Last night, i went to the BBC site (ard 2am) - i visit the BBC every 2hrs and religously when i wake up and go to sleep... But last nights headlines were a complete shocker!!! I don't remeber the exact words, but i was up for the next 2 hrs thinking... is the BBC and UN exercising double standards? The story in particular was about the Sri Lankan Army (SLA) recruiting child soldiers to fight for the breakway Ltte faction (Karuna forces). It said, a report from the UN head for chil rights, Alan Rock) believes, without hard evidence, that the SLA is helping the Karuna faction to recruit forcibly child soldiers... but by morning the aritcle has changed to SLA turning a blind eye into the child rights abuses going on in government controled areas. This drastic change in reporting suggests a quick editing job (Dumeethra Luthra, i guess the editing team needed to make changes to your biased style of reporting - but this is another topic to blog abt)... but this article made me think, and here is what i thought about:
1) reading the comments on 'Have you say' section on BBC, i noticed a lot of comments from tamils condeming the GOSL (government of Sri Lanka) for recruiting children and abusing human rights. Most of these tamils support the Ltte - for their 'Ealam', equal rights for tamils and these are legitamate reasons to support a group - but if you support the Ltte, you are also supporting Suicide bombing, child soldiers, killing civilians and using civilians as human shields. the Ltte are notorious for their child recruiting etc.. so if you condemn the GOSL, arnt you also condeming the Ltte? or is it a simple case of its ok for us to do it, but not ok for anyone else?
2) It is obvious both sides are commiting serious human rights violations - but its a War, it should be expected... child or adult - if they can carry an AK47 they are soldiers... i'm not supporting child soldiers but in a War, what has to be done, has to be done!!
3) the Ltte say that they dont forcibly recruit children - children come to them to fight. I wonder how many 11 or 12 year olds decide they want to give up their lives for a cause they have no idea about or how it started. when i was 12 all i thougth abt was if i can make it to the TV room on time to watch my cartoons.. kids at that age dont make up their own minds - they lack the capicity to know whats right from wrong - they need adult guidance. but to think about it - children make the best soldiers - they dont argue, its easy to instill fear in them, its easy to model them into the ideal soldier, and have no clue whats right or wrong - they simply do what the adults say.
4) Do ppl really think there are such things as LTTE orphanages? For a organisation notorious for using child soldiers for the last 23 yearsm, an orphanage sounds more like a Hitler youth camp - creating the perfect soldiers...
5) The GOSL has no official connection with the Karuna faction. It has no paper or formal agreements of collusion. But it is obvious that they are helping each other out - like wat is said in the Art of War "The enemy of my enemy is my friend". GOSL is obviously sharing intelligence, giving weapons and turning a blind eye into Karuna activities - all the time continually stating it has no connection with Karuna. the best part of this is, GOSL has deniability. If it is proven that Karuna is recruiting children - the international body cannot prove the GOSL is helping it - can only accuse. Thus, cannot have sanctions against GOSL.
