When Dr. Mukesh Kapila arrived in Khartoum in March 2003 as the United Nations Resident and Humanitarian Coordinator for Sudan — the UN’s most senior official in the country — he carried with him the weight of witness: Rwanda’s killing fields, Srebrenica’s mass graves, and the scarred landscapes of Afghanistan, Sierra Leone, Angola, and Myanmar. An Oxford-trained physician who once stitched wounds in Cambridge’s quiet wards, he had long since traded scalpels for cables, convinced that saving a single life meant little if the machinery of massacre was allowed to keep grinding.
But Darfur would test him in ways no previous posting had. The systematic destruction unfolding in Sudan’s western region — villages razed, women raped as weapons of war, entire communities erased — bore the unmistakable signature of genocide. From his office, Kapila sent urgent cables to New York and Geneva, documenting what he identified as crimes of a genocidal nature. He pressed UN leadership and powerful member states “at their highest levels.” The replies were polite — then nonexistent. The world’s capitals had perfected the art of looking away.
Then came Ayesha. After a thousand-kilometre journey across the bloody and burning sands of Darfur, the young woman from Tawila walked into his office bearing testimony that would shatter any remaining illusions: she had been multiply raped in front of her husband and family by Janjaweed militiamen. Alongside her, 110 other women suffered the same fate in public view. "She had heard," Kapila recalled, "that the UN was supposed to stop such things, and so she came to demand action from me."
The rage that rose in him that day was not just at the perpetrators but at the betrayal of a promise. A decade after Rwanda, the world's governments still mouthed "Never Again"—yet when genocide unfolded in real time, they chose inaction. Faced with this moral collapse, Kapila made a calculated decision that would end his UN career but pierce the wall of complicity: "If the world's governments would not listen to me, I would speak directly to the world's peoples."
On March 19, 2004, in the BBC's Nairobi studios, he gave what he calls "the interview of my life"—declaring Darfur the world's greatest humanitarian crisis, comparing it to Rwanda's genocide, and naming Sudan's government as perpetrator. Within three weeks, the Security Council convened. Within six weeks, peacekeepers were authorized. The price was immediate: he was transferred out of Sudan in April 2004, just 13 months into a 24-month assignment, and his mainstream UN career was over.
But he had achieved something larger: in a system designed to muffle dissent, he had proven that one strategically deployed voice could force the world to confront what it preferred not to see. Today, as Professor of Conflict and Humanitarian Affairs at the University of Manchester, Kapila continues his work of challenging established orthodoxies and complacent certainties—writing, teaching, and mentoring a new generation to understand that in the face of atrocity, silence is a form of complicity.
Jaffna Monitor’s exclusive interview with the man who broke the UN’s silence to save Darfur in 2003 — at a time when Darfur is once again burning, becoming the epicentre of Sudan’s latest civil war.
You took the rare step of defying UN protocol by going public about Darfur — a move that ended your posting but changed global awareness. Looking back, what compelled you to take that risk, and how do you see that decision today?
When my efforts within the UN and with powerful member states — including at their highest levels — to secure urgent action to stop the unfolding genocide failed, I felt a deep anger. The world’s top leadership was failing despite the rhetoric of “never again” they had declared after the Rwanda genocide ten years earlier.
I decided then that if the world’s governments would not listen to me, I would speak directly to the world’s peoples. That meant going to the media, and the BBC was the obvious choice. But the question was how to do it with maximum impact.
Then a young woman named Ayesha walked into my office and gave me a detailed account of what had happened to her in a place called Tawila. She had been repeatedly raped in front of her husband and family by Janjaweed militiamen. Alongside her, 110 other women had suffered the same fate.
Amazingly, despite her personal trauma, she found the courage to travel a thousand kilometres across the bloody and burning sands of Darfur to my office in Khartoum. She had heard that the UN was supposed to stop such things — and so she came to demand action from me as its head in Sudan.
I was shaken by her story, and even angrier. How could I let this woman down when she had placed such trust and expectation in me? And so, I decided to speak up immediately — for Ayesha, and for people like her.
You’ve had direct experience in Sudan and have observed its complex humanitarian crises over the years. How do you assess the ongoing conflict there today, and in what ways has the international community fallen short in responding to it?
Sudan has been in some kind of civil war almost continuously since gaining independence from the Anglo-Egyptian colonizers in the 1950s — except for a few brief intervals of peace. The current chapter of conflict began around the turn of the millennium as a dispute between the Islamic fundamentalist, Arab-supremacist elite who ruled Khartoum and the marginalized people of Darfur — communities made up largely of non-Arab, Black African tribes and other ethnic groups.
This escalation came on the back of the South Sudanese struggle for independence. When the Anglo-Egyptian colonisers left, they hastily merged very different peoples and regions into one vast country — Africa’s largest at the time. The Arab populations in the North and along the Nile Valley were culturally and historically distinct from the non-Arab communities in the South and West. But in the rush of decolonization, they were all bundled together under one flag.
