Why is the Sri Lankan civil war important?
The Sri Lankan civil war is barely recognized outside of West Asia. Perhaps this is due to the egregious atrocities such as the Cambodian Khmer Rouge, the Bosnian conflict, or even the Cultural Revolution in China. Yet, it is vitally important to remember this conflict. It arose as one ethnic group controlled by the levers of power in government and sought to subjugate the rights and freedom of a minority. Even Western countries such as Belgium and Canada have stark divisions among different ethnic and linguistic groups. Protection of the rights of all peoples, a fundamental tenet of liberal democracy, is paramount to avoiding the type of massacre that occurred in Sri Lanka.
As Americans, it can be easy to ascribe systematic human rights violations as the problems of other countries; however, even in our own country we have political candidates proposing limitations to move and travel based on religion, in addition to inciting division between races and countries through the proposals to restrict or limit access to the US.
Even though the Sri Lankan civil war is officially over, the conflict ended due to the subjugation of one group over another. A peace settlement has not been achieved. While a plan for federalist government that would provide a degree of autonomy and self government and equality to the Tamils has been discussed, the underlying friction that gave rise to the conflict will likely not subside until the rights and freedoms of all the Sri Lankan peoples are treated fairly and equally. This conflict is important to Westerners as it is one more example of the need to call out and eradicate intolerance, bigotry, and discrimination by governments before it escalates into conflict.
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