MANNAR, SRI LANKA – Kannathasan Jeyeseela, 27, and her daughter, 2, live in Keerisuddan village in Mannar, a district in northwestern Sri Lanka. Villagers there have been forced to move four times because of decades of civil war in Sri Lanka.
Keerisuddan is a small and isolated village, home to just 38 families. A 20-kilometer gravel road connects this village to Madhu Church and Madhu main road. There are no human settlements along the gravel road leading to this village.
Before Jeyeseela was born, her fellow villagers were moved to Keerisuddan in 1977 and 1978 from Polgahawela, Kurunagala and other villages in northwestern Sri Lanka because of ethnic clashes.
“There were 145 families settled there, but I could not remember about the number of persons,” villager Sebasthiyan Piyathas, 76, says. “All the families were provided a half-acre [of] land for settlement by the government.”
The war displaced the villagers – and this time Jeyeseela was one of them – again in 1990 to Vavuniya, a district in northern Sri Lanka. Some also fled to India as refugees.
In 1995, Jeyeseela and 36 families returned to Keerisuddan. But they were displaced again in 2007 because of a government operation against the opposition forces, the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam, LTTE, in their control area. Villagers say they were displaced to Pokkanai, Nanthikkadal and Mullivaikal in the Mullaitivu district.
Brad Adams, Asia director at Human Rights Watch, an international human rights organization, called the area “one of the most dangerous places in the world” in April 2009. The toll of wounded and dead civilians rose at this time as they were trapped in between the government and LTTE forces, according to the United Nations.
“My husband was killed at Pokkanai in Mullaitivu due to shell attack towards the LTTE-controlled area done by the government during the humanitarian operation held at 2009 April,” says Jeyeseela, starting to cry as she pats her daughter’s head.
Many Sri Lankans were displaced during the decades of civil war here, with some still waiting to be resettled. In addition to their lack of homes and land, they also face a lack of income, with women bearing the brunt of the responsibility for taking care of families after their husbands died or were separated from them during the war. Villagers say they also face a lack of health care and other public services.
Sri Lanka suffered from a conflict between the government and the LTTE for more than 25 years, resulting in economic, civil, political, social and cultural devastation. Between 80,000 and 100,000 people were killed during the civil war, according to the United Nations. More than 1 million people were displaced from their homes in the northern and eastern parts of the country, such as in villages in the North Central and Uva provinces adjoining the war zone. After two decades of fighting and three failed attempts of peace talks, the government declared victory and the protracted conflict ended in May 2009.
According to a March 2011 report by the United Nations, the U.N. panel appointed by Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon has determined credible allegations that reveal a different version of the final stages of the war than maintained by the Sri Lankan government.
“The Government says it pursued a ‘humanitarian rescue operation’ with a policy of ‘zero civilian casualties,’” according to the report. “In stark contrast, the Panel found credible allegations, which if proven, indicate that a wide range of serious violations of international humanitarian law and international human rights law was committed both by the Government of Sri Lanka and the LTTE, some of which would amount to war crimes and crimes against humanity.”
Some Sri Lankans were displaced within the country, like Jeyeseela, while others migrated to India, Australia and countries in Europe. Some are still in camps or living with friends and relatives, waiting to be settled.
Jeyeseela says that she and her daughter stayed in welfare centers after the conflict.
“We stayed there until November 2010, and all of us were return to this village on 29th November 2010 with the support of government after the clearance of land mines,” she says.
Jeyeseela currently stays with her mother in a temporary shelter, which was given to them by a nongovernmental organization, NGO. The shelter is located on government land, as Jeyeseela does not have any land to her name.
“I decided to start my life separately and occupied in a government land in the village,” she says. “Now I am requested a permit for that land from officers in the Madhu [Assistant Government Agent] Division. I have to think about the future of my child who does not have her father.”
She says that in addition to not having land, she has also struggled to earn a living.
