The Tamil diaspora's responsibility

This photograph released by the Sri Lankan military May 15, 2009 shows what the army says are civilians fleeing from the area inside the "No Fire Zone" that is still held by the Tiger rebels. Sri Lankan troops on Saturday seized the entire coastline for the first time in its 25-year war with the Tamil Tigers, the military said, cutting off escape for separatist rebels now facing total destruction. (Sri Lankan Government/Reuters)

TORONTO — As the war in Sri Lanka nears its end, stories of the conflict zone begin to emerge with greater clarity. A lack of media access has obscured certain narratives, but some who have escaped have relayed their situations to family and friends. Here is one such story told to me:

Whether you call Puthumathalan a war zone or not depends on your take on Sri Lankan politics. But the ordinary citizens who gather in this part of northern Sri Lanka’s Wanni region at this moment don’t care what you say: They don’t talk about politics. Nor do they know the kind of political games the outside world is playing with their lives. They talk about survival.

In a scene played out over the past few months of intense fighting, a few of the men converse quietly with each other before returning to their spouses, who are carrying infants. Their older children cluster around them. Between their exchanges, some try to escape into bunkers to avoid being killed by ongoing military assaults. The government says that they are destroying the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam, and government forces continue to pound the area with artillery fire, despite the civilians’ presence there.

The Tigers, too, fire at the civilians, to prevent them from escaping into government-controlled territory. The rebels’ lives depend on holding these civilians as their shields.

But these particular civilians don’t intend to follow this plan. The men’s conversations translate into action, and several of them march toward the defense lines, where two arms-bearing Tiger cadres are on sentry duty. The sentries have been charged with ensuring that none of the civilians escapes into army territory. The men approaching them take them by surprise: Leaping into a scuffle, the civilians wrest the guns from their captors and charge forward.

Their family members follow them toward army territory and past the Tiger lines. This group of men and women are the suicide fighters of the civilian force. They have no idea what will happen to them as they risk their lives to escape. Still, they press on for their freedom.

In other places, only half this story will be told: For many of my brothers and sisters in the Sri Lankan Tamil diaspora, it is not the Tigers’ crimes, but only the army’s atrocities that come to light.

It is true that government forces have committed many atrocities in the past, and may be committing more right now. Still, that does not change the fact that in recent months, the number of atrocities committed by the Tigers against their own people have skyrocketed. Forceful recruitment of children, firing at innocent civilians and using civilians as human shields are only a few of their crimes.

In the diaspora, we come to know these things easily. We have access to press, electronic media and access to websites in many languages. Why do we continue to deny the truth?

http://www.globalpost.com/dispatch/worldview/090516/tamil-diaspora-crisis-sri-lanka