Sri Lanka
By Brian Le and Nathan May
Brief Historical Background
Occupation of Tamil Tigers within Past Decade
News Article of Massacre Sprees
Buddhist Monk Protesting Against Sinhalese
Sri Lankan Civil War
Spatial Extent of Ethnic Conflict
Being a civil war, it’s pretty well contained in Sri Lanka. To add to that, Sri Lanka is an island which meant that bordering countries were of no concern. Mainly each side was ambushed by the other and, in the LTTE's case, they used an abundance of suicide attacks - over 370 which is more than any other organization's suicide attack count. However, the country’s suffering economy has an impact on India, nearby countries, and other trade partners. It’s worth mention that India became involved with the conflict in the 80s. Throughout the conflict India helped each side of the battle in different ways (i.e. India sent food to the Tamils and troops to the Sinhalese, etc.).
Conflict Over Different Scales
Globally this affects everyone that is involved with trade with Sri Lanka, as the country is in deep debt from the war - especially India.. Regionally the broken economy is also a problem. Also, India's involvement has caused a lot of controversy because even though they meant to stay impartial and help both sides, it only prolonged the war by constantly giving supplies to the rebels (25 tons) while giving entire platoons to the Sri Lankan army. Socially and culturally this also causes obvious huge divides and hostility that still continue today, methods such as torture and terrorism were used which causes for unrest and fear among the people. Newspapers and protesters in various Buddhist countries as well as America raised protests against the genocides that happened.Monday, Jul 23, 198, 09:00 PM
Sri Lanka
Timeline
~1500's - Sri Lanka colonised by Portuguese
~1936 - English became the national language
~1944 - Sinhala replaced English, giving the English speaking Tamils a huge disadvantage in terms of respect, career choice, and reputation.
~1948 - Sri Lanka gains independence: Ceylon Citizenship Act made citizenship impossible for Tamils to achieve after the Anti-Tamil legislation passed it
~1950's - Tension begins to boil exponentially between the ethnicities
~1958 - Anti-Tamil riots broke out when Tamils were driven away from the south.
~1959 - Buddhist monk assassinates Sinhalese S.W.R.D. Bandaranaike causing a violent uproar of uprising tension.
~1970’s - Tamil makes fighting army to pursue being separate state (LTTE). Army performs riots, raids on military convoys, attacks, etc.
~1983 - War starts after guerilla warfare
~1983 - 2009 - War between the Tamil Tigers and the Sinhalese
~2003 - Talks of peace begin to break down
~2006 - After extensive violence starts escalating, both the Tamil Tigers and the Sinhalese agree to reaffirm ceasefire.
~2009 - War ends after treaty