19 March, 2024

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Sri Lanka’s Easter Bombings: Peaceful Coexistence Under Attack

By Alan Keenan

Alan Keenan

Sri Lankans from all ethnic and religious groups – Sinhalese and Tamil, Muslim, Buddhist, Christian and Hindu – lived through terrible violence during the decades of war and terrorism that ended ten years ago. Still, no one was prepared for Easter Sunday’s atrocities, whose death toll – now over 300, with more than 500 injured – and degree of organisation make them Sri Lanka’s worst-ever terror attack. The damage to the country’s already torn social fabric is likely to be immense.

Amid the shock, grief and anger, there is also bewilderment. For many, the attacks seem to have come from nowhere. The government has arrested twenty-four Sri Lankan Muslim suspects, allegedly part of a hitherto little-known Islamist militant group, National Towheed Jamaat (NTJ), which government officials have said carried out the attacks with foreign support.

Sri Lanka has a long and complex history of inter-ethnic and inter-religious violence. Political struggles between Sri Lanka’s Sinhalese and mostly Buddhist majority and the mostly Hindu Tamil minority, who make up about 15 per cent of the population and are concentrated in the north and east of the island, eventually led to a three-decade civil war, which left some 150,000 dead (a small minority of both Sinhalese and Tamils are Christians). Soon after the government crushed the Tamil Tigers’ separatist struggle in May 2009, Sri Lanka’s Muslim community – about 10 per cent of the population – became the target of violence, hate speech and economic boycotts by groups of Sinhalese Buddhists who claimed that Muslims threatened the island’s stability and Buddhist character. (Historically, Sri Lankan Muslims have been considered and considered themselves a separate ethnic group, but increasingly their identity is defined in religious terms as well.) Nearly a week of anti-Muslim rioting by Sinhalese mobs in March 2018 was contained only after the government declared a state of emergency and deployed the army.

In the face of years of sustained attack, Sri Lanka’s Muslims have displayed calm and restraint, with not a single act of retaliation against Sinhalese. Nor is there any history of serious tension between Muslims and Christians. Indeed, recent years have seen unusual joint advocacy campaigns by Muslim and evangelical Christian groups, as the latter have also suffered violent attacks by militant Buddhists angered by what they see as “unethical conversions”.

Extremist voices have emerged in recent decades among Sri Lankan Muslims, but the limited violence such groups have committed has hitherto been against other Muslims, not Christians or Buddhists. NTJ, for instance, was one of a number of Salafi groups known and criticised for its violent rhetoric and occasional physical attacks on Sufi Muslims, whom it considers not to be true Muslims. Until very recently, however, there were never attacks against Sri Lankans of other faiths. In part for this reason, the police and Sinhala political leadership largely deferred to Muslim political and religious leaders, who did little to challenge such groups.

The first sign that NTJ’s targets might be changing came in December 2018 when Buddhist and Christian statues were vandalised in the central town of Mawanella. Police quickly arrested a group of young Muslim men who reportedly had attended Quran classes taught by the NTJ leader and Salafi preacher M. T. M. Zahran. Worries grew among Muslim community leaders, who were struggling to keep the peace, when police investigations into the statue attacks led to the discovery in January of a weapons cache hidden on a farm in north-western Sri Lanka.

The Easter attacks appear principally to be the fruit of seeds planted by transnational jihadists, which responsible local Muslim leaders failed to effectively uproot. A small number of Sri Lankan Muslims are known to have travelled to Syria to fight with the Islamic State (ISIS). The scale and complexity of the attacks suggest that a small number of local radicals received outside guidance. ISIS has now laid claim online to what it calls Sunday’s “blessed raid”. In statements released over social media, it has celebrated the killing of Christians and “subjects of the countries of the Crusader Coalition” that has combated the group globally. ISIS aims to eliminate any space for tolerance and coexistence between Muslims and non-Muslims, and to draw Muslims everywhere into the group’s cataclysmic battle with “infidel” and “apostate” enemies.

