This evening the roads around Parliament Square were again blocked by thousands of Tamils protesting to try and persuade the UK government to intervene in a meaningful way in the conflict in Sri Lanka .

Today’s Evening Standard today made the following report of events in Sri Lanka ...


"Tamil terrorist chief killed as civil war ends
Martin Bentham
18.05.09

Sri Lankan army chiefs today claimed to have killed the leader of the Tamil Tigers as they announced the end of the 26-year war.

The death of Velupillai Prabhakaran, who has led the rebel group throughout the armed struggle, was revealed in a broadcast on state television which claimed he and two of his deputies were shot and killed trying to escape in an ambulance.

At the same time, the head of the Sri Lankan army, Lt Gen Sarath Fonseka, claimed to have inflicted a final defeat upon the Tamil Tigers by routing the few remaining rebels still holding out against his troops' advance."


The Evening Standard is making two important assumptions;

1) that Velupillai Prabhakaran is/was a “terrorist”

2) that the “civil war ends”.


Though my understanding of the conflict is limited, I am qualified to say it has been an asymmetric and complicated conflict with a long history including British colonialism. I think the Standards assumptions would be difficult to argue in non-tabloid circles.

Furthermore insofar as the British were involved perhaps we have a moral obligation to work honestly to help bring about a peace, if that can ever be possible after recent events.

Does anyone out there know which parties the UK has been selling weapons in this conflict?