The agenda of the Co-Chairs during
the peace talks was not to resolve any conflict, but to get rid of the
LTTE Army, because of the doctrine that each country could have only one
army. The method number one was to strengthen the government side.
The United Nations is a trade union of governments. So, the trade union may defend government interests.
The
USA and the West today are not only concerned of China and the Islamic
world, but also of Latin America and BRICS (Brazil, Russia, India, China
and South Africa), in which China and India alone have 37 per cent of
the world population.
Like the Sinhala Buddhists, the USA, Israel and Japan are inherent with the ideology, ‘chosen people with a promised land’.
You
can predict that the United States and Israel will be supporting the
Buddhist majority against the Tamils, and Japan will help the Americans,
which they do by providing logistics in the Indian Ocean.
Obama’s
United States is reputed today for the killing inside in 134 countries
in the world. You can get the local government to do the killing for
you. One government after the other do it.
For the English, whose
education was earlier disseminated in the institutions of colonial
Ceylon, “Federation is an F-word […] The word you should mention is
Union,” as in the United Kingdom and Union Jack.
If those English
professors had been better at home and made in 1801, a Federation of
British Isles, they would have saved thousands of lives.
Indian government is as brutal as anybody in its fighting against Naxalites, which is a class warfare.
[Nation
and class are the two issues of conflict faced by the 200 odd States
having about 2000 nations in the world. While federation is the
solution for nation, more equality is the solution for class, Galtung
said].
* * *
The Chinese are playing the wrong game [at the UN].
This
is because they are hungry for resources. I think they are badly
informed. The Chinese know a lot about the world, but at some times they
are badly informed.
“I would send a high-powered delegation to China, may be also to Russia to make it very clear what happens.”
“You
will realise of course that if you take United States and European
Union, you have three of the permanent members of the Security Council.
But, today it is called 5+1, because Germany for some reason has managed
to get into it. That means the European Union has three countries out
of the 28 in the Security Council.”
“On the other side you have Russia and China.”
“I
think —to be quite frank — your hope is that Russia and China could
speak your voice. I will put emphasis on that. But, I will not threaten
with violence. I will have vision written on the wall.”
* * *
Born
in 1930 in Oslo, Norway, Professor Johan Galtung is a mathematician
turned into sociologist and political scientist in his doctoral level
academic achievements in the 1950s.
Founding the International
Peace Research Institute in Oslo in 1959, the world’s first academic
research centre focussed on peace studies, he is regarded as the Father
of Peace Studies.
While he conceived and developed the idea of
Peace Studies, to the competitors it is ‘Security Studies’. The latter
is an Anglo-American philosophy originating from the “institutionalised
paranoia” seated in London and Washington, Galtung says.
Recipient
of over a dozen honorary doctorates, professorships and many
international distinctions, and authoring or co-authoring more than 160
books and over 1600 articles, Professor Galtung has coined terms such as
structural violence, sociocide etc., to cenceptualize the contemporary
State-humanity phenomenon.
He predicted the downfall of Soviet Union at Berlin wall, several years ago the collapse took place.
He also has made similar predictions on when the United States will be losing its position as a super power.
He has mediated in over 100 conflicts between states, nations, religions, civilizations, communities, and persons since 1957.
Professor
Galtung, with a lifetime mission of peace philosophy, and basing his
activities in several parts of the world, has cut an image transcending
any State or nationality of his own.
As a non-State NGO mediator, Professor Galtung visited the island for nearly 34 times during the peace initiative of 2002-2006.
He says that he failed in convincing both Colombo and the LTTE over a federal solution.
He
says that Thamilchelvan of the LTTE was a very good personal friend of
him. “I miss him. He and I disagreed completely about the Federation
idea,” Galtung said.
“He [Thamilchelvan] said, if we get federation then it would only be one more way the Buddhists will suppress us.”
“The Buddhists say if we get federation, the Tamils will declare independence next day,” Galtung said.
* * *
Comments from veteran Tamil political observers and activists to certain observations made by Professor Galtung:
The
Tamil diaspora “is one reason why the Norwegian government got
involved, and if I may say so — I think they listened a little bit too
much to you than to listen to the other side too, and the Muslim side.
When the Buddhists have the feeling that the Norwegian government was
sort of leaning in favour of you, I think they were right,” Galtung said
in the interview.
It is like the old myth of saying that the
British were favouring the Tamils in colonial Ceylon, the Tamil
political observers commented.
“New Delhi was wise enough to give
Tamils a Tamil Nadu, a Tamil State [in India]. You may remember before
that it was a very strong Tamil independence movement. When they got
Tamil Nadu, that movement went down. Because, you saw your self in the
name of the place you were living, and you liked it, Galtung said.