Sunday’s atrocities thus do not appear to grow directly from Sri Lanka’s previous complicated history of intercommunal tensions and political violence, though years of pressure on Muslims from Sinhala Buddhist militants have increased the alienation and anger felt by many young Muslims. Now, however, the attacks will likely become an essential part of Sri Lankan conflict dynamics and – as interpreted from within that history and made use of by multiple political actors – could go on to have lasting and destabilising effects. The bombings, shocking in their large number, brutality and high death toll, will now be cited as evidence of the violent Muslim extremism of which militant Buddhists have long warned. The anger felt by Christians – both ethnic Tamil and Sinhalese – at the massacre of their brothers and sisters threatens to strengthen already powerful anti-Muslim sentiments across society.

The attacks will also strengthen the hand of the Sinhala nationalist opposition, led by former president Mahinda Rajapaksa and his brother, and would-be presidential candidate, Gotabaya Rajapaksa, during whose government militant Buddhist organisations such as Bodu Bala Sena (Buddhist Power Force) were allowed to incite violence against Muslims with impunity. Already the front runners in the presidential and parliamentary elections due over the next year or so, the Rajapaksas and their party supporters are certain to argue that during their government, terrorism – in the form of the Tamil Tigers – was defeated, and that only they can save Sri Lanka from the latest brand of terror that the divided government of President Maithripala Sirisena and Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe has failed to prevent. The government’s apparent failure to act on intelligence reports warning of the suicide attacks seems to have been at least in part a product of the bitter political infighting between the president and prime minister and the former’s refusal to share police warnings with the cabinet. It has deepened the widespread sense that the government is weak and the country at risk.

Should the Rajapaksas return to power, the current government’s modest efforts at post-war reconciliation and strengthening the rule of law will almost certainly end. Already, in response to the attacks, the president has declared an emergency that provides broad powers of arrest and detention to the security forces, and plans to replace the draconian Prevention of Terrorism Act – long criticized by the UN and others for facilitating torture of Tamil detainees – are likely to be scrapped.

Thorough investigations and tightened security measures are essential to reassure a frightened public. The capital Colombo in particular remains tense, with reports of rising anger toward Muslims, particularly after ISIS’s claim of responsibility and police warnings of possible further bombings. A serious and independent inquiry into the failure to act on intelligence warnings must lead to reform of Sri Lanka’s dysfunctional system of intelligence sharing.

Muslim leaders, in turn, need to speak out much more forcefully against the forces of hate within their own community that they have until now been reluctant to challenge. The fear of giving ammunition to their antagonists in other communities, which is one reason they have held back, can no longer be accepted. Continued silence, instead, is the greater danger.

Yet at the same time, efforts are needed to avoid demonising Sri Lanka’s overwhelmingly peaceful Muslim community. The alternative would be to erode the authority of Muslim leaders who themselves are horrified by the violence, and wish to contain it, and deepen the sense of alienation that some young Muslims already feel. Intercommunal conflict and schism is precisely what ISIS hopes to provoke. Instead, leaders from all ethnic and religious communities must speak out against holding Muslims as a whole responsible for atrocities that a very small number of their community may have committed. All must work to protect Muslims from reprisals that could eventually set off a deadly cycle of intercommunal conflict. In addition to the Christian community that was the direct target of the bombings, what was attacked was Sri Lanka’s strained but still living tradition of inter-religious and inter-ethnic cooperation and friendship. This tradition must be defended in every way possible by Sri Lanka’s political, national security and religious leadership.

*Alan Keenan – Project Director, Sri Lanka – The International Crisis Group
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Latest comments

  • 5
    0

    This article made me weep
    We are ready to help
    in any manner to find the ruthless killlers
    We had no issues with the roman catholics,we have no right to fight or demand as we are a minority in this country
    We too were shocked as to why batticoloa ,the muslim areas
    We have to abide by their laws
    Knowing about th training abroad they should have bren vigilant and kept track onthem
    When there is a warning on the dangers especially during religious atleast warned the public
    As soon as the bomb blasted the warning letter was circulated
    Breaking the statues i expected severe repercussion but sadly they wete released
    I wear a shawl and i dont blame thm for hating us
    We are not good muslims
    Suicide bombiing is unacceptable
    My condolence to all who lost their kith n kin,we are weeping with them
    And instead of learning the history of those ruthless get rid of them

  • 3
    0

    These Hollywood style “Shock and Awe” bombings used Muslim youth a pawns but were very likely to legitimize the continuation of Diego Garcia military Base and CIA black site in the Indian Ocean against which the International Court of Justice (ICJ) ruled in February 25 , 2019 ,as there is a Cold War against China. DG base justification is to provide “(in)security for the world!

