Sri Lanka: Ethnic Strife, Fratricide, and the Peace vs. Human Rights Dilemma†

摘要

The rapid intensification of the conflict in Sri Lanka during the mid-1980s followed the July 1983 communal violence. Agents of the state perpetrated human rights violations, including attempts at demographic transformation through massacres and the displacement of minority Tamils. The accompanying rise of the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam through the brutal elimination of rivals brought another dimension to the conflict. Conventional human rights work, which dealt exclusively with the State, distorted the problem. The new totalitarian cult of the hero within a disillusioned Tamil society portended internal terror, recruitment of women and children, debasement of its own civilians in peace and war, and a barbarous approach to civilians from other communities.