Journey Without a Destination: Is there a solution for Sri Lankan refugees? (Chapters 6 and 7 and Bibliography)

 

Chapter 6: Tamil Eelam: the only solution, or part of the problem?

There were some Tamil refugees – not many, but a few – who felt that the only solution to the problem of decades of discrimination against and persecution of Tamils was the creation of a separate Tamil state: 

Are there any prospects for a positive change in the future?

 

• If there is a separate homeland. Before the British came, we were separate, and we were united only because of their regime. So it’s better for us to live separately… Most Sinhalese don’t like the idea of a separate state, but at the same time they won’t give any equal opportunities or rights to the Tamils either. 

You think most Sinhalese people are like that?

 

Yes. The government last year promised to give some devolution of power, but it is in writing only – in practice they don’t give it… they won’t ever give equal opportunities. 

So you think the only solution is to have a separate Tamil state?

 

Yes. Then we can be good neighbours. Otherwise Sinhalese and Tamils will always be fighting. But we can be friendly neighbours if we have a separate state.

Journey Without a Destination: Is there a solution for Sri Lankan refugees? (Chapters 4 and 5)

Chapter 4: ‘How can we live like this?’

    The condition of Tamil refugees in Britain leaves much to be desired; but the state of those remaining in Sri Lanka is incomparably worse. I did not visit Tamil refugee camps in the North and East, and therefore did not see the worst; but what I saw was quite bad enough. Refugees were herded into large halls, their mats spread side by side along the walls and down the middle, all their belongings crammed into that small strip of space which, for the time being, they could call their own. Or crowded into small cadjan [coconut palm leaf] huts, several families in one room.

    Facilities were minimal: about four water taps and the same number of toilets shared between about 1,500 people; in some camps, people stayed up all night, waiting to use the toilets. Rations – mainly rice and bread – were provided by the government. Conditions had deteriorated between my visits in October 1990 and September 1991, with more and more refugees coming in. Unregistered inmates outnumbered registered ones by about three to one, and since the government provided rations only for those who were registered, the shortfall was made good partly by donations from voluntary organisations, partly by watering down and stretching out whatever food was available, making the monotonous diet even less nutritious and more unappetising. Lacking employment and therefore money, most of the refugees spent their time in forced inactivity, although efforts made by voluntary groups had secured school places for children of school-going age, and later on, classes for pre-school children as well.

Journey Without a Destination: Is there a solution for Sri Lankan refugees? (Chapter 3)

Chapter 3: The experience of exile

    Refugees who reach Britain, compared with those remaining in the camps in Sri Lanka, can perhaps be considered lucky: at least their physical distance from the conflict and chances of living a decent life are greater. Yet they too face problems and hardships which make this, in most cases, only a stop-gap solution. The problem causing most anguish, perhaps, is the difficulty of getting asylum, and the consequent insecurity and fear of being sent back. Statements like these were common:

 • We are still on tenterhooks: any time a letter may come asking us to get back to Sri Lanka. We don’t have a proper stay – it’s a psychological problem.

• I’m still always scared of being sent back.

 

• I keep thinking I can be deported at any time. I can’t do any work or studying; I have no peace of mind.

    But in some cases the fear was more acute:

 

• The reason why I don’t feel at home is because I don’t feel well at the moment, mentally or physically… After 1985 March, April – that was the beginning of my terror. Before that I felt well. Right now, the situation for me is like I’m at home and every time I see a car pass by, my heart starts beating. Every time a car parks outside my window, I just feel that somebody’s come to pick me up.

Journey Without a Destination:Is there a solution for Sri Lankan refugees? (Chapter 2)

 

Chapter 2: Flight 

    When the refugee problem first began to take on serious proportions after the 1983 riots, there was a more or less uniform cause of flight: government-sponsored violence in the form of pogroms, reprisals against civilians, and torture and extra-judicial executions facilitated by the Prevention of Terrorism Act (PTA) 1979. This Act provided for a person to be detained incommunicado for up to 18 months without being charged or brought before a magistrate, and had no provision for legal remedies for detention or torture.

    By mid-1989, the situation had become far more complicated; the refugees might be fleeing the Sri Lankan security forces, the Indian army, the EPRLF, the Tigers, some combination of these forces, or the crossfire between them, in a ‘dirty’ war in which all sides engaged in atrocities against civilians, including little children.

    We turn now to the experiences which led to their decision to leave – or, in some cases, to their relatives’ decision to make them leave. The accounts which follow are all compatible with reports published by Amnesty International and other human rights organisations, as well as published accounts by Sri Lankan writers and analysts; there seems to be no reason for doubting their authenticity. Yet only those marked with an ‘R’ at the end of their statements had been given refugee status; none had received political asylum.

Journey Without a Destination: Is there a solution for Sri Lankan refugees? (Foreword, Preface, Chronology of Major Events and Chapter 1)

 

Foreword

 

Rohini Hensman’s Journey without a Destination is the story of Sri Lanka’s bloody civil war, told in the words of those displaced or dispossessed by the fighting.

    Over half a million Sri Lankan Tamil refugees have fled to other countries while over a million Sri Lankans are displaced internally by the continuing conflict.

    Her in-depth interviews bear witness to the complexities and the contradictions of a society at war with itself – the conflicting emotions of those who have fled the country, the hopes and fears of those who are internal refugees.

    She charts in the process an incisive oral history of Tamil and Sinhalese nationalism – two cultures on a collision course – and a human cost that can never be adequately measured.

    She has found that those who suffer sometimes have insights that could hasten a solution – insights inevitably based on tolerance and understanding.

    These are qualities that we also urgently need in European countries if we are to face up to our own responsibilities – to help and support those who seek refuge from such savage conflicts.

 

Alf Dubs, Director

British Refugee Council

[1993]