WHITHER INDIAN PEACEKEEPERS?

Amjed Jaaved

India boasts of professional competence and conduct of its peacekeeping forces. But, the facts tell a different story. Take Republic of Congo. In view of elusive ceasefire (1998-2003) between rival groups, the United Nations deployed a multinational 8,000-strong force there. The force evinced sterling-clean conduct, except for two groups of Indian `soldiers’. One group indulged in gold trafficking and gun running. And, the other committed `sexual exploitation and abuse’ in Congo’s North Kivu province.

The local commander tried to cover up the incidents for fear of beclouding UN peacekeepers’ image. But, Human Rights’ Watch (HRW) somehow managed to get an inkling of the Indian troops’ moral infarctions. When Indians’ misconduct surfaced in the HRW report, the United Nations’ Secretary General Ban ki Moon, had to order an inquiry through the Office of Internal Oversight Service.

The Service confirmed several allegations. As such, the secretary general had to demand from India `disciplinary action to the maximum degree permitted by Indian law’ against Indian peacekeepers’.

India’s defence minister, A. K. Antony and vice chief of army staff, M. L. Naidu, had to carry out a time-bound probe to punish the offenders. Aside from moral turpitude, Indian peacekeepers regard gun running as a lucrative pastime. They do so, not as individuals, but as state-sponsored-policy agents. Indian peacekeepers in Sri Lanka amply bear out this policy role.

India forced Sri Lanka to accept its `mediation’ and `peacekeeping’. During peacekeeping, its forces never made a sincere attempt to eliminate the LTTE. They were more interested in establishing a pro-India administration in northern Sri Lanka than exterminating armed rebels.

Prabhakarn was India’s prodigal son. He received political, financial, and military support from India’s central government during 1978-87. He enjoyed patronage of not only the Tamil Nadu’s state government, but also the politicians from all shades of opinion in that state Prabhakaran lived in Tamil Nadu for several years. His Ambassador car used to be escorted by Tamil Nadu state police. He sustained his outfit’s warfare through supplies of arms, ammunition, explosives, medicines, etc from Tamil Nadu, his base of operations.

The position of the LTTE vis-à-vis India was total cooperation until Rajiv Gandhi began to compel it to negotiate outside Eelam context in late 1986. The Indian agencies the RAW, and Q Branch of the Tamil Nadu police not only armed and funded the LTTE but also provided logistical as well as intelligence support for their operations. The Sri Lankan government realised that Indian forces were actually perverting, not keeping peace by avoiding confrontation with the LTTE. So, it considered it wise to initiate negotiations with the militants. It directed Indian peace keepers to pack up and leave Sri Lanka.

India reluctantly left Sri Lanka. But, look, what it did before leaving! She decided to punish the LTTE for its conciliatory attitude towards the Sri Lankan government. It expressed its ennui at the LTTE by raising, arming, training and funding another militant force, Tamil National Army.
The Indians conscripted `volunteers’ from the refugee camps, and trained them in handling weapon and explosives. For easy identification, lest they should slip out, the young men drafted were shaved and their eyebrows plucked.

On June 23, 1989, president Premadasa asked the IPKF to remain in their barracks, if they could not withdraw by end-July, as he earlier directed. Judging the government’s mood, Indians decided to withdraw. But, before doing so they heavily armed the TNA to pave way for gory clash between the LTTE and the TNA.

Rohan Gunaratna points out: “Most of the Indian troops were airlifted on board Soviet-built Ilyushin-76 transport aircraft. Accompanying these planes were Antonov-32 transport planes carrying arms and ammunition for the TNA” (Indian Intervention) in Sri Lanka, p. 3560. To India’s ill fate, the TNA was wiped off in a few months.

The Sri Lankan experience reflects that Indian peacekeepers do not keep peace. They pervert it. They are morally bankrupt. In view of Indian government‘s ulterior motives in peacekeeping in foreign lands, these forces should never be deployed anywhere in the world.

RAW THE RASCAL by PREM RAJ in Columbo

Up to the mid-seventies the Sri Lankan government had kept India happy by following policies which followed the Indian line - domestically and externally. The trouble began in 1977 when the Sri Lanka Freedom Party (SLFP) lost power to the Jayewardene-led United National Party in elections. He moved towards a more cooperative policy with the United States and Sri Lanka chose to oppose the Indian demand for the withdrawal of all foreign naval forces from the Indian Ocean. Mrs. Gandhi had already been irked by Sri Lanka’s support to Pakistan during the 1971 war when it allowed landing and fuelling facilities to Pakistan’s East-West commercial flights.

So RAW saw a perfect opportunity to exploit within the prevailing dispute between the Sinhalese majority (74 percent) and Tamil minority (14 percent) over distribution of economic and social spoils of independence. Before the two sides could work out a compromise, India, through its RAW, managed to polarise the two sides as well as militarise this essentially political conflict. On the Mukti Bahini model, RAW built up terrorist training camps in India for a number of Tamil terrorist organisations, while India suddenly began orchestrating a public campaign feigning concern because of the links the Tamils had with the 50 million Indian Tamils of Tamil Nadu state - which was separated from Sri Lanka by the Palk Straits. It was only a matter of time before the militants trained in India began sidelining the moderate Tamils and instead demanding complete independence - Ealam. Ironically, the presence of Tamil training camps in Tamil Nadu often created a law and order situation when large arms were captured by the state police. The surprise for the state government came when New Delhi ordered that such captured material be returned.

According to Rohan Gunaratna, in his book Indian Intervention in Sri Lanka, RAW waged a secret war in India beginning 1983 so that when the Sri Lankan armed forces launched a major offensive against the Tamil militancy in 1987, the Indian government had already ensured that the Tamils were well supplied and were able to conduct terrorist acts that brought the war closer to Colombo. Tamil Nadu had become the sanctuary for the Tamil terrorists in their hit-and-run tactics. Already, a year prior to this offensive, that is by 1986, there were over 20,000 Indian trained and financed Tamils and India forced Sri Lanka through this militant pressure to alter its foreign policy. But even more crucial, India by now was systematically destabilising Sri Lanka. Being unable to resist the temptation to now intervene directly, India used the Sri Lankan offensive against the Tamil terrorists to force Sri Lanka to accept India’s armed intervention ostensibly to save ‘ innocent Tamil civilians’. Unfortunately for India, the controversial Indo-Sri Lankan Accord of July 1987 proved to be as much of a failure as India’s policy of direct intervention. The result was India’s massively assisted LTTE (Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam) turned on its benefactor and declared war against the Indian forces in Sri Lanka. All in all, this Indian adventure killed 60,000 men, women and children and forced the Indians to withdraw their forces without successfully completing their mission. The price has been steep for both India and Sri Lanka and even today Sri Lanka is paying the price for this Indian-initiated and RAW inspired polarised conflict. The extent of RAW’s role in this affair has been painstakingly documented by Gunaratna in his book on the Indian intervention.