Time Running Out for Sri Lanka's IDPs

Bart Beeson and Annalise Romoser - Everywhere in the Sri Lankan capital of Colombo, posters featuring smiling soldiers holding rocket launchers and machine guns celebrate the recent end to the nation's 26-year civil war. But in the government-run camps that still house more than 250,000 ethnic Tamils displaced by the war's fighting, the mood is far from celebratory.

In late August, heavy rains at the largest camp, Manik, flooded tents and led to unsanitary conditions. According to aid worker K Thampu, "The situation was heartbreaking. Tents were flooded and mothers, desperate to keep their children dry during the night, took chairs and tables from school facilities for them to sleep on."

Rains also caused toilets to flood, with worms covering large swaths of ground near latrines, says Thampu. At stake, according to local experts, is not only the immediate welfare of camp residents, but chances for long-lasting peace in Sri Lanka.

Most of the internally displaced people (IDPs) have been living in the camps since May, when they fled the intense fighting that marked the final battle between government forces and the insurgent group known as the Tamil Tigers. Publicly, the Sri Lankan government has committed to returning IDPs to their homes by November of this year, and several thousand people have been released from camps to live with relatives. But the government under President Mahinda Rajapaksa also maintains that others must remain in camps until the area around their former homes is cleared of mines. At the same time, government representatives are slowly screening camp residents to identify former combatants.

Aid workers and local experts agree that the government must move quickly, for several reasons. The most urgent among them is monsoon season, which starts at the end of September and will only exacerbate the already difficult camp conditions. More tents and toilets will flood, increasing the risk of communicable and mosquito-born diseases.

"We saw how bad things got after the recent rains, which only lasted 3 or 4 days," says Thampu, who works for the Baltimore-based humanitarian organization Lutheran World Relief. "Imagine how bad they will get once the monsoons are upon us."

In addition to the rains, long-standing tensions between Tamils and the Sinhalese-led government remain, even if the armed insurgency has been defeated. Many worry that if the government does not act quickly to return people to their homes, it will lead to new problems in northern Sri Lanka.

Thampu says that many teenagers in the camps are already frustrated. "Young people have told me, 'We have no freedom to talk, no protection, no education, no recreation and no employment! Everything looks like hell in our life. What do we have to live for?'"

Despite living in a warzone, many teenagers were able to pass the university entrance exams. But now they cannot leave the camps to begin their studies. Thampu adds, "Victory has been declared, but what does that mean for them? It is important to give them a new start in life."

According to T Thevathas, another aid worker in Manik Camp, "Peace and security in the north is the most important thing to consider. People have been waiting 30 years for this, but IDPs in the camps feel no security and have no peace of mind despite the government's victory."

Thevatas notes that for real advances to be made in the north, it is crucial for Tamils in the camp to feel that the national government is working on their behalf. "At this point," he says, "IDPs have placed all their hopes for return on local governments and the international community."

Bernard Jaspers Failer, of the aid organization ZOA Refugee Care, acknowledges that the Sri Lankan government has genuine security concerns. "But," he is quick to add, "those have to be balanced with the fact that the longer people remain in camps, new frustrations are being generated which will have long-term impacts on society."

The Sri Lankan government has strictly regulated access to the camps. But those organizations and governmental representatives who have been able to visit have expressed concern over the conditions. Human Rights Watch, the New York-based rights organization, has said that the government "is threatening [IDPs'] health and even their lives by keeping them there during the rainy season floods."

U.S. officials have also put pressure on the Sri Lankan government to allow camp residents to return home. In comments made on Aug. 19, Eric Schwartz, assistant secretary for the Bureau of Population, Refugees, and Migration at the State Department, said the "involuntary confinement is especially a source of concern given the recent rains and given the coming of the monsoon season, and it makes it all the more important that release from confinement be an issue that friends of Sri Lanka continue to raise."

In an effort to expedite the process, on July 27, the U.S. announced an additional $8 million in aid to assist in the return of IDPs to their homes in northern Sri Lanka.

