{"id":160622,"date":"2016-04-12T00:09:08","date_gmt":"2016-04-11T18:39:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.colombotelegraph.com\/?p=160622"},"modified":"2016-04-18T10:41:15","modified_gmt":"2016-04-18T05:11:15","slug":"confusion-reigns-roberts-on-the-wars-final-stages","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.colombotelegraph.com\/index.php\/confusion-reigns-roberts-on-the-wars-final-stages\/","title":{"rendered":"Confusion Reigns: Roberts On The War\u2019s Final Stages"},"content":{"rendered":"

By<\/strong>\u00a0Mark Salter<\/a><\/span> –<\/strong><\/p>\n

\"Mark<\/a>

Mark Salter<\/p><\/div>\n

From Michael Roberts\u2019 latest essay \u2018Attempts To Rescue Pirap\u0101haran Et Al In 2009<\/span><\/a>\u2019 <\/em>(Colombo Telegraph<\/em>, 5 April 2016) I see that I have joined the list of authors whose work has been subjected to his less than forensic critical attentions. In this instance his focus is the final stages of the Sri Lankan conflict. Rarely one for modest enterprise in this context, part of Roberts\u2019 aim here is an attempt to show where \u2013 and how \u2013 others have got it wrong, and\/or wilfully sought to mislead, over events in the final stages of the war.<\/p>\n

I do not propose to tackle all Robert\u2019s factual assertions or broad-brush claims, though many of them certainly warrant such critical treatment. Rather I shall confine myself to those that reference my recent book To End A Civil War: Norway\u2019s Peace Engagement in Sri Lanka<\/em><\/a><\/span> (Hurst), notably Chapter 11, \u2018Endgame\u2019, dealing with the conflict\u2019s final stages.<\/p>\n

Two distinct but related key issues present themselves in this context. The first concerns Norwegian efforts to persuade the LTTE leadership \u2013 in essence meaning Prabakharan \u2013 to agree to a proposal for what was described as an \u2018organized end to the war\u2019 via the good offices of \u2018KP\u2019, the Tiger\u2019s chief arms procurer turned inter-national representative. The second concerns related efforts, led by the Norwegians but with support from the US in particular, to craft an actionable plan to evacuate Tamil civilians trapped in the war zone and secure the surrender \u2013 and safety \u2013 of all Tigre cadre bar Prabakharan himself and his security chief Pottu Amman.<\/p>\n

First, on a relatively minor note Robert\u2019s points to differences in the details of the peace plan relayed to the LTTE leadership by KP as reported both by me and by DBS Jeyaraj, the latter\u2019s version being based on a very informative later interview h conducted with KP. Differences in recollection, especially at a distance of some years from the events, are hardly surprising \u2013 even if Roberts doesn\u2019t seem to have noticed that balancing the Norwegian account of the plan, I also provide a summary of the Jeyaraj KP interview \u2018version\u2019. But the key point here \u2013 as Roberts, to be fair, points out \u2013 was KP\u2019s belief, clearly expressed to the Norwegians, that Prabakharan would not accept such a proposal owing to the fact that, as I quote Erik Solheim saying \u2018the LTTE leadership was living in a surreal world, believing in miracles\u2019.<\/p>\n

Next after briefly recounting the story \u2013 which I elaborate in the book \u2013 of a secret meeting between KP, other LTTE representatives and the Norwegians held in Kuala Lumpa in late February, Roberts returns to the subject of a \u2018rescue\u2019 mission to the North. In this context he refers to \u2018a negotiated end to the hostilities\u2019 as the goal of international peace efforts but with the rider \u2018if Salter\u2019s account can be relied upon\u2019. This is a curious comment, because there is no need whatsoever to \u2018rely\u2019 on my account. (Although I\u2019d of course be happy if Roberts did!) If Roberts had read the earlier sections of my chapter carefully he would have seen reference to a meeting of the Sri Lanka Co-Chairs Group, made up of Norway, the USA, the EU and Japan, held on 2 February 2009. (In this respect Roberts\u2019 reference to \u2018Norway and the USA\u2019 as sponsors of a rescue plan needs adjusting.)<\/p>\n

In particular, the meeting\u2019s final statement called on the LTTE to initiate discussions on \u2018the modalities for ending hostilities, including the laying down of arms, renunciation of violence, acceptance of the [GoSL\u2019s] offer of amnesty, and participating as a political party in a process to achieve a just and lasting political solution\u2019.<\/p>\n

This statement, which as Solheim points out in the book was \u2018not what either side wanted to hear\u2019, provided the basis for international efforts to limit, and if possible stop the blood-letting that enveloped the war zone over the following months. And, if he so prefers, Roberts can take the Co-Chairs rather than my word for this.<\/p>\n

In this context, too, it would be pertinent to point out that the impetus to develop a rescue plan did not come soley from international actors. From interviews with Tore Hattrem, former Norwegian Ambassador to Sri Lanka I learned (and reported in the book) that around the time of the February Co-Chairs meeting, Hattrem received a phone call informing him that there were \u2018a strong voices\u2019 within the LTTE calling for a \u2018face-saving mechanism that would allow civilians to leave the war zone\u2019.<\/p>\n

Indeed, Hattrem went on to suggest that it was following this \u2018message\u2019 that efforts to pull together a rescue plan really began in earnest. First the ICRC was proposed for registering the names of cadre who surrendered, and the US soon added the suggestion of evacuation ships docking in the Vanni. This in turn provided the basis for deliberations over the coming weeks \u2013 noted by Roberts \u2013 on the modalities of involving US naval forces in the rescue operation. In response the GoSL was reportedly \u2018hesitant\u2019 over the proposal.<\/p>\n

