Accountability Another View

Accountability in Sri Lanka – Another view

by Sunil Bastian

This article focuses on the politics of the United Nations Human Rights Council (UNHRC) resolution, which was first passed in March 2014. It has been more than ten years since this event. It is necessary to understand both the reasons for state repression on the side of the Sri Lankan state and the interests of foreign powers in intervening in this situation, in order to unpack the politics of the UNHRC resolution.

The analysis in this article begins with a particular understanding of state. The conventional approach treats a state as a concrete, self-contained entity that has attained a final status. The geographic space occupied by the state is given a political interpretation, and it is securitised. A map showing boundaries demarcate this geographic space. The legal notion of sovereignty strengthens this idea.

In contrast, a state has to be seen as a product of historical processes like any other social phenomena. State formation involves developing mechanisms to control territory and manage state-society relations. These processes take place in a specific historical

context, where certain state-society relations become more strategic. These strategic state-society relations can be maintained either through consent, or use of the coercive power of the state. In addition, state formation always takes place in a global context – the study of state formation is the study of an individual state in a global context. Key relevant factors in the global context for this discussion are global capitalism, a system of states and organisations formed by these states.

Two strategic state-society relations became important in the post-colonial history of Sri Lankan state formation. First, relations between the centralised state and minority ethnic groups. The failure to manage this relation led to violence and state repression. The

second was relations between the centralised state and the Sinhala majority in the context of the politics of capitalist transition. Capitalist transition is a political process. Conflicts and struggles are always a part of this. The entire Sinhala majority did not benefit

equally from the process of capitalist transition. The politics of this contradiction has led to violence and state repression.

The post-1977 period of Sri Lankan state formation is a qualitatively new period, for three reasons. First, it shifted the capitalist transition to a new period which gave prominence to the private sector, markets and openness to global capitalism. This resulted in new challenges to managing relations with the state and the Sinhala majority. Second, deteriorating relations between the state and the Tamil minority led to a separatist demand, armed conflict and state repression. Third, the changes that took place at a global level. This led to the development of what can be called a global neoliberal political project supported by US hegemony. The ideology behind this project presented global capitalism as a benevolent system, which incorporates more and more people into a market economy, brings about an interconnected world, and spreads prosperity and freedom to all corners of the world. The political agenda was to establish liberal democracy, and reform states based on liberal principles. It was also believed that liberalism in economics and politics would lead to a more peaceful world. This is the security dimension of this project, often called liberal peace.

Liberal principles in economics, politics and security added up to a vision of the total transformation of the world based on liberal principles – or a liberal utopia. The ideology of liberal triumphalism, led by hegemonic power of the US, was at its peak in the

aftermath of the socialist bloc of states which had been led by the Soviet Union. With the final break-up of the Soviet Union in 1991, this process was complete. But how the world has evolved since then, and whether expectations of the liberal utopia have come true, is a different matter. It is also necessary to remember that this was only an ideology which tried to legitimise a Western hegemony led by the US. The actual behaviour of Western states was determined by their strategic interests, which sometimes had been far from liberal ideals.

Due to the beginning of the new period of capitalist transition, the Sri Lankan state was integrated to a greater degree into this global neoliberal project. As a result, the Sri Lankan state received much more foreign aid from developed capitalist countries of the West, Japan and multilaterals. On one side, this strengthened the economic security of the state. It allowed the state to continue with an armed response to the Tamil demand, a war that was becoming increasingly expensive. But, since the availability of foreign aid helped to cover normal functions of the state, the Sri Lankan state could use its own resources for the war effort. On the other side, the foreign policy agenda of donor countries began to have a significant impact on Sri Lanka. Their ideological impact was seen both at the level of the state and society.

In order to implement the economic agenda, the ruling political elite brought about significant changes to political institutions. The establishment of a presidential system and the proportional representation of elections were key. The other strategy was to use

organised violence and state repression against opponents of reforms. This violence reached a very high level in 1989/90, when the state sought to eliminate sources of armed challenges to the state. A delegation of European parliamentarians, who visited Sri Lanka in October 1990, estimated the number of killed and disappeared on all sides, in south and central Sri Lanka alone, to be at least 60,000 in 1989 and 1990 (Human Rights Watch World Report 1990 - Sri Lanka).