With the monsoon season rapidly approaching, and frustration levels on the rise within the camps, local experts agree that time is a critical factor. For Thampu, it is "a situation where a successful return process would be a giant step towards long-lasting peace. But if these people who were forced from their homes are forced to stay in camps, it could result in increased tensions for the down the road."

While the Sri Lankan government has made moves to release some of the most vulnerable individuals, such as the elderly and disabled, aid workers and the U.S. government alike agree that the return process must be accelerated. For the people in the camps, their return home will mark an end to war in Sri Lanka. And, as T Thevathas notes, "It will finally provide relief from the fears they endured during war and continue to feel in the camps today."

Bart Beeson is a freelance journalist and campaign organizer focusing on politics and the environment in Latin America. Annalise Romoser is a freelance journalist who oversees Washington, D.C.-based advocacy efforts related to human rights and rural development in Latin America and Africa.

© World Politics Review

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India's power project in final stage: Sri Lanka

Press Trust Of India - Sri Lanka and India are giving final touches to the proposed $500-million thermal power plant at Sampur in Trincomalee, the island nation’s power minister W D J Seneviratne has said.

“We are giving finishing touches to the negotiations with India to construct jointly a coal power plant at Sampur in Trincomalee. This would be the country’s largest coal power plant with a capacity of 1,000 Mw,” the minister said.

An agreement on power purchasing of the new plant would be signed between India’s state-run power producer NTPC and the Ceylon Electricity Board after conclusion of the negotiations.

“The plant will be a joint venture between the Indian and Sri Lankan governments and the plant will be jointly owned by (the) two countries in equal shares,” the minister told the state-owned Daily News.

The minister said Sri Lanka would benefit from the project and that the power produced would be brought to Anuradhapura in North Central Sri Lanka and would be distributed to other areas.

Once the negotiations are complete, NTPC is expected to sign the commercial agreement with the Sri Lankan power authorities for construction of the power plant in eastern part of the island nation.

NTPC officials were holding discussions to this effect in the recent weeks. The project will consist of two phases and the first phase is expected to be completed by 2012.

The initial planning of the project has been completed and the commencement of the construction work is expected in November, according to officials.

The construction work of the plant would be undertaken by NTPC, while the Ceylon Electricity Board would monitor the engineering work of the project, it said.

According to officials, initially, both sides will invest $75 million each and later $350 million will be infused by both parties.

NTPC signed an agreement with the government of Sri Lanka and Ceylon Electricity Board in December 2006 for the development of a 2x250-Mw coal-based power project at Trincomalee in Sri Lanka.

According to the memorandum of understanding, the project would be developed through a joint venture company of NTPC and Ceylon Electricity Board.

© Business Standard

Related Links:
REGULATIONS made under Section 5 of the Public Security Ordinance
Trincomalee High Security Zone and Special Economic Zone - CPA
High Security Zones and the Rights to Return - COHRE

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Life as a Sri Lankan war refugee

By Charles Haviland - Tirumagal is sweeping the yard. The yard of an ordinary house in the palm trees.

She, her husband and their three-year-old daughter are back home in Trincomalee from their war-time suffering and from Menik Farm.

The largest and most controversial of Sri Lanka's refugee camps, Menik holds about a quarter of a million Tamils who fled the war zone in the final weeks as the government finally vanquished the Tamil Tigers or LTTE.

No-one is automatically allowed to leave the camp. But Tirumagal's family were among the first few hundred sent home by the authorities in early August to four districts in the east and north.

Like others at Menik, they had earlier been caught in the Tiger-held zone during the war's final spasms - a shrinking sliver of land between a lagoon and the sea.

Life in the zone of hostilities was a nightmare.

Hospital shelled

"One day I was getting ready to get some high-nutrition food for my daughter," she told me.

"Then I changed my mind and didn't go that day. But I saw people queuing up to get it from the clinic, several hundred of them.