When the Islamists came to power in Khartoum, they tried to impose Sharia law and their rigid ideological framework on the country’s culturally diverse regions. That fueled long-simmering tensions between North and South, eventually leading to South Sudan’s independence in 2011. Inspired by that outcome, the people of Darfur — who are also non-Arab and have long been marginalized — began to demand autonomy and equality.
The regime of President Omar al-Bashir reacted with extreme violence. Already reeling from the South’s secession, Khartoum refused to risk losing the West. Remember, Darfur is an enormous region — roughly the size of Spain or France — and Sudan itself is as large as Western Europe.
The government’s response weaponized ethnic divisions, turning the conflict into a campaign of racist violence and ethnic cleansing. It was later declared a genocide by the International Criminal Court — the first genocide of the 21st century. That was around the time I was serving as the head of the United Nations in Sudan, from 2003 to 2004.
The UN intervened, and peacekeepers were deployed; however, while this temporarily froze the conflict, it never truly resolved the root causes. What we are witnessing now is effectively the second chapter of that same unresolved genocide from twenty years ago.
Today’s fighting is between two generals who, ironically, share the same origins. The Rapid Support Forces (RSF) — the militia now accused of atrocities — are the descendants of the Janjaweed, the paramilitary group originally mobilized by President al-Bashir two decades ago. The RSF’s rival, the Sudanese Armed Forces, represents the remnants of the old regime. Both groups once fought on the same side; now they are locked in a deadly struggle for power.
Meanwhile, the people of Sudan are once again enduring the same horrors — massacres, rapes, forced displacements, and famine — as the world watches. What we see today in Darfur is not a new war, but the tragic continuation of one that was merely paused, never ended.
So, Dr. Kapila, are the groups involved in the current conflict still fighting with the aim of establishing a separate state?
No, they’re not fighting for a separate country. From the very beginning, they weren’t seeking an independent state because they knew that would be extremely difficult to achieve. What they were fighting for was greater autonomy, respect, and recognition of their grievances — an end to the long-standing marginalization of Sudan’s peripheral regions.
This kind of marginalization happens in many large countries: the further one moves from the center, the more neglected and alienated people tend to feel. Sudan is no exception.
So no, they are not fighting for their own country. Even the Rapid Support Forces (RSF) are not seeking independence — they are fighting to dominate and ultimately control the entire country of Sudan.
That said, I wouldn’t rule out the possibility of partition in the future. Remember, the old Sudan eventually had to be divided into Sudan and South Sudan because that was the only way to resolve a struggle that had lasted for two generations, ever since independence.
Could you explain which external actors or regional powers are currently backing the RSF and, conversely, who is supporting the Sudanese government’s side in this conflict?
There are numerous allegations, and according to researchers, analysts, and United Nations reports, the Sudanese Armed Forces (SAF), the so-called government or military regime now based in Khartoum, are reportedly receiving support from countries such as Egypt and Saudi Arabia.
On the other hand, the Rapid Support Forces (RSF) are believed to be backed by the United Arab Emirates. These countries, of course, officially deny any involvement. But the evidence points to external support, because the weaponry being used — drones, modern communications systems, surveillance equipment, and the latest machine guns — are clearly not produced in Sudan. They are being imported, which means someone is supplying them, and someone is paying for them.
A number of countries are benefiting from this war by selling arms in exchange for Sudan’s wealth. The country is rich in agricultural land, gold, and other minerals, particularly in the Darfur region. Illegal and unregulated gold mining, worth billions of dollars, has become a key source of funding for weapons purchases. This cycle of exploitation and arms trading is what continues to fuel the conflict.
Beyond the economic dimension and arms trade, are there other strategic or political factors influencing the UAE’s support for the RSF and the backing provided by other countries to the Sudanese government?
These countries deny providing any armed support. In fact, they are part of what’s known as the Quad — a peace initiative led by Egypt, Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, and the United States. Several meetings have been held under this framework in Washington, Jeddah, Cairo, and Geneva; however, none have yielded meaningful results to date.
The problem, as I see it, is that when the so-called peacemakers are themselves involved — directly or indirectly — in provoking or benefiting from the conflict, their neutrality inevitably comes into question.
Of the four, the United States is probably the only actor that can claim some degree of neutrality in this situation. Ironically, while Washington has been criticized for bias in other conflicts, such as Gaza, in Sudan’s case, it hasn’t been fueling either side. The U.S. has even gone so far as to declare the atrocities in Darfur earlier this year a genocide, signaling its clear stance on the humanitarian dimension of the crisis.
By contrast, the regional members of the Quartet — Egypt, Saudi Arabia, and the UAE — each have vested interests and cannot be viewed as impartial mediators. Meanwhile, institutions that might have been expected to play a more credible role — such as the African Union, the Arab League, and even the United Nations — remain largely paralyzed, indifferent, or ineffective.