For the subject of this article, it is important to point out that, although there were numerous statements of concern pointing out human rights violations, there was no initiative to scrutinize the actions of the Sri Lankan state through an international body. This was in contrast to what happened after military operations to consolidate territory which ended in 2009. Western states that were influential with the Sri Lankan state, and were providing foreign aid support, did not see this as necessary. In addition, this violence did not have an impact on the flow of foreign aid to the Sri Lankan state. In fact, during the high point of state repression in 1989/90, the Sri Lankan state received a relatively higher level of assistance. This was because the regime in power entered into new agreements with the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and World Bank to carry out new economic reforms. In short, as long as the Sri Lankan state did not undermine the foreign policy interests of developed capitalist countries of the West, there were no repercussions on the state.

Given this history, the question is what had changed when the Sri Lankan state undertook the military operation to eliminate the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) and consolidate the territory of the Sri Lanka state. One of the important differences was that

the global context had undergone significant changes, compared to the period when a global neoliberal political project supported by the hegemonic power of the US dominated. One of the biggest conceptual flaws in the ideology of global neoliberalism was the zero-sum approach to the relation between state and global capitalism. With the expansion of capitalism globally, the importance of states was expected to diminish. Some propagated this idea with the notion of the coming of a ‘flat earth’. The liberal internationalists' belief in a rule-based international system was also based on these assumptions.

In contrast to what liberal internationalists believed, the growth of global capitalism has not made states less important. Capitalist development under neoliberalism has had a diverse impact on states. Due to the growth of capitalism, some states have become

stronger, and are able to challenge the balance of power at regional and global levels.

The emergence of new centres of capitalist growth, and these states becoming stronger and challenging existing power relations at global level, has happened in the past. We are seeing a new phase of this. It is better to understand the current global context within a

framework of global capitalism and competing states, some of which are stronger. The term major powers can be used to identify them. A key outcome of the period of neoliberal capitalism has been capitalist growth in China, and China becoming a strong state. With these developments China has begun to challenge the hegemony of the US, especially in the Asia-Pacific region. The US has constructed a new regional strategic space called the Indo-Pacific to meet this challenge.

There is a lot of evidence to show that, by the time the Rajapakse regime undertook military operations against the LTTE, the key international actors influential with the Sri Lankan state were not averse to seeing the end of the LTTE. The LTTE had lost support from India, the only power that had intervened in the past to stop military operations of the Sri Lankan state. The fall-out of the armed conflict in Sri Lanka had become a security issue for the global neoliberal political project. The US and EU had designated the LTTE as a terrorist organisation. The flow of Tamil refugees was becoming a political problem in European countries. By 2001, five European countries, Switzerland, Netherlands, Denmark, Norway and Italy- managed to secure agreements with the Sri Lankan state to repatriate rejected asylum seekers. These factors, and the impact of the war on capitalist growth, were the main reasons for the Norwegian effort to bring about a negotiated settlement, backed by an ideology of liberal peace.

However, the most important development during the 2009 military operations was that an economically stronger China became an ally of the regime in power in Sri Lanka. This revived an old relationship between China and Sri Lanka. The post-colonial Sri Lankan

state accepted the One-China Policy right from the beginning. The 1952 Rubber-Rice Agreement between Sri Lanka and China, when Sri Lanka faced an economic crisis, was a significant event. Through this agreement Sri Lankan sold rubber, which was designated as a strategic good by the UN because of the Korean war, to China in exchange for rice below global market price. From the mid-1950s, relations between China and Sri Lanka expanded. Chinese support to build a conference hall to hold the non-aligned summit in Sri Lanka is a symbol of these links. When the US cut off foreign aid because of the state take-over of petroleum distribution in 1962, China became an important donor. There was always a political current within the Sinhala majority that favoured better links

with China. The political parties that combined to form the United People’s Freedom Alliance (UPFA) under the leadership of Mahinda Rajapakse included these political currents that supported China.