"They were shelled. Just in that shelling 75 people were killed and many more injured. I only escaped because I'd changed my mind."

The UN says that the Tigers forcibly stopped people from leaving and that the army shelled civilian areas.

The dignified young woman says she does not know who did what. She did, however, hear stories of the Tigers shooting people and of a hospital being shelled.

She looks calm throughout our interview but her voice constantly breaks with emotion, betraying her trauma.

"Because of the fighting and shelling we moved into the no-fire zone. But we got shelled there.

"People got killed and injured. We wanted to get back to the place we'd come from. We just moved from place to place, taking nothing but the tent and a few utensils and some rice to cook, if possible.

"We started digging bunkers. But where the sand was too soft we couldn't."

Out on the beach near Trincomalee, Tamil fishermen prepare their nets for the day's outing, the sun's rays fierce even at 7am.

Their colourful boat is heaved into the water.

It is a reassuring everyday scene, not very far down the coast from the former war zone where catastrophe reigned until May this year.

'Terrible'

We meet another refugee who also left Menik Farm last month, 61-year-old Sadasivam.

He and his wife were trapped in Tiger-held land while visiting their children there back in 2006. As the war restarted, the rebels would not give the family a pass to leave.

"Life there was terrible," he recalls. "We had no idea what would happen."

From January onwards, constant shelling forced them to move their shelter five times.

"Wherever we dug bunkers, there was the smell of dead bodies."

In April their injured grandson and his mother were evacuated in a ship by the International Committee of the Red Cross. Then, on 9 May, Sadasivam was wounded.

"A shell landed. There was fire. My son-in-law's auto-rickshaw was parked and it caught fire.

"Then I saw the blood on my thighs. I was injured.

"I managed to come to the place called Mullivaikkal with the help of others. We started digging another L-shaped bunker and we put up a tent and stayed there.

"As we were putting up our tent, I saw dead bodies lying around. I saw the wounded people being loaded into a tractor and taken somewhere to be treated."

Extraordinary exodus

In mid-May the army arrived. It evacuated them in the endgame of the war.

Tirumagal had left a month earlier when the armed forces breached a Tiger rampart.

The extraordinary exodus of thousands across the lagoon was captured by cameras on unmanned air force planes, the images beamed around the world.

On the ground, outlandish rumours were swirling around, says Tirumagal.

"There was one story that men and women would have to walk naked for one kilometre before they got into the hands of the military. Hearing all this we were scared to cross over.

"But on 20 April we heard an announcement: 'Come to our area.' We weren't sure who was saying it but we decided to leave.

"There had been continuous shelling for two days. I wondered whether we would be able to cross the lagoon and get to the government area alive. We were lucky. Three of us managed to leave and cross the lagoon."

At the house in the coconut grove, Tirumagal's kindly elderly relatives - who themselves were war refugees earlier - give us tea.

Life is getting more normal. She tells the BBC about Menik Farm, the vast complex of camps to which she, Sadasivam and countless other Tamil refugees were taken.

'Things improved'

"When we came to Menik Farm there was no water. Then my daughter had diarrhoea and she and I both had flu for six weeks.

"I used to stand in the queue every day but there were thousands of people queuing up for the hospitals. I couldn't get a number for a doctor."

Tirumagal says that for the last two days in the war zone there was nothing to eat. At the camp, the army fed them but food remained in short supply at first.

"But later on we were given cooked food, then vegetables and rations to cook. So things improved."

Sadasivam agrees that is true, but only from a starting point where there were no basic facilities.

There have been uncorroborated accounts of some refugees being "disappeared" or abducted from the camps by shadowy paramilitaries. But he says he has not heard of any such thing happening.

I asked him about the screening process. The government says it has weeded out 10,000 former rebels and is still working on the exercise.

"When we all came to the big camp they made announcements, saying that if anyone had connections with the LTTE we should be separated and queue up separately," the elderly man says.

"They wanted to register those people and gave them numbers. They got separated."