“If
Colombo had been wise enough to take the Northern Province and may be
half of the [Eastern] province, because the [Eastern] province is more
problematic. Let us put it mildly. And if they had been wise enough to
give that autonomy and call it Tamil Eelam […] But, they didn't have the
wisdom and the Tamils were too violent,” Galtung added in the
interview.
Unlike British Ceylon, the very origin of India was
federal, with the three Presidencies (Calcutta, Bombay and Madras) as
its nucleus. Only the linguistic tag of federalism was conceded in the
1950 and 60s as a larger policy in a multiplicity of linguistic nations
and there was nothing exclusive to Tamil Nadu. The comparison, in the
context of the two nations in the island, is inappropriate, and there is
a subtle attempt to detract the chronic issue in the island by
projecting it as “Buddhists, Tamils, Muslims and a thin over layer of
Christians.” This is exactly what the US resolution at Geneva attempted,
the Tamil political observers were commenting.
* * *
Federation is the solution to genocide, Professor Galtung was reiterating throughout the interview.
“That
is what I was arguing as an NGO-mediator in my 34 visits to Sri Lanka.
Total failure, I could say. But I stand by the solution, a loose
federation.”
“I have nothing against Tamil Eelam. It means the Tamil homeland.”
“I have nothing against the word Liberation. You could have chosen a more peaceful animal than Tiger perhaps.”
“Very
important in that regard was of course Gandhi. I could of course say
that if the Tamils in Sri Lanka had been fighting non-violently you
would have got your autonomy long time ago. The military LTTE, to my
mind, was a mistake,” Galtung said.
But, Tamil activists sadly
observed that the Tamils had been waging a peaceful Gandhian struggle
for 30 years, for nothing but federalism in the island. The struggle for
federation started in 1949, has only brought in the response of Sinhala
Only in 1956 and the pogrom against Tamils in 1958 – all before the
foundation of the Peace Studies institutes. But, international peace
initiators thought of looking at the issue only when the Tamils were
inevitably forced to opt for the armed struggle, the activists said.
Advising
Tamils on pooling their resources earlier spent on the LTTE now on a
positive, constructive campaign with a vision, Galtung said:
“Please
be so kind and have the story accompanied by a vision, which does not
threaten the Buddhists, but it does say to the Buddhists, okay, okay,
you are the majority, we recognise that, but give us our piece of
autonomy where we can rule our piece in the Tamil language in the Tamil
way. We will cooperate with you at the top of a federation. We will do
that. Bring the story to the world, and you will make it. It will take
some time.”
The interview of Professor Galtung itself should give
a vision to Tamils all over the world on the need for a better
enlightening campaign and on the lacuna in the world in grasping the
ground realities in the island, veteran Tamil activists who have seen
the text of the interview commented, citing the
2005 interview to TamilNet by the doyen of Eezham movement, Mr V. Navaratnam.
It
is not just wasting the meagre resources of a small nation, contrary to
“lot of money” ostensibly projected by others, on the corrupt
international media in the hands of the same system, but acting in an
intelligent, unblemished and democratic way, so that none of the
concerned parties including the media and the peace activists could
escape from accepting the realities, the Tamil activists further
commented.
Professor Johan Galtung was interviewed in Spain last
month, before the commencement of UNHRC sessions in Geneva and before
Russia annexing Crimea following a referendum. He was interviewed by
Sasithar Maheswaran for TamilNet.
Full transcript of the interview with Professor Johan Galtung follows:
TamilNet:
Obviously you are following several conflict scenarios across the
world. In the unfolding global scenario at the moment, do you think that
there is a confrontation or distrust between Peoples and States has
sharpened to a sort of crisis point?
Johan Galtung:
You know we have about 200 States in the world; 194 members of the UN.
State is an organisation. Inside all States, more or less not quite all
of them, you have two basic fault lines. Nation and Class.
There
are about 2,000 nations in the world - an average of 10 per State. But,
some of them are Nation-States in the sense that, literally speaking
only one nation, like for instance Norway, Italy, Japan, Germany -
interestingly enough.
But, certainly not France, Spain and
United States and Sri Lanka – certainly not where you have - some people
say three - you have Buddhists, Tamils and Muslims, and there is a thin
over layer of Christians at the top very much linked to the West.
So, you have nation as one, then you have the Class as the other.
As
you all know inequality is increasing in the world, and it is
increasing inside the countries. So, that one is getting worse. I would
fix the attention on Nation and Class.
The question is whether the governments are able to handle these two. That was your question I think.
