Sri Lanka Provincial Council Elections Mark Start of Long Reconciliation Process

Sri Lanka Provincial Council Elections Mark Start of Long Reconciliation Process

After three decades of protracted conflict and four years of relative peace, a recent event has emerged as a sign that democracy, albeit ailing, is still alive in the island-nation of Sri Lanka. On Sept. 21, 2013, for the first time in 25 years, provincial council elections were held in the war-ravaged Northern Province, offering the country’s ethnic Tamil minority, largely present in the region, the opportunity to choose its own political destiny.

Sri Lanka established provincial councils in 1987 as a result of the Indo-Sri Lanka Agreement that called for the devolution of power to the provinces in a bid to end the country’s ethnic conflict. Today, Sri Lanka has nine provincial councils, all of which have held regular elections—with the exception of the Northern Province, which was the scene of bloody conflict until the majority Sinhalese government’s victory over the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) in May 2010.

Since then, national and international actors have called for an accelerated process of reconciliation, epitomized for many by the hosting of provincial council elections. Long promised yet long overdue, the elections finally took place in an atmosphere of relative calm and high expectations.

Keep reading for free!

Get instant access to the rest of this article by submitting your email address below. You'll also get access to three articles of your choice each month and our free newsletter:

Or, Subscribe now to get full access.

Already a subscriber? Log in here .

What you’ll get with an All-Access subscription to World Politics Review:

A WPR subscription is like no other resource — it’s like having a personal curator and expert analyst of global affairs news. Subscribe now, and you’ll get:

  • Immediate and instant access to the full searchable library of tens of thousands of articles.
  • Daily articles with original analysis, written by leading topic experts, delivered to you every weekday.
  • Regular in-depth articles with deep dives into important issues and countries.
  • The Daily Review email, with our take on the day’s most important news, the latest WPR analysis, what’s on our radar, and more.
  • The Weekly Review email, with quick summaries of the week’s most important coverage, and what’s to come.
  • Completely ad-free reading.

And all of this is available to you when you subscribe today.

More World Politics Review