Since July the Red Cross has had no access to these people, or indeed to Menik Farm. It is not clear how many of those detained are alleged fighters or those who, in the government's words, are simply "mentally" connected with them.

Tirumagal says it is a fact that many were entangled with the Tigers - but not necessarily through choice. For instance, her own husband was severely injured years ago in an LTTE bomb.

"So he's disabled. But we also had to pay money to the Tigers saying we couldn't take up arms or be part of their operations because he's disabled.

"When we all lived under their regime, you couldn't avoid having some kind of participation in their activities."

As screening continues, hundreds of thousands remain inside Menik Farm.

Many of those who have left still have close relatives inside and are not sure when they'll get out. They live in hope.

After years and months of indignity and trauma, Sadasivam and the other returned refugees display dignity above anything else.

They have returned to their homes in a still volatile corner of an unstable island.

At least the war is over, and they are no longer fugitives.

© BBC

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Sri Lankan leader skips meeting in US

Feizal Samath - When world leaders met at the opening of the annual United Nations General Assembly yesterday, Mahinda Rajapaksa, the Sri Lankan president, was a notable absentee.

The president instead sent his deputy, prime minister Ratnasiri Wickramanayake, to lead the country’s delegation at the UN’s 2009 session in what is widely see as a reluctance to meet western leaders critical of the government over human rights issues, according to analysts.

The president has attended all three previous sessions since his election in late 2005.

Lakshman Kiriella, a Sri Lankan opposition MP, told reporters on Tuesday that Mr Rajapaksa should have gone to the UN to defend his administration against allegations of human rights violations during the country’s defeat of Tamil separatists last May. He pointed out that the general assembly has traditionally been a platform for developing world leaders to respond to western criticism.

“While serious allegations are being levelled against Sri Lanka, the president has failed in his duty to defend the country,” Mr Kiriella said at a press conference of the main opposition United National Party (UNP).

The UNP parliamentarian said the president speaks of an international conspiracy against the government but has evaded taking the issue up with world leaders at the UN.

Mr Rajapaksa and other government officials, at various public meetings, have spoken of an international Tamil-Tiger-led conspiracy – through media, international bodies and rights groups – against the Sri Lankan government.

Dullus Allahapperuma, the transport minister, told a press conference in Colombo on September 10 that the government had thwarted a plot to assassinate the president and the defence secretary in March.

Mr Allahapperuma said the “huge conspiracy” was the joint work of the Tamil Tigers – based in Sri Lanka and around the world – and both local and international sympathisers, though he did not give further details.

“We will [soon] reveal to the country and to the international community those who are responsible,” he said, the first time the public has been told of a plot to kill the president.

Mr Rajapaksa has resolutely defended allegations by human rights groups and western leaders that the military used brute force against civilians in the last stages of the battle against Tamil Tiger guerrillas.

World leaders have also criticised the government for keeping some 250,000 Tamil residents who fled the fighting in camps whose perimeters are patrolled by the military. The government says the refugees will be allowed home once de-mining of their towns in the war torn north are completed.

“It would have been embarrassing for the president to face up – at the UN – to world leaders like Barack Obama, the US president, or British prime minister Gordon Brown, who, among others, have been concerned about the Sri Lankan situation,” said a former Sri Lankan diplomat in Colombo, speaking on condition of anonymity.

The government last week announced that Mr Wickramanayake would lead the Sri Lankan delegation to the 64th UN General Assembly, where he is also scheduled to meet UN secretary general Ban Ki-Moon. A government statement said Mr Wickramanayake will address the assembly on September 26 on the “strengthening of multilateralism and dialogue among civilisations for international peace, security and development”.

There has been no official explanation as to why Mr Rajapaksa is skipping the UN session except for a brief statement from the president’s spokesman, Lucian Rajakarunanayake, earlier this month, to The Sunday Times that reported that Mr Rajapaksa was travelling to New York for the session, saying he would not be attending this year.

