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Viewing cable 05COLOMBO955, SRI LANKA: COMMUNAL TENSION CONTINUES OVER

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Reference ID Created Released Classification Origin
05COLOMBO955 2005-05-26 12:19 2011-08-25 00:00 UNCLASSIFIED//FOR OFFICIAL USE ONLY Embassy Colombo
This record is a partial extract of the original cable. The full text of the original cable is not available.
UNCLAS SECTION 01 OF 02 COLOMBO 000955 
 
SIPDIS 
 
SENSITIVE 
 
STATE FOR SA/INS 
USPACOM FOR FPA 
 
E.O. 12958: N/A 
TAGS: PGOV PTER PHUM KIRF CE LTTE
SUBJECT: SRI LANKA:  COMMUNAL TENSION CONTINUES OVER 
"UNAUTHORIZED" BUDDHA STATUE 
 
REF: A. COLOMBO 0916 
 
     B. COLOMBO 921 
 
1.  (SBU)  Summary:  Religious and ethnic tensions continue 
to percolate in Trincomalee over the May 16 erection of a 
large Buddha statue on public land in the city center.  A May 
18 decision by a local judge ordering the removal of the 
statue has not yet been implemented, and the statue remains, 
behind barbed wire and guarded by local police, in its 
controversial location.  A Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam 
(LTTE) front organization, which launched a four-day strike 
that crippled businesses and transportation in the city from 
May 17-20, has decided to give authorities until June 2 to 
remove the statue before contemplating resumed strikes. The 
ethnically polarizing machinations by government coalition 
partner Janatha Vimukthi Peramuna (JVP), which instigated the 
placement of the statue, and the LTTE, which instigated the 
strike and the demand for the statue's removal, seem 
calculated to ensure even greater violence and instability in 
this troubled district.  End summary. 
 
2.  (U) The Tamil People's Forum, a heretofore-unknown group 
widely assumed to be a front for the Liberation Tigers of 
Tamil Eelam (LTTE), decided late May 25 to give Government of 
Sri Lanka (GSL) authorities until June 2 to implement the 
Trincomalee magistrate's May 18 order to remove a large 
Buddha statue from municipal council land in Trincomalee (Ref 
A) before resuming protests.  The Forum had called a four-day 
strike, or "hartal," that shut down businesses and vehicular 
traffic in Trincomalee town May 17-20 to protest the statue's 
placement on public property in the ethnically diverse area. 
The Forum's decision followed a four-hour meeting May 25 
between Forum representatives and Tamil National Alliance 
(TNA) MPs and Government-appointed mediators.  The meeting, 
chaired by Governor of the North-East Tyronne Fernando, 
included two Sri Lanka Freedom Party (SLFP) heavyweights, 
River Basin Development Minister Maithripala Sirisena and 
Deputy Minister of Ports and Aviation Dilan Perera, 
considered especially "tough" on the Sinhalese nationalist 
coalition partner, Janatha Vimukthi Peramuna (JVP), which 
instigated the placement of the statue on public land leased 
to one of its unions.  Participants in the meeting also 
decided to seek the assistance of the Attorney General in 
implementing the magistrate's order to remove the statue. 
Prior to that meeting, President Chandrika Kumaratunga 
reportedly met R. Sampanthan, TNA MP for Trincomalee, and 
urged him to find an amicable solution to the confrontation. 
 
 
3.  (U) The statue--now surrounded by barbed wire, sand bags 
and armed guards--remains in its contested location, despite 
the magistrate's May 18 ruling. On May 25 the magistrate 
reaffirmed that order, again directing police and the Urban 
Council to remove the statue, as well as any other 
"unauthorized" religious structures found elsewhere in the 
city on public land.  (Note:  Neither order imposes a 
specific deadline for the removal of the statue. End note.) 
Further heightening tensions on May 25, a former Tamil 
Chairman of the Trincomalee Urban Council, who had been shot 
in the sporadic violence accompanying the hartal on May 18, 
died of his injuries. 
 
4.  (SBU)  In a May 20 conversation with poloff, TNA MP 
Sampanthan acknowledged that there appeared no immediate, 
practicable resolution to the confrontation that would be 
mutually satisfactory to all parties.  Complicating matters, 
he alleged, is the "mono-ethnic" (i.e., Sinhalese) 
composition of GSL security forces in the ethnically diverse 
district.  Moreover, the "unauthorized" Hindu structures 
cited by the JVP in response to the magistrate's ruling are 
largely located in predominantly Hindu neighborhoods, he 
averred; in contrast, the Buddha statue was deliberately 
placed in a prominent public location frequented by all three 
ethnic groups.  (Note:  A total of 33 "unauthorized" 
religious structures of various kinds--but most of them small 
Hindu shrines--reportedly have been identified on public land 
in Trincomalee.)  Nonetheless, he emphasized, he was working 
hard to try to defuse the situation, including pressing hard 
for a suspension of the hartal during Buddhist holidays May 
21-24. 
 
5.  (SBU)  Comment:  Now that the Buddha statue is up, it 
will be very difficult to get it down, court order or not, 
without further violence and confrontation.  The stakes are 
high for both the LTTE and JVP, which are each manipulating 
the face-off to prove their claims to influence and 
popularity in this ethnically diverse district.  The decision 
to give the GSL a week of breathing space to implement the 
court order is a welcome sign of flexibility--and probably no 
small tribute to Sampanthan's hard work and personal 
commitment to trying to defuse the crisis.  That said, the 
GSL's typically risk-averse approach to other contentious 
issues, including its apparent reluctance to prosecute 
perpetrators of attacks on Christian churches (Ref B), gives 
us little hope of a resolution soon. 
LUNSTEAD