagny—L'Islet—Kamouraska—Rivière-du-Loup, QC]

Thank you.

[The Chair, Conservative, Kevin Sorenson]

Thank you, Mr. Crête. Thank you for rewording your statement. I appreciate that.

We'll move to Mr. Lunney.

[James Lunney, Conservative, Nanaimo—Alberni, BC]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

I just wanted to pick up on a remark that was made recently about Colonel Karuna. I believe he was from the eastern part of the territory. He seems to be a leader who has managed to survive, although I understand he has his own history and has been in jail himself. He's working now with the government. Are you suggesting a cadre of other leaders will come forward if this current leadership is somehow neutralized by the current conflict? Is there a way of resolving this without killing everybody who remains?

[Asoka Weerasinghe]

Exactly. Douglas Devananda, who is--

[James Lunney, Conservative, Nanaimo—Alberni, BC]

I don't mean everybody; I mean the Tigers, of course.

[Asoka Weerasinghe]

Douglas Devananda, who is a Tamil cabinet minister who looks after Jaffna, was a terrorist who was fighting Prabhakaran. LTTE tried to assassinate him 11 times; he has survived. They might very likely go after Karuna too, but I hope he's going to survive.

Pilliyan, who is now the chief minister of the eastern province, was a child soldier with the LTTE. He too pulled out from Prabhakaran's group in 2004. The people in the eastern province elected him by ballot to be the chief minister. You can see the trend now, so that is going to happen.

[Mahinda Gunasekera]

If I may, I would comment on that. It is not that the Sinhalese and Tamils cannot get along or that they are so hostile and they will kill each other. They live as neighbours and they work in the same offices in the city in most parts of Sri Lanka. In fact, before, the Sinhalese organized something called the brotherhood train, which started in the deep south in the town of Matara, with several stops on the way. The people willingly came and gave gifts to be given to the displaced Tamil people. It was valued at 25 million rupees. This was taken as far as the rail track went up to the north.

[James Lunney, Conservative, Nanaimo—Alberni, BC]

When did that happen?

[Mahinda Gunasekera]

That happened in November.

Our own organization, after the eastern province was retaken by the government, provided school books for one of the new schools that the government established there. The children didn't have a school earlier. We provided school books. We provided mosquito nets. And that's happening all the time. The people are, on their own, trying to build bridges.

[James Lunney, Conservative, Nanaimo—Alberni, BC]

I appreciate those remarks.

You were starting in your earlier remarks, but I think you ran out of time, to talk about some of the problems with equitable education, language discrimination, and so on, and access to education for the Tamil minority. I wondered if you had more to contribute to the discussion of how to overcome those problems. You're saying volunteers are already coming forward to try to remedy some of those things. You're talking about donating school books and so on. What do you see as the solutions in helping to reach out and reconcile these communities?

[Mahinda Gunasekera]

That is happening right now. I know of so many volunteer groups who are running medical clinics, medical camps, in remote areas, in Tamil villages. There are Sinhalese groups who have been taking things for these displaced Tamils, so it's not an isolated event. I was there in Sri Lanka for two months, from December to February, and while I was there in fact there were things like medical equipment.... Even quite recently we funded the shipping of six physicians' packs, costing $30,000, to be taken for caring for and looking after the IDPs. There's a second shipment to follow, so it's ongoing.

As far as education goes, maybe whatever shortcomings are there can be worked out. For instance, Jaffna had some of the best schools, but because of the separatist violence the standards dropped, and today the very thing they complained about--standardization--is helping the children there to gain admission to the universities, because they've become a deprived district under the same formula.

[James Lunney, Conservative, Nanaimo—Alberni, BC]

I'm looking at this scenario that you're painting, and it's a very optimistic one, and we certainly want to be optimistic.

I have my own concerns about remnants of terrorist organizations that blend in with a community and are very hard to root out. We certainly hope for the best here.

What role do you see for Canada in that scenario then? What recommendations would you have? How do you see Canada participating in reconciliation and rebuilding?

[Mahinda Gunasekera]

Canada could certainly help with the redevelopment of that region. There is a lot of work to be done, because 20 years have gone by and we have seen pictures of the civilians coming out of the northern areas that have been retaken by the Sri Lankan forces. The people have lived in extreme poverty while the Tamil Tigers were building beautiful palaces for themselves--air conditioned houses, every facility for the LTTE leadership. The people's labour was exploited to dig trenches and to dig bunkers, and they had to also pay a human tax. They had to donate a child or some member of the family. This was a big cost that they had to bear.

At the moment, what most of the people there have been telling some of my friends who have visited them is that all they want is to have peace, equality, opportunities, and a chance for their children to go back to school, which they very often lacked because they've been nabbed on their way to school or at religious festivals.

So if the security situation improves, things will move along and there will be space for everybody. I hope also that the Tamil community will not isolate themselves by only forming Tamil-only parties, but that they'll join the mainstream parties and voice their views and win their demands through the electoral process.

[James Lunney, Conservative, Nanaimo—Alberni, BC]

I certainly hope you're right on that one.

I'm going to pass over to Lois, Mr. Chair.