The ‘Boycott Sri Lankan Sports’ campaign has taken a significant turn with the filing of a petition before the Madurai Bench of the Madras High Court seeking to restrain the Indian cricket team from taking part in a tri-series involving India, Sri Lanka and New Zealand. In his petition, advocate Joel Poul Antony, stating that he is a great fan of the Indian cricket team, makes a prayer for calling off the Indian team’s tour to Sri Lanka citing the earlier precedent of India snapping sports contacts with the racist South Africa in the 1980s.
The petitioner charges Sri Lanka with committing genocide against the minority Tamils in the country and of violating international human rights laws. Citing the confinement of the Tamil speaking war refugees in military controlled camps, and treating them as slaves, he argues that by these actions Sri Lanka is violating provisions of the Fourth Geneva Convention of 1949 and the Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide, 1948. The petition also notes that the Sri Lankan navy has killed more than 500 Indian fishermen (in the last three decades) and there have been frequent agitations in Tamil Nadu against these killings.
The court has ordered notices to the secretaries of Home, External Affairs and Youth and Sports Welfare ministries of the government of India. Whether the Indian team’s tour is going to be called off or not – the tri-series is scheduled to start next week – this petition by the Madurai advocate could be a forerunner to future campaigns against the Sri Lankan government.
The ‘boycott Sri Lanka’ slogan is a powerful weapon that Colombo will find it difficult to handle with its military power. This campaign has been going on for some time on a low key, with the ‘boycott’ emails doing the rounds. With the petition by the Madurai lawyer, the campaign has been taken to another level.
A sustained campaign by the Tamil diaspora, who are present in large numbers in the cricket playing nations of Australia and England, can turn around public opinion so swiftly that before Colombo realizes it, President Rajapaksa and his aides would be fighting a diplomatic battle with their back to the wall. It will be a difficult battle for them. Surely, it will not be as simple as getting the support of China and Russia in the United Nations security council to block a debate on the human rights situation in Sri Lanka.
The genocide charges against Colombo will be discussed on the streets, play grounds and sports pages of newspapers and magazines around the world. The spokespersons for the Tamil cause may not be a Thirumavalavan, or a Vaiko or a Nedumaran in Tamil Nadu anymore, but possibly a Sachin Tendulkar or a MS Dhoni or a Ricky Ponting.
The cricket boards of the respective countries will have to respect the sentiments of players. They would have no choice except to boycott Sri Lanka if the players feel so. Just last year, Zimbabwe was isolated by the other cricket playing countries of the world because of the racist policies – against the white minorities – and human rights violations of the Robert Mugabe government.
English player Andrew Strauss spoke out against Zimbabwe last summer. A BBC report in June said, “The batsman feels both the England and Wales Cricket Board and the government have missed previous chances to send Mugabe a message by refusing to play. He said: “In the past there’ve been chances to show the strength of feeling here and the government chose not to. If it comes down to players to do that we’ll definitely have to look at it.”
A few weeks later, the England and Wales Cricket board announced that it was canceling its 2009 tour of Zimbabwe. “All bilateral arrangements are suspended with Zimbabwe cricket with immediate effect,” the board said. A disgraced Zimbabwe cricket board announced that it was pulling out of the 2009 Twenty20 world cup in England “in the larger interests of the game.”
Zimbabwe cricket chairman Peter Chingoka said, “We have been informed that the British government may not grant visas to our players and that situation may prevail during the Twenty20 World Cup. We don’t want to be gatecrashers.”
However, for the ‘boycott Sri Lanka’ campaign to be successful, the Tamils should get the support of top international players. They need to apprise players like Sachin, Dhoni, Ponting, Hayden, and others, on the sufferings of Tamils in Sri Lanka. They need to tell them how Sri Lanka has been indicted by human rights agencies around the world over the rampant “disappearances” of people in the country. They need to tell them about the absence of safety for journalists in Sri Lanka.