    Now FBI is doing the investigation of bombings in Lanka.
    Ironically the parties who should be among the main suspects along with IS and whoever else they accuse, are also leading the investigation and crafting the ‘ narrative ‘in Banana republic Lanka.

  • 12
    5

    Nonsense. Muslims are projection themselves as peaceful in the Sinhalese areas only because they feel fearful of the Sinhalese State and armed forces/police if they created any problems but were doing the opposite in the Tamil areas , especially in the east, as they know the Tamils now are weak , powerless and have no one to support them. Here with the overt and covert support of the Sri Lankan state they were openly destroying Hindu temples , encroaching on Tamil lands and taking over them. Sinhalese Buddhist hardliners are also doing this in the Tamil north and east with the support of the Sri Lankan state. The present Muslim governor of the east is a well know Islamic extremist and anti Tamil , who was caught openly boasting on video , as to how he used his political power to steal temple lands belonging to a certain Hindu temple and handed these to the local mosque to build a supermarket and a slaughter house ( an abomination ) for the benefit of the local Muslim traders. The eastern Tamils and the Tamilised Hindu Vedda are the original and real owners of the east ,not these largely low caste converted South Indian origin immigrant Dravidian Tamil Muslims , who only arrived in the island a few centuries ago and in the ancient Tamil east as refugees fleeing persecution from the Portuguese on the North western coast of the island , where they originally settled when they migrated from South India.. The Tamils who are still the largest community in the east and the original people who ruled the east , prior to European colonisation are now becoming increasingly marginalised in their own land by the Sri Lankan state and their Muslim allies , who are now very radical. During the war many 100% Tamil Hindu villages in the east have now been converted to 100% Muslim villages , and the original Tamil population were either killed or still not allowed to return.

    • 8
      3

      Internationl Crisis Group, which is CIA front, is the political orchestrator and justifier of genocide of Eezham Tamils

      The justification is conflict resolution.

      These criminal ICG is also denyer againt Eezham Tamil statehood. The justification is LTTE treated muslims very badly.

      Yet, for ICG, genocide being commited on Eezhalam Tamils by Sinhala Sate is perfectly legitimate and acceptable, and even ICG denies it.

      • 3
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        KA

        Your is a loaded typing.
        Could you cite references in their publications for all your accusations.

        • 2
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          https://www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=26&v=eAAUfGoN6B4

          The following source you mat not like it. However, their anaysis is precise, though they support Tamil statehood.

          https://tamilnet.com/art.html?catid=79&artid=39402

          The statement about ICG being CIA front is my inference about ICG after watching ICG long time not only in the Island’s context but also the line of literature published by ICG itself in several other contexts.

    • 3
      7

      If the Tamils are feeling weak why are the TNA leaders (LTTE spokesmen at the time) trying to get rid of the army? They want a troubled North so that they can push separatist program based on ethnic cleansing of other Ethnic groups.

      • 4
        1

        We all now that you are a lying Islamic Wahhabi/Salafist blogger who constantly comes here and may at other forms to post your lies and false history. Always condoning Islamic extremism and Wahhabism. You really should be investigated together with many prominent Muslim politicians and elite , whom I suspect had either funded this carnage , knew about and did nothing , as the intended victims were Tamil Christians.

      • 1
        0

        Bodin

        Come on, how long you been in politics.

        “They want a troubled North so that they can push separatist program based on ethnic cleansing of other Ethnic groups.”

        Please leave the worrying to to Hindians.
        Separate state or not, its Hindian problem and not yours.
        You are rest assured you can go to sleep.

        Please stop pratting.

  • 2
    0

    Look within Dr. Keenan, and hold the lectures and expert advice on what next for a bit!

    The Devil is in the detail and the facts on the ground don’t quite fit the FBI fancy IS narrative or the pretty pictures yet, So lets see what they with come next..

