You could sum up the previous government’s approach to foreign policy in one quote:
“You are only a f*****g High Commissioner. I am a street fighter. I will have you f*****g thrashed.”
That is what Sajin Vass Gunawardena reportedly said to Chris Nonis, then our High Commissioner to the UK. In the ensuing controversy, Mahinda Rajapaksa sided with Sajin. It gives you a rough sense of the priorities.
Another forced error was putting Bandula Jayasekera anywhere public. This rather disagreeable individual was appointed to rather important positions in Canada, briefly the UN and then Australia, with predictable results. Some sample quotes from him: “maybe the Toronto Star is getting money from the Tamil Tigers. Make my day.” (Toronto Star), “I can see you as a bloody prick. So keep off whoever you are” (on Twitter), and then emails full of the stuff here.
As a private citizen, fine, be an asshole, whatever, but a diplomat is supposed to represent the country. The job is more like being a lawyer than a hitman. You don’t see lawyers yelling at judges or other lawyers or the press, that wouldn’t serve their clients. Having people like Bandula and Sajin on the front lines of the foreign service was a real forced error by the government. They were literally creating more problems for the country by being rude. If you sent a trained monkey they would have done better just by virtue of not being able to speak.
At it’s most basic level, diplomacy isn’t that hard. Don’t be an asshole, don’t get emotional and don’t make it personal. You can be defending horrible policies but as long as you’re stating them politely and respectfully, that counts as diplomacy. Countries need to keep lines open even when they disagree and that’s what diplomats do. This does however, take a bit of skill.
Mahinda somehow couldn’t figure that out. He appointed a lot of people who seemed to be die-hard believers but who possessed zero diplomatic and very few social skills. He seemed to miss the point that a good diplomat didn’t need to be a believer, any more than a lawyer needs to be agree with their client’s choices. They just need to be professional and do their job.
Under Mahinda, the professional diplomatic system was completely circumvented by people he personally trusted, going around both the diplomatic service and even political appointees (ie GL Peiris). Sajin Vass somehow seemed to be running foreign affairs without being the Minister, and his solution seemed to be paying foreign PR firms and ‘international advisors‘ millions of dollars to somehow fix things. Meanwhile he’s assaulting our own diplomats. It’s like paying someone a million dollars to fix your toilet and pissing in the bed. The answer is simple, just stop pissing in the bed.
‘Street-fighters’ like Vass and Jayasekara (among others) had no place representing Sri Lanka abroad. Thankfully, they’ve both been recalled/lost their jobs.
Sirisena’s Foreign Policy
Maithripala Sirisena’s foreign policy so far, as practiced through Foreign Minister Mangala Samaraweera, has done 10x better just by virtue of not being self-destructive. If Mangala can get through the next six months without bitch-slapping someone, we’d still be ahead.
Beyond that, this government is practicing actual diplomacy. On some level, diplomacy is a bunch of naked people standing around talking about clothes. Everybody is violating the shit out of human rights (especially the US) but the ones that don’t talk about it are the ones that stick out. The point seems to not be doing the right thing right now but at least talking about it so that A) things might get better and B) other countries have plausible deniability. Nobody expects nations to be perfect, but they do expect them to at least appear to have adults in charge.
Hence this government has gotten a delay in the UN war crimes report. The whole thing is a farce we could have avoided by implementing the LLRC report four years ago, and by generally talking to the UN, but it is where it is now. This government is able to work with the UN because they talk to them, they don’t deny everything and they’re basically being diplomatic. The country actually looks like it has adults in charge and not ‘street fighters’, AKA children.
A Bit Of History And Back
The reason foreign policy is/was a mess was because that was one pillar the LTTE assiduously tried to knock over. They tried three assassinations which would have changed the course of the war – the Defence Secretary, the Army Commander and the Foreign Minister. Of those, they only managed to kill Lakshman Kadirgamar, the Foreign Minister.
Kadirgamar was highly intelligent, Tamil and a skilled diplomat. He was vital to getting the LTTE banned and he was highly capable of defending Sri Lanka abroad. When he was assassinated there was a real vacuum and Mahinda plugged it the only way he knew how, with cronies. This left the country at a disadvantage.
During the war, the LTTE really tried to manipulate international concern, cynically, to save their own hides. They didn’t have time, but the diaspora has continued that message, blithely ignoring that war crimes were the LTTE’s bread and butter. For years now they’ve been floating the genocide/partition argument without any real response from Sri Lanka. Well meaning people and countries have asked questions and gotten yelled at and called terrorists in response. Even if Sri Lanka was actually in the right, these belligerent denials made us look like a tin-pot dictatorship. By appointing cronies, thugs and dunces, Mahinda somehow made the country look worse than it is.
