An upsurge in violence, including a spate of bombings in the last few weeks of 2007, led the government on 2 January to declare it would be pulling out of the 2002 ceasefire agreement (CFA) on 16 January.
This it has now done, and the prospects for an improved humanitarian situation and lasting peace look gloomier than ever.
On 28 November 2007 a parcel bomb at a shopping arcade in the Sri Lankan capital, Colombo, left 17 dead. Since that blast, the violence has escalated at breakneck speed throughout Sri Lanka. Two parliamentarians were assassinated on 1 and 8 January, and the number of clashes between government forces and the Tamil Tigers have increased sharply.
On 2 January a bus carrying government soldiers to a military hospital in Colombo was targeted in a claymore mine attack. It was then that the Sri Lankan government informed Norway, the facilitator of the 2002 ceasefire, that it was withdrawing from the CFA as of 16 January.
Mutual recriminations
“Let it not be said that the government of President Mahinda Rajapaksa didn't try to engage the LTTE [Tamil Tigers] in negotiations towards ushering in peace,” Foreign Minister Rohitha Bogollagama told parliament on 10 January. “However, once again underlying its lack of commitment to the peace process, the LTTE has shown no inclination to arriving at a political settlement and continued its duplicitous action of escalating violations of the ceasefire agreement.”
The Tigers have in return blamed the government for undermining the truce. “With no regard to the CFA, the government of Sri Lanka began undertaking large-scale military offensives, creating immense human misery in the Tamil homeland,” the Tiger Peace Secretariat said in a 10 January press release.
 Photo: Sri Lankan Government Information Department  |
| Twenty-six people were killed in a claymore mine attack on a civilian bus in Buthala, about 250km southeast of Colombo, on 16 January 2008, the final day of the ceasefire agreement. Violence is expected to escalate |
The ending of the CFA also ends the presence of the Sri Lankan Monitoring Mission (SLMM), which has been staffed by Nordic nationals. This could lead to more violence, according to observers.
“There is very likely to be an escalation of the violence in intensity and frequency,” Jehan Perera, executive director of the Colombo-based peace advocacy forum National Peace Council, told IRIN. “The removal of the truce and the SLMM has taken out the last deterrent on the ground.”
Clashes have increased in the north between government and Tamil Tiger-controlled areas. According to statistics released by the Defence Ministry and the Tigers, the number of casualties in fighting on the northern battlefront in the first 10 days of 2008 could be over 200.
The final day of the truce was one of the bloodiest: 32 civilians were killed and over 50 injured in attacks in Buthala, about 250km southeast of Colombo. Twenty-six of those killed died in a claymore mine attack on a civilian bus. Survivors said that after the blast, gunmen had fired at the bus for about five minutes.
Bleak humanitarian, economic outlook
Security has been tightened in major Sri Lankan urban areas with the government anticipating more attacks. Since mid-December the UN and other international agencies limited their work in some areas under Tiger control, after Tiger warnings that their safety could not be guaranteed.
International donors have also expressed fear the violence will lead to further deterioration of the humanitarian and human rights situation in the country.
 Photo: Sri Lankan Government Information Department |
| A Sri Lankan child injured in one of the explosions in Buthala (about 250km southeast of Colombo) that killed 32 and injured 50 |
If the situation slides further, countries, including EU members, may impose economic sanctions, Muttukrishna Sarvananthan, a Colombo-based economist said.
“Duty free access of garment exports from Sri Lanka to the EU is up for renewal this year. It is likely it would not be renewed because of the poor human rights record of Sri Lanka in recent years,” he told IRIN.
Sarvananthan also fears the economy would not be able to withstand an extended conflict. “The year 2008 is going to be extremely challenging for the security, economy and polity of the country,” he said. “High defence and public expenditure in general cannot be sustained for long.”
The immediate prospects are so dire that some professionals are already looking at leaving the country. “What else to do? The only good option is to go somewhere else,” assistant bank manager Sujeewi Jayasuriya told IRIN.
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This article was produced by IRIN News while it was part of the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs. Please send queries on copyright or liability to the UN. For more information: https://shop.un.org/rights-permissions