  • 8
    2

    Contd: Sri Lankan Muslims are Tamil by ethnicity but deny this for political and economic benefits and claim an exclusive Arab or other western Asian origin. Only a few hundred families amongst a population of 2 million Sri Lankan Muslims have a distant male Arab ancestor. This does not make them or the rest of the Sri Lankan Muslims Arab or anything else but Tamils , whose largely low caste Hindu ancestors converted to Islam a few centuries ago in South India . DNA also proves this and their culture was very Tamil until 30 years ago. They also followed the 1000 year old Tamil Sufi Islam that they brought from their South Indian homeland. Due to radicalisation and large amount of aid from Saudi Arabia and certain other Islamic nations, they have now become some sort of pathetic carbon clones of the Gulf Arabs. They still speak Tamil , or a peculiar South Indian Muslim Tamil dialect as their mother tongue but deny that they are Tamils. Only in Sri Lanka a religion has become an ethnicity and to justify this a fake origin has also been created for them. The British and later the Sinhalese in order to divide and ruled the Tamils , accepted their claim that they a different ethnic group and called them” Moors”, the incorrect description that the Portuguese first used for all South Asian Muslims. The Portuguese used this incorrect term not to denote a race but a religion , as the only Muslims they had met prior to their travels , were the North African origin Moors , who ruled the Iberian peninsular. The Portuguese did not like the Muslims and used this term derogatively . All other South Asian Muslim ethnicities immediately discarded this derogative and incorrect description but the opportunistic Tamil Dravidian Sri Lankan Muslims pounced on this and started to call themselves Moors and claim an imagined Arab origin, that only a few of them partially had to hide their largely low caste converted immigrant Indian Tamil origin.

    • 7
      4

      Your so called peaceful Sri Lankan Muslims , instead of creating peace and harmony and truly acknowledging their actual Tamil origin , did the opposite, for their own benefit they contributed and created more disharmony by opportunistically joining all Sinhalese led government from the time of independence to present to discriminate , and commit war crimes on the island’s Tamils , so that they can benefit. During state sponsored anti Tamil pogroms in the south of the island , Muslim mobs, thugs and criminal elements organised by local Muslim politicians use to join Sinhalese gangs and mobs and go around looting burning and destroying Tamil homes and properties and killing and raping hapless Tamil civilians , strangely enough shouting in joy and screeching in the Tamil language. Muslim Home guards in the east of the island , heavily armed by the Sri Lankan state were very busy killing , raping , destroying Tamil Hindu villages and Hindu temples. They were spying for the Sinhalese armed forces. This resulted in the LTTE attacking them in the east and expelling them from the north. Muslim politicians and elite for their own selfish political and economic benefit were very busy brainwashing the Muslim masses who were 100% Tamil , to hate their own Tamil origin and heritage and to consider themselves Arabs and worship everything Arab. This in itself is a form of genocide of not allowing a people to acknowledge their own origin and heritage. A Muslim minister , who was part of a hardline Sinhalese government in the 1970s , introduced a system called standardisation , to deny higher education to young Tamils , with Sinhalese and Muslim students entering university with far lower marks. All these are not act of a peaceful people but a nasty opportunistic people. Please really research and visit eastern Sri Lanka and see the ground realities there before posting garbage from the comfort of your Colombo hotel or elsewhere.
      This is from a Muslim
      https://www.colombotelegraph.com/index.php/sri-lankan-muslims-are-low-caste-tamil-hindu-converts-not-arab-descendants/

    • 2
      6

      In that case why did you separatists drive out the Muslims from the North?
      Why are you resisting their resettlement

      • 7
        2

        Because they were spying for the Sinhalese soldiers, stocking arms inside mosques , arms against whom? The LTTE caught them and did not want a repeat of what happened to the Tamils down south and east at the hands of the Muslims to happen in the north. They may have been a small community but once heavily armed , especially in the Mannar region they could have created havoc. They also safeguarded the Muslims by sending them away from reprisals from the Tamil public. They never killed or harmed any one of them like, what the Muslims did to the Tamils but packed them off. Happy satisfied. You Sri Lankan Muslims , despite being ethnically Tamil , and Tamil speaking deny this and to make a point deliberately go out of your way to harm Tamils. Even now these ISIS suicide bombers deliberately set of their bombs when the massed were being conducted in the Tamil language for the Tamil Catholics and Protestants in Batticaloa , so that most of the victims of this carnage will me Tamils or Tamil Christians and not Sinhalese Christians. The vast majority of the victims of this terrorist attack are Tamils but nothing is mentioned about this. Even by this man

      • 0
        0

        Bakir/Bodin

        “In that case why did you separatists drive out the Muslims from the North?
        Why are you resisting their resettlement”

        Who is resisting whose resettlement, when where, …..?

