TGTE condemns Putin’s Invasion of Ukraine: Calls for Negotiations under UN Auspices.

We Eelam Tamils, as a Nation who were subjected to a similar predicament by the Sri Lankan state in 2009, hold our hands in solidarity with people of Ukraine 

The Transnational Government of Tamil Eelam (TGTE) is alarmed at the situation in Ukraine as hundreds of civilian casualties including children are being reported; thousands of people have been left without power or water due to damage to civilian infrastructure; UN agencies are reporting that thousands of civilians were being forced to huddle in makeshift bomb shelters; and seven million people had been displaced, with the figure “rising exponentially”. Bombing continues beyond Kyiv into other major cities of Kharkiv and Chernihiv.

Today we know of a missile attack on a primarily civilian area. The TGTE empathizes with the people of Ukraine and we join the voices around the world and call Vladimir Putin to pull his troops out of Ukraine and save the 44 million people now on the brink of a humanitarian catastrophe. The TGTE also salutes the resilience of the Ukrainian People and President Zelensky. Despite being so outnumbered and outgunned by their adversary, the courage, determination and the will to fight of the Ukrainian people is remarkable. We ourselves, as a Nation who were subjected to a similar predicament by the Sri Lankan state and the international powers in 2009, the Eelam Tamil People, hold our hands in solidarity with the people of Ukraine. 

As the UN deliberates over this crisis at the General Assembly’s rare and unprecedented emergency Special Session, we request the UN to work towards conducting referendums to determine the will of the People in Donetsk and Luthansk. We are encouraged by the chorus of voices coming out of the UN Assembly in New York against Russia’s action. At this juncture, it is hard to resist the thought that had the international powers paid scant attention to the massacre of more than a hundred thousand Eelam Tamils during the final stages of the armed conflict between the Eelam Tamil People and the Sri Lankan state in 2009, thousands and thousands of lives would have been saved in our homeland.

We are deeply moved to see the reception of Ukraine refugees in Europe, unlike the treatment accorded generally to refugees from Africa and the Middle East. It is no secret that there has been tightening of borders in Europe and clear mistreatment of refugees in recent times. It is our fervent hope that this new situation of movement of millions of Ukrainian people, and thousands of guest students and workers from Ukraine, would be handled with utmost care towards the fundamental rights of all displaced people and refugees, as the events unfold before our eyes. There are those who argue that the battle for Ukraine was a battle for the new world order. If the place of democracy as a central plank in the present world order continues to be challenged through this crisis, rule of law, and indeed the law pertaining to self-determination of Nations also come under challenge. Therefore, it behooves us all to pause and reflect on this matter and do our utmost to bring the Ukraine crisis to closure. That way, all sovereign nations, ones as small as Tamil Eelam and ones as large as Ukraine, get to shine in the sun as free nations.