People often debate the meaning and classification of genocide - which conflicts are genocide and which are not? When do individual acts of repression turn into a concerted campaign to exterminate a people? Often times the question is one of the scale and speed of the crimes - when the world sees tens of thousands killed in one day, they take notice. But when the crimes occur over decades, they often pass with little note. Genocide, however, is not a question of scale - it is a question of intent.

The Government shows their intent when they declare an area a safe zone, shepherding civilian towards it, and then proceed to shell the area.

They show their intent when they order all international NGO’s out of a region when civilians desperately need their help.

They show their intent when they disappear their critics, silencing them forever.

They show their intent when journalists are suppressed, when orphanges are bombed, when aid workers are killed and when hospitals are shelled.

The Government has made its intent clear.

So on this, the fourth day of our fast, I keep going by remembering that in three decades of ethnic conflict, it has been the Tamil civilian population that has overwhelmingly borne the brunt of the Government’s aggression. It is they who have suffered at the hands of a government that refuses to value the lives of the people it claims to be fighting to govern. Compared to their sacrifice, my fast is nothing.