        You stupid moron should have visited VP the psychopath and demanded an explanation for the ethnic cleansing of Muslims from the North and all the massacres that took place in the East while explaining why the Muslim Home guards and thugs went on killing spree in that area and destroying Hindu Temples.

      • 0
        0

        Bakir/Bodin

        “Why are you resisting their resettlement”

        By the way you also should have asked the psychopath as to why he dragged lot of Tamils all the way from Jaffna Peninsula to the Vanni.

  • 9
    0

    if the atrocities help to bring the rajapaksa to power then it is because sirisena did not share the info with ranil
    the latter has proved weak when dealing with sirisena and by doing so letting him get the upper hand
    if he was not invited to security council meetings why did he not make a fuss and publicise the matter and demand to attend
    this inaction on both sides will result in their downfall

  • 3
    1

    Some people now say that the biological father of an official is a Muslim with whom his mother had a longstanding affair and that fact explains why he indulges Muslims so much. Can this be true or is it scandalous defamation?

    • 6
      0

      Adrian,

      Muslim is a follower of a Religion, not an ethnicity, like Christian.

      Do if you do a DNA test, you will find that the father was a Para Sinhala, Para Tamil or other Para who ended up in the Land of Native Veddah Aethho.

  • 7
    1

    recently saw pictures of Alan meeting, greeting with sri lankan military in the north. on the one hand talks about reconciliation and on the other normalises militarisation by engaging with them. is this your version of coexistence and if so with whom?
    for link: http://www.cimicjaffna.com/Cimicnews_2019_04_04.php

    • 9
      2

      This man wants the Tamils to be suppressed and their ancient history and statehood and self determination denied. Under the guise of reconciliation he and many other western spy agencies are working with the Sri Lankan armed forces and government to destroy the Tamils. This photo is an ample example of the duplicity of many western nations and their part in the Eelam Tamil genocide. No wonder Sri Lankan is never punished for war crimes like Serbia or other nations. Their excuse that LTTE was cruel to the Muslims but will deny/ignore. as to why and what the Muslims who are Tamils themselves, did to the Tamils in the east and are still doing. Islam is a religion not an ethnicity , just like Buddhism, Christianity or Hinduism and people from many races and ethnicities follow various forms of Islam. There is no such thing called a Muslim, Buddhist, Christian or Hindu ethnicity. The Muslims in Sri Lanka are Tamil by ethnicity and Muslim by religion. Not Moor or Arab . Their origin is from Tamil South India not the Arabian Gulf or North Africa. By calling themselves Moor and feeding them with fairy tales and lies about their Arab origin , the British , the Sinhalese and their elite/politicians , to divide rule and have power, have created all this mess and made the island’s Muslims believe all this lies that they are Arabs, therefore should look and behave like Arabs and discard everything Tamil about them. What has resulted is hatred and chaos.

      • 2
        0

        Absolutely.

        However, this is from the time of western rise of colonial and imperial powers.

        Tamils in general are anathema to these westerners, especially Anglo Saxon stock.

        Take a simple look at the history.

        You cannot name a single Sinhalese royalty who at the least resisted these western powers.

        All Tamil royalties vehemently fought tooth and nail against these westerners.

        On the other side of Palk straight too, Tamils fought tooth and nail against these western bastards.

        By the way, Palk straight’s name is not Palk, and a British governor, Palk, changed it to Palk

        One Queen named Velu Naachiyar and her bodyguard, Kuyili, who launched suicide attack by turning herself into arson against British arsenal and destroying it, resulting in the defeat of British on the hands of Tamil Queen. The Hindi b******s had hidden this part of history. See https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Velu_Nachiyar, and the accuracy of wikipedia are questionable.

        The Sinhalese, on the other hand, even betrayed the Tamil royalties, and showered gifts including women, children and men to these whites.

