COLOMBO, Sep 3 (IPS) - It is a walk that no one has taken in the last quarter of a century. The nation having been beset by a bloody sectarian war, who would have thought of travelling the length of Sri Lanka south to north, let alone walk the distance, in the name of peace?
On Aug. 25, three men from the deep south of the country, all from the majority Sinhala community, began their 600-kilometre walk from the southern end of the island. The walk would later stretch through the vast swath of land called Vanni in the north central parts of Sri Lanka and formerly held by the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE), otherwise known as the Tigers, and across other parts of Sri Lanka.
Internally displaced girl in Sri Lanka.© trokilinochchi (flickr)"Our aim is to take the message of peace to these areas that were devastated by war," said Kasun Chanaka, one of three scouts belonging to the Boy Scout Core, who are taking the gruelling journey.
The Core was started in the country by Lord Robert Baden Powell, founder of the Boy Scout and Girl Guide movements, in 1912. Extremely popular in Sri Lanka, these movements are a great unifying force in this multi-racial nation.
The Vanni region, which has been reclaimed by government forces since May, has remained largely inaccessible since the military victory over the Tamil Tigers. Its over 280,000 civilian population, almost all of them from the minority Tamil community, initially ran deep into the Tiger heartland and then out of it, in fear for their lives, at the height of the conflict between the government troops and the LTTE fighters.
The sprawling welfare centres set up for the internally displaced people (IDPs), located in districts adjoining the Vanni, have since become their home. The government has pledged to commence the resettlement of at least 60 percent of the displaced families before the end of year. Until then, it needs to address the reported horrible living condition inside the camps.
Founded in 1976, LTTE, also known as Tamil Tigers, waged a violent secessionist war in 1983 to create an independent Tamil state in the northern and eastern parts of Sri Lanka, which is inhabited by two ethnic groups, the Sinhalese and the Tamils. The decades-long ethnic conflict finally ended four months ago after the LTTE was defeated by the military.
The Tamil people comprise a majority in north Sri Lanka and a significant number on the eastern side. Elsewhere on this island state in South Asia, they are considered a minority. Their history, traditions, culture and language are distinct from the majority Sinhalese people, who make up about 71 percent of the country’s population.
Since the militant group’s defeat, government has signalled the total destruction of their military and political structures following the annihilation of their leader, Velupillai Prabhakaran, shot dead on May 19 in the last phase of the fighting.
Due to difficulties of access into the IDP camps, reports on the living conditions there have been hard to come by. The United Nations said that the situation has improved over the last four months but a lot more needs to be done. The state of the camps worsened after flash floods struck in mid-August.
Government also announced the need to screen the IDPs based on reports that former Tiger operatives could be hiding there. Considered the biggest impediment to resettlement has been the presence of mines and unexploded ordnance in the former conflict areas.
All this shows normalcy has proved elusive for the displaced civilians. Chanaka and his two other companions know this full well. Hence, they said, they want to do their bit to help hasten its return to the war-ravaged Vanni. By making a peace march, that is. link..
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