A few months ago, the veteran journalist Anita Pratap told me that the United Nations has increasingly become a ‘toothless body’ when it comes to preventing wars or intervening to stop genocides. As someone who has held senior leadership positions within the UN, how do you view the organization’s current effectiveness in responding to crises like Sudan?
I would say that the United Nations has been very effective for much of its 80-year history. Certainly, during my time there, about 20 years ago in Sudan, we achieved significant results. We successfully secured a Security Council resolution, deployed peacekeepers on the ground, and facilitated the delivery of large-scale humanitarian aid to displaced people and refugees in neighboring countries.
The UN also played a key role in helping Sudan transition from a military regime to a civilian-led administration, following a popular uprising that unexpectedly ousted the military rulers.
However, in the past two decades, the UN has gradually become paralyzed by global geopolitics. Increasingly, countries prefer to act bilaterally or form their own multilateral alliances to handle specific conflicts — whether it’s Gaza, Ukraine, or other crisis zones.
The UN, after all, is only the sum of its member states. It’s those member states that make war or peace, while the UN itself is merely the secretariat. Currently, the prevailing mood among many member states is to pursue their own agendas, often disregarding international law and norms.
The UN does not have its own standing army or peace enforcement mechanism. It does have institutions like the International Court of Justice and the International Criminal Court, but if member states choose not to comply, there’s very little the UN can do beyond issuing condemnations.
To its credit, today’s UN is far more outspoken than in the past. Unlike in earlier times, when it preferred to ‘see no evil, hear no evil, and speak no evil’ — the modern UN openly documents and denounces human rights abuses and atrocities. But the paradox is that this honesty has made it increasingly unpopular with certain governments, who react by expelling UN officials or restricting their access whenever they feel criticized.
So, yes, the UN still has a voice — but it no longer has the influence or authority it once had to enforce peace.
Don’t you think people around the world are beginning to lose faith in the United Nations and its ability to uphold justice or prevent conflicts?
Oh, People lost faith in the UN a long time ago. But we must distinguish between the different parts of the United Nations.
There’s the political UN, based in New York — the Security Council, the General Assembly, and so on. People have long since lost faith in that system. The General Assembly brings together governments, not ordinary people — and, unfortunately, many of those governments today are either outright dictatorships or democracies in name only. So, in that sense, yes, people have lost trust in the UN as a political institution.
However, when it comes to the humanitarian side of the UN — largely based here in Geneva — the picture is somewhat different. Organizations like the World Health Organization (WHO), UNICEF, and the Rome-based World Food Programme continue to do important work, providing humanitarian and development assistance. But even they face serious challenges. They rely on member-state funding, which has been declining for years — not just under Trump, but as part of a bigger global trend.
At the same time, many recipient countries are demanding a greater say in how aid and development assistance are used, asserting their own sovereignty and priorities. Meanwhile, humanitarian agencies are under growing pressure, often accused of not being fully neutral or impartial. Some crises receive enormous international attention and funding, while others are neglected. When people see, for example, Afghanistan ignored while other regions receive disproportionate support, they naturally question whether the UN still upholds its founding principle — to help everyone according to need.
There’s also a broader systemic issue. The global architecture has changed. Regional and sub-regional organizations — such as SAARC, ASEAN, and the African Union — were expected to take on greater responsibilities as the UN receded. But they, too, have been constrained by internal politics and limited capacity.
As the UN’s influence diminishes due to global geopolitics, regional organizations have not filled the resulting vacuum. Multilateralism itself is now under severe strain, caught in competition between rival institutions and blocs of countries. And that, ultimately, has deepened the world’s loss of faith — not only in the UN, but in the entire multilateral system.
You described what happened in Sudan as the first genocide of the 21st century. May I ask — do you believe that what happened in Sri Lanka during the final phase of its civil war could also be classified as genocide?
No, I do not think so. I think it was very brutal. I've been to Sri Lanka several times — I went to the Northeast, to Jaffna, to Trincomalee — and it was terrible brutality. It was a very brutal civil war in Sri Lanka, and I think much of the world didn’t really know about that brutality because, at that time, there was no social media bringing out the news. The press was always excluded.
The contrast is with Gaza, where there is no independent press access today, but you still receive a lot of news from there. You also get a lot of news from Darfur, amazingly, thanks to local journalists and courageous ordinary people who, at great risk to their lives, shoot videos and send them out to the world. After proper validation, their voices are heard.
But in the case of Sri Lanka’s long and extremely brutal civil war, we didn’t have that kind of information coming out then. Nevertheless, from what came out afterwards, we began to realize how brutal it had been.