She says she received nonfood relief items and 25,000 rupees, $230 USD, from the Office of the U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees, the U.N. refugee agency. She says the government also gave her a six-month dry ration. She says Caritas Valvuthayem, an NGO, gave her a sewing machine to help her start a livelihood, but that she couldn’t earn money with it because all the other women received them as well.
“I could not earn [a] single cent with the sewing machine,” she says.
The Rev. Jayapalan, who declined to give his full name, head of Caritas-Valvuthayem, says that the Keerisuddan villagers have benefited from the project, which offers other options for livelihoods as well.
“Our organization is giving livelihood assistances and the training to the displaced families,” Jayapalan says. “At the movement, we are giving assistance for home gardening, tailoring, small business and etc.”
He says the project ended recently because of a lack of funds but that the NGO is willing to continue the project once it has the funds.
“I believe with the livelihood support, [the] displaced can strength[en] their lives to lead for durable solution,” Jayapalan says.
Traditionally, agriculture, irrigation, fisheries and forestry have been the main sources of livelihood among this heavily rural population. But the war disrupted these occupations, leaving families with few options for income.
“Out of these families, 75 percent of families do not have income resources,” the Grama Niladari, the village-level government representative, who declined to be named, says. “Most of them survive by getting dry ration. There is no income-generating opportunity in this village. Because they have lost their all income-generation sources – such as livestock, home gardening, poultry – due to war and displacement. Also, there is no paddy cultivation done due to displacement.”
Women in these conflict-affected areas say they have had to bear a disproportionate share of the burden as the survivors and caregivers of their families. Family separation during the displacements and casualties during the war left many women on their own, according to the U.N. report. Many of these women have been abruptly forced to be female heads of households and sustain their families without shelter, food, basic services, education or a means of livelihood.
“Women, children and the elderly usually bear the brunt of suffering and loss in wars, and the Sri Lankan case is no exception,” according to the 2011 U.N. report.
Jeyeseela says she was unable to register the death of her husband while she was in the security zone in the government operation area so she was unable to apply for the compensation offered by the government.
“I have lost my all the educational certificates and the birth certificate, too,” Jeyeseela says hopelessly.
She is currently working as a preschool teacher in the village, for which she earns 3,500 rupees, $32 USD, per month from an NGO.
Women say that in addition to struggling to provide for their families, health care is also difficult to access.
Jeyeseela says she takes her child to the clinic for vaccinations in Murungan, about 45 kilometers away from her village because there are no health centers in Keerisuddan. Before the displacement, the villagers used to go to Thileepan Clinic, which was only three kilometers from their village.
There are currently two pregnant women, eight lactating mothers, eight disabled people, one paralyzed patient and 14 children under the age 5 in this village – all who have to trek to Murungan Divisional Hospital to get the health services they need, the Grama Niladari says. The pregnant mothers have to catch a 5:30 a.m. bus, and they say that sometimes when they arrive, the health officers there refuse to attend to them, saying that there is a clinic in Madu.
One pregnant mother, Sivakumar Shanthi, says she visited the Madu Mobile Clinic Center earlier this year, but that there were no officers there. The officers changed the date of the clinic without informing the people in advance. No midwives have been visiting this village area either.
Many children born during the displacement also don’t have access to personal documentation, which typically is needed to access public services.
“My daughter has no birth certificate,” Jeyeseela says. “Without [a] birth certificate, it is difficult to send her to school.”
Many villagers say they don’t have full and nondiscriminatory access to national and divisional protection mechanisms, such as services from the Additional District Registrar, social service officers and medical officer of health.
Women form the majority of the displaced population that has suffered the consequences of war, mostly in regards to their health, nutrition and protection. Hence, women have various needs when it comes to rehabilitation, reintegration, resettlement, health care, leisure and employment. These needs are not exhaustive, but are reflective of the immediate priority needs that should be addressed in post-conflict settings.
Print