However, according to other sources, there were other reasons for the president’s absence, which are related to a problem securing US visas for some members of his delegation.

The Times, which reported that the UN had named Mr Rajapaksa on the list of speakers for the opening day yesterday, also printed a list of the 50-member delegation, which included Vinayagamoorthy Muralitharan, a former rebel turned minister who is known by one name, Karuna, and MP Wimal Weerawansa, who has been critical of the US and other western nations. According to analysts the pair would have had trouble attaining visas for the assembly. A statement from the president’s office said no such list had been delivered to them by the UN.

Mr Muralitharan, a former Tamil rebel commander, was arrested in the UK in early 2007 and detained for some six months on charges of possessing a forged passport, before being sent back to Colombo. Mr Weerawansa, a former member of the Marxist People’s Liberation Front, heads a small party that backs the president.

Mr Rajapaksa is also busy with local government elections and preparations for parliamentary and presidential polls, which can be called any time after November.

Opposition parties are discussing selecting a common candidate for the presidential election, and former army commander General Sarath Fonseka, who was instrumental in winning the battle against Tamil rebels, has been tipped as a possible choice, according to several reports in local newspapers.

© The National

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Sri Lankan army clashes with detainees

A detainee was seriously injured and had to be hospitalized as a clash broke out between the Sri Lankan Army (SLA) and detainees being held at a school in Vavuniya in north-eastern Sri Lanka on Tuesday.

The detainee, Sri Chandramorgan from Kanahapuram, Kilinochchi, was initially reported to have been killed by the army when he tried to escape from the Poonthotham Teachers Training College, which serves as an unofficial detention centre. The rumour sparked unrest in the camp and the road to the facility was closed by authorities.

“The danger of serious human rights violations, including torture, enforced disappearances and extrajudicial killings increases substantially when detainees are held in locations that are not officially acknowledged places of detention and lack proper legal procedures and safeguards”, said Sam Zarifi, Amnesty International's Asia Director.

Detention centres such as the Poonthotham Teachers Training College are irregular places of detention. Since May 2009, an estimated 10,000 to 12,000 individuals suspected of ties to the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE or Tamil Tigers) have been detained in irregular detention facilities operated by the Sri Lankan security forces and affiliated paramilitary groups.

Several such groups are active in Vavuniya and have been implicated in human rights violations, including People’s Liberation Organisation of Tamil Eelam (PLOTE), Tamil Eelam Liberation Organization (TELO), Eelam People’s Democratic Party (EPDP) and both factions of the Tamil Makkal Viduthalai Pulikal (TMVP).

On 25 May, just a week after the Sri Lankan government declared victory over the Tamil Tigers, Army Commander General Sarath Fonseka announced that 9,000 Tamil Tigers cadres had surrendered to the army.

Since then, there have been regular reports of arrests. Some have been officially acknowledged and reported in the Sri Lankan press and others reported by relatives of detainees in displacement camps.

Many of these detainees are being held incommunicado, meaning they have not had access to family members or legal counsel and have not appeared in court.

Amnesty International has confirmed the location of at least 10 such facilities in school buildings and hostels originally designated as displacement camps in the north. There have also been frequent reports of other unofficial places of detention elsewhere in the country.

The International Committee of the Red Cross has no access to these detainees and there is no transparency about their registration and treatment.

Incommunicado detention of suspects in irregular places of detention (i.e. places other than police stations, officially designated detention centres or prisons) has been a persistent practice in Sri Lanka associated with torture, killings and enforced disappearances.

Amnesty International has called on the Sri Lankan government to ensure that the screening process for suspected combatants is carried out in ways that guarantee the human rights and dignity of all those involved.

Arrangements should be made for independent monitoring of screening processes. Tamil Tigers suspects must be held only in recognised places of detention and be brought before a judicial authority without delay after being taken into custody.