Technically, it has not been proven that it was a genocide. To establish genocide, you have to demonstrate a command and control structure with a stated, clear intention and policy to eliminate a group of people on account of their identity. Unless you can prove that the Sinhala-dominated government in Colombo was trying to remove all Tamils from Sri Lanka — to push them into the sea or kill them all, as the Nazis did to the Jews in Europe — you cannot legally call it genocide.
However, some of this preoccupation with the term “genocide,” I think, is a waste of time. Why? Because for the victims, it doesn’t matter whether their suffering results from genocide, crimes against humanity, or simply extreme brutality. If you are raped multiple times, tortured, starved, or beaten, it makes no difference whether your suffering is categorized as “genocidal rape” or not. It is irrelevant to the human experience of pain.
You also have to be careful using the word “genocide,” because when you invoke it — as in Gaza — it makes peace-finding more difficult. I don’t think what Israel has done in Gaza constitutes genocide, either, although many experts think otherwise. It is very bad, extremely bad, war crimes, and even crimes against humanity. But genocide? There is no legal evidence to support that. However, that’s for the International Court of Justice to decide.
Once you label something as genocide, it complicates reconciliation. History shows that in post-genocide situations, peace often has to be imposed through violence or other destruction that eliminates the genocide-committing adversary. For example, when the allies eliminated the Nazis in the Second World War, or the Vietnamese intervened against Cambodia’s Khmer Rouge, and exiled Rwandan forces in Uganda crushed the genocidaires in Kigali.
Meanwhile, people often think that using the word “genocide” brings more attention or implies a higher degree of seriousness than “ordinary brutality.” That’s not necessarily true. Suffering is suffering — and for those who endured it, making that distinction is meaningless.
Would you say that Tamil political parties and advocacy groups have failed to make headway internationally, partly because they continue to define what happened in Sri Lanka as genocide — a position that has not been substantiated before international bodies?
I have great respect for the Tamil diaspora, but, yes, on this political aspect, they have failed. But that happens elsewhere, too. For example, in Balochistan, the Baloch people say that genocide is being committed against them. The Hazara people in Afghanistan say that the Pashtuns and the Taliban have committed genocide against them. People shout “genocide” left, right, and centre to gain attention in frustration against unresolved marginalization and injustices, as the Tamils and other groups mentioned above have obviously suffered.
It also doesn’t mean their suffering isn’t real — my statement is not intended to undermine their pain and suffering. But the overuse and careless use of the word genocide have made it almost meaningless nowadays. So when a real genocide happens — as with the Rohingya in Myanmar, in Darfur, or as it happened in the past in Rwanda, Cambodia, Srebrenica, or against the Yazidis in Iraq and Syria — people no longer believe it. The term has lost much of its gravity.
I remember once, when my daughters were very young, my elder daughter was beating up the younger one. I think one might have been eight or nine, the other about five. Obviously, the younger one was being overpowered, and she started shouting, “Genocide! Genocide! Genocide!” — just to get parental attention to stop the fight.
But I don’t blame deeply suffering people for screaming genocide in their agony. However, we must be very careful. In any case, the remedy is the same, and the impact is the same — whether or not a war is officially recognized as genocide — because the suffering is the same. And if you look at the Rome Statute’s definitions of genocide and crimes against humanity, the penalty is also the same.
Practically speaking, what should Tamil leaders do differently to garner the international support and pressure necessary to hold the Sri Lankan state accountable?
Well, the more they use terms that the rest of the world doesn’t believe, the less likely it is that they will achieve either accountability or attention for their past grievances. In these days of hyperbole, many people tend to use extreme language about almost everything. They can shout as much as they like, but that won’t necessarily help their cause.
And by the way, let’s not forget that the LTTE was among the nastiest groups. I compare them to the RSF now in Sudan. The LTTE committed some terrible, terrible, terrible things in Sri Lanka. No amount of grievances that the Tamil population felt — and undoubtedly, they were discriminated against, including through language discrimination and many other injustices — can justify the vicious, militant, and, you could even say, reverse-genocidal response from the LTTE. They were some of the nastiest terror groups in the world, much like the RSF in Darfur today, or Hamas in Gaza, or Hezbollah in Lebanon.
Two wrongs do not make a right. I’m afraid that if the Tamil people want accountability, justice, and attention, they will have to be far more measured in how they argue their point of view. They must understand all aspects of their own history. And after so many years have passed, accountability and justice for the past must go hand in hand with moving forward.
As for the Tamil diaspora in other countries, it’s very easy to sit abroad and fuel the fire back home with words. That’s true for all diasporas worldwide. Sitting comfortably and safely somewhere gives them the freedom to say anything they like. But words spoken carelessly from afar can have serious consequences on the ground.
Don’t get me wrong — I’m not taking sides here. I’m not saying the Sinhala side was any better. The Sinhala-supremacist, almost fascistic approach of the Sinhala-dominated authorities at that time, and the militarization that came with it — I have nothing but condemnation for that side either.