A major factor in the US decision to give leadership to the March 2014 UNHRC resolution was concern about its own strategic interests, because of the growing influence of China with the Sri Lankan state. There is always a difference when human rights are advocated by states, and non-state actors. In the case of the former, the strategic interests of states play an important role. This was the case when the US sponsored the UNHRC resolution. The title of the resolution, ‘Promoting reconciliation, accountability and human rights in Sri Lanka’, showed that this was an attempt to use liberal principles to consolidate the post-war state. The most challenging

element in the resolution for the political elite that controlled the Sri Lankan state was the call for an international inquiry into what happened during the last stages of war.

In addition to this action by the US, the EU suspended the GSP+ benefits that the Sri Lankan state enjoyed. The Generalised Scheme of Preferences (GSP) is a concession provided by the EU that allowed export of goods with less, or sometimes no duty to EU countries. GSP+ is a special component of GSP that provides additional benefits to countries that are already part of the GSP scheme. The Sri Lankan state benefitted from GSP+ from July 2005. But in August 2010, the EU suspended Sri Lanka’s GSP+ status.

The politics of the post-war Sri Lankan state towards the UNHRC resolution depended on the regime in power, and its relations with other states. The strategy of the regime that came into power in 2015 was to improve relations with the US and cooperate with the UNHRC. In September 2015 the regime co-sponsored a new version of the UNHRC resolution, together with the US government. The content was almost the same as the 2014 resolution with one key change. The section on having a war crimes investigation by international judges was replaced by a Sri Lankan one with technical support from international sources. Under the same regime the EU also restored GSP+ in March 2017. Subsequent political developments resulted in the Sri Lankan state withdrawing co-sponsorship of the resolution in February 2020. At present a mechanism established by the UNHRC regularly reports on the status of implementation of the resolution by the Sri Lanka state. But it is not clear whether this will ever lead to punishing those responsible for civilian casualties.

In considering the current situation, it is also important to take into account the recent crisis in the process of capitalist transition, major power struggles within the Indian ocean and how they are having an impact on the Sri Lankan state. The Sri Lankan state’s

inability to fulfil the demands of global financial capital led to defaulting on loan repayments, leading to a severe foreign exchange crisis. The economic fall-out gave rise to a protest movement. The ruling political elite’s response had the following elements. First, state repression to put down the protest movement. Second, the coming together of two political currents to stabilise the situation – the one that gave political leadership to consolidating the territory of the centralised state in 2009, and the other that has always favoured undiluted neoliberalism. Third, implementing further reforms to promote capitalist transition, supported by the IMF. Now the interest of Western powers who were champions of accountability is to stabilise the state and ensure capitalist growth. There can be statements about human rights issues, but it is difficult to foresee any major steps on the economic front to bring pressure on the Sri Lankan state.

This approach is also dictated by the greater strategic importance of the Indian ocean at present, due changes in patterns of economic growth within global capitalism. In this context, the particular location of the Sri Lankan state in the Indian ocean seems to have an impact on how major powers relate to the Sri Lanka state. What is noticeable is the involvement of these three major powers, China and India and the US in developing Sri Lankan harbours - Colombo, Trincomalee and Hambantota. The agreements between the Sri Lankan state and these powers on each of these locations differ. But, as happened during the colonial period, the Indian ocean has begun to play a bigger role in relations between the Sri Lankan state and other states.

To end this short article, let me be clear that I am a supporter of the efforts to ensure accountability of the Sri Lankan state for human rights violations resulting from state repressive policies. The objective of this article is to show the limitations of current efforts.

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Citation: Sunil Bastian, “Accountability in Sri Lanka – Another view” in Navigating the Complex Terrain of Accountability in Sri Lanka: a special issue of the PKI Global Justice Journal (2025) 9 PKI Global Justice Journal 2.