© Amnesty International

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'Clashes' in Sri Lankan centre - BBC

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Government moves to silence Thamilvani

The government in response to the damning and controversial interview given to the London Guardian by Thamilvani Gnanakumar after returning to London following her release from the “illegal detention camp” in Vavuniya, has arrested members of the family that provided lodging to her while she was in Vavuniya, Lanka News Web reliably learns.

Damilvani has stopped revealing details to the media following this incident. Although Thamilvani has told the media that she was unable to speak due to mental stress, the real reason for her silence is the arrests made in Sri Lanka. She has decided to revert from her initial decision of informing the international community about the real situation in the displaced camps through media interviews in order to protect the relatives who provided her with shelter back in Sri Lanka.

Lanka News Web further learns that the government has decided to delay the release of Tamil nationals who are citizens of Australia and Canada from the displaced camps in order to prevent the Sri Lankan government from facing a similar situation.

© Lanka News Web

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Rs. 142 mn for 2009 war expenditure

The Government had allocated Rs. 142,141 million for war expenses in the year 2009, Chief Government Whip Urban Development and Sacred Area Development Minister Dinesh Gunawardene informed Parliament yesterday.

A document tabled by Minister Gunawardene in response to a question raised by JVP MP Premasiri Manage said that there was no separate classification as war expenditure of government and the recently concluded operations were humanitarian operations.

Asked to inform the House the main sources from which the the money is expected to be obtained, the Minister said it would be from domestic funds.

The amount of expected revenue through the Nation Building Tax for Defence affairs for this year was Rs. 32,000 million, the document said.

© The Island

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Major General Jagath Dias assigned to investigate into JDS organization

Diplomatic sources said the Defence Ministry has assigned Major General Jagath Dias to investigate into the organization called Journalists for Democracy in Sri Lanka (JDS) that is said to have given the controversial video footage showing Army soldiers killing several Tamil civilians to Channel 4.

Major General Jagath Dias assumed duties as the deputy ambassador of the Sri Lankan embassy in Germany last week. The first duty assigned to him by Defence Secretary Gotabhaya Rajapkase is to investigate into the people connected to the JDS organization and report back.
A story published in the Lakbima newspaper on the 23rd under the headline “Assistance from German Police sought to investigate into journalists who manufactured the Channel 4 video,” states the Defence Ministry has requested for help from the German Police to investigate into members of JDS, which is said to have given the video showing Army soldiers shooting at several Tamil civilians to Britain’s Channel 4.

The news report further states that Human Rights and Disaster Management Minister Mahinda Samarasinghe has said that the security units have already identified several journalists who have fled to Germany and are active members of the organization.

The Minister had also said that UN Human Rights Commission Head, Navai Pillai had admitted to him during a discussion that the video footage shown on Channel 4 and subsequently on BBC, CNN and Al Jazeera was a fake.

Samarasinghe had further said that while Channel 4 had not yet tendered an apology or expressed its regret over telecasting the fake video, Attorney General Mohan Peiris has left for London to discuss with several law firms the legal steps to be instituted against the media institution.

© Lanka News Web

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No room for suspected war criminal in Germany - www.gfbv.de

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SL Defence ministry asks German police help to probe JDS - Human Rights Minister

The Defence Ministry has asked German Police for assistance to probe Journalists for Democracy (JDS) that had reportedly given to Britain’s Channel 4 the video that alleges executions by the Sri Lankan Army.

According to human rights minister Mahinda Samarasinghe, the defence ministry has found out that several Sri Lankan journalists who had fled to Germany are involved in JDS.

Other television channels like BBC, CNN and Al Jazeera had quoted Channel 4 and given publicity to the controversial video.

The minister said that UN high commissioner for human rights Navi Pillai had admitted the video to be false when he had met her.

As Channel 4 is yet to make an apology for airing the video without ascertaining its authenticity, attorney general Mohan Peiris is now in London holding talks with lawyers on the possibility of initiating legal action against the British TV channel, Mr. Samarasinghe added.