You compared the LTTE with the RSF. Could you please elaborate on that comparison in terms of their modus operandi and overall way of functioning? What similarities led you to draw that parallel?
Well, I think in the case of the RSF now, they are essentially the sons of the Janjaweed who carried out the first chapter of the Darfur genocide twenty years ago — and now they are enacting the second chapter. It’s the same people, just operating under a new name.
The techniques they use are rooted in terror: population displacement, the control of entire communities, depriving people of freedom, raping women, ruining agriculture and other means of survival, destroying the livelihoods of those who are not on their side, and preventing people from fleeing to safety. What we have now in Darfur is a situation where thousands have fled, but in truth, hundreds of thousands more should have escaped by now. They are being stopped, concentrated in cities and towns, trapped, and then slaughtered and butchered. This is happening particularly in Al-Fashir, as we are now learning from the accounts emerging.
Today, satellites in space can almost count the massacre sites in Sudan, even detecting bodies on the ground and blood-stained soil.
Now, in the case of the LTTE — from what I know, and have read, and later seen with my own eyes — they employed very similar tactics. They were extremely controlling of the populations under their command, brutally punishing anyone who disagreed with them. They used what we would call terror tactics — terrorizing even their own people and communities. They followed a very intolerant, militant ideology in pursuit of a cause that may have been justified, but they perverted it.
Of course, there are differences between Sri Lanka and Sudan — contexts and times are different — but in broad terms, and even in many specific aspects, I see a great deal of similarity between the horrors committed in the two places.
Could you please explain — especially for a die-hard LTTE supporter based in Jaffna — why the LTTE is considered a terrorist organization in international terms?
Right. I think the definition of a terrorist organization is one that uses terrorizing tactics — that is, it infringes human rights on a massive scale against specific populations. Those populations may be those under its own control or may be opposing communities. Such groups employ asymmetric approaches: in conventional warfare, soldiers fight soldiers, and under international humanitarian law, they are obligated to protect civilians. In terror approaches — and with terrorist organizations — civilians become the tools of war. They are put on the front line and effectively weaponized.
Terror groups also rely on subjugating the populations they control for their own sustenance and survival; they parasitize those communities. That is why they are terrorist organizations. A real army would do the opposite: it would conduct its fighting with command and control while protecting the populations in its area of operations.
Therefore, for die-hard LTTE supporters, this is a blot on their history — and it is a shame for any Tamil who still supports them. Tamils may have historical grievances — marginalization and dispossession driven by supremacist policies from Colombo — absolutely, and those grievances are legitimate, just as the Darfuris have legitimate grievances against Khartoum. But when a movement adopts not just violent means, but population-parasitizing methods — putting women, children, the elderly, and the vulnerable in harm’s way, treating them as expendable — then I lose all sympathy. These are terror groups that need to be put down in some way or another, just like Hamas in Gaza.
But then, what would be the appropriate term for the actions of the Sri Lankan Army, which also committed unimaginable atrocities during the final phase of the war?
Not just the Sri Lankan Army, but many armies across Africa and elsewhere, including official state forces, have behaved extremely badly and committed huge atrocities.
When I was in Jaffna on my last visit, I visited the hospital there and saw the memorial. I heard the story — a disputed one — about how the LTTE had taken refuge inside the hospital, and the Indian Peacekeeping Forces attacked it. Many people were killed in the crossfire, and many laws were broken. It was not a good chapter, neither for the so-called Indian peacekeeping intervention, which was not really peacekeeping but peace enforcement, nor for the Tamil fighters.
The truth is, there are bad armies all over the world. Many have carried out coups — for example, in Mali and several other countries in the Sahel in recent months. The Sudanese Armed Forces, the RSF’s opponents, have also committed numerous atrocities. And beyond that, we have well-documented cases of American and Western forces committing atrocities in Iraq.
Wherever you go, you will find stories — well-proven stories — of ill-disciplined militaries breaking the military code of conduct and international humanitarian law, behaving, at times, like terrorists themselves. All one can do is condemn it.
And yes, from what we have read and learned, the Sri Lankan Armed Forces behaved very badly.
Ultimately, what this tells us is that armies everywhere must be better trained and held accountable for their actions. And that accountability can only come through strong and reasonably democratic governments.
Can such actions by state forces be described as state terrorism?
No, I don’t think so. If you call it state terrorism, what are you really saying? It’s a careless use of two words — state and terrorism. All it does is become another polemic, another social-media trope: “I don’t like that government, therefore it’s a state terrorist.”
Remember, by definition, a state has a monopoly over the legitimate use of violence. Only a state is authorized to maintain an army. Only a state has courts that can sentence people to life imprisonment or death. The very definition of a state is its monopoly on the use of force — ideally used wisely — because the state’s duty is to ensure security.
