The Colombo Chogm: a troubling outcome: W. David McIntyre comments on Chogm 2013, which, obscured by Sri Lankan distractions, was the most controversial since the days of apartheid.

AuthorMcIntyre, W. David
PositionCommonwealth Heads of Government Meeting

The 2013 Chogm Week in Sri Lanka was a disaster for the Commonwealth's reputation and leaves its supporters fearing for its future. Over the last fifteen years the governmental Commonwealth has been declining in comparison with the growth of regional and global summits. The rise of the corporate and voluntary Commonwealths, with their Business, Youth, and People's Forums, has widened participation and raised many hopes. Each of these Commonwealths performed effectively in Sri Lanka, but attracted almost no attention because of the controversy over the host country's human rights record in the aftermath of the brutal termination of its 30-year civil war in 2009. That the distraction was allowed to happen causes real fears for the future of this unique association.

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Chogm 2013 in Colombo was a public relations disaster and a damaging setback for the Commonwealth. This was because media coverage of the run up to the meetings and the meetings themselves was almost exclusively dominated by debate about the aftermath of Sri Lanka's 30-year civil war. Charges of human rights violations and war crimes had led to Sri Lanka's withdrawal from being host in 2011. When the invitation was renewed there were numerous calls for countries and organisations to boycott the meetings in 2013, or for the venue to be changed again, not least because President Mahinda Rajapaksa as host becomes chair-in-office for the Commonwealth for the next two years.

In the event the Canadian prime minister adhered to his longstanding threat to boycott the meetings and the Indian and Mauritian prime ministers also absented themselves. Only 26 out of the Commonwealth's 53 heads of government (sixteen prime ministers, nine presidents, and one ruling monarch) came to represent their countries. Three countries, Grenada, Kiribati, and Maldives, did not attend and Fiji is under suspension. Half of the delegations were led by vice-presidents or ministers. Media concentration on Sri Lankan controversies proved a huge distraction, which all but ruled-out attention to the rich multi-course fare that now fills Chogm Week.

Under normal circumstances it would have been entirely proper for Sri Lanka to play host. In the heyday of Empire Ceylon had been the premier Colonial Office posting and the scene of interesting constitutional experiments. Independent Ceylon was one of the three Asian Dominions that signed the London Declaration of 1949 that marked the start of the New Commonwealth. Sirimavo Bandaranaike was the first women prime minister in the world in 1960 and in 1972 led the country to become of the Republic of Sri Lanka. Members of the Tamil community had long held prominent roles in Sri Lankan public life, but after Bandaranaike introduced policies that favoured Sinhalese some young Tamil activists began to agitate for a secessionist state of Tamil Eelam in the north. Over the years the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam evolved into a guerrilla army that waged war with the government from the 1980s and was not defeated until 2009. They were responsible for the assassination of two heads of government and attempts on the lives of others. Intervention of an Indian peacekeeping force failed to suppress the movement. Attempts of regional devolution were unsuccessful and the final suppression of the Tigers by the Sri Lanka armed forces was accomplished with such force that there was a world-wide outcry about human rights violations against civilians caught up in the war zones.

Examination of these issues by the media was inevitable and necessary, but the matter was of such longstanding and so complex that a fair and balanced...

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