Monday, October 23, 2006
The Hidden Truth behind the Sri Lankan Peace Process
Dominic Whiteman - 10/24/2006
A week after publishing VIGIL Network’s shock-inspiring intelligence report on the activities of the LTTE (Tamil Tigers) in the United Kingdom, it seems a good time – after one successful infiltration - to release the details of another successful infiltration some time ago and the factors behind the initiation of the peace process between the LTTE and the Sri Lankan Government in the late nineties. To tell the world that it took an outsider – just one man with the goal of peace and a shrewd mind – to initiate the peace talks between a country and a terrorist organisation in conflict with that country.
This is an opportune time to reveal this evidence – so that the LTTE right now wakes up to the indisputable fact that it was as easily infiltrated then as it is now (yes, LTTE, London, more evidence is on its way from the latest infiltration of your group by VIGIL). That it ought fast to realise that it is a particularly amateurish, hot-headed crowd. That its members should just grow up, put down their arms and get back to the negotiating table used by real men as soon as possible - unless it wants to seem, increasingly in the world’s eyes, like just another group of gutless, suicide-bombing losers, mentioned in the same breath as those other life-haters Al Qaeda, who, without asking their fellows, have hijacked a whole religion while the LTTE have hijacked all Tamils’ good name.
Go back to the 10th April, 1998. VIGIL intelligence operative Glen Jenvey was sitting in his chair at the LTTE’s
This was a fax from Mr Danaka – from the IRA’s political wing’s press office in Falls Road,
Jenvey was in scheming mood. Fed up with what he called the “forever-arguing Lord of the Flies organisation” that is the LTTE in London, he decided it was about time they were pushed onto the peace-negotiating table, rather than continually arguing amongst themselves and stumbling mindlessly from one terrorist atrocity to the next. Jenvey reached for some LTTE headed paper and compiled a fax to the South African Embassy’s first secretary in London, Sue Singh, with words transferred from the IRA document asking South Africa to hold peace talks with the LTTE and Sri Lankan government. One of the lines lifted from the IRA document Jenvey remembers was “in good faith on all sides”. Much of his transmission was a verbatim copy of the Good Friday Agreement’s terminology – adjusted here and there to seem more applicable and genuine.
A few days later the LTTE press office fax machine whirred to life again. Out came a fax from the South African Embassy saying they would agree to meet the LTTE with the view to holding peace talks between the LTTE and the Sri Lankan government. Jenvey was both surprised (that his scheme had worked) and delighted. To him it made sense to have the South Africans as hosts – their truth and reconciliation committee, reconciliatory governmental manoeuvres and the high profile of Nelson Mandela seemed like a perfect backcloth for a peace deal between the Sri Lankan Government and the Tamil Tigers.
A copy of the South African Embassy’s fax was swiftly passed onto the LTTE London hierarchy and to the Sri Lankan government via the SIS official. Phone calls to the South African Embassy by Jenvey revealed his request for the South African government to hold peace talks went through to the number two of the new ANC government in
Jenvey remembers the LTTE were at first cautious about the talks and got in quite a fluster. After several free-for-all arguments, the
The Sri Lankan President’s office were openly asking if the LTTE were ready to stop violence and sit at the peace table for the good of the whole of
It was looking as if the civilians on both sides were going to get a chance for peace because of Jenvey’s opportunistic fax.
Alas the LTTE leadership had other ideas. In spite of claiming to be the “ANC of Sri Lanka” the LTTE declared that the South Africans were not suitable hosts. The LTTE wanted to have the talks chaired by
And thus the “peace process” began. Today it teeters on the abyss, though its Norwegian peace envoy Jon Hanssen-Bauer expressed today “cautious optimism” that both sides might sit down shortly for more talks. This against a background this last week of highly-publicised sea battles and scores of yet more pointless deaths.
Jenvey is proud that, from his chair in
What is clear, following VIGIL’s intelligence report published last week, is that the LTTE is all about feathering its own nest. Like the IRA in
If only the Tamil people realised that the LTTE’s dismissal of South African-led talks years ago was in fact a self-preserving gesture on the part of LTTE leaders, who feared a genuine peace and an end to their racketeering. That their acceptance of Norwegian-led talks was the result of a decision by the LTTE leadership, concluding that the Norwegians would be easier to play along than the South Africans, who then seemed to be getting impossible things done in a spirit of fairness, reconciliation and truth. The last thing the LTTE wanted then or wants now is truth – shame for them that VIGIL has to keep printing it.
Last words to Mr Jenvey, whose opportunism is surely worthy of recognition by Nobel:
“The very first approach to the South African ANC Government for peace talks between the LTTE and
Dominic Whiteman is spokesperson for the London-based VIGIL anti-terrorist organization – an international network of terror trackers, including former intelligence officers, military personnel and experts ranging from linguistic to banking experts.
Sri Lanka 's political rivals join to solve separatist conflict as violence kill 2
The agreement comes as the government and Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam rebels are preparing for peace talks in
The parties also agreed to cooperate in areas such as electoral reforms, good governance and social development.
The parties together control 125 seats in
The LTTE rebels, who have fought against the government since 1983 to create a separate state for ethnic minority Tamils, have long claimed that bickering between the two main parties in Parliament has made a political settlement impossible.
Fighting between the rebels and the government killed 65,000 people before a