යළි ඉන්දියානු මැදිහත්වීමක්
Ivan assesses India’s offer to mediate if both sides ask, after it refused the President’s request for air support. India distrusts the Norwegian process, dislikes Pakistani and Israeli involvement, and will not allow outside powers to crush the LTTE, yet even its intervention seems unlikely to bring a solution before the election. He notes rifts within the Ceylon Workers’ Congress and the Muslim Congress, and emergency rules used to hobble the opposition.
ජනතාව අඳුරේ තබනු එපා
The editorial contrasts the army spokesman’s claim that only 72 soldiers died at Elephant Pass with the Deputy Defence Minister’s later figures of 358 killed, 346 missing and 2,568 wounded. It argues that hiding the truth during a national crisis is dangerous in a modern society where information cannot be fully controlled, and criticises censors for suppressing material unrelated to national security.
රට ඇත්තේ විනාශයක එළිපත්තේ ය
Ivan says Prabhakaran’s offensive on Jaffna has evaporated the government’s plans to extend Parliament or win an election through constitutional change. A defeat in Jaffna could topple the government; any election would exclude the North. He notes MPs’ retrospective pay rise, doubts the new Sinhala nationalist party can offer a practical answer, and warns that the war could move south and force the whole country into bunkers.
අර්බුදයක විෂම චක්රයක්
The editorial traces a vicious cycle of ever larger crises from the 1958 riots, the 1971 insurrection and 1983 to the 1988–90 revolt, and says the country now stands at the threshold of a bigger one as the army faces decisive defeat in Jaffna. It weighs the fate of the troops there, the likely collapse of the People’s Alliance government, Prabhakaran’s push into the East, and the prospect of two de facto states at war.
Invasion of Jaffna inevitable
The Army Commander says Elephant Pass was given up on strategic grounds. What the LTTE had in fact done was bring the base to a point where the army could not get water or food into it — and a base abandoned for strategic reasons still proves that the means of holding Jaffna are gone.
වෙන්වීමක ඇතිවිම නොවැලැක්විය හැකිය
Ivan analyses the army’s withdrawal from Elephant Pass, the gateway to the Jaffna peninsula, and argues that the capture of Jaffna without securing a land route was always a trap. With some fifty thousand troops and police now with nowhere to retreat, he expects Jaffna to fall to the LTTE, sees no hope in Norwegian-facilitated talks short of confederation, and concludes that separation is unavoidable, citing Lee Kuan Yew on Sri Lankan leaders’ failure to manage ethnic passions.
එල්. ටී. ටී. ඊ.
The editorial argues that Anton Balasingham’s interview with the Tamil Guardian, setting out the LTTE’s conditions for Norwegian-facilitated talks such as the Thimpu principles and a homeland, should be debated seriously rather than sensationalised by Lankadeepa and Divaina. It agrees that both the People’s Alliance and the UNP view the national question from a Sinhala standpoint, calls their talks a deception, and condemns the Foreign Ministry’s reply as pandering to chauvinism.
Self interest in making constitutions
As a nation we are on the edge of a great abyss, and the leaders behave like crabs dancing in water until it boils — so blinded by hunger for power that they cannot see the danger to themselves, let alone the danger to the country.
Way to peace is found within
Norway has come forward as a facilitator to help Sri Lanka find a way out of the ethnic crisis. Will the Norwegian intervention lead to a solution? Ivan’s answer turns on what both Sri Lankan leaders have already shown they will trade for Prabhakaran’s neutrality.
Who killed Kumar Ponnambalam?
Kumar Ponnambalam was the most courageous of Sri Lanka’s political commentators. He lived in Colombo among Sinhala people, most of his associates were Sinhala, and knowing exactly what it cost to defend the LTTE from Colombo he went on saying what he thought, fearlessly and well.