Samaraweera is no Kadirgamar, but he’s a vast improvement over what we had. Under him and President Sirisena, the country is acknowledging that there were horrors and excesses of war and showing a commitment to addressing them. This more than bellicose posturing serves the interests of Sri Lanka and all of its people. What a relief, that we are no longer putting our dumbest asses forward.
I have to totally agree with you Indi this time around.
Its a shame for the other diplomats who witnessed the assault that the royal pimp Sajin Vass unleashed on Chris Nonis and later had to deny or just had to say what MaRa asked to say.
What a shame for someone like Prasad Kariyawasam or Palitha Kohona had to face in this situation, you had to lie to protect a thug.
The new government is doing a very good job in cleanseup the foreign service and kudos for Magala Samaraweera.
A good sum up of the situation. I think we were pretty much regarded as a pariah state or perhaps even a rogue state by most of international community.
Chris Nonis had apparently been threatened with violence by Sajin Vaas if he ever set foot in SL. He had avoided visiting until now.
The Govt could certainly have used a Kadirgarmar production machine. Or a competent training programme.
I dont agree with you indi.
It is true that MR gov made a mess of foreign affairs because of sajin. And I dont see any difference between mangala. Mangala may talk nicely but infront of international media and politicians he said, we will change SL, we will give justice, we will do this and that….in other words he is accepting that propaganda against SL is correct. He doesnt give the right picture about this country to the world. That is what our foreign ministry and ambassodors should do.
Not going there and say, see our enemies are correct….
If MR’s foreign policy is street behavior, RW’s is of bending maximum to the west. Does RW think west will take his side because he bends them and please them?
I think RW is ignorant and west is extremely cunning.
And about war crime report, what is the point of post poning it? just throw it away and present it. If they present still we will defend SL because we are free of most of those allegations.
If you really read what the US or UK government says, they havent changed their position, they just havae found a poodle in SL gov, who will do anything to make them happy.
Just look at the access given to NGOs who were against SL gov and pro LTTE to north…this is like a repetition of 2001-04……..RW is a good gentleman, but gentlemen cannot do politics in a world of dirty politics…..RW has shown he has not learnt a single lesson from his 2001-04 period.
Well written piece- summarizes quite nicely the low levels the once esteemed Ceylon foreign service had stooped down to. What dreads of society we attempted to pass off as diplomats?!
Jack
Sach, when you say NGO’s and the West were against Sri lanka can you explain why?
@Jack point,
Well it is quite apparent isnt it?
@jack point
Do you know RW in his previous gover undermine security apparatus and let the LTTE and their western counterparts to do anything in SL?
Sach, There were a lot of things that were said about human rights. Have a look at the following link, it puts things in perspective.
http://groundviews.org/2014/08/28/international-human-rights-dispelling-the-myths-by-radhika-coomaraswamy/
@Jack point,
I will read that later. But what did this government win other than a mere postpone? Isnt the west’s perception about SL war the same? Has this government done anything to dispell the myths? No they havent. I know GOSL both MR and now RW have not properly answered allegations against SL. That is what we want. But that is not what they do. Our government is handled by RW and CBK, not maithree. Read Rajiva W’s interview and what he mentions about ministerial portfolios.
I hope in a MR government Dayan might handle foreign affairs. That is why i am voting MR.
And are you ok with how RW plays with this country’s security? The hurry to bring back SLn refugees with not much security screening. Who else would come? The hurried nuclear agreement and US praising it…
Cant you see?
I am steadfastly against the 19th amendment. Today witness protection bill is passed, and now information bill or something like that is coming. The UK firms are pointing at what needs to be done in our information act :) to strengthen that.
Before election RW talked about domestic investigation and now it has become a tribunal. The 19th Amendment will reduce executive power and TNA will have executive power in parliament. Cant you see the direction they are going? a war tribunal, information act, witness protection act…..
when things become apparent even Maithree cant do anything, why? he has no power!
The reality is west cant do anything to us because of china and russia in UNSC. So they are using SL gover to do what they want.
I remember Indi pasted a link to a nytimes article written by Ryan Goodman. There was a distasteful cartoon in it where an american was sitting on SL lion in the flag. Many Lankans rightly criticized it. But that is what is happening now.
When Ryan wrote how to prosecute Gota, it was how to do what they want if UNP government doesn’t go ahead with the promise. Given the current poodles in the gover, i don’t think US would have to worry about it.
What has not been included in that disgraceful assault on the former SL HC to UK is that he is said to have gone to a local hospital in NY in the early hours of the morning and had his jaw x’rayed. No bone was broken but what a disgrace! An absolute disgrace!
