Foreign Affairs committee  It's not in response to that, but in response to the question about caste and the internal struggles of these two groups. This is an extremely important issue that very few people outside Sri Lanka know anything about. I'm not going to enter into it now in any detail, except to say that caste is a phenomenon of the Indian subcontinent that spread over into Sri Lanka.

Foreign Affairs committee  Frankly, sir, I doubt it. I don't think that would wear well with them, under the present circumstances, where there's a fair amount of chauvinism in the air and victory is perceived to be quite near. It would look like interference and I don't think it would gain Canada any honourable prestige in this matter.

Foreign Affairs committee  Chandra Kumaratunga, who was then the president, invited Norway to come in to Sri Lanka to do this. You won't find the present president at all interested in having Norway or any other international group perform the same function.

Foreign Affairs committee  Why don't you take a crack at that, David? I really don't see, right off the top of my head, that there is.

Foreign Affairs committee  Well, there would be no harm in that. I don't know how practical it is.

Foreign Affairs committee  Yes, but certainly there'd be no harm in it. There have been so many recent initiatives. I read the other day that there were 10 former American ambassadors who have written to Mahinda Rajapaksa and said to him, do you realize that your country is becoming an authoritarian, almost fascist, state?

Foreign Affairs committee  It is to indicate that we are very interested and earnest in our urging of the Sri Lankan government to attend to the humanitarian crisis in the northern province and to keep pressing for this humanitarian pause that I mentioned to you a few minutes ago, rather than use the word “ceasefire”, which of course suggests that the LTTE may be able to regroup if there's just a ceasefire.

Foreign Affairs committee  Well, very quickly I would say no, because the Sri Lankan government right now would not be interested in hearing from the Commonwealth. They don't want to hear from anybody. Secondly, you did raise a very interesting point when you used the word “terrorism”, and I think that's been part of the problem right from the beginning.

Foreign Affairs committee  From the point of view of the Government of Canada?

Foreign Affairs committee  I hope you don't mind if I answer you in English. In this instance, the LTTE, over a period of 25 years now, has systematically eradicated, eliminated, destroyed, or neutralized--whatever--any Tamil opposition. The long list of Sinhala and Tamil moderates who've been assassinated by the LTTE is very sad testimony to the rigour of the LTTE plan for the Tamil destiny.

Foreign Affairs committee  The Muslim community, which is at least one million strong, or maybe more, is all over the island, except in the north, where they were expelled by the LTTE in the early 1990s. They are very strong in the eastern province. They would make up about one-third of the population of the eastern province.

Foreign Affairs committee  Buddhism is involved on the Sinhala side as part of the nationalist identity. Hinduism is not involved on the LTTE side. In fact, many of the LTTE, if they embrace any religion at all, are Roman Catholics. If it is described as a kind of religious war, if you want to put it that way, it would have to be a very loose description, and it could only pertain to the hard right-wing Sinhala nationalists who wish to bring that dimension into it.

Foreign Affairs committee  Thank you, Mr. Rae. I'd be glad to do so, in a sort of encapsulated form. The Government of Sri Lanka invited IIGEP to come to Sri Lanka. It wasn't imposed on them. By the way, I'll say right now, in case I forget to say it later, that I think this is the last time any international body will be invited by the Government of Sri Lanka, at least under the Rajapaksa government.

Foreign Affairs committee  Like Professor Cameron, I want to thank the committee for inviting me to come to speak to you about Sri Lanka. I'll give you a little bit of background. I went to graduate school there in 1970 as a Commonwealth fellow in Buddhist civilizations. In 1971, while I was still a student in Peradeniya, the first Janatha Vimukthi Peramuna insurrection broke out, caught me completely off guard, and basically turned my focus from Buddhist studies to contemporary sociological and political studies.