All the pontificating about LTTE bastardry does not solve the perennial problem of separatist, nationalist and liberation struggles which, for the most part, arise out of long-term intolerable conditions of discrimination, persecution and injustice.

In a pattern that is mathematical in its consistency, these initially humanitarian struggles always, ALWAYS descend into a brutality spiral when met with violent suppression over time by state military arsenals.

Rather than ending the problem, state military victories only exacerbate it. All they really achieve are triumphalist genocides and atrocities that pour petrol over the flames of long-term internal warfare, a civil siege mentality and minority persecution.

After the initial flush of Singhalese triumphalism is over and the ongoing Tamil refugee problem entrenches itself over time, state paranoia will escalate as a defeated and degraded Tamil population becomes even more desperate and the public purse is drained by the increasing security demands that all military occupations create for themselves.

International public opinion has to become more proactive in trying to break this international cycle of injustice, followed by resistance, followed by brutal crackdowns, followed by brutal resistance. It didn’t work in Northern Ireland (until the British Government finally admitted that a military defeat of the IRA just wasn’t worth the effort anymore) or South Africa or Iraq… and it’s not working in Israel or Afghanistan