A senior journalist Lasantha Wickrematunga was killed by unknown assailants early this year. Last week, the editor of The North Eastern Monthly, J S Tissainayagam, was sentenced to twenty years rigorous imprisonment on charges of receiving funds from the LTTE. Over forty Sri Lankan journalists have fled the country fearing for their lives.
The moment international cricketers become aware of the situation, they themselves would lead the campaign for an international sports boycott against Sri Lanka.
The writer PC Vinoj Kumar is a Special Correspondent for the Indian weekly magazine – Tehelka. The views expressed are his own.
[youtube width="480" height="385"]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3IJ6u8Z8IL0[/youtube]
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5 Comments
its a futile dream to attempt to boycott srilanka. the indian government wont allow such an self-embarassing action, as that would get the lankans one step closer to china [as if they are not in bed with the chinese dragon (and making babies), already].
all this boycott appeal will fizzle out like a wet cracker on a rainy diwali (a.k.a deepavali) day.
i cant imagine dhoni or sachin antagonising the Indianestablishment for a cause which doesnt ‘pay’ them a penny, but would invite unwanted IT problems for themselves.
so, please, people, this is a wrong way to punish genocidal srilanka, it will fizzle out. cant hold water. wont work out.
rather than that i would advice humanitarian indians to sponsor and support the Internation War Crimes and ICJ initiatives that would bring the Gotabhaya and Fonseka to justice over genocidal acts.
let us approach the international community directly through the ICJ , rather than depending on BCCI, Indian Government, and other Asian Powers etc. to punish Srilanka for Genocide.
Approach ICJ directly, make UN accountable, get US Citizens to voice out.
The world is not comprised of a few Despots and Facists Asian Countries, there are millions of caring people the worldover who would not just sit and look at weekly murders and nightly rapes in menik farm (and other killer camps in SL), provided these humanitarians can be united, educated and their energies are focussed in fighting human rights evils in Srilanka today.
This is a good approach and initiative. Sports cannot be viewed as mere entertainment activity without any social responsibility. Rather than introspecting cause/effect, we need to indulge the responsible sports personalities and ask them to question the Sri Lankan government and Indian governments on why they have neglected the obvious.Tendulkar, Dhoni or Dravid are easy to approach and will be very receptive to lend their voice for the atrocities that are continuing unabated. Sri Lanka continues to be a disgrace to entire Human race. Several Sinhalese have also realized this and are silently hoping for an end to this disgusting regime. The Tamils are unfortunately bearing the brunt of worlds mistake.
I dont see this as a political initiative against the Congress government. Our sportsmen are also not naive to think this is politics. The internment camps and the deaths in the final days of the war – can never be justified by any means.
I wonder if anything will ever come out of this? Will people like Dhoni, Tendulkar etc. even respond to such an appeal? They are interested only in making money and advertisements, they are really concerned about anything else. To expect such short-sighted people to even think of humanitarian concerns against a mass murdering criminal regime is like expecting the so-called “Miss Worlds”, “Miss Universes” etc. to be concerned about real issues like gender discrimination, female foeticide, female genital mutilation etc. I really doubt if people like Dhoni, Dravid, Tendulkar and others have got even one-quarter of the guts and humanity of people like Andy Flower, Henry Olonga and some English cricketers to boycott the racist criminal regime of Mugabe.
What happened to the case? Will the BCCI come to its senses? Highly unlikely…Third World shit-holes of different colours completely back their fellow Third World shithole and its criminal regime even if it has been involved in mass murder of unimaginable proportions as they made it clear in the non-sensical UN “Human Rights Council”. Expecting the semi-civilised savages of Third World shitholes that backed genocidal Sinhala Lanka at the UNHCR is expecting them to behave in a civilised manner and think about things like humanity, human rights and civilisation – things that are beyond the comprehension of the pea-brained idiots that constitute the majority of the population in the overpopulated shitholes of the Third World.
*Correction in the 2nd line – it should be they are NOT really concerned about anything else
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eSyUT4Qhi5A