The Hindu Business Line : `LTTE has not come to the negotiating table to surrender': Dr Jayadeva Uyangoda

THE ongoing peace process in Sri Lanka, even though "fragile and vulnerable", has more opportunities than threats. But to nurture it and bring a solution out of it will require the support of both India and the international community, said Dr Jayadeva Uyangoda, Head of the Department of Political Science, University of Colombo talking to Business Line recently in Colombo.

Excerpts from an interview:

How do you see the peace process going?

It is going to be extremely complicated because you have at one level a politico-military entity that has been engaged successfully in a secessionist war, coming to the negotiating table not as a vanquished guerrilla group but from a position of military strength.

This is the first time in my knowledge a secessionist guerrilla group has come to the negotiating table from a position of military strength. And you have a state on the verge of economic collapse. This is an unprecedented case of negotiation and hence the logic of it will be unpredictable. It will have to be managed very carefully. The next three to six months will be very crucial because of the unpredictability factor.

How did the Sinhala majority look at Prabhakaran's press conference?

He has generated a lot of anger in many people and they are still trying to come to terms with it. From what we see in the newspapers, it is a very complex set of responses, and it is not necessarily to what Mr Prabhakaran said, but how he said it... the background, the symbolism and the symbiotics of it! But though the people can react emotionally, the Government has to respond politically.

How do you read India's reaction, particularly that of the Congress(I) and the Tamil Nadu Government?

Indians have their own agenda. Mr Prabhakaran is like a lightning rod and different political agendas are going around him. In that sense he has become a South Asian political figure.

The political compulsion of India and Tamil Nadu will come into play. That is why modern ethno-political conflicts and their resolution are not confined to the borders of the state. They are extra-territorial and you cannot bring them to an end because there is no ending point. You have to go through trial and error and make a series of interim processes. It is a very, very difficult job. The solution is extra-territorial; it does not lie in Sri Lanka. I think there are opportunities; this process offers threats as well as opportunities. Unfortunately, the public debate and the media debate in India too focuses upon threats and not opportunities.

What about the perception here is that the LTTE continues to recoup and rearm?

You have to accept this as a political fact. Many people think that ceasefire means the LTTE should surrender its weapons. But modern ethno-nationalist movements are not like old guerrilla movements. They negotiate continuously from a position of military strength and we have to recognise that. They will not only negotiate from military strength but also reinforce their military strength because they want to appear to be sovereign representatives of the nation.

The LTTE has not come to the negotiating table to consider the terms of their surrender. We have to understand that. The negotiations are not about the terms of surrender; but about how two sovereign entities can solve a problem; that is the LTTE's view. Military strength is important to them to be taken seriously.

Do you think Prabhakaran is honestly planning to make a transition from a military to a political leader?

He is applying a new political strategy. Whether honest or not, it is a political strategy and in politics there is no such thing as honest strategy!

The LTTE want to be taken seriously in their new strategy. If not, they hope they can always go back to their old and familiar terrain. I didn't expect the LTTE leader to say they were re-considering their separatist demands. They will say if the south does not keep the political space open for them, they will go back to war. The challenge for the south is to continuously engage politically with the LTTE.

How do you look at his response to questions on Rajiv Gandhi's assassination? All that he would say is it was a tragic incident, and didn't want more questions on it.

I look at this differently from what many Indian newspapers have seen it. Mr Prabhakaran is seeking security guarantees; as any guerrilla movement would do on the negotiating table. Their primary security guarantee is immunity from prosecution. The LTTE will not come to the negotiation table for any peace deal without securing the safety of their leader. It wants to work on India. Whether India will accept it or not is a different matter. But that will be their strategy.

So India's refusal to give such a guarantee can scuttle the peace process?

Yes, but it is up to India to decide. But the LTTE is going to work very hard on that because normalisation of relations with India is crucial for LTTE's new political role. For the military strategy India is not important.

That is why I think Mr Prabhakaran's effort for political negotiation is serious. He does not need to normalise relations with India if he wants to continue a military conflict.

How would you react to the criticism from some quarters that the MoU is virtually a surrender document?

That is an unfair criticism of the MoU. We have to keep in mind that the MoU has been signed between a state and a militarily successful guerrilla army. Some of the critics say the MoU has recognised the ground reality. But without recognising that ground reality the peace mechanism cannot move ahead.