© Colombotoday.com

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Why peace seems elusive in Sri Lanka

The Sri Lankan military already is bigger than that of Britain and Israel. The planned further expansion would make the military in tiny Sri Lanka larger than the militaries of major powers like France, Japan and Germany, writes Professor Brahma Chellaney.

If war-scarred Sri Lanka is to re-emerge as a tropical paradise, it has to build enduring peace through genuine inter-ethnic equality and by making the transition from being a unitary State to being a federation that grants local autonomy. Yet even in victory, the Sri Lankan government seems unable to define peace or outline a political solution to the long-standing grievances of the Tamil minority.

A process of national reconciliation anchored in federalism and multi-culturalism indeed can succeed only if possible war crimes and other human-rights abuses by all parties are independently and credibly investigated.

United Nations Secretary General Ban Ki-moon has acknowledged civilian casualties were 'unacceptably high,' especially as the war built to a bloody crescendo earlier this year. The continuing air of martial triumph in Sri Lanka, though, is making it difficult to heal the wounds of war through three essential 'Rs': Relief, recovery and reconciliation.

In fact, the military victory bears a distinct family imprint: President Mahinda Rajapaksa was guided by two of his brothers, Gotabaya, the powerful defence secretary who fashioned the war plan, and Basil, the presidential special adviser who formulated the political strategy. Yet another brother, Chamal, is the ports and civil aviation minister who awarded China a contract to build the billion dollar Hambantotta port, on Sri Lanka's southeast.

In return, Beijing provided Colombo not only the weapon systems that decisively titled the military balance in its favour, but also the diplomatic cover to prosecute the war in defiance of international calls to cease offensive operations to help stanch rising civilian casualties.

Through such support, China has succeeded in extending its strategic reach to a critically located country in India's backyard that sits astride vital sea-lanes of communication in the Indian Ocean region.

India also is culpable for the Sri Lankan bloodbath. Having been outwitted by China, India was compelled to lend critical assistance to Colombo, lest it lose further ground in Sri Lanka.

From opening an unlimited line of credit for Sri Lanka to extending naval and intelligence cooperation, India provided war-relevant support in the face of a deteriorating humanitarian situation in that island-nation.

Sinhalese nationalists now portray President Rajapaksa as a modern-day incarnation of Dutugemunu, a Sinhalese ruler who, according to legend, vanquished an invading Tamil army led by Kind Elara more than 2,000 years ago. But months after the Tamil Tigers were crushed, it is clear the demands of peace extend far beyond the battlefield.

What is needed is a fundamental shift in government's policies to help create greater inter-ethnic equality, regional autonomy and a reversal of the State-driven militarisation of society. But Rajapaksa, despite promising to address the root causes of conflict, has declared: 'Federalism is out of the question.'

How elusive the peace dividend remains can be seen from Sri Lanka's decision to press ahead with a further expansion of its military. Not content with increasing the military's size fivefold since the late 1980s to more than 200,000 troops today, Colombo is raising the strength further to 300,000, in the name of 'eternal vigilance.' Soon after the May 2008 victory, the government, for example, announced a drive to recruit 50,000 new troops to help control the northern areas captured from the rebels.

The Sri Lankan military already is bigger than that of Britain and Israel. The planned further expansion would make the military in tiny Sri Lanka larger than the militaries of major powers like France, Japan and Germany.

By citing a continuing danger of guerrilla remnants reviving the insurgency, Rajapaksa is determined to keep a hyper-militarised Sri Lanka on something of a war footing.

Yet another issue of concern is the manner the government still holds nearly 300,000 civilians in camps where, in the recent words of UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Navi Pillay, the 'internally displaced persons are effectively detained under conditions of internment.'

Such detention risks causing more resentment among the Tamils and sowing the seeds of future unrest. The internment was intended to help weed out rebels, many of whom already have been identified and transferred to military sites.

Those in the evacuee camps are the victims and survivors of the deadly war. To confine them in the camps against their will is to further victimise and traumatise them.