However, if you have a badly governed state that oppresses its own people — and there are many such states around the world — then that’s what it is: an oppressive state, a non-democratic state, a corrupt or dictatorial regime. You can call it many things, but I don’t think state terrorism is a meaningful concept.
Of course, a state’s armed forces may have special units – special forces - that conduct commando-type operations that can be quite brutal. They may use tactics that resemble terror tactics — but they justify them as military necessity. Israel, for instance, has defended its brutal actions in Gaza on that basis – but , of course,many are skeptical of that excuse for Israeli misbehaviours.
So, while states can behave in oppressive or even brutal ways, and that is to be condemned, I don’t believe calling them state terrorists adds any real depth to the discussion.
Sir, you also described Hamas as a terrorist organization. Could you please elaborate on that — in what sense do you consider it to fall under that definition?
Undoubtedly, Hamas is the foremost enemy of the Palestinian people. I believe that the cause of Palestine — its self-determination and the dream of a Palestinian state — has suffered such a severe setback that I doubt we will see a Palestinian state in my lifetime. Perhaps it might happen in yours — you’re younger than I am — but even that seems uncertain. I don’t think it will happen anytime soon, and maybe not for another fifty years.
Any legitimate movement with a genuine grievance, campaigning for the rights of its people, loses its legitimacy when it resorts to vicious and brutal violence — not just ordinary violence, but terror-based violence. When that happens, it undermines and damages its own cause.
Today, I cannot see why the world would support Palestinian independence when the Palestinians allowed Hamas to grow among them, while their own government in the West Bank — now increasingly occupied by Israel — has also behaved poorly. And when Hamas began posing a threat to its neighbours, it further discredited the movement.
I am totally against Israel’s inhumane conduct in Gaza — absolutely. But one must understand this: having a legitimate cause does not entitle you to adopt illegitimate means to achieve it. When you use terror and violence as tools, you destroy the very legitimacy of your original cause.
How do you view the fact that the Israeli Army’s strikes on Gaza have killed more than 70,000 people — mostly civilians, including thousands of women and children?
Well, I think that’s an enormous number of people — obviously, seventy thousand too many. Of course, some of them are militants, though I don’t know how many. But even if twenty thousand were militants, that would still mean fifty thousand civilians killed.
You must understand that this is a highly modern form of warfare. Gaza is one of the most densely populated places on Earth. The nature of warfare today is largely urban — I’ve seen it myself in Sarajevo, in other cities, and now in Ukraine. Modern wars are fought in cities because no one wants to control empty land. Cities are where everything is — people, infrastructure, power — and that makes urban warfare extraordinarily difficult.
Even with modern precision weaponry, protecting civilians in such conflicts is almost impossible, and the collateral damage is inevitably high. When combatants choose to fight from within urban areas, civilians around them inevitably lose their protection. In Gaza, the only way Hamas could fight was from tunnels beneath buildings and from within large apartment blocks. When that happens, civilians around those sites lose their legal and physical protection.
That does not mean Israel is justified — I am not saying that. It’s important not to misunderstand me. But people should not be naïve: when you fight in cities, most of the casualties will be civilians, especially when the group you’re fighting against is using civilians as human shields and fighting from among them.
Even under international humanitarian law, there is something called the “military imperative.” However, there is no specific legal definition of what level of civilian harm is acceptable. You cannot say, for instance, that it’s permissible to kill two civilians for every one combatant, or ten, or a hundred. There is no formula. It all depends on context — and on the perceived value of the target.
If, for example, a Hezbollah leader in Beirut is being targeted by Israel, and that leader is surrounded by thousands of civilians, the collateral damage might be much higher because that individual holds enormous strategic importance. The principle of proportionality simply says that civilian harm must be minimized, and that the damage caused must be proportionate to the military objective — but “proportionate” is a subjective term.
So yes, what has happened in Gaza is grossly inhumane and brutal. But I believe the responsibility for that tragedy lies equally with both Israel and Hamas.
In your opinion, why did Hamas choose to launch the October 7, 2023, attacks on Israel — fully aware that Israel not only had the capability and the will to eliminate its leadership, but would also unleash such widespread mayhem in retaliation?
There are several reasons. I think Hamas was concerned that several Arab countries were beginning to normalize relations with Israel. That process had already begun under President Trump’s administration, when countries like the UAE and others established diplomatic ties, and even Saudi Arabia was engaged in discussions. Hamas felt increasingly marginalized by these developments.
It’s important to remember that Palestinians are not particularly popular in many Arab countries. Despite all the expressions of solidarity we see today from fellow Arabs and Muslims, the reality is quite different. When you actually go to the Arab world, you’ll find that Palestinians are often treated poorly. The Arab world’s approach to the Palestinians has always been, frankly, quite hypocritical.
Hamas, therefore, was under a great deal of pressure and wanted to prevent any further Arab–Israeli rapprochement. That was one reason. The other, I believe, was a gross miscalculation. They thought that by striking this blow, Israel would retaliate, but in a limited and controllable way. They completely underestimated the scale and ferocity of Israel’s response.