Mangala S was after all part of the grand trio that authored the famous ‘Mahinda Chintanaya’ (MC)! What was shocking then, and still surprising even now, is why he resigned from that government and crossed over to the UNP the day after he returned to SL from Brussels after triumphantly getting the LTTE listed as a terrorist organisation by the EU! It was even reported that his own life was in danger, according to local news reports! There has not been much news about the other senior member of the MC-the late J.R.Suriyaperuma- who was said to have died in a curious car crash while going from Colombo to A’pura. As was later lamented in a news report there was not even a magisterial inquiry into a violent death and yet his body is said to have been sent to the Undertakers within 24 hours! Even there was no news about what became of that car wreckage.
On the LTTE. They were the by product of compounded failures of State governance from 1948 to the early 1980s! They and the rest of the Tamil rebels were the by products of such colossal policy and non-implementation failures and violence against Tamil people with impunity and came into prominence in the 1980s! All because of the non-implementation on the use of the Tamil language by the Tamil people as provided for under the 1971 and 1976 constitutions! The situation is the same even today!!! Hopefully the new President and the new government will set the government and governance in order and do what is in the law quite finally!!! Not much brains is needed for that surely!!!
jack point,
“when you say NGO’s and the West were against Sri lanka can you explain why?”
Big reason would be most of the NGO types and US officials (specially US WH officials like Susan Rice, Samantha Power, State officials) follow a certain vague notion known as R2P (generally these guys are known as R2Pers ). These Noe-liberals has been very active in places like Syria, Libya, Ukraine in the recent past and now they are here. And compared to the failures like them, Sri Lanka can work for them. You know a shining example of the R2P concept.
Please note that US government policies actions are influenced by lot of different people in lot of different organizations with lot of different interests. So this may not be the only reason.
“his solution seemed to be paying foreign PR firms and ‘international advisors‘ millions of dollars to somehow fix things”
That was mainly for Lobbying. Unfortunately, that how things happen in DC.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lobbying_in_the_United_States
http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/in-the-loop/wp/2014/05/14/which-foreign-countries-spent-the-most-to-influence-u-s-politics/
And just have a look at how Campaign for freedom of expression based in Britian is working in the Sri Lanka’s Information bill.
Our people are innocent, these fellows are a cunning bunch
This is for you jackpoint
Sach,
the reason for the postponement is because there is now some committment to improving human rights.
These rights did not exist in Sri Lanka. Bharatha Lakshman, Khuram Shaikh, Nihal Perera, the worker in Katunayake, the fishermen in Chilaw, the people of Rathupaswela :these were just some of the people who were murdered and whose families could get no justice. The questions raised are with the war and the Tamils, but the same issues affect all of us, even if you may not have realised it. The people listed above probably did not either-until they were affected.
Therefore addressing questions of human rights is a priority. MR campaigned for this in 1989 when he went to Geneva. The situation now is no different.
The LLRC was set up under MR but it was supposed to be just an eyewash to fool the international community, whcih is why very little was implemented. Now that there is a committment to improving the ruleof law and human rights we have got some leeway.
have you forgotten that Dayan was kicked out by MR a long time ago? sajin Vaas was running the show. Dayan is now signing MR’s praises because he wants to come back.
You are worried about security ? What about KP, Karuna, Pillayan and Douglas who were running amock under MR? Are you saying that every single refugee is a terrorist?
To get to the root of the issue – the way to solve problems permanently is to address the causes. People who are angry may take up arms – the solution is not to keep the boot at their throats but to look at their grievances.
Lobbying does happen but there doing the right things goes a long way. Sri Lanka did not pay lobbyists in the past, it was only due to the mismanagement that this was the only thing left to try-and it was not even working.
Posted this on my blog as well
http://jestforkicks.blogspot.com/2015/02/sri-lankas-new-foreign-policy.html
I am sorry Jackpoint, you are such a gullible person .
DO you really buy the idea that UN postponed the report because there is hope for new commitment for human rights? UNHRC high commissioner has said, they postponed the report because they have better access now and they can bring a more damning report…
Mangala S had asked US to postpone it, because they want to win the general election. That means if the report was released in March, people can see the government’s action. And they will definitely lose the election. Both UN and US do not want this government to lose the election.
That is the reason for the postponement. When UN high commissioner and our Mangala had already said that, why do you think of something else?
And nobody says SL was perfect under MR. It did have a lot of issues, that is why many voted him out including me. But only now the real game is open. Please see what this government does and not what it says.
We should never have accepted the UN report of investigation. This government did exactly that. By asking to postpone they gave it legitimacy. Read Sumanthiran’s interview in DBSJ.
Dayan was kicked out by MR, that was the reason for most of the problems. But that doesnt mean we should allow Mangala to destroy what it left.
Really? KP, Karuna Douglas are security issues for you? Except KP, do you know they were instrumental in fight against LTTE? Are you that gullible? These people have a security risk only to TNA….
I expect Jackpoint’s views