The LTTE is a guerrilla organisation without any political ideology and has all along had an un-accommodative ideology. The challenge is to manage the period when the LTTE's political ideology has to go through a transformation from separation to accommodation. Its problem is that it does not have among its leaders strong political ideology.

What do you feel about its de-proscription?

It needs to be de-proscribed because if you are serious about LTTE's future participation in the political process, this has to be done. If you do not de-proscribe them, you are also giving them the option of a military strategy.

In fact the current situation is a de facto de-proscription and all that is left to be done is to make it de jure.

How do you read India's response to the Prabhakaran press conference and its aftermath?

I think India is very cautious. Its official position after Rajiv Gandhi's assassination is that this is an internal matter of Sri Lanka and it is up to its government to resolve.

But everybody in Sri Lanka knows that India would not like a resolution to the conflict without its at least being aware of it and a party to the final settlement; it would like to be kept informed. That is why Sri Lanka and Norway are keeping Delhi informed about the developments, which is a very good policy.

Do you think at a later stage Indian will have to get involved?

I feel that though this is a domestic problem, its solution is regional. And India has got its own security concerns and dilemmas. At some later state India might have to play a political role in the solution.

One opinion I heard was that even a long ceasefire does not mean anything. In 1990 too the ceasefire lasted for 15 months. Do you think that this time around the hope is running ahead of reality?

Actually many people are worried about this. The Norwegians have said the peace process is going a little too fast. That scepticism is not bad; healthy scepticism always helps a complex process like this. The dilemma now is that there is an authoritarian guerrilla organisation, which wants to come to the political process but it has not gone through a political transformation that requires commitment to civil society or democracy. So the challenge for the civil society in the south is how to deal with this situation. It can be dealt with in two ways:

One, to recognise that it is not easy for he LTTE to go through the political transformation immediately, and, two, to continuously critique and expose human rights violations as well as authoritarian political and cultural behaviour of the LTTE. There is no other option, because the LTTE is authoritarian not only in the political and military sphere but also in the cultural sphere and have already laid down dress codes or women.

Such acts will of course have to be opposed?

Yes, but in Tamil society I do not expect an immediate resistance to its authoritarian behaviour but the debate has to take place outside the north-eastern society. But my worry is that the very contradictions that are generated by the ceasefire can jeopardise the prospects of peace. Already we can see signs of tension. I'm not very sure whether the LTTE has adequate political maturity to nurture a peace process. Some indications are already there; the flight path of Mr. (Anton) Balasingham was changed. That is how guerrillas behave. Also, reports of their bringing in weapons. These things go counter to the interest of the MoU and the ceasefire.

There is one opinion here that for some time the people will have to reckon with two powerful armies. Your comment.

The LTTE, in its future negotiations, will argue that through long years of arduous struggle, it represents the sovereignty of the Tamil nation and it has not only symbols but also material manifestations of that sovereignty in the form of its armed forces and administration. The challenge for the Sri Lankan Government will be to come to terms with and accommodate this. But that will require a great deal of political and constitutional imagination.

Yes, two armies is a possibility; and the LTTE is likely to argue for it, not immediately but two or three years down the line. Any settlement or solution will have to come to terms with the fact that the Tamil movement in this long and arduous struggle has built up its own apparatus including the armed forces. The LTTE's political strategy will be akin to two political entities coming together to form a federation.

But will your government come to terms with that?

It will have to be flexible on that. It is like the US, while setting up the original 13 independent entities, had their own armed forces, and they formed a federation. Later, a fairly long negotiation process and adequate constitutional mechanisms enabled these states to retain certain powers and form a union. I think the LTTE's strategy could be something similar to that. It is like two political entities forming one nation.

So do you think Eelam or a separate homeland is out?

I have a feeling that the LTTE has realised that at the moment historically this is not possible due to geo-political and regional reasons. But many people in the south do not seem to recognise that and continue to say that LTTE has not abandoned its demand for Eelam. The term Eelam can be a separate state or something other than a separate state.

Are you optimistic about peace returning?

I am optimistic in the long run. In the short run, I feel that a peace process can fall victim to its own contradictions. So I can see the new contradictions emerging. Even from the government side there are very few people explaining the peace process to the people. Not the entire government seems to be behind Mr Ranil Wickremesinghe's peace initiative. I don't know whether that is tactical or not.

Response can be sent to rasheeda@thehindu.co.in

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