Wednesday, Aug 11, 2004
Left favours full autonomy to solve Sri Lankan crisis
By V.S. Sambandan
COLOMBO, AUG. 10 . The Left parties in India favour "full autonomy, within the framework of a united Sri Lanka," as a solution for the ethnic conflict, and were against any dilution of the island-nation's territorial integrity, Sitaram Yechury, the CPI (M) Polit Bureau member, said here today.
In an impromptu interaction with select journalists, Mr. Yechury, who was here to deliver a commemoration lecture on the invitation of the Communist Party of Sri Lanka, said the Indian Left's position was that "the rights of the minorities of all nationalities in Sri Lanka should be respected," and that the formula for the solution to the decades-long separatist crisis was "for the Sri Lankan people and its political forces to decide."
Asked about the contours of an Indian role, he said: "we can help as a good neighbour, in whichever way Sri Lanka wants." On the possibility of a military role by India if invited by the island-nation, he said: "it is not on the agenda."
The solution, he said, would have to be arrived at in a manner in which the "framework of a united Sri Lanka should not be disturbed."
Asked if his party had reservations about a confederation system as a federal model for Sri Lankan conflict-resolution, Mr. Yechury said: "we won't have any problem with that as long as the country is united."
He said the demand for a separate state by the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam "did not fit into our understanding of how a multi-national and multi-lingual country should function." Emphasising that "a united Sri Lanka and a unitary system are not synonymous," Mr. Yechury said federalism "is not a static concept."
On the importance of the territorial integrity of South Asian countries, where there were several ethnic conflicts, Mr. Yechury said conceding a demand for separation would cascade into the "balkanisation of India," which had its own ethnic conflicts. "Any dilution of territorial integrity," Mr. Yechury said, would "only open up a Pandora's box of insoluble problems."
Copyright © 2004, The Hindu.