        200 years later, the Sinhalese and Hindians alone could not handle Prabha and LTTE, and sought direct intervention of western powers for controlling Prabha. Even that was not possible until all these western b******s turned to genocide as a strategy to defeat Prabha and LTTE.

        Western bastards very well know that Sinhalese will kowtow their line even at their own expense, where as Tamils are not malleable or easily controllable.

        This is the reason westerners want the Sinhalese to have Island’s control.

        The western b******s have seen what the Tamils can do, and this is the reason to have the Tamils suppressed and gradually destroyed.

    • 8
      2

      The sooner the actual truth is told that they are not descended Arabs but converted Dravidian Tamils from South India and to be proud of their actual 1000 year old rich Tamil Sufi Islam and culture and not be some sort of pathetic pale imitation of a Gulf Arab , who really is using them for their agenda but despises them. Like France and many other nations these Arab extremist dressed like Abaya, Burkha, Nikab Hijab should be banned and Wahhabism/Salafism should be outlawed. These newly introduced Arab form of dressing and forms of Islam that is alien to the land’s culture and the local Muslim dress forms and Tamil Sufi Islam that blended with the island’s culture, only speaks of intolerance and extremism , creating havoc. If they want to dress and behave like this , they can move to Saudi Arabia. Lets see if the Arabs will accept these South Asian Tamil converts as one of them.

  • 4
    3

    Something does not make sense here. Why pick on the Christians? If there is any anger coming from some Muslims, it will be towards the Sinhalese, who have burnt shops, Mosques, and killed Muslims. There is more to this than we realize. In one blow 2 of Sri Lanka’s minorities have been sent reeling, marginalizing them. These criminals must have been used as tools by a devious entity overseas. Follow the money.
    Sri Lankans be aware that there are evil entities out there who want to divide us, so that they can insert themselves into our country.

  • 4
    1

    Alan,s assessment of Rajapaksas gaining momentum is correct.
    So should it, because there is no one else to undo this mess which Dr Ranil and his Stooges have created, as result of their total focus to please the West , UN. Diaspora , TNA and the rich Wahabis in the Muslim Political Front..

    Tiger defeating Rajapaksa rule had a rock solid Defence Force and a Fool Proof Intelligence Network, which kept the Nation free of Suicide Bombs and even Land Mines from 2009 to 2014 ..
    Dr Ranil changed all that that in less than 12 Months.

    Ever since Dr Ranil took over ,Muslim Militants have been going from strength to strength.
    And in Four years of Yhapalanya , Muslims have been able to do a Suicide Attack which must be the Mother of all Suicide Attacks in Srilanka.

    No wonder the Yahapalana PM and the President have been going for cover since Easter Sunday, because they jointly nurtured this phenomenal Muslim Militant Growth.
    Dr Ranil putting 34 Hardened , Hands on Military Intelligence Officers behind Bars and locking up Ven Gnassara were a Bonus for Assath Sallys, Mujibur Rahumans and Baththudeens of the UNP Alliance.

    I can not understand how the Catholic Church got on to the Lap of Dr Ranil seeing Dr Ranil already having the one time LTTE supporting TNA on one Knee and the Hakeem Bathtudeen , Sally, Rahuman on the other.

    My main concern is when, not whether the next Attack will come.
    With Dr Ranil and his UNP Buddies well behind the Eight Ball, after what their Muslims mates did to Malcom Ranjith and his followers, UNP will resort to anything to gain back the momentum.

    This is where our great majority of the inhabitants who are the poor rural Sinhala Buddhist have to be extremely careful.

    • 0
      0

      KASmaalam K A Sumanasekera

      “Tiger defeating Rajapaksa rule had a rock solid Defence Force and a Fool Proof Intelligence Network, which kept the Nation free of Suicide Bombs and even Land Mines from 2009 to 2014 ..”

      You aren’t kidding, are you?
      Remember most of those unintelligent members of intelligence were recruited and groomed by your favourite war criminal former national hangman Gota.

      What was Shavendra Silva doing in his ugly sunglasses while sitting on Hindian’s specific tips? Was he still eating babies for his Sunday breakfast?

