The episode in East comes to an end with Armed Forces take over

While the episode in the East comes to an end with the military taking full control of the Eastern province from the clutches of the LTTE, common masses are contemplating what would be the next step by the Government.

The main concern of the public is whether the Government would continue with its military campaign against the LTTE or pursue a peaceful resolution to the North and East conflict.

However, any decision by the Government to tread on military path or on peaceful path would depend on the challenges before the Government in the aftermath of the liberation of the East and its ability to face those challenges effectively.

The next step

Government Defence Affairs Spokesman Minister Keheliya Rambukwella told the media this week that Government will take the tough challenge of instituting economic and political freedom of the Easterners in a bid for full restoration of democracy in the East.

As said by the Minister it is a tough challenge before the Government to fully restore democracy in the East especially due to attempts made by the LTTE to destabilise the East to take the upper hand in the Eastern province. Without any say in the Eastern province, the LTTE cannot realise their dream of establishing Tamil Eelam.

The immediate challenge before the Government is to flush out LTTE terror groups now hiding in jungles in the Eastern province with the fall of Thoppigala.

Many groups have fled northwards in their bid to take refuge in Wanni having moved to Peraru jungles in the North Trincomalee seeking assistance from their Headquarters in Wanni, while several other groups have escaped southward, towards Kanchikudi Aru jungles in the Ampara district.

Therefore, it has become vital for the Security Forces to conduct mop up operations to track those fleeing Tiger cadres to ensure that the East is fully free of Tiger influence. Troops are now engaged in this arduous task effectively inside the jungle terrains in Thavulvewa in the border Peraru jungles.

Tracking of these Tiger cadres is a difficult task to take control of Tiger strongholds in the East as the chances of evading the Security Forces are very much higher for the Tiger cadres inside the thick jungle as they are in small groups.

Since these cadres avert confrontations with the Security Forces it has become extremely difficult to trace them inside the jungles.

Two soldiers attached to the 3 Commando Regiment were killed after walking into a ambush set by the fleeing Tiger cadres inside Peraru jungles.

However, it is compulsory on the part of the Security Forces to drive them out of these jungles as these Tiger cadres can easily sneak into civilian populated areas to destabilise the East.

Apart from this task, the other tough challenge before the Government is to track the intelligence cadres mingling with the civilian population in the Eastern province.

With the receipt of intelligence reports that LTTE had inducted many intelligence cadres in the East in the backdrop of the fall of the East, alarm bells rang to detect those intelligence cadres as they would pose a severe threat to the establishment of civil administration in the East.

Tracking of these intelligent Tiger cadres would greatly help the Security Forces and the Police to dominate the entire Eastern province without allowing the LTTE re-establish their dominance in the East with the support of the covert operations by the Tiger intelligence cadres mingled with the civilian population. If the Government needs to obtain the full support of the Tamil population in the East, it is compulsory to rehabilitate the Tiger cadres who surrendered to the Security Forces during military operations and also the Tiger cadres who had reunited with their family members after escaping from the Tiger outfit. To ensure that they would not rejoin the LTTE, they should be provided with employment opportunities after rehabilitating them and providing them with job training.

Dominating jungle terrain

So these challenges should be effectively faced by the Government with the support of the Security Forces and the Police apart from the challenge of controlling the Eastern population while dominating the jungle terrain captured by the Security Forces during this operation.

The controlling of the Eastern population, a mixture of Sinhalese, Tamil and Muslim communities, is a massive challenge before the Government since it needs a strength of nearly 30,000 Security Forces and Police personnel to maintain law and order in the East, according to Government estimates.

The real challenge is that for the effective control of the civilian population there is need to recruit Tamil and Muslim people to Police service as it is compulsory to have Tamil speaking people at each and every Police station in the Eastern province to hear their complaints and grievances in Tamil.

Therefore, the Government has already initiated programme to recruit Policemen to cater to these needs and to strengthen the civil administration in the East. The Army has already handed over the control of the Maha Oya Chenkalady A-5 route to the Police Special Task Force control with the completion of their mission in the East.

Four Police stations have already been established at Vavuniativu, Vakarai Kokkadicholai and Ayiththiyamalai areas and ten more Police stations are to be established to maintain law and order in the areas which were under the Tiger grip for nearly 14 years.

These are the real challenges the Security Forces and the Police have to face in the aftermath of the liberation of the East, apart from the challenges before the political leadership to enthrone the Easterners with their democratic rights after 14 years tyrannical administration of the LTTE.

As mentioned by the President Mahinda Rajapaksa, the Government have initiated a 180 day development drive in the East with the launch of Eastern Reawakening programme to lay a solid foundation to provide economic freedom for the Eastern population.

