යහපත් අනාගතයක් සඳහා
Sri Lanka should not go on manufacturing new conflicts once an old one ends. Fonseka’s arrest looked at first glance like the winner punishing the loser, but the President’s account is that the army authorities wanted to court-martial Fonseka over matters arising from his time as Chief of Defence Staff, and that he instructed them to wait until after the election so it would not appear he was blocking his opponent from standing. If the process cannot be reversed it should at least be transparent, and a conviction could be met with a pardon in view of Fonseka’s war service. With the war over, the President’s duty is to soften his administration: let the opposition campaign unhindered, invite back journalists who fled, investigate the one who disappeared during the campaign, and legislate on torture and children’s rights — which would also restore GSP Plus.
ආපසු හැරී බැලීමක් සමග ඉදිරිය දැකීමක්
Ivan sets out his own positions and why they left him isolated. He held that the Tamil rebellion was inseparable from Tamil grievances and had to be settled by negotiation — until it became clear the LTTE would accept nothing short of a separate state or confederation, at which point he supported defeating it militarily. He backed the war publicly and predicted the LTTE’s defeat while most of Ravaya’s own writers argued it could not be won. On the killing and beating of journalists he told colleagues the blame could not be laid wholly on a government unable to move against its army commander mid-war, and was angrily rejected by Sunanda Deshapriya. He records that this was the third insurrection he supported suppressing, including the 1971 rising he took part in himself. At the presidential election his loyalty was to Rajapaksa, whose remaining task he defines as remaking the state and political system.
ජනාධිපතිවරණය ජනතාව භේද කරන තරගයක් නොවිය යුතුය
Government figures have attacked the Tamil National Alliance’s decision to back Sarath Fonseka, one claiming it could revive terrorism. The alliance did serve the LTTE’s programme, but out of fear rather than conviction; with the LTTE defeated its representatives can act freely, and its local councillors have sung the national anthem. Backing one of the two main candidates is better than a boycott or a separate candidate. Fonseka, once a hardline Sinhala nationalist, has drawn wide minority support. The Vaddukoddai declaration ruined the Tamil people as much as the country, and the LTTE’s defeat opens space for a united society of equal citizens. Both candidates have a duty to make this an election that moves the country forward rather than one that sows division.
ආරක්ෂක සම්බාධක ලිහිල් කිරීමේ අවශ්යතාව
Lifting the restrictions on travel south from the Jaffna peninsula is a good first step, Ivan writes, and the high security zones should go the same way now that the threat that justified them is gone. He asks for the military atmosphere to be dismantled rather than displayed, and for the journalists who left the country for their safety to be invited back.
කේ පී අසුවීම
Taking KP abroad and bringing him to Sri Lanka is a considerable victory, Ivan writes, not only because he led the diaspora’s notional state after Prabhakaran but because he ran the LTTE’s arms purchasing — and everyone in custody now talks. He notes that the low turnout at the two northern council elections shows the Tamil people’s unease is not over.
යුද්ධය අවසානයි ඒ බව දැනෙන්නට සැලැස්විය යුතුය
Ending a thirty-year war is a great thing, Ivan writes, but the public has to be able to feel it: the harshness of wartime relaxed, the money once spent on ammunition visibly turned to development, and the A9 open to ordinary travellers. Free and fair local elections in the north would do more for Tamil confidence than any declaration.
දස දහසක් මල් පිපෙන්නට ඉඩදෙමු
Detainees who once bit a cyanide capsule now tell the forces everything they know, which is why weapons caches and LTTE documents are being found in quantity. With no fear of a guerrilla revival, Ivan argues, the restrictions imposed for the war should go, the aid and the IMF loan will follow, and the country can turn to the political reforms that would make it the richest in the region.
එල්ටීටීඊ පරාජය හා දෙමළ ජනතාව යුද්ධයේ අවසානය හා රටේ අනාගතය
Because the war ended with the whole LTTE leadership destroyed rather than with a remnant intact, Ivan argues, the movement lost both the capacity and the confidence to regroup — which is why Prabhakaran’s death brought no violent reaction. He turns from there to what the peace should be used for: relaxing security, rebuilding villages, and setting the army to public works.
අපි ජයගත්තෙමු. එය ප්රමාණවත් ද?
Twenty-nine of the forty-seven members of the Human Rights Council in Geneva voted with Sri
Lanka and twelve against, which Ivan counts an important victory in the international
argument. Some violation of rights is unavoidable in any war and more so against a terrorist
movement; but the victory has created a humanitarian problem the country cannot solve
without the world’s help, and on that question it should speak with one voice.
ආරම්භ වී තිබෙන නව පරිච්ඡේදය අර්ථවත් කරගැනීම
A movement that held a large part of the country by force for close to three decades has
been destroyed, and Ivan writes that in every one of the three armed rebellions the state
has put down, the enemy was its own citizens. What the country owes itself now is to find
the social, economic and political causes that keep producing them, and to use the opening
the victory has made rather than waste it as earlier openings were wasted.