On chronology, at least, so far Roberts\u2019 has followed the script. Now, however, he begins to lose it. Let me quote: \u201cBasil Rajapaksa was the conduit through whom this international cabal explored such options. But Solheim and Salter \u2013 perhaps deliberately \u2013 do not tell us WHEN Rajapaksa or some other Sri Lankan dignitary was approached. This is a critical gap in my present stock of information. It is my surmise that Sri Lanka was only approached with this scheme late in the day, say mid-April or late April\u201d <\/em><\/p>\n

Where to start? While it is true that no specific date is given for communicating the rescue plan to Basil Rajapaksa is given \u2013 but deliberately<\/em>? \u2013 the proposal cannot have been, and indeed was not a surprise either Rajapaksa or government as whole. if Roberts had read earlier section of the chapter he would have seen reference (pp. 340-341) to an SMS sent to Tore Hatrem in early January 2009 by \u2018a high-ranking official close to the president outlining an amnesty proposal to the LTTE and including an offer to continue their struggle by political means, forming a political party\u2019. Details of the official in question\u2019s identity apart, this surely makes it crystal clear that in the early part of 2009, the Rajapaksa administration \u2013 or at any rate parts of it \u2013 were thinking along similar lines to the Co-Chairs, if not in details, at least in substance regarding the both the contours, and the desirability, of a peaceful end to the conflict.<\/p>\n

Second, as I also note in the account of developments in February 2009, towards the end of the month Foreign Minister Bogollagama was quoted in media reports as pronouncing himself \u2018aware\u2019 of the Co-Chairs rescue initiative, while also stressing that the GoSL was talking to \u2018other friendly countries\u2019, India in particular, about the options for evacuating Tamil civilians from the Vanni. Thus at whatever point it was that Basil Rajapaksa was officially informed of such plans, they would almost certainly not have come as a surprise to him, and definitely not to the GoSL as a whole.<\/p>\n

Indeed there is a final, clinching reason why Rajapaksa cannot have been in the dark. As I (again) report, following the secret February meeting with KP in Kuala Lumpur, Tore Hattrem debriefed him on its outcomes, notably KP\u2019s pessimism regarding the prospects of his persuading Prabakharan to go along with the Co-Chair proposal, in response to which Rajapaksa was reportedly \u2018disappointed\u2019.<\/p>\n

All in all, as I hope this account makes clear, the suggestion or insinuation \u2013 the latter is in fact more Robert\u2019s style \u2013 that the Norwegians attempted to hoodwink or withhold vital information from the GoSL is simply absurd. A final word on the subject \u2013 from the book \u2013 goes to B\u00e5rd Ludvig Thorheim, then First Secretary at the Norwegian Embassy in Colombo. Thorheim points out that media stories alleging a Norwegian attempt to save the LTTE, which began to emerge after the (supposedly secret) Kuala Lumpur meeting, soon faded.<\/p>\n

Thorheim attributes this to the GoSL\u2019s realization that if the Norwegians received too much criticism for having assisted the LTTE, \u2018they could cover themselves by revealing that the government had been fully informed about all contacts with the LTTE, and had even passed on messages to the Tigers not long beforehand (the latter a reference to the \u2018amnesty\u2019 proposal SMS sent to Hattrem in January 2009).<\/p>\n

Roberts saves his crudest and most absurd jibe for last \u2013 one, moreover, in which I am reduced to a mouthpiece, dubbed \u2018Solheim through Salter\u2019. Discussing the Sri Lankan Army\u2019s behaviour in the final days of the war Roberts takes me \u2013 or rather Solheim-through-me \u2013 to task for demonstrating what he calls our \u2018infantile military intelligence\u2019. The evidence proffered for the charge of military infantilism is my reference to suggestions that SLA troops \u2018fired or threw grenades into civilian bunkers as a \u2018precaution\u2019 against LTTE attacks\u2019.<\/p>\n

In response his argument could be summed up as: any old fool knows that advancing troops can\u2019t check what they\u2019re attacking \u2013 especially not if terrorists are mixed in with civilians. Well, if the case ever gets as far as an international court I don\u2019t suspect that\u2019s a defence that will get Syrian troops accused of barrel-bombing civilian districts of Aleppo held by \u2018terrorist forces\u2019 very far. Nor should it in Sri Lanka\u2019s case \u2013 if and when the long-promised domestic courts eventually materialize.<\/p>\n

What makes the critique even more absurd, moreover, is the fact that if Roberts had only bothered to read onto the end of the paragraph he quotes from so dismissively, he would see that I offer a clear explanation of the contextual factors that probably help explain the Sri Lankan Army forces\u2019 use of this gruesome practice: during the earlier battle for PTK wounded Black Tiger cadres had allegedly hidden themselves in bunkers and then blown themselves up when an army unit passed by. (An alleged Army response at the time was for heavy army vehicles to flatten bunkers containing civilians.)<\/p>\n

So there it is: the Robert\u2019s critique, such as it is, of my book. And if any further response from him is forthcoming, it would be heartening to discover that it was informed both by a careful reading of the text itself, and an avoidance of fatuous personal jibes.<\/p>\n

*Mark Salter – Author, To End A Civil War: Norway\u2019s Peace Engagement in Sri Lanka<\/a><\/span><\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

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