  • 10
    6

    Who is this novice journalist ( if at all he can be called a journalist)? He has got his facts all mixed up, and conclusions all wired wrong.
    Whilst the first three chapter of the article summarizes the back drop leading to the Easter Sunday carnage, He has all got it wrong in the fourth chapter, when he opens up by stating that “In the face of years of sustained attack, Sri Lanka’s Muslims have displayed calm and restraint, with not a single act of retaliation against Sinhalese”.
    Let me ask this Alan Keenan the writer , a few questions that needs further elaboration.
    1. What are the events that took place against the Muslims for you to conclude that there were “years of sustained attacks”.
    2. Are you aware of how the Muslims reacted to any sporadic acts of anti-Muslim activities
    3. How sure are to state that there were no ” acts of retaliation against the Sinhalese”, by the Muslims?

    Whilst I am not an extremist of any religion by any means, I do Hate those who write articles ASSUMING many a conditions, without any facts or investigations to back-up such statements.

    Just so that the authour of the original article, Alan Keenan know:

    1. Both the last two incidents ( the Digana incident, and the Mawanella incident) were instigated by Extremist Muslims, which then provoked other parties, that led to the aftermath.

    2. Even the events that occurred in Durgha town before the aforementioned event s (in 1 above) was also instigated by extremist Muslims.

    Therefore, Alan Keenan, know your facts before you take to journalism or else you contribute to a misinformed global community, and you would be a capital sinner of any aftermath unfolding that may have global catastrophic impacts.

    My fianl words to , Alan Keenan, know your facts, know your facts, and know our facts again before you publish, or else be prepared to face the wrath of the consequences.

  • 0
    0

    adrian
    i know whom you referred to but these are unfounded rumours because of the ladys supposed relationship with a muslim
    i am pretty sure his biological father is not a muslim

  • 3
    1

    Alan Keenan,

    Thanks for your article.

    Yes, what we have is an explosive mix of ethnicities and religions, who dislike and hate each other, within their radical fractions, based on historical brainwashing and religion-based theological brainwashings.

    The key is to isolate and marginalize them, and let the mainstream, prevail and live. Unfortunately, the date has given too much room to the Sinhala Buddhist radicals and now Islamic radicals to roam free.

    Religion is belief, and easy to brainwash. Brainwash they do, from the day the child was born, to the day the child dies. By the time the child is a teenager, the brainwashings are more or less complete.

    So, when they are adults, the structure is already in place, and what is needed is a switch, an incident, an atrocity to trigger the switch.

    It is like the DNA and the molecular switches that turn on and off genes, to cause cancer.

    Regarding National Tawheed Jaamat, the Wahhabi-Salafi Followers, a Sri Lankan Muslim group, warned 5 years ago the authorities. They did nothing. Warnings came 2 weeks ago, and they did nothing.

    The mean IQ of Sri Lanka is 79.So, there is a large population pool, that can be easily brainwashed and fooled, because they lack the intellect and knowledge to think properly.

    • 2
      1

      Amarasiri – The mean IQ of Sri Lanka is 79.
      The IQ of Sri Lankan politician is below 50. ….

      • 1
        0

        Rajash,

        “The IQ of Sri Lankan politician is below 50. ….”

        Wow!. That is 2 standard deviations below the mean!

  • 6
    3

    Alan Keenan

    You’ve been misinformed.

    What you know about Sinhalese & Muslims is totally wrong.

    Your organization must be named as international crisis CREATING group.

  • 3
    1

    Mr Keenan, there are no simple answers here, but you need to call stronger international action.

    Sri Lanka has a poisonous cocktail of vested interests, namely: powerful ethno-nationalist grass roots movements (like the BBS), nationalist politicians (like Sirisena and Rajapakses) and a military with vast business holdings (like the PLA or the Iranian RG). And historically, it looks much like Japan or Germany during WWII. I.e. a massive state-military complex with all the associated vested interests.

    It would be difficult for young Sri Lankans to imagine that Sri Lanka post independence had a GDP per capita greater than S Korea, Japan and Taiwan. Its people are educated and industrious. However, oppressed under this venomous web of nationalist interests piecemeal reforms will be futile.

    These entrenched ethno-nationalist forces will simply lie in wait take advantage of the next crisis (e.g. a second cold war with China) to push their nationalist agenda.