* * *
TamilNet:
When we look at Nations, as you pointed out that there are 2,000
Nations in the world and there are about 200 States. When particular
nations are facing the threats to the degree as genocide, how do you
think, what sort of the solution you envisage for such nations that are
facing the threat of genocide?
Galtung: You had
the genocide against Armenians by the Turks; against Jews by the
Germans; against Tutsis by the Rwandans including so-called moderate
Hutus – also by the Hutu Rwandans; by the Muslims in Indonesia against
the Chinese. I can mention many more, but they are exactly what you
mention. That brings up of course the problem that you are indicating
what is the solution to that.
The solution is extremely is very
simple – the federation. You simply give autonomy to the nations to rule
themselves, particularly in terms of language, religion, worldview and
the way they look at history.
Now, these are three aspects, they
usually also have a geographical attachment, like sort of saying that
these hills are ours. And, somebody else saying “no they are ours”. And
you have a clear incompatibility, in other words a conflict coming up.
Autonomy in education, autonomy in local economy...
Federations
usually come together at the top where they have a joint foreign
policy, joint security policy – military or not depends on their taste,
joint finance policy, and today we would say joint logistics -
particularly the Internet and things of that type - but, also the old
ones: traffic by road and rail, by ship, by flight.
This is the solution and the mother of all these solutions is of course Switzerland.
I remember the first time I was in Afghanistan. I was asking myself what was this country remind me of?
Clearly, a Switzerland.
Eight
nations in Afghanistan; four in Switzerland. 25,000 quite autonomous
villages in Afghanistan; 2,300 in Switzerland, which is the mother of
federations.
But, governments don't like it because they feel
that they loose some of the control. They often prefer unitary States,
run from one single point and having everything under control.
United Nations is, let us call it a trade union of governments.
So, the trade union may defend government interests.
Let me add to that one more problem, since you are talking of genocide.
When you have 10 nations in a country / in a State on the average, then there is always one dominant nation.
In
Sri Lanka, it is the Buddhists, the Sinhala-speaking and in Norway it
is the Norwegians, the Norwegian-speaking and not the Sami, as you know
perfectly well since you know my country.
What very often
happens is that the nations that are not dominant want to have the sun
shining on them. They don't want to be overshadowed by the others. They
don't necessarily want independence. That is a little bit old-fashioned
today, to get a new State. But, they want autonomy.
They don't get it.
They
get more and more angry that they start throwing bombs. One such bomb
hit the court system in Islamabad yesterday, for instance.
And suddenly, they have an Army.
Here
comes the aspect that is the doctrine that in one State one Army’ — not
two or three. In other words, you can easily mobilise other
governments, ‘trade union’ (United Nations) or governments, against that
other Army. That is when it starts getting genocidal proportions.
In
your country, I will say that the end of the whole thing was touching
genocide, by the Buddhists, by the Sinhalese against the Tamils.
But, you have to understand that there was an ideology behind it.
The
ideology is known to everybody, but not spoken about so often — the
Mahavamsa — the idea of being a chosen people with a promised land.
That
the Lord Buddha, around minus 500 by the Christian Reckoning, had
promised Sri Lanka to the Buddhists as their land — highly unlikely I
would say. Being born in Nepal and stretching out of India, I don't
think his knowledge of Sri Lanka was excessive. But, let us leave that
point aside.
“Chosen People with a Promised Land”. Israel,
chosen people with a promised land. The United States — chosen people
with a promised land — since the Jews didn't make it, we will make it.
The Japan — chosen people by the Sun Goddess — Amaterasu-ōmikami — with a
promised land.
So, what can you predict on that? You can
predict that the United States and Israel will be supporting the
Buddhist majority against the Tamils!
Japan has limited support
power because of Article 9 prohibiting offensive military action, but
they can help the Americans, which they do by providing logistics in the
Indian Ocean.
Without going into that in detail, I am just
saying that the Mahavamsa Doctrine made it very difficult to find a
solution and it still make it difficult. The solution is obvious, it is a
Federation.
That is what I was arguing as an NGO-mediator in my
34 visits to Sri Lanka. Total failure, I could say. But I stand by the
solution, a loose federation. But, I think also that the LTTE made a
number of mistakes.
I had talks with everybody except
Pirapaharan. The day the talks were set-up, something happened the day
before, a floodway of Tsunami, that wiped up some of the military
capacity of the Tamils; wiped up everything of the Aceh in Sumatra in
Indonesia, made it very easy to make peace since there were no weapons
left. That was not the case with the LTTE.
But, I have indicated something about Nation. Now, I come to Class.