It was an act of overconfidence — and a disastrous misjudgment — on Hamas’s part.
Many scholars and international observers have described what is happening in Gaza as a genocide. However, in this interview, you said you don’t believe it qualifies as one. Could you please elaborate on why you hold that view?
Well, I think it’s ultimately for the International Criminal Court and the International Court of Justice — both of which are currently handling related cases — to determine that question. In my view, yes, there have been many statements from the Israeli government that sound genocidal in tone. However, in the middle of a war, people often make such statements as part of their wartime rhetoric — saying things like, “We’ll destroy the enemy,” or “We’ll crush all of them,” or “Not a single one will survive.”
Now, to prove genocide, one must establish that the Israeli government intends to destroy, in whole or in part, a particular group of people on account of their identity — in this case, Palestinians. I find that highly unlikely. For one, such a goal would be unachievable. And second, there are large numbers of Palestinians, or rather, Arab-origin people – more than two million - living within Israel itself, that is more than 20 percent of the population. There are even Arab members of the Israeli Parliament and Arab officials in institutions, even the army. So, I remain skeptical that there is a formal genocidal intent beyond the blood-curdling rhetoric, which is a war tactic.
Of course, many will disagree with me. That said, perhaps the problem is that the definition of genocide within the Genocide Convention is outdated. Like all laws, international law evolves — it doesn’t remain static. But the Convention has not - it dates back to the 1940s, immediately after the Nazi Holocaust. The world has changed dramatically since then. Maybe that definition needs to be revisited, reinterpreted, or refined. However, given how international law operates, it’s virtually impossible today to amend such a foundational convention. The International Criminal Court, which is relatively young, simply adopted the existing definition from the Genocide Convention.
So, if you’re strictly applying the law, it will be extremely difficult to prove genocide in this case. But as I said earlier, this is a largely pointless debate — because the suffering is identical, whether it’s genocidal or not. The victims endure the same agony. The legal penalties are similar, and the moral responsibility is the same. More importantly, peace is far more achievable in conflicts that are not defined as genocidal.
That’s why shouting “genocide” is not in the interest of peace if your eventual goal is reconciliation. Because the label traps people in black boxes. Imagine accusing your adversary of genocide — essentially comparing them to Hitler. Once you’ve painted someone as pure evil, they’re so damned that they have little left. So that accusation – if poorly justified - can actually push alleged genocidaires toward further atrocities, because they are cornered. They can feel they have nothing left to lose. So they may as well do their worst.
So, I think those who casually throw around the word genocide — social media warriors, diaspora activists living safely abroad, or simply thoughtless people — are doing real harm. The careless and emotional use of that term only worsens the prospects for peacemaking, reconciliation, and eventual recovery.
Sir, between 2003 and 2004, you served as the United Nations’ senior-most official in Sudan. During that period, did you play any role in — or have oversight of — the process that eventually led to the partition of Sudan?
No, I actually tried very hard to prevent the partition of Sudan. The division happened much later — about seven years after I left in 2004, when South Sudan gained independence in 2011.
During my tenure, I was involved in the peace talks between the North and the South. Those negotiations resulted in an agreement for a five-year transitional period, followed by a referendum, and it was through that referendum that the people of the South voted for independence.
Personally, I was very sad to see Sudan break apart. It is always sad when a country divides, because it means that people have reached a point where they can no longer live together. On a purely human level, that is deeply tragic.
Ideally, I would much rather see nations stay united. I often think how wonderful it would have been if the whole of Africa were one country — or if India, Pakistan, and Bangladesh had remained a single entity. Of course, historically, there was never truly a “united India” — it was the British who brought all those regions together under colonial rule — but you understand the broader point I’m making.
That said, if peaceful coexistence becomes impossible — if forced unity itself perpetuates conflict — then separation, for the sake of peace and development, can sometimes be the better path.
You personally witnessed the birth of new nations such as South Sudan. In your opinion, why did the Sri Lankan Tamils — or the LTTE, which fought for a separate state — ultimately fail in creating an independent country?
Because they chose the path of violence. Instead of working to build a pluralistic, democratic Sri Lanka for all its citizens — regardless of ethnicity or religion — they pursued a separatist course. No government in Colombo – democratic or dictatorial, good or bad - would have accepted that, and it inevitably led to the vicious war that followed.
In the end, I believe the Tamil side was destined to lose precisely because it resorted to terror tactics. In much the same way, the people of Gaza were bound to lose under Hamas’s leadership. If, instead, the Tamil movement had continued to campaign peacefully for human rights and equality — even in opposition to a dominant government in Colombo — perhaps twenty years of negotiation and debate might have led to a more federated Sri Lanka today, with greater autonomy for its regions. There could have been a Tamil self-governing unit within a united Sri Lanka.