    Waxing lyrically will do nothing to solve the problem, and Sri Lanka will continue its slide toward poverty and violence. Nothing short of a massive intervention will do the trick.

    Good luck to that island, and my thoughts are with them at this tragic time.

  • 6
    1

    Catholic Church in Sri Lanka driven by His Eminent Cardinal Malcome Ranjith is puerile ..They praised & thank GOD..rejoiced at the brutal annihilation of the LTTE with thousands of innocent Tamils..how on earth the Church of Christ thank GOD for such heinous Crimes whist claiming as the representative of Lord Jesus Christ ? He loves to play ..Aren’t they also creation of God ? The Colombo diocese is very dangerous…because he is puerile in every way ….as such he loves to rub shoulders with the Politicians…so Alan Keenan get your facts straight..

  • 6
    1

    Alan Keenan – what peaceful-coexistence?
    which country are you referring to?
    in Sri Lanka there is no peace and there is no coexistence

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    Peaceful coexistence this is why there are photos of you shaking hands and being cordial with the racist occupying Chingkalla armed forces in the north. Whom are you trying to fool you deceitful western spy and Thamizh hater. You do not care anything about the Thamizh or their rights.

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    Alan Keenan –

    Mr. Alan Keenan

    Sri Lankans from all ethnic and religious groups – Sinhalese and Tamil, Muslim, Buddhist, Christian and Hindu – lived through terrible violence during the decades of war and terrorism that ended ten years ago. Still, no one was prepared for Easter Sunday’s atrocities, whose death toll – now over 300, with more than 500 injured – and degree of organisation make them Sri Lanka’s worst-ever terror attack. The damage to the country’s already torn social fabric is likely to be immense.

    *** I take it you are British and with all due respect you must take some responsibilty for this carnage and regrettable though it is it was waiting to happen. Briain at the time of Indendance was still a World Power( but no longer ) . You could have easily foreseen this and created a Federal System of Governenance and you could have Guaranteed it. But you failed and here we are facing 70 years of Brutality at the hands of a Racist Society. I dont have to give you an account of what we suffered but I am sure you watched the Channel 4 Programme ” Killing Fields” a chilling reminder of what life was like. We fought for survival. This is not the end of Suffering and sadly more to come because 90% of the Majority are Racists .

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    Alan Keenan, The International Crisis Group Project Director, Sri Lanka: At the Local Government elections SLPP sold the bizarre view that the much touted ‘Reconciliation will result in Separation’. MR saw the success and immediately engineered a hostile takeover, much to the chagrin of the Founder Basil R.
    .
    MR will lead SLPP in the next Presidential election. If he wins we, layLankans, will remain in square one.
    If we reject him, he will just wait for the next chance and so on.
    PS: We have forgotten what this ‘Peaceful Coexistence’ is. Some eight decades is a long time.

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    Dear Alan

    With all due respect I am troubled over simplified narratives/conclusions.

    I rememeber how Tamil children dissapeard to Tamil Nadu for training at various camps without the knowledge of their parenets under the supoervision of the TULF in 1970’s. By the time they returned home armed they settled matters accordingly and told everyone how to behave hence the election victories of the TULF.

    Now the same is happening to muslim children and Muslim comunities.

    JVP was all a local event since the 60’s not sure??

    We need to remove all the identity politics and parties based on Religion/Race/Language from our Nation. Bring a Natiuonal Security Act where anyone ever utter a word of biggotary will dissaper……..The discussions by the Constitutional assembly should only be limited to the above changes.

    If SL does not get this correct she will be doomed. We can not have our children killing each other ever again under no circumstances. Identity politics got to go……….geo politics will thrive on this basis in the Indian Ocean not for the first time.

    We do not need to negative politisize the past and present leaders??? specially now we understand what the world got planned for our Nation is becomming ver clearer for all of us?? you do not understand what the 10 year peace meant for SL Mothers who lost their children ever since the JVP/TULF violent ventures now followed by the Muslim children?? This have the same patterns/trade mark of violent suppression of rights within the respective communitiy leading to the community being on the run for somebody elses crimes…then the wrold hear a different story…we have all been trhough this path before. The TULF/TN was the masters of this game.

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