Class
is structural violence. People die of starvation. My daughter made a
PhD thesis — her name is Irene, which means peace — and before that a
master thesis titled, 852 million starving equals 852 million court
cases, because all these governments have signed the document called the
Human Rights Declaration, where right to life is essential. Now, out of
those court cases you had, as far as I understand from my daughter,
essentially one in India, and the Indian government has lost it.
The
bereaved said you should have provided food for the population one way
or the other, and out of that came School Lunches in India. In other
words, there is a room for a legal approach — to put it that way.
But the usual approach is struggle, violent or non-violent, and the genocide is structural. It is Structural Genocide.
We
can reckon if you will – about 140,000 die every day, 40,000 of
starvation and 100,000 of totally preventable and curable diseases. But,
to prevent them and cure them you need medicine and the people at the
bottom don't have the money. Of course that made a scene and the
prevention or the cure could be made available very cheaply by the
government. Many governments don't do it. Norwegian government does; The
French government does; The Spanish government is shaky and they don't
have money right now and people start dying at the bottom. In United
States they die incredibly at the bottom. 16% of the US population do
not know whether food comes for next day. As I have told couple of
times, very many of them are un-insured and do not have the medical
safety-net.
So, all this differs around the world and I would
then respond to this very quickly saying Class and Nation are the two
major forces.
For Nation I indicated Federation and
Confederation, because sometimes you have own Nation that is in the
shadows in the neighbouring country. You have Tajiks in Afghanistan and
in Tajikistan; Uzbeks in Afghanistan and in Uzbekistan; You have Dari
speakers in Afghanistan, in Iran it is called Persian; in other words
you make a community to put together those that are tied by nations and
you make a Federation inside so that Nations that don't want to become
too close, can be apart, and then for Class you make for more equality. I
can come back to that.
* * *
TamilNet:
You touched on the topic of Mahavamsa, which is quite important from
the Tamil perspective as well, it is the Mahavamsa mindset of the
Sinhalese that is allowing for continued Structural Genocide of the
Tamil nation even to date. There are several countries in the United
Nations, which choose not to look into this issue of Mahavamsa. They
rarely speak of it and they rarely even acknowledge it.
Galtung:
I mentioned three of them. United States, Israel and Japan. You have
many before. If you go a little bit back in time, when I talk with
Englishmen of my age in the eighties, they say when they were younger in
their 20s, 30s, they were not for a second in doubt that the England
had been chosen by God. When did that disappear? Well, it started
disappearing at the end of the war when the colonialism came to an end.
They started doubting their own right to have colonies.
Very important in that regard was of course Gandhi.
I
could of course say that if the Tamils in Sri Lanka had been fighting
non-violently you would have got your autonomy long time ago. The
military LTTE, to my mind, was a mistake.
I have nothing against the word Liberation. You could have chosen a more peaceful animal than Tiger perhaps.
I have nothing against Tamil Eelam. It means the Tamil homeland.
New
Delhi was wise enough to give Tamils a Tamil Nadu, a Tamil State [in
India]. You may remember before that it was a very strong Tamil
independence movement. When they got Tamil Nadu, that movement went
down. Because, you saw your self in the name of the place you were
living, and you liked it.
If Colombo had been wise enough to
take the Northern Province and may be half of the [Eastern] province,
because the [Eastern] province is more problematic. Let us put it
mildly. And if they had been wise enough to give that autonomy and call
it Tamil Eelam.
But, they didn't have the wisdom and the Tamils were too violent.
* * *
TamilNet:
Looking at the situation as it is at the moment, there is structural
genocide going on against the Tamil nation in the name of ‘development’.
And we have, not only Colombo, but also Washington, New Delhi, London
and Beijing involved in the processes at the moment. Any sort of
ideological mobilisation against this structural violence which is
taking place in the name of development is being characterised as or
being put down under the counter-insurgency mechanisms of these powers.
Specially the younger generation of youths are being made to be
subservient to the powers and the Establishments, not to question them
for the risk of being branded as ‘terrorists’. How do you think that,
especially the younger generation, can come up and raise that voice
against the Establishments with an ideology?
Galtung:
I get the point. I will give you an answer, which I will repeat at
least three times, as my Japanese wife's advice: “Johan, don't say it
only once; say it three times”.
The younger generation of Tamils
have to produce a vision of what they want; not only what they don't
like. If they only critique and criticise and say what is wrong — I am
not denying that they have good reasons for doing so — they will saw the
seeds of violence in the other side. They would be perceived as
dangerous, as potentially violent and when you are critiqued, you are
not in a mood to say, ‘OK, I see your point. We have been very bad. We
will change our manners.’
It doesn't happen that way.
I will tell you which way it happens.
During the 34 visits, my constant spiritual struggle with the Tamil side: Produce a vision acceptable also to the others!