Sri Lanka's interests would be better served through greater transparency. It should grant the UN, International Red Cross and nongovernmental organisations at home and abroad unfettered access to care for and protect the civilians in these camps, allowing those who wish to leave the camps to stay with relatives and friends.

Then there is the issue of thousands of missing people, mostly Tamils. Given that many families are still searching for missing members, the government ought to publish a list of all those it is holding -- in evacuee camps, prisons, military sites and other security centres. Even suspected rebels in custody ought to be identified and not denied access to legal representation.

Bearing in mind that thousands of civilians were killed just in the final months of the war, the authorities should disclose the names of those they know to be dead -- civilians and insurgents -- and the possible circumstances of their death.

The way to fill the power vacuum in the Tamil-dominated north is not by dispatching additional army troops in tens of thousands, but by setting up a credible local administration to keep the peace and initiate rehabilitation and reconstruction after more than a quarter of a century of war. Yet there is a lurking danger that the government may seek to change demography by returning to its old policy of settling Sinhalese in Tamil areas.

More fundamentally, such have been the costs of victory that Sri Lankan civil society stands badly weakened. The wartime suppression of a free press and curtailment of fundamental rights continues in peacetime, undermining democratic freedoms and creating a fear psychosis.

Sweeping emergency regulations remain in place, arming the security forces with expansive powers of search, arrest and seizure of property. Public meetings cannot be held without government permission. Individuals can still be held in unacknowledged detention for up to 18 months.

For the process of reconciliation and healing to begin in earnest, it is essential the government give up wartime powers and accept, as the UN human rights commissioner has sought, 'an independent and credible international investigation...to ascertain the occurrence, nature and scale of violations of international human rights and international humanitarian law' by all parties during the conflict.

According to Ms Pillay, 'A new future for the country, the prospect of meaningful reconciliation and lasting peace, where respect for human rights and fundamental freedoms can become a reality for all, hinges upon such an in-depth and comprehensive approach.'

Rather than begin a political dialogue on regional autonomy and a more level playing field for the Tamils in education and government jobs, the government has seen its space get constricted by the post-victory upsurge of Sinhalese chauvinism opposed to the devolution of powers to the minorities.

The hard-line constituency argues that the Tamils in defeat shouldn't get what they couldn't secure through three decades of unrest and violence.

Indeed, such chauvinism seeks to tar federalism as a potential forerunner to secession, although the Tamil insurgency sprang from the State's rejection of decentralisation and power-sharing. The looming parliamentary and presidential elections also make devolution difficult, even though the Opposition is splintered and Rajapaksa seems set to win a second term.

Add to the picture the absence of international pressure, despite the leverage provided by a cash-strapped Sri Lankan economy. The United States enjoys a one-country veto in the International Monetary Fund, yet it chose to abstain from the recent IMF vote approving a desperately needed $2.8 billion loan to Sri Lanka.

In the face of China's stonewalling in the UN, Ban Ki-moon has been unable to appoint a UN special envoy on Sri Lanka, let alone order a probe into possible war crimes there. By contrast, the UN carried out a recently concluded investigation into Israel's three-week military offensive in Gaza earlier this year.

Today, reversing the militarisation of society, ending the control of information as an instrument of State policy and promoting political and ethnic reconciliation are crucial to post-conflict peace-building and to furthering the interests of all Sri Lankans -- Sinhalese, Tamils and Muslims. So also is the need to discard the almost mono-ethnic character of the security forces.

Colombo has to stop dragging its feet, as it has done for long, on implementing the Constitution's 13th amendment, which requires the ceding of some powers at the provincial level. But these tasks are unlikely to be addressed without sustained international diplomatic intervention.

As world history attests, peace sought to be achieved through the suppression and humiliation of an ethnic community has proven elusive. It will be a double tragedy for Sri Lanka if making peace proves more difficult than making war.

Brahma Chellaney - A professor of strategic studies at the independent, privately funded Centre for Policy Research in New Delhi, is on the international advisory council of the Campaign for Peace and Justice in Sri Lanka.

© Rediff.com

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