THE PLIGHT OF THE TAMILS EXPOSED

It was never easy going to be easy holding a Commonwealth summit in a country that has only recently emerged from a long and bloody civil war.  During the final months of a 26-year conflict the Sri Lankan army crushed a Tamil revolt amid much bloodshed in 2009. The Commonwealth heads of government were faced with a dilemma following the invitations they received from Colombo. Some countries like Canada and India stayed away in protest at the brutality displayed by the Sri Lankan government during its civil war and it’s still continuing appalling human rights record towards the Tamils. Sri Lanka does not wish to answer or be held to account for any of its ostensible heinous war crimes.

It will be noticeable to many analysts that the final communiqué from the meeting made no reference of David Cameron’s call for an inquiry into the human rights abuses that the Sri Lankan military allegedly committed during the closing stages of the war. Some may infer that this is evidence that the prime minister made a mistake in attending because Britain has, once again, not only unnecessarily exposed its declining influence in the world but made to appear complicit, to a certain degree, by being present during the Sri Lankan leader’s grandstanding before the world.

Diplomatic quandaries don’t come much tougher. Mr Cameron was clearly uncomfortable with the idea of a British boycott of the CHOGM, which would have been a first for a Commonwealth gathering, and no doubt felt that not to have gone to a difficult summit would have been a coward’s way out.

As it is, the Sri Lankan President has called for a new, more credible, probe into human rights abuses, and this runs alongside what Britain is demanding. He believes, however, that he can afford to ignore British criticisms as he attempts to nurture closer ties with China, which wants to draw the strategic island into its own orbit, and professes no interest in Sri Lanka’s human rights record. In predictable style, the President has also fired a barrage of rebukes in Mr Cameron’s direction, describing Britain as an ex-colonial power with plenty of blood on its own hands in Iraq and elsewhere.

The British prime minister did make good on his pledge to place a spotlight on the question of Tamil rights, visiting the war-torn district of Jaffna in the north to meet Tamil protestors first hand. He may make little headway with his call for a wider investigation, though it is less likely that the government in Colombo will resort again to the use of violence against the Tamils in the future. But not much more was ever going to be achieved.