Now,
the Tamil side produced their vision of Tamil Eelam in an island with
the rest of the island was white as a non-settled land. Well, it
happened to be settled by a quite a lot of Buddhists and there were
Muslims around and others. You have to take the ‘other’ into
consideration.
You will understand that I will stand by the same
argument I had before, a Federation with a high level of Autonomy. I
will mention what I mean by that high level of autonomy.
Let us
say that you have that part, the Northern part. Let us say that you
decide your capital to be in Jaffna. I think you should have a right to
have a Consulate in Chennai. I mean, obviously Tamil Nadu is very close
to you. And you should have a right to have a Consulate there, but not
to have an Embassy — that is when an independent country.
But,
the Consulate will handle peoples’, Tamils’ affairs, Tamil businesses —
and what happens when somebody dies in Tamil Nadu, but wants to be
buried in Tamil Eelam — to have all of that organised in your own
language. This is not a threat to Sri Lanka in any way, and you don't
change any borders. But, you may have the right and put it forward that
in your Sri Lankan passport, you might have the right to have Tamil
Eelam written at the bottom of it. You are still a Sri Lankan, but from
the Tamil Eelam part.
You might be interested in arguing a
federation of nine provinces in Sri Lanka as a total and this should be
one of them. And you should be very considered to the Muslims, what they
might like. It might be that the southern part of the [Eastern]
province would be mixed Tamil - Muslim - Buddhist province, may be it
could have a model character in showing how the three could live
together.
I mentioned a lot of points now, I may repeat it
again: It is by having a positive, constructive vision that doesn't
scare the others that you go forward. By having a positive-constructive
vision.
You may agree or not agree with what I have said now. We
should write it out in detail and put it forward. It will not be
accepted immediately.
The point is that the visions are written
on the wall. And they are — what the Americans call ‘compelling’ — if
you have made a good vision.
I have done this about 30 times in my life, and the visions have been realised, and it was ahead of time.
The first vision was a vision of what peace research or peace studies could look like.
Psychologists,
sociologists, anthropologists and international relationists, all
attacked it and said: ‘this is nonsense, we handle all of that’.
We had a vision on the wall!
Here it is! All over the world now!
All
over the world, it's competitors call it ‘Security Studies’, which to
my mind is some kind of academically institutionalised paranoia. It is
seated in London and Washington and it is an Anglo American philosophy.
If
you think you have enemies, you will produce them just by thinking it.
It is by having a vision that we could live together that you create
friends.
* * *
TamilNet:
When we talk about the on-going structural genocide against the Eelam
Tamil nation at the moment, very larger aspect of that is to do with
land. Land grabs by the military of the Sri Lankan State.
Galtung:
They squeeze Tamils into the margin into a marginalised existence. I
think also because they want to [make Tamils to] migrate to Tamil Nadu.
* * *
TamilNet:
This is the key issue facing the Eelam Tamil nation at the moment, the
structural genocide by land grabs, being carried out by the military of
the Sri Lankan State. How would you think that particular issue can be
addressed in terms of securing the territorial integrity of the Tamil
homeland so that the land is not threatened? And also restricting the
military from being able to carry out as it pleases within the area that
it occupies at the moment?
Galtung: You have
to somehow make it a UN issue. And if you could make it a UN General
Assembly issue, not a Security Council issue, it would be useful.
The Chinese, to my mind, are playing the wrong game.
That is because they are hungry for resources. I think they are badly informed.
I would immediately send a high-powered Tamil delegation to Beijing to try to explain to them the situation.
The Chinese know lot of about the world, but at some times they are badly informed.
I would then recommend non-violence of course.
I would cooperate with the media on non-violent protests very visible.
I
think what happens to the Tamils now, as far as I can understand, is
that one part of them would migrate to Tamil Nadu, where they get the
identity — lots of unemployment, India is poor, but still more dignity
and maybe a piece of land. Although one should pay attention to the fact
that the Indian government is as brutal as anybody in its fighting
against Naxalites, which is a Class warfare, a basic Class warfare. On
behalf of the Pariahs and the Sudras and the tribals against the three
casts at the top and where the Indian government is using drones and so
on. It goes all the way from Assam to Kerala, but in a sense got Tamil
Nadu. One could be save from that.
The other part is of course
the Tamil diaspora all over the world, not at least in Norway, not at
least in Northern Norway — and that is one reason why the Norwegian
government got involved, and if I may say so — I think they listened a
little bit too much to you than to listen to the other side too, and the
Muslim side. When the Buddhists have the feeling that the Norwegian
government was sort of leaning in favour of you, I think they were
right. So, you can see from my thinking that I try to be very symmetric
in the approach to it.