The Government has faced the initial challenge of resettling the displaced civilians in the Eastern province overcoming all the obstacles before the process of resettlement.

The Government has already resettled over 95,000 Internally Displaced Persons (IDPs) affected by the recent fighting in the East leaving only 37,000 more persons out of their original habitations in the East.

Out of 23,948 displaced from the Trincomalee district 5,425 have already been resettled leaving only 18,523 to be resettled shortly.

In Batticaloa district out of 93,638 IDPs, 74,939 have already been resettled.

Only 18,000 remain to be resettled. Therefore, the Government has faced this challenge faster than any other Government which had faced this type of challenge earlier.

However, the most demanding question by the public is not regarding the resettlement process in the East or what would happen in the East next. The most demanding question is regarding the next step in the North.

The next step of the Government in the North also depends on many factors concerning the Tamil community and the national security.

It is very clear that Government is not ready to bow down to terrorism at any cost despite its commitment to have negotiated settlement to the Tamil question.

That was the position reiterated by President Mahinda Rajapaksa in his address to the nation to celebrate the liberation of the East.

Therefore it is clear that Government would not try to pursue a political solution without weakening the LTTE militarily. Except all the other Government which dealt with LTTE terrorism during the past two and half decades, the Mahinda Rajapaksa administration has realized the true picture of the LTTE and also their long term objectives.

Not only that the Rajapaksa administration was courageous enough to divulge the bitter truth to the international community without trying to appease them to add few millions of dollars to the Government coffers promising them peace. The stance taken by the Ministry of Defence throughout the past one and half years is that LTTE should be militarily weaken before any political package is given to solve the grievances of the Tamil population in the North and East.

The grim reality

It is the grim reality that any political solution now being vibrantly discussed at the All Party Representative Committee to be finalized within the next month cannot be implemented in a scenario where LTTE is unleashing its gun culture.

If any political solution to the problem is implemented the areas should be accessible to the Security Forces and the Police. The only part which is not accessible to the Security Forces and the Police in the country, after the liberation of the East is Wanni which is controlled by the LTTE.

Unlike in the East the Tamils are the dominant community in the Wanni region with the LTTE chasing all other communities from this region with the outbreak of hostilities in early 1980s.

The Tamil community should have the freedom to enjoy any political right given to them under any political solution.

Therefore, the Government firmly stands on the position that these Tamil people should be liberated from the clutches of the LTTE if they are to enjoy true political freedom.

If ensuring of democratic rights of the Easterners was the prime aim of the Government throughout its military operations in the East that would be applied to the Wanni too without a single change.

This reporter reliably understands that the Government will move towards further weakening the LTTE militarily. One of the basics behind weakening them militarily is through starving them of arms and ammunition. The Sri Lanka Navy does a pivotal role to starve the LTTE of arms and ammunition by destroying their arms smuggling ships in the deep sea far off the coast of Sri Lanka. According to the assessments by the Ministry of Defence the LTTE is receiving very little arms and ammunition from the Eastern coast.

With the fall of the Eastern province at the hands of the Security Forces even the small quantity of arms and ammunition coming to the Eastern coast has been stopped.

According to assessments LTTE is receiving many of its arms stocks from the West coast especially across the Palk Strait and the Gulf of Mannar region.

Therefore, the Ministry of Defence would focus to block the arms smuggling of the LTTE especially in the North and South of Mannar as this region provides them a better opportunity to smuggle weapons mingling with the fishing boats.

According to Sri Lanka Navy they use fishing vessels poaching on Sri lankan territorial waters to smuggle weapons and transport them to the land using the Vilpattu jungle area in the South of Mannar and North of Puttalam.

The untold sufferings by the innocent fishermen in the Mannar region at the hand of the LTTE is also one of the contributing factor should the Government decide to launch any military operation focusing the West coast in Mannar and thereby completely cutting off the flow of arms and ammunition to the LTTE.

The possibilities for the LTTE to pose air threat to the South especially to the Katunayake airport can also be cut off if Security Forces can take full control of the areas south of Mannar and the West coast.

These factors are highly considered by the Ministry of Defence at this juncture prior to taking any decision on the next move of the Security Forces.

However, the Security Forces will also consider the threats posed by the LTTE especially targeting the civilian population in the Wanni as it is incumbent upon the Government to neutralise such threats from the LTTE.

Therefore the Government will definitely implement a political solution with the support of the international community after a final solution to the Tamil question is agreed to at the All Party Representative Committee while facing all the challenges posed by the LTTE.

The task before the Security Forces would be a tough one. But they are determined to reach the goal without any delay as it was the determination of the government to ensure the democratic rights of the Tamil population of the country.

Therefore, it is incumbent upon the LTTE to decide either to give up their arms struggle or join the democratic process without being isolated in the Wanni haplessly.