සටන්කාමයට වඩා දැන් අවශ්යව ඇත්තේ ප්රඥාවයි
With the LTTE’s territory gone and its leaders holding civilians as a shield, Ivan writes
that the rules of war require a defeated side to surrender — Hitler’s suicide was a signal
to his army to do so — and that Prabhakaran has chosen instead to maximise the harm to his
own people. Whether the forces can take the remaining leaders without that harm will decide
how the victory is remembered, and how India’s election reads it.
යාල්දේවී නැවත ඇරඹීම
Ivan reads the decision to restore the Yal Devi line to the north as symbolic as much as
economic, and proposes that the sleepers be paid for village by village — each temple,
church, school and workshop buying one marked with its name — so that the south has a hand
in rebuilding the north. What the north needs now, he writes, alongside development and
elections, is kindness.
ගෞරවනීය අවසානයක් සඳහා
With 99.5 per cent of LTTE territory taken and the remainder unwilling to surrender, Ivan
proposes that the government turn the question around: invite the world bodies and powers
now speaking for the trapped civilians to put forward a programme for freeing them, subject
to the government’s own scrutiny, with the freed civilians handed to the state and any
surrendering cadres to the forces.
පෑරුණු හදවත් සුව කිරීම
Written as the military defeat of the LTTE became inevitable, this article shifts focus to the monumental task of post-war reconciliation. The author argues that true victory requires healing the psychological wounds of the Tamil people, acknowledging past mistakes by the Sinhalese, and addressing legitimate minority grievances. Drawing a powerful historical parallel to the successful rehabilitation of JVP youth after the 1971 insurrection, the piece advocates for a compassionate, rehabilitative approach for surrendered LTTE cadres and a unified, cross-ethnic national effort to rebuild the North.
ශ්රී ලංකාවේ දෙමළ ජාතික අරගළය
A comprehensive historical analysis reflecting on the defeat of the LTTE and the 25-year armed struggle. Tracing the political history from the colonial Colebrooke-Cameron reforms to the post-independence Sinhala Only Act and university standardization policies, the author examines the root causes of the conflict. The piece argues that while discriminatory policies by Sinhalese governments fueled the crisis, Tamil political leaders also shared blame due to their utopian demands, lack of pragmatic foresight, and early reliance on ethnic nationalism.
අවසානය කුමක්ද?
Written during the critical final phase of the civil war in February 2009, this article analyzes the LTTE’s strategy of using civilians as a human shield to force a political settlement. The author addresses the outrage from the global Tamil diaspora, pointing out the LTTE’s own history of violence against Tamils. By comparing the military offensive to the much harsher state suppression of the JVP youth insurrection in the late 1980s, the author argues that the government has a duty to defeat the armed rebellion while minimizing civilian casualties, without abandoning its primary objective.
තවත් ප්රභාකරන් කෙනෙකු බිහිවීමට ඉඩ නොතබමු
Written during the final phase of the civil war, this article reflects on the imminent collapse of the LTTE and the resulting leadership vacuum within the Tamil community. The author argues that Sinhalese leaders now bear the responsibility to treat the Tamil people with compassion and justice. It serves as a strong plea for post-war reconciliation and the creation of a united, equal Sri Lankan identity to prevent the rise of future violent extremism.
ආධාර කණ්ඩායමේ නව ස්ථාවරය රටට යහපත්ය
Reading the Co-Chairs’ call on the LTTE to lay down its arms, Ivan notes that the European
Union, Japan, the United States and Norway — the parties most opposed to the war — now
accept that the LTTE has been militarily defeated and say nothing of political talks with
it, and argues that their duty is to release the promised aid and help the country with what
follows.
අලුතෙන් හිතන්නට කාලය පැමිණ තිබේ
Sri Lanka is close to winning one of the two decisive questions before it. Where every previous approach had failed and the country was stuck with no end in sight, Rajapaksa made a reckless attempt, staking his own survival and the country’s on fighting the LTTE to a military defeat, and went on down that road against opposition at home and abroad. The world thought he would destroy the country and himself; instead he reached the post he aimed at. The world is changed by those who swim upstream, and until they arrive they are taken for madmen rather than heroes. Military defeat will not settle the ethnic question by itself, but it creates conditions in which it can be settled — and doing so is the shared responsibility of everyone, with the opposition’s duty being to help rather than obstruct. The second question, replacing a disordered political system, needs the same cooperation.
අනාගතය ගැන අලුතෙන් හිතමු
The war’s quick end is now in sight, and the largest remaining problem is how to free the civilians trapped on a small strip of land. The government has declared a no-fire zone, but the LTTE, using those people as a shield, is unlikely to let them cross into it. Once that is resolved the LTTE can only take to the jungle — and the jungle left to it, however thick, is not as large as Thoppigala. Ivan doubts a movement developed to that level can easily revert to guerrilla warfare. The end of the LTTE would widen both the country’s development space and its democratic space: resettlement, rebuilding, provincial and local elections in the north. The most contested question will be what answer is given to Tamil grievances, and it can only be answered if government and opposition work together. The country needs a large change, not a small one.