But, the Norwegians made a very basic mistake. They have a tendency to confuse Ceasefire with Peace.
So,
they monitored the ceasefire agreement and they were not even aware of
that fact — as far as I can understand — cohabitation.
You have a
system with Prime Minister from one party and the President from the
other. If you make an agreement with the Prime Minster, you have a
built-in guarantee that the President will be against it. And they got
on the signature of the Prime Minister. Terrible. I mean, there is a
limit to how uninformed you can be!
But, leaving that aside, we are in the basic Tamil situation.
Then
you have the Tamils who are accepting the situation and playing with
the government in trying to get the best of it. If they are leaning over
backwards to be with the government, they may get a reward.
Then you have the Tamils who are apathetic, just desperate.
And
you have the Tamils sitting somewhere, preparing revenge. I am not sure
that they will use suicide vests next time, there are more powerful
weapons in the world.
Only one thing I can say for certain, the
present structural genocide, the present oppression of the Tamils will
not last forever. But, it depends on how you behave too.
* * *
TamilNet:
We have about more than 100,000 Tamils who did go to Tamil Nadu several
decades ago and they are still lingering in camps without any basic
necessities, without being allowed to get jobs under very cruel
circumstances. The aspects of Tamils that flee Tamil Eelam finding any
space in Tamil Nadu seems very slim. When it comes to the Diaspora
Tamils, they are repeatedly told by the Western powers where the Tamil
diaspora is mainly based, that the West is pre-occupied with the Islamic
world and China. But, when it comes to actual conflict, we can see that
the West is actually involved quite deeply. How do you explain this,
especially when we ask about solutions or talk about solutions, the West
quite preparedly or as it was pre-prepared talks to diaspora that we
are quite occupied with the Islamic world to China. But, that doesn't
seem to be the reality in causing the crisis to begin with?
Galtung: If
you go little back in time, the British Empire covered 25% of the
surface of the land of the world, an enormous territory. If you add to
it the French, the Italian, the Portuguese, the Spanish, the Dutch and
the Belgian, it was an enormous power.
All those colonies are gone. The West has lost enormously.
Now, they are concerned of losing more. And, now comes the second point, the West has been outcompeted economically.
China
and India alone has 37% of the world’s population and can produce 120%
of what the world needs of industrial goods – any bit of a same quality
as the West, for much cheaper prices, outcompeting.
That is China and India and that is only the two of the countries in the BRICS: Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa.
BRICS spans four continents: you have South America, Africa, Asia and Russia from Europe. They have the second concern.
On
top of that is the absolutely nightmarish concern of the Americans to
lose the dollar as the world's so-called reserve currency, which they
will sooner or later. They will lose it.
Up come, as you have rightly pointed out, the Muslim world and China.
But, I would like to add Latin America.
In Latin America, the United States used to have one enemy, Cuba.
Today,
they have may be one friend, out of the 33 countries. There is CELAC,
the Council of the States of Latin America and the Caribbean. It is a
fantastic achievement. I have been arguing that one since 1962 and I was
one of the first outsiders to argue that.
But, they also took
great pains saying not threaten North America: equal terms and equity.
CELAC has a discussion with North America on equal terms. So, the West
has more than enough to worry about.
The West does not dare attack China. They would love to do it. The US would love to do it.
That
is why they attacked, in my mind, Afghanistan in year 2001, 7 October.
It had nothing to do with 9-11. That attack [on Afghanistan] was decided
long before. I heard about it in February 2001, meaning in other words 9
months before 9-11. I heard it from a top official in Afghan. I was
mediating in Peshawar the whole Afghan situation. We came up with a
5-point solution that I still stand by.
The point about the
story is that he told me and the whole conference that the United
States, he told in February, had prepared the war to attack Afghanistan
in October to get a base – and he put his thumb on a map – to get a
pipeline. I lifted his thumb, it was Bagram, of course.
In other
words, don't be confused by their propaganda. The US policy is to have
their so-called permanent interests — no permanent friends, no permanent
enemies; they will drop friends at any moment — I am quoting Lord
Palmerston — but permanent interests.
One of the interests is to be number one in the world.
They have an instinctive paranoia against any number two. They have appointed China number two.
When
I talk with the Chinese leadership and I have quite good access as I
have been twice invited to give talks at a party school for the Supreme
Council of the Communist Party of the Peoples Republic of China! One of
the talks was actually about the possible decline and fall of the
communist dynasty.
The Chinese say very explicitly: we don't want
a world empire; we have enough with our own dynasties. There are
empires over time and they go like that, they are born, declined and
born, declined and so on. We want harmony with the rest of the world.
Then sitting and discussing how one can get that.
