OSLO - In Sri Lanka's brutal civil war,
some rebel women end their lives as suicide
bombers that have killed hundreds over the years.
A Norwegian documentary film that follows two
24-year-olds training to do just this has enraged
the Sri Lankan government, but raises important
questions about the conduct of war and its
consequences.
The women are from the
Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE), often
called the Tamil Tigers, a rebel group that has
been fighting for an independent homeland for the
Tamil ethnic minority since the 1970s. The demand
has arisen, they say, in reaction to
abuses and discrimination
by the Sri Lankan government.
A third of
the Tigers are women.
The documentary
My Daughter the Terrorist follows Darshika
and Puhalchudar, two elite female soldiers in the
Tamil Tigers, as they train for missions that can
include suicide bombings against perceived enemy
targets. It also talks to the mother of one,
painting a tragic picture of loss and sacrifice in
war.
According to the film, about 300
hundred suicide bombings are alleged to have been
committed by the Black Tigers, Darshika and
Puhalchudar's elite Tamil Tiger squad founded in
1987. Although the women insist that only military
targets are attacked, Human Rights Watch (HRW)
accuses both the rebels and the military of
serious human rights abuses, including attacks
against civilians and the forced recruitment of
child soldiers.
Hostilities have increased
dramatically following the gradual collapse of
peace talks and a ceasefire brokered by Norway in
2001. A large-scale government offensive against
the rebels is currently raging in the northern
parts of the country, with heavy casualties
reported on both sides.
Active Black Tiger
soldiers have never been interviewed before,
according to the 2007 documentary by Snitt Film
Production. Norwegian director Beate Arnestad had
to spend one-and-a-half years in sensitive
negotiations with the Tamil Tigers before gaining
access during the ceasefire period.
"I
wanted to show the human costs of war," Arnestad
told Inter Press Service. "Very often you only get
official statements from politicians, but I wanted
to see what the real costs are - what happens to a
population that has experienced more than a
generation of warfare. Is this how terrorism is
born? I wondered how people become suicide
bombers, a choice that seems completely
incomprehensible to most of us," she said.
Arnestad added: "Most families live very
traditional lives, and particularly women. For a
woman to first become a soldier and then a suicide
bomber candidate is a huge and radical step."
In the documentary Darshika says she
joined the rebels as a 12-year-old after losing
her father, and suffering abuse and humiliation at
the hands of the military. The young Puhalchudar
and her family were rescued by Tamil Tiger rebels
defending a bridge they had to cross to escape a
military attack.
"Thanks to them [Tamil
Tigers] our family was saved. When we were running
through the shelling the army attacked us ... But
the movement fought back. That's how we survived.
After that I felt that I had to save these [Tamil]
people. I thought that if I don't join the
movement, our people will be forced into slavery,"
Puhalchudar sobs in an emotional scene in the
documentary.
Even though both girls are
Christian, they are not driven by religious
fanaticism. The Tamil Tigers do not adhere to any
particular religion, according to the pair. In the
documentary Darshika asks: "If there is a God, why
does he keep us in this endless misery? Even those
who came to church for protection ended up in
pools of blood."
Producer and co-director
Morten Daae says that while the suicide bombers
are not religious martyrs, they are revered as
heroes. "In the West there is a preconception that
all suicide bombers are fanatical Muslims
expecting virgins in the afterlife, but that is
not the case here," Daae told IPS. "They don't
believe they will be rewarded in the afterlife or
anything like that, but they will be remembered
every year on Heroes' Day, when all the villages
ceremoniously honor their individual martyrs with
pictures and candles.
"They are willing to
go that extra mile to protect their country and
their families and their people, and they are
proud of it. And because they live in a very
male-dominated society, the female Black Tigers
have an extremely high status compared to ordinary
women. They are both respected and feared. When
they are out among civilians you can to a certain
degree see that they radiate much more
self-confidence and authority than the civilian
women next to them."
It took some time for
director Arnestad to gain the girls' trust. Daae
believes that the fact that Arnestad is a woman
helped. "In the beginning the girls were very
careful, and mostly stuck to the official line. I
do think that Beate's position as a woman meant
that her long period of trying to convince them to
open up actually paid off, because it is easier to
talk to a woman. Of course, she is also a very
skilled interviewer."
Things became easier
still when the girls were taken to places they
could relate to, such as childhood sites. Daae
gives the example of a scene in the documentary
where Darshika arrives at a church which was
rebuilt after being destroyed in the war, before
being destroyed again by the 2004 tsunami. "She
broke down completely because this was the church
that she used to attend as a child. After that she
began to pour her heart out."
While My
Daughter the Terrorist has won prizes and has
been well received by most international
audiences, Sri Lanka's government is not very
thrilled. On their website they accuse the
documentary of "glorifying suicide bombers", and
unsuccessfully tried to prevent it being shown at
a film festival in the United States on April 4 by
pressuring the US State Department and the Federal
Bureau of Investigation.
Arnestad does not
understand the government reaction. "The
documentary does not justify terrorism or glorify
suicide bombers - rather the opposite. I also find
it strange that this criticism is being levied a
whole year after we first released the
documentary. I suspect this is because it is being
shown in so many places, while the Sri Lankan
government does its best to impose a complete news
blackout," she said.
Following a suicide
bombing on April 6 that killed the transport
minister and a national Olympic hero, Daae
received anonymous death threats via e-mail. The
producer does not believe that they will be
carried out, but says he understands why some
people have reacted so strongly.
"For some
in Sri Lanka it no doubt appears that a Norwegian
man and a Norwegian woman are being so impudent as
to support people that they consider as mere
butchers, which is quite something. We do not
support them - if we support anyone it must be the
victims. But it is not so surprising that they
feel this way as they have most probably never
actually seen the documentary and have only heard
the government's version of events."
Filming for the documentary wrapped up
just as the ceasefire began to collapse, and
Darshika and Puhalchudar were posted to a new
mission according to the Tamil Tiger leadership.
Arnestad and Daae have not been able to trace
their whereabouts since then, and do not know if
they are still alive.
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