மோடி வருகை வரலாறு-மனோ கணேசன்

 

Indian PM Modi will address thousands of Sri Lankans of Indian origin in Central Province

Prime Minister will address thousands of Sri Lankans of Indian origin in Central Province

Prime Minister Narendra Modi will arrive in Colombo on Thursday to participate in the international UN Vesak Day hosted by Sri Lanka.

During the two-day visit, he will address thousands of upcountry Tamils of the country, shining the spotlight on the 1.6 million-strong community inhabiting the island’s Central and Southern provinces.
On Friday, Mr. Modi will speak at a public meeting in Norwood, in the island’s hill country, which is likely to draw tens of thousands of upcountry Tamils, most of them descendants of Indian-origin labourers brought in by the British.

On his last trip to Sri Lanka in March 2015, the first bilateral visit by an Indian Prime Minister in nearly 30 years, Mr. Modi visited the war-battered Northern Province.

This is the first time that an Indian Premier will travel to the Central Province, where the country’s famed tea estates are located, to address Sri Lankans of recent Indian origin.

‘Historic visit’

Senior upcountry leaders deemed the Modi visit ‘historic”, after Mahatma Gandhi and Jawaharlal Nehru’s visits in the pre-Independence era.

 “India has always expressed concern for our Tamil brothers and sisters from the north and east. This visit is only an extension of that to include Tamils from other parts of the island,”

said Mano Ganesan, Minister for National Co-existence, Dialogue and Official Languages, and leader of the Tamil Progressive Alliance.

As “full-fledged Sri Lankans”, who battled statelessness in the past, members of the community have made a mark in different fields, even as a fourth of them continue toiling in tea plantations, braving low wages, poor housing and education, Mr. Ganesan said. “We remain loyal to our motherland, but see India as our fatherland.”

Meeting with parties

Mr. Modi is scheduled to meet leaders of the TPA and those of Ceylon Workers’ Congress, a party that traditionally represented upcountry Tamils, but has more recently lost ground to the TPA. “We are mobilising 20,000 workers for Mr. Modi’s meeting,” CWC President Muthu Sivalingam told The Hindu .

While TPA hopes to revive a 2014 MoU and seek Indian support in housing, education and vocational training, the CWC too wrote to Mr. Modi in April, requesting for assistance in the same areas. India is currently building 4,000 houses for estate workers. Mr. Modi will inaugurate a hospital in the area built with Indian assistance.

Mr. Modi will inaugurate the UN Vesak Day celebrations in the city on Friday. Soon after, he will proceed to the island’s Central Province by a helicopter, specially brought from India.

Following his engagement in Norwood, he will visit the Temple of the Tooth in Kandy, ahead of his departure to New Delhi. While Mr. Modi will meet top Sri Lankan leaders, no bilateral agreements will be signed during his visit. Sri Lanka police have deployed 6,000 personnel for enhanced security. For the first time, Sri Lanka is hosting an international conference and celebrations around UN Vesak Day. Nearly 750 people from 85 countries will participate in the event.

In order to stop the Syrian war, country 'will have to be divided'

In order to stop the Syrian war, country 'will have to be divided'
May 5, 2017 Oleg Yegorov, RBTH 

Russian experts believe the introduction of de-escalation zones in Syria will guarantee the dissolution of the country, as there is no other way of stopping the civil war.

The truce in Syria, established thanks to Russia, Turkey, and Iran’s mediation efforts, has been on shaky ground for the past several months. Source: AFP

During talks in Astana on May 3 and 4, Moscow and its partners proposed introducing "de-escalation zones" in Syria which will be monitored by foreign peace-keeping contingents. The truce in Syria, established thanks to Russia, Turkey, and Iran’s mediation efforts, has been on shaky ground for the past several months. For weeks the government forces and the armed opposition have been shelling each other with increasing frequency. The situation escalated further after the chemical attacks in the Idlib Province on April 4, killing 89 people (the government and the opposition blame each other).
In the fourth round of talks in the Kazakh capital, Russia, Turkey, and Iran proposed a completely new regulation plan that foresees the creation of four de-escalation zones, where any use of weapons will be forbidden, the infrastructure will be restored, and conditions will be created for the work of humanitarian organizations. Demarcation lines will be set up on the borders to prevent shelling. The Kremlin explained that the de-escalation zones would also be no-fly zones.

Who's for and against it?

On May 4 in Astana, Russia, Turkey and Iran signed a memorandum to create the de-escalation zones. Representatives of the Bashar al-Assad government expressed their support for the initiative while the opposition delegation opposed it, protesting against Iran's role as guarantor. However, President Vladimir Putin remarked that he had discussed the idea with U.S. President Donald Trump who supported the initiative.

Arab scholar and expert from the Russian International Affairs Council, Sergei Balmasov, believes both the Syrian government and the opposition will not agree to the initiative in practice and will do everything to undermine it. "The idea to create safe zones has been discussed for several years. But the conflict has not been solved and now any agreement, even if it is supported on paper, will be violated," said Balmasov. In his view, the civil war is still at the stage where neither side is prepared to compromise.

Imposing peace from the outside

On the other hand, if pressure from the mediating troika is strong enough, and it’s supported by Washington and the Persian Gulf countries, the external forces will be able to impose their solution on Damascus and the opposition, believes Leonid Isaev, senior professor at the Political Sciences Department at the Higher School of Economics. "The external players agree on this deal, on these rules of the game. The Syrians are not being asked and it’s understandable. The Syrians have not been able to come to an agreement for many years. That is why now they will have to agree to what others are proposing."

The memorandum foresees the possibility of sending foreign contingents to Syria that will guard the demarcation lines. The document does not specify where the contingents will come from. However, Director of the Center for Islamic Studies at the Institute of Innovational Development Kirill Semenov (in an interview with Svobodnaya Pressa) believes that they can be "neutral international players, such as Malaysia, Indonesia, and the Maghreb countries." Semenov says that the measures enforcing a truce must be harsh and that they must be applied not only to the opposition but also to the government forces. Only then is success possible.

Does Syria still exist?

Work to realize the memorandum has only just begun. The Russian delegation says that combat action in the territories indicated in the document will cease on May 6, that the borders of the de-escalation zones still have to be agreed upon, and that some other work also still has to be done. But if the project is implemented, the country will be divided: The government will control certain areas, the opposition others, and between them will be the peacekeepers.

"This will de facto mean a reinforced division of Syria. But actually, Syria has not been united for several years," notes Sergei Balmasov. He adds that neither side of the civil war has any illusions about peaceful co-existence and their participation in the talks in Geneva and Astana is just a façade. Leonid Isaev partially agrees: "Syria as a state exists only on Google Maps, in geography lessons, and on the UN chair nameplate. But de facto the country has collapsed."

At the same time, Isaev says, it’s unlikely that the forces opposing Damascus, whether they are the opposition or the Kurds, are seriously thinking of establishing independent states. This would be too problematic. "These will a priori be failed states. They don't have the resources for independent existence," Isaev says. He believes that this creates the possibility of Syria restoring itself as a state, but at some indefinite point in the distant future.