So, they [the
US] have attacked the Muslim world. I mentioned the attack on
Afghanistan. I am not of the opinion that their approach is in any way
peaceful.
Obama's United States is reputed today to be killing
inside 134 countries in the world. If you have a good functioning
Empire, you wouldn't have to do that, you can get the local government
to do the killing for you. One government after the other uses to do it.
Right now they are trying to establish a government in the Ukraine that can do that kind of job.
The Empire is crumbling. Crumbling, crumbling, crumbling...
So,
up comes then the lack of vision of the West. My advice when I give
talks at these capitals, why don't you produce a vision of a more modest
West?
A more modest one, which will still be totally
acceptable. You will find that your population are not interested in
expansion, wars and battles.
They want a good life. They want a safety net and they want culture. They want the identity; they want meaning.
They want you to focus on more economic growth; they want more economic equality.
Just
ask them! You have public opinion polls, and produce the parties that
can give them this. You will get a happy contented West that threatens
nobody.
I come back to my wife's point: for the fifth time I say
that the essence is to have a vision – compelling vision – on the wall.
* * *
TamilNet: When
it comes to United Nations, the United States and the EU for example.
Since 2009, they have been issuing statement after statement welcoming
the end of conflict in the island of Sri Lanka and in some way
congratulating the government of Sri Lanka for ‘bringing about a peace’.
Do you think that it is the case in that island? Do you think that the
conflict has ended and the peace has come?
Galtung:
Here you see this horrible Anglo-American use of the word conflict.
They can welcome the end of violence and they can have their opinion
that is the only way to do it, it is an opinion, it is not mine, but it
is an opinion.
The conflict is more than ever.
Let us
thus be very careful. Conflict means having incompatible goals. The
Buddhists have Mahavamsa. ‘We are in control because we were given this
island promised to you by nobody less than the Lord Buddha.’ To believe
in that is an act of faith.
The Jews and many, many Evangelical Americans and many Japanese have the same act of faith about their own States.
So, the Tamils have an undisputable human right to autonomy.
If
you just look at the human rights catalogue — I am not thinking of the
1948 Declaration — because it is not an international law.
I am
thinking of the Convention of 16 December 1966, where you find exactly
the same. The right to you own language, the right to your own worldview
and so on.
The only thing that can guarantee it is that you
yourself are the rulers in your own house, but that doesn't have to be
an independent house, could be autonomy of some sort.
So, I will
again and again say there is a conflict. The conflict has not been
ended. Since that has not been ended in all likelihood, the violence
will come up again.
What happened was a brutal genocidal attack.
But,
I must also say that the LTTE behaved violently till the very end. So,
it is about two sides to the issue. You have got my view on that.
Look
at the Tamils in Sri Lanka, you have the long time settlement in the
North and the link to India. Then you have, the tea plantation Tamils,
the tea-pickers, you have them in the hills.
Then you have the
Tamils, very many, in Colombo, intellectuals, professionals of top
quality. And you have also on the Buddhist side a top quality and they
have been to the same universities very often. They have been taught by
the same English professors.
I mention that because, to English
professors, Federation is an F-word. It is a word that you should not
mention. The word you should mention is Union.
That you know is
United Kingdom, Union Jack and as I say, Manchester United and all of
that! The Union usually means something with the London at the top. And
the Buddhists love that, because that means Sri Lankan Union with
Colombo at the top.
If those English professors had been better
at home and made in 1801 a Federation of British Isles, they would have
saved thousands of lives.
But, there had to be a Union! The United Kingdom of Great Britain and the Northern Ireland!
Well,
the Northern Ireland has more or less disappeared. The Great Britain,
the greatness is up for a vote in Scotland about possible status of
independence — I think the Scots make a mistake, they should ask for
advanced autonomy and negotiate the rules. But, that is not their
vision. What is left will be London with surroundings; to put it the way
Tony Benn puts it. You see the dynamism of the world, nothing is
stable. It is all dynamic.
* * *
TamilNet:
You briefly touched upon the peace process, which took place between
2002 to 20008 until the Sri Lankan government withdrew unilaterally from
it. During that time you had the so-called Co-Chairs to the peace
process, the United States, European Union, Norway and Japan, who were
trying to prevent the resurgence of violence by finding a solution. But,
during that period, Washington held a donor conference where they
invited the government of Sri Lanka and the government of Sri Lanka only
and promised them millions of dollars. Then, we have the EU, in 2006
that proscribed one of the parties, the LTTE, as a terrorist
organisation. In the same year, they channelled attack helicopters,
multi-barrel rocket launchers and all sorts of weaponry to the Sri
Lankan military. How do you view these contributions of these world
powers? How would you describe what they did?
