This tweet by the Sri Lankan Prime Minister Wickremesinghe came at the end of the 2018 Sri Lankan Constitutional Crisis. A month earlier, the President of Sri Lanka, without any prior notice, on live television elected Rajapaksa who was the former President of Sri Lanka, to be his Prime Minister. This happened without the sitting Prime Minister, Wickremesinghe, being formally removed in any way. This move was unconstitutional and created lots of political upheaval in Sri Lanka. Eventually Rajapaksa resigned, and Wickremesinghe was reinstated as the PM.

I think Wickremesinghe was correct in stating that this was a win for Sri Lankan democratic insitutions and not just himself or his party. This is because it showed that the institutions of Parliament and the Supreme Court were able to do their jobs and prevent against a autonomous leader from taking over and things getting out of control.

Today marks a victory not for myself or for the UNP. It is a victory for Sri Lanka’s democratic institutions and the sovereignty of our citizens. I thank everyone who stood firm in defending the constitution and ensuring the triumph of democracy.

— Ranil Wickremesinghe (@RW_UNP) December 16, 2018

HR: Tweet, https://www.nbr.org/publication/reorienting-indias-foreign-policy-neighborhood-first/,

https://www.theweek.in/news/india/2019/06/06/modi-foreign-policy-lay-stress-sagar-doctrine-and-act-east.html

https://www.scmp.com/week-asia/politics/article/2170621/what-rajapaksas-return-means-china-india-tug-war-over-sri-lanka

This tweet was sent out after the Prime Minister of India spoke during the President of Sri Lanka’s visit to India. The tweet references the speech made by the Prime Minister of India addressing Sri Lanka. The President made this state visit to India because he had recently been elected as President of Sri Lanka. The “Neighborhood First” policy is a foreign policy objective by India to increase relations between itself and the surrounding south Asian countries. Basically, India is trying to increase cooperation in the area by offering assistance to countries that need it in order to build up their infrastructure. Historically, India had been promising countries things they had not delivered on, and this policy is trying to decrease that. This project falls under the  SAGAR doctrine that is mentioned in the speech, SAGAR stands for Security and Growth for All the Region, which is the foreign policy objectives of India, as mentioned above, to increase cooperation within the region.  I think a large part of the reason that the President visited India was because he ran on a anti-China platform, and one of India’s goal with the SAGAR doctrine is ultimately to unite south Asia against China, so it makes sense that the President would go to show his support. Based on the fact that the President of Sri Lanka referenced the promise that the PM of India made to contribute to a strong Sri Lanka, it shows that the President supports the PM and is also hoping that he will follow through with his word to build up Sri Lanka.

“A stable, secure and prosperous Sri Lanka is not only in India's interest but also in the interest of the entire Indian Ocean Region” – stated HE @narendramodi during the press conference today – the translation of speech can be accessed : https://t.co/jqTbxmqDrz

— Gotabaya Rajapaksa (@GotabayaR) November 29, 2019

 

Anne Hirlinger

HR: the blog

 

The blog I chose is called Beyond Borders Sri Lanka (https://beyondborders.wordpress.com).

Beyond Borders is a broader group that also has pages for India, Bangladesh, Pakistan and the UK. They are youth-run blogs that aim to give youth an opportunity to voice their opinions on issues that concern them. Some things focused on specifically in Sri Lanka are citizenship education for underprivileged children and training in schools on sexual health as well as HIV/AIDS. They hosted some forums for young people and focused on climate change as well as globalization. They also hosted a youth festival in 2006 that gave over 1000 youth from Sri Lanka and other countries the opportunity to build their political skills. After 2007, they started channeling their efforts into projects concerning conflict, education and used theater as an alternative media source.

I think the concept of the organization and this blog was a really good idea, and it is a shame it got discontinued. I think it’s great that youth were given an opportunity to be politically active online and in person in their communities. My only concern would be how the government of Sri Lanka would view these kids protesting. On one hand, while Sri Lanka guarantees the right to protest in its constitution, the letter of the law is not always carried out and many protests get shut down. I would be concerned from a “parent” standpoint that if my child was involved in a protest that the government didn’t like, or wrote a radical blog online and had their name tied to it, as most of the blog posts do on the site, would that reflect badly not only on the child but on the rest of the family? Would it affect a young person’s ability to get jobs and make them a target of the state? In the UK where they also have a Beyond Borders site, I think it is much safer and more reasonable that kids could use the sit and be politically active, but in a less free country, I would be worried for their safety.

The United Nations banned all non-essential Sri Lankan troops from serving with U.N. Peacekeeping operations. This happened in response to Lt. Gen. Shavendra Silva, who had previously been accused of war crimes, being appointed as the chief of the Sri Lankan army. Although this decision was directly correlated with Silva being appointed, in the past the Sri Lankan troops have not done a great job of being UN Peacekeepers, with allegations of past sexual assaults being brought up.

As it says in the article, I think it is good that the UN is not allowing these war crimes to go unnoticed. However, they mention a lack of vetting from Sri Lankan troops as US Peacekeepers, which led to the sexual assaults happening. If this is the case then why doesn’t the US themselves vet which troops are able to be UN Peacekeepers, instead of leaving it up the countries?

https://www.newsweek.com/united-nations-bans-sri-lankan-troops-over-general-accused-war-crimes-1461639

(Sri Lanka is famous for producing tea so I used it as a metaphor for an uprising)

As the finest producers of tea in the world, Sri Lanka is no stranger to what great tea tastes like. Our shop, the Sri Lankan Tea Traders have created a brand new tea flavor, the Fire Dragon. We have been working on the Fire Dragon tea for months and it is finally now packaged and ready to be drank by all of Sri Lanka, and the world! It is a spicy, warm and unique tea that is sure to surprise and change the way you think about Sri Lankan tea. This tea is perfect for anyone, even those who don’t like tea, or who have never had it before. We are going to make the world debut of the Fire Dragon in Sri Lanka on September 27th, 2019. This is going to be a very important event for Sri Lances, so everyone should be there to see and try this wonderful tea!