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| A train passes by the American
Embassy in Colombo. |
| Photo by James Overly |
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| U.S. Ambassador, E. Ashley
Wills |
| Courtesy of American Embassy,
Colombo |
E. Ashley Wills, departing U.S. Ambassador to Sri
Lanka and the Maldives, acknowledges that for more
than two decades, Americans have associated Sri
Lanka with trouble. But, Wills says, times have
changed.
“Sri Lanka is one of the most under-appreciated
countries I can think of, but it is about to emerge
in a starring role internationally. It’s time
for Americans to get to know Sri Lanka, visit it,
and take advantage of what it has to offer. The vision
of ‘exotic Ceylon” (Sri Lanka’s colonial
name) is about to recreated,” Wills says.
Most observers here would call such descriptions understatements.
They reflect the long path Sri Lanka has traversed
since the early 1970’s, when the country adopted
strongly socialist political and economic policies.
More significantly, the country is just emerging from
a vicious twenty-year civil war that impoverished
the country, both in spirit and treasure. Internationally,
the country has departed from the naïve and unrealistic
“Third World-think” that diminished its
stature in America and the West.
“We began to examine our relationship with Sri
Lanka as its policies began to diverge from the Non-Aligned
Movement (NAM) and Group of 77 (G-77) in the 1990’s.
As the (experiments with socialism ended and the)
economy re-opened, our bilateral relations began to
improve, “ Wills recounts. “Now, our bilateral
relations are excellent, and the U.S. has worked effectively
with governments of both major parties.”
But even as bilateral relations began to improve,
the civil war between the “Tamil Tigers,”
known formally as the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam
or LTTE, and the government of Sri Lanka complicated
the relationship. “The United States felt some
sympathy for the Tamils, because they were clearly
being discriminated against. But terrorists took over
their movement, and adopted means and methods that
we found deeply offensive. Moreover, the U.S. could
not support the Tamil demand for a separate state,”
Wills says.
On the other hand, Wills continues, the U.S. found
it difficult to support a democratic government facing
a terrorist threat, because the Sri Lankan Security
Forces were committing a number of serious human rights
violations against the Tamils.
The assumption of power by the current government
near the end of 2001 changed the situation. “This
government came to power committed to ending the war
and further opening the economy. It’s already
the most open economy in South Asia, but this government
wants Sri Lanka to be able to compete globally, and
it is justified in believing that it’s possible,”
Wills says.
A government with these goals, oriented toward working
with the U.S., led the U.S. to be more active politically
and economically. “In Sri Lanka’s quest
for peace, we use our prestige and authority to back
up the (Norwegian-brokered) peace negotiations,”
Wills says.
“We still regard the LTTE as a terrorist organization,
and no nation agrees with the LTTE demand for a separate
state. But the Tamil grievances are real and must
be dealt with,” Wills says. Because the LTTE
is listed on the U.S.’s Foreign Terrorist Organizations
list, “we have no contact with them but communicate
our positions publicly. We tell the LTTE through our
public statements that they have an historic opportunity
to transform their movement into a democratic movement.
Only, and I stress only, if they do that, will the
U.S. take the LTTE off the FTO list,” Wills states.
That posture gives the Sri Lankan government moral
support that is buttressed by official Washington
reception and support given Sri Lankan leaders. “Prime
Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe had an excellent meeting
in the White House with President Bush last year,
and Secretary of State Powell and Deputy Secretary
of State Armitage are both personally supporting the
peace process with strong statements when indicated.”
Wills adds that Washington sees the prime minister
as a “leader showing real guts in acknowledging
the mistakes of the past, and in trying to invest
his nation with a sense of possibility.”
And, Wills goes on, Sri Lanka indeed offers possibilities:
“The peace process presents the possibility of
creating a new constitutional environment for a federal
government. The peace process here could easily serve
as an example for other conflicts in the south Asia
region.”
But it is in the economic area that Ambassador Wills
and many others see the real sense of possibility
for Sri Lanka. Wills points out that even during the
height of the war, the country maintained the highest
GDP per capita in the region, and an economic growth
rate that averaged between 4 and 5 percent annually.
The country has “the best indicators” in
the areas of health and literacy in the region, and
a high number of English speakers. “Sri Lanka
could move quickly into the middle income per capita
levels, and could be South Asia’s ‘Singapore,’”
the Ambassador says.
So Wills and his staff have patterned official U.S.
assistance to build on these strengths, and encourage
Sri Lanka to be more competitive globally. The embassy
has identified eight or nine sectors of the economy
with the potential for fast growth and high export
value. “There are immense opportunities for U.S.
trade and investment in information technology, light
manufacturing, agribusiness, tourism, gems and jewelry
design and manufacture, health, basic infrastructure
such as ports, roads, airports, telecommunications,
and power generation.”
“U.S. firms have ignored Sri Lanka, but there
is a market here of 19 million people, next door to
a market of a billion – and Sri Lanka is the
only nation that has signed a Free Trade Agreement
with India. I foresee a major pickup of U.S. investment
here with the end of the war.” |