Galtung: Very simple. I was of course aware of this. During this period, I was so often in Sri Lanka.
Before
I give the answer, I remember once the whole newscast by the State
television one evening was actually given to me, a half-an-hour talk
about the Federation. So, I cannot complain that no attention was paid.
But, I think that the Co-Chairs had a totally different agenda.
Their agenda was not resolve any conflict.
Their
agenda was to get rid of the LTTE Army, to simply get rid of it,
because of the doctrine: for each country, one Army. Monopoly of
ultimate power. The ultima ratio regis, the last argument of the King,
or the last argument of the Government or the Secretary General in
communist countries. The last argument is that there should be only one.
OK, If you have a Nation or a Class, sufficiently desperate,
they will not respect that doctrine; and the Tamils didn't and they
organised the LTTE.
Thamilchelvan was a good personal friend of mine. I miss him. He and I disagreed completely about the Federation idea.
He said, if we get federation then it would only be one more way the Buddhists will suppress us.
The Buddhists say if we get federation, the Tamils will declare independence next day.
I
said, look, 40% of humanity lives in the 25 federations, two or three
of them are broken up because they were badly made – Soviet Union,
Yugoslavia and Czechoslovakia. I can give a list ways on doing
federation. You can make them so attractive that the Tamils will stay
and you would prefer to have them inside.
But, leaving that
point aside, the Co-Chairs were not interested in such things. Their
primary concern was just to get rid of the [LTTE] Army. Method number
one, to get rid of the other Army, was to strengthen to the government
side. You mentioned some ways it was done.
I am sad that China was on the wrong side. I have said something about, who I think otherwise is well on that side.
You
should be aware that in European Union too, there are some concerns.
France is concerned that the Corsicans and the French in Normandy and
Swan might start throwing bombs. The Germans have all kinds of concerns
about violence for good reasons and you can take one by the other,
Italians have some small minorities that are sort of restless — you can
find some of them in the islands.
So, they [States] will have a tendency to go the governmental line: One State, One Army. That is what they were concerned.
The
other one was to de-legitimise the LTTE. There of course, they have the
catalogue of terrorists [these] countries. I wish the world had a
similar catalogue of State Terrorist countries.
The terrorists
are people not in uniform, killing people not in uniform. State
terrorists, usually - not always, have a uniform as this is an envoy of
this government. And he may sit in his uniform high up at 10,000 meters,
30,000 - 40,000 feet pushing buttons and having the bombs kill all
kinds of people kill underneath. Or, he or she may sit in a computer
room in Washington and fire the drones. That is State terrorism. The
people who die are mainly without uniform.
If you have people
without uniform attacking people in uniform, it is called guerrilla, it
is a Spanish invention from the early 1800, 1806.
If you have people in uniform fighting people in uniform, it is called a war.
Ok, it is called a war.
We have fewer wars now; we have more of the other three: Guerrilla, State terrorism and Terrorism.
I am against all three of them. I favour a non-violent fighting.
* * *
TamilNet:
The Co-Chairs who were deeply involved in seeing through what happened
in May 2009, the genocide then, are now excusing that with the
activities of the Sri Lankan State again. They are still refusing to
acknowledge that the Tamils are being subjected to a campaign of
genocide. They still decline to acknowledge that the Tamils face
specific threats that need solutions. How do you think that the global
humanity can potentially approach these States and the combinations of
them, which is the United Nations, which carry on seeing everything
through geopolitics?
Galtung: Look, let us say
you have one million Tamils in the Tamil diaspora. They used to collect
money for LTTE. They collected a lot of money. Let me put it in very
plain simple terms. These one million work on the media of the world and
make the story better known.
And, please be so kind and have
the story accompanied by a vision, which does not threaten the
Buddhists, but it does say to the Buddhists, okay, okay, you are the
majority, we recognise that, but give us our piece of autonomy where we
can rule our piece in the Tamil language in the Tamil way. We will
cooperate with you at the top of a federation. We will do that. Bring
the story to the world, and you will make it. I will take some time.
I would also send a high-powered delegation to China, maybe also to Russia to make it very clear what happens.
You
will realise of course that if you take United States and European
Union, you have three of the permanent members of the Security Council.
But, today it is called 5+1, because Germany for some reason has managed
to get into it. That means the European Union has three countries out
of the 28 in the Security Council.
On the other side you have Russia and China.
I
think —to be quite frank — your hope is that Russia and China could
speak your voice. I will put emphasis on that. But, I will not threaten
with violence. I will have vision written on the wall.
TamilNet: Professor Galtung, thanks a lot!
Galtung: My heart is with you; my brain is with you. But, it is also with the other sides that are also for peace!
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