A tightrope walk for Tamil scribes

By Nirupama Subramanian

COLOMBO, JUNE 25. Accused, on the one hand, of being agents of the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) and, on the other, of being puppets of the Government, Sri Lanka's Tamil journalists, whether living here or abroad, have to constantly walk a tightrope between the two sides to the island's conflict. But increasingly, many are refusing to be cowed down.

A London-based Tamil journalist, Mr. P. Seevagan, was to begin a hunger-strike today to protest against what he described as the LTTE's ``rowdyism'' against his publication in Switzerland.

He told The Hinduby phone from London that earlier this month, LTTE members in a Swiss town had gone around threatening Tamil news agents selling the publication, a monthly called Vanmurasu, and asked them to take it off the shelves, without giving reasons.

He could not name the town, but said he had immediately written to the LTTE representative in London, Mr. Anton Balasingham, the LTTE's Paris office and its headquarters in northern Sri Lanka.

``There has been no response. I have also written to (the LTTE leader) Mr. Prabhakaran,'' said Mr. Seevagan, who is the editor of the journal.

``If I don't get a response from him by June 25, I will go on a hunger-strike. It is high time the LTTE started controlling this sort of rowdyism by its cadres,'' he said.

The irony is that Mr. Seevagan fled Sri Lanka fearing for his life last June in the aftermath of the military debacle at Elephant Pass when state television named him and three others as LTTE sympathisers.

Meanwhile, here in Sri Lanka, an association of Tamil journalists has criticised the manner in which the state media and a privately-owned Sinhalese language newspaper have recently picked on another Tamil journalist, calling him an ``LTTE spy.''

The description first appeared on a little known website which, besides naming the journalist, Mr. D. Sivaram, also included a UNP parliamentarian, Dr. Jayalath Jayewardene, in the same category.

``Mr. Sivaram informs us that as a result of these articles and news stories which carry his full name and pen name plus his photograph, he is unable to move about freely for fear of being identified on the basis of the serious accusations made against him ... He says that he and his family now face the possibility of retaliation by extremist elements and assassins,'' the Sri Lanka Tamil Media Association (SLTMA) said in a letter to the President, Mrs. Chandrika Kumaratunga.

Last year, Mr. Nimalrajan Mylvaganam, a Tamil journalist based in the Jaffna peninsula, was shot dead by unidentified men. The incident showed that the fears of the Tamil media in Sri Lanka are not imaginary, especially if the journalists happen to be based in the conflict areas.

The Uthayan, a popular Tamil language daily published from Jaffna, is under constant pressure from all sides to the ethnic conflict, journalists working for the newspaper said.

Earlier this year, the Government arrested a Tamil journalist under the Prevention of Terrorism Act and released him after three months as it was unable to bring charges against him. It was the same story with two other Tamil journalists arrested in 1998.

``We condemn this dangerous trend of baselessly and grossly levelling dangerous accusations against Tamil journalists, clearly calculated to silence them by terrorising them and their families with the accusation that they are pawns of the LTTE,'' the SLTMA said.

This was being done with the full knowledge of the reactions that such accusations could provoke from Sinhala extremist organisations, the association added.

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