13 July 2014.

His Holiness Pope Francis

Apostolic Palace
00120 Vatican City

Through
His Excellency Archbishop Pierre Nguyen Van Tot,
Apostolic Nuncio to Sri Lanka

Your Holiness,

Regarding your intended visit to Sri Lanka in 2015.

We write to Your Holiness having learnt from press reports of your intention to visit Sri
Lanka in January 2015. The Tamil Civil Society Forum is a network of more than 100
civil society activists in the North-East of Sri Lanka, the homeland of the Tamil people
on the island of Sri Lanka. We write to Your Holiness seeking to raise certain issues and
concerns regarding your visit to Sri Lanka.

While we welcome Your Holiness visit we write to gently forewarn Your Holiness of the
possibility that the Government of Sri Lanka may utilize this visit to serve their political
purposes. We also suggest in this letter how Your Holiness could avoid such crude
political instumentalisation of your visit.

As Your Holiness is well aware the Government of Sri Lanka stands accused of having
committed serious violations of international human rights and humanitarian law
during the last phase of the war in the latter part of 2008 to mid-2009. In the post-war
context the Government of Sri Lanka, despite invoking the rhetoric of reconciliation
has been engaged in acts that are designed to weaken the Tamil Nation. The heavy
presence of the military in Tamil areas, appropriation of lands belonging to the Tamil
people for use by the Sri Lankan Army, the settlement of Sinhalese in what are
historically the traditional homeland of the Tamil people (the North & East of the
island), the all perverse use of torture and violence in the everyday lives of the Tamil
people, the denial of livelihood support for the war affected population are some
examples of the real face of reconciliation underway. The recent incidents of violence
against the Muslim community are an extension of this larger project to consolidate the
Sinhala Buddhist nature of the Sri Lankan state. Both the GoSLs conduct of the war and
their handling of the post- war context, the Tamil people believe amounts to a structural
genocide of the Tamil Nation.

We are informed that Your Holiness in your address to the Bishops from Sri Lanka on
the 3
rd
of June, when they met you as part of their visit to Limina Apostolorum, noted,

Though the war has ended, you rightly note that much work needs to done to promote
reconciliation, to respect the human rights of all the people and to overcome the ethnic
tensions that remain. I would like to join you in offering a particular word of consolation
to all those who lost loved ones during the war and remain uncertain as to their
fateremain close to those who still mourn and suffer the lasting effects of war

Your Holiness was perfectly right in identifying that ethnic tensions remain high and
that there is scant regard for human rights in Post-War Sri Lanka. We are confident that
Your Holiness will appreciate, following your visit to Sri Lanka, that Sri Lanka is not
merely lacking in reconciliation but that the problem is far worse than that - as we
have tried to describe above, the problem is one of consolidating an ethnocratic state.
Your Holiness will no doubt recall that it is this ethnocratic project that led the Tamil
people to take up arms against the Sri Lankan state.

While we welcome your visit, which may provide to be a potential blessing for the war
affected Tamil people, it is is likely that the Government will make use of your visit to
boost its standing amongst the international community of states. To prevent such
appropriation of Your Holinesss visit we would like to suggest that as part of your visit
to the island, that you pay a visit to the war-torn places in the North and East and to
meet the survivors of the brutal war waged against the Tamils.

We would like to particularly suggest that Your Holiness visit Mullivaaykkal, the scene
of the last days of the war on the Tamil people in May 2009 and offer service at the
Church therein. Alternatively or additionally, Your Holiness could visit the Our Lady of
Madu Church in Mannar, and meet the affected people, pray for those who died in the
war and call for accountability, justice and a genuine political solution.

During your meeting with Head of the State in Colombo we wish to suggest that you
openly call upon his Government to stop militarising and colonizing Tamil lands, to
restore the troop presence in the North and East to pre-war levels, end violence against
women, honestly address the problems of the disappeared and the abducted including
Rev. Fathers T. N. Jim Brown and G. A. Frances Joseph, accelerate the process by which
surrendered detainees and all those who are in in communicado detention are released
and allow people to remember the dead. We have no faith in the Sri Lankan
establishment. The only reason for requesting Your Holiness to raise this issue in your
meeting with the Sri Lankan President is so that these issues may get more prominence
and attention.
We are aware that Your Holiness lived through the Dirty War in Argentina from 1976
to 1983, during which at least 20 000 people disappeared. We are also aware that Your
Holiness saved many lives from the military junta during that period. We have much
confidence that you are rightly placed to understand the struggle of our people and to
empathise with our pain and suffering. We earnestly hope that Your Holiness during
your visit to the island will help amplify our voice calling for justice and accountability.

We look forward to hearing from Your Holiness and would be glad to be of any
assistance with regard to those matters raised in this letter.

(On behalf of the Tamil Civil Society Forum)