The problem, however, lies in the nature of the country itself. Sri Lanka is a relatively small island — not small in an absolute sense, but small compared with, say, India — and its communities are deeply interconnected. To divide it into “Tamil land” and “Sinhala land” or any other separate entities was never a viable idea.
Similarly, I don’t think there will be a separate Palestinian state anytime soon. I can’t imagine two viable, separate states coexisting in such a tiny stretch of the Middle East. In fact, I now believe the best long-term solution there may be a single, shared state — call it Israel-Palestine, or whatever name you prefer — where everyone lives together with equal rights in the same geographical space. Perhaps that will happen one day, but not for another fifty years.
Likewise, in Sri Lanka, after a 30-year civil war — nearly two generations — the outcome is evident. Sri Lanka was once on the verge of becoming a developed nation: educated, stable, and prosperous. But the war dragged it backward. Ultimately, I never thought a separate Tamil state was ever a viable proposition.
Do you mean to say that in the 21st century it is no longer possible to create a new country through armed rebellion or the use of force?
Well, no, you can create countries through forced – there are examples -, but not through the use of terror.
If you look at what happened in Syria or Iraq with the Islamist movements, or with Boko Haram in Nigeria, you’ll see that these groups tried to carve out their own so-called “states.” They created what they called an Islamic Caliphate — but it was never going to be allowed to survive. And rightly so. I don’t believe that using extreme violence to create a state can ever bring stability or security. Yes, you might be able to occupy some territory for a while, establish some control, and even function as a de facto state for a period.
Take Somaliland, for example — it has effectively separated from Somalia, and while it’s not internationally recognized, it operates almost like a country. You can even fly there; it has institutions and order. But notice the key difference: they’re no longer fighting each other.
Recognition ultimately of statehood by other states is secondary. If you look at Europe, there are many nations that were at war with each other less than a century ago, and today many are part of a union — living, trading, and cooperating together — while several others are queuing to join up.
My well-wishing view is clear: for Sri Lankans of all communities, the real path forward lies in learning to live together within one country.
It seems that almost everywhere the British ruled as a colonial power — whether in Sudan, India, or Sri Lanka — they left behind deep divisions and unresolved conflicts. In your view, why has British colonial withdrawal so often been followed by instability or strife?
Well, it wasn’t just the British. The Belgians did it in Congo, the French did it across their colonies — some of which are still in conflict — and the Spanish did it as well, particularly in areas like Western Sahara, which remains unsettled even today.
But the real question is: how long are we going to keep blaming colonialism for everything? Colonialism was undoubtedly a bad thing — generally speaking, it’s never a good idea for one nation to colonize another. However, many decades have now passed, and the problems we see today are, in truth, entirely homegrown.
All the crises unfolding across Africa, for instance, are largely the result of contemporary leadership and governance failures. The same could be said, perhaps, of Sri Lanka.
In today’s world, if you had genuine regional cooperation — common trade, freedom of movement, intermarriage, shared opportunities — then it wouldn’t really matter whether one was in Sri Lanka, India, or Pakistan. That’s how Europe functions today —not perfectly, but mostly.
So I don’t accept that colonialism can be blamed for the state of the world now. The issues we are dealing with are the creation of more recent generations — and, in particular, of self-serving leaders who have failed their own people.
Tell me about yourself, sir?
Well, I’m originally from India — from Chandigarh — and I came to England when I was sixteen on a scholarship. I later won a place at Oxford University to study medicine, and after that began working in Cambridge as a medical doctor. But I grew frustrated dealing with the same problems of the same patients again and again. I wanted to address the root causes in society, so I moved into public health.
From there, I was seconded to the United Nations and began building an international career — initially in public health, particularly in HIV and AIDS, and later in global health and development. I also worked with the World Health Organization in Geneva and, before that, headed the British Government’s Conflict and Humanitarian Affairs Department within the Department for International Development, which is now part of the Foreign Office.
In that role, I found myself increasingly drawn into conflict and war zones. I was in Rwanda during the genocide, in Bosnia during the war, and have worked in North Korea, Myanmar, Sierra Leone, Angola, Afghanistan, Cambodia, and many other major crisis zones, including Iraq and Iran. Over the years, I’ve developed a specialisation in conflict and humanitarian affairs, both from the political and humanitarian perspectives.
Eventually, I stepped away from institutional roles and accepted a full professorship at the University of Manchester, where I now serve as Professor of Conflict and Humanitarian Affairs. I continue to write extensively, sit on the boards of several organisations, and use my experience to reflect, teach, and contribute to public understanding of conflict, peace, and humanitarian action — always with a questioning mindset, so that established orthodoxies and complacent certainties are challenged. That, to me, is the only way to strive for a better world for all.
That’s essentially how I ended up where I am today. But I hope I’m not done yet — let’s see what challenges lie ahead.
