Why did the government decide to end the ceasefire? The timing suggests that recent victories, including the re-capture of the east by the Sri Lankan military and the killings of senior leaders including the chiefs of the LTTE’s political and secret service wings, may have emboldened the government. In late November, President Rajapakse said that LTTE leader V. Prabhakaran was dead, or at least gravely wounded, by an air attack on his bunker. The LTTE later denied it. A rudderless LTTE or at least an incapacitated one may have provided the impetus to the government to back a military solution to the conflict.

But this approach by the Rajapakse presidency fails to appreciate that ethnic conflicts cannot be won on the battlefield; they need a political resolution. The international community has condemned the Sri Lankan government’s actions, and several states, including the US, have already stopped military supplies to Sri Lanka.

What does the end of the CFA portend for a resolution to the conflict? First, despite optimism in Sri Lankan government circles, there is no end in sight. The problem is neither side is powerful enough to win nor weak enough to lose the war but both believe that they can win militarily.

Second, the exit of international mediators (however ineffective) is worrying, because in intractable conflicts where distrust between combatants is high, it is important to have third parties who could act as a check.

Third, India, which is the only credible mediator, has been reluctant to get enmeshed again in the island’s deadly struggle, having lost 1200 soldiers and a former prime minister in the late 1980s. In the last decade, Indian foreign policy privileged institutional and multilateral solutions to the conflict by following a three-fold strategy: “track 2” political engagement with Sinhalese and Tamil democratic parties (hence not LTTE) to strengthen acceptance of devolution and power-sharing, economic aid to all regions, and some security ties including giving defensive and “non-lethal equipment” to the Sri Lankan military.

... contd.