Britain has been placed on the highest threat level of ‘critical’, since a vehicle crashed into the Glasgow airport in the wee hours of yesterday. The US airports have also introduced stricter security measures after the attack. (In Spain, too, the police detonated a suspicious parcel following a warning and the Ibiza airport was evacuated.) Ironically, these incidents were reported at a time when the Katunayake International Airport (KIA) was to be reopened for night flights weeks after terror attacks.

Whoever thought a decade or so ago that the high and mighty of the world would become targets of terrorists. When the KIA first came under a devastating terror attack in 2001, Sri Lanka suffered alone without anyone pledging solidarity with her. Insurance companies like carrion seeking vultures descended on her, slapping as they did surcharges just like the proverbial bull that gored a man who fell from a tree. Colombo became something like a lepers’ colony to the international airlines.

But, little did the powerful nations realise that terrorism like a virus didn’t spare anyone. Within months of the first KIA strike, came the 9/11 attacks, which shocked the world. After a few years, the London attacks occurred. And ever since, the Supermen and Superwomen of the West have had irritable bowels, not knowing when terrorists would strike next!

British High Commissioner in Colombo Dominick Chilcott told a forum in Colombo recently that no country was an island in today’s global context. There were differences in the way countries related to one another. He pointed out that in the formulation of foreign policy of a country ‘enlightened self-interest’ figured prominently. He was making no revelation. Everybody knows that ‘kissing goes by favour’. Even parents have their favourite children. So do teachers.

No country, big or small, can, therefore, be faulted for preferential treatment extended to their friends. But, the policy of ‘kissing by favour’ can lead to serious problems and threaten global peace when countries choose to smooch terrorist outfits on the grounds of ‘enlightened self-interest’. Some countries have used terrorism as an extension of their foreign policies e. g. India fathered Sri Lanka’s terrorism to cut the then JRJ government down to size, the US created Osama bin Laden to further her interests in Afghanistan and Britain sponsored the Chilean dictator Pinochet. Hundreds of such instances could be cited.

Terrorism is, as was said earlier, a deadly virus and when countries kiss and cuddle terrorists amorously, they expose themselves to the germ. What is happening in London is a case in point. Britain may have deceived herself into the belief that harbouring terrorist outfits on her soil was the best way to protect her interests in the countries affected by their terror. Yes, her strategy may have worked to some extent decades ago. But she failed to realise that terrorists networked just like transnational companies and operated at subterranean levels that the law enforcement authorities couldn’t penetrate. In the world of terror, too, kissing goes by favour as could be seen in the way Sri Lanka’s terrorists are training their Indian counterparts. They also inspire one another.

The British policy of leniency towards foreign terrorist groups has manifestly come home to roost. The threats that she has come under may not necessarily emanate from the terror outfits she is mollycoddling but the fact remains that her enemies are making use of the terrorist infrastructure her friendly organisations have put in place. It is like a cobra taking shelter in an anthill! Looking for venomous snakes of terrorism that abound in underground labyrinths is an exercise in futility without the entire system being destroyed. Of late, the British police have begun to crack down on some terrorist groups but their operations have the trappings of a half-hearted attempt.

If the western powers are genuinely desirous of ridding the world of terrorism, they ought to adopt the no-country-is-an-island policy in dealing with the phenomenon without prescribing different remedies based on their ‘enlightened self-interest’. It is time they stopped being deceived by the various causes that terrorists flaunt in extenuation of their heinous crimes against humanity into handling them indulgently.

The Co-chairs of Sri Lanka’s peace process have reportedly resolved that negotiations are the only way to resolve the conflict here. But, it was only several moons ago that the White House contemptuously rejected an offer of a truce from bin Laden. A spokesman for President Bush said the ‘best way to deal with terrorists is to put them out of business.’ It is being argued that the US has prescribed a negotiated settlement to Sri Lanka’s problem as the outfit Sri Lanka is fighting has a ‘political programme’, whereas Al Quaeda is without any such agenda. But, as far as we are aware, bin Laden, too, has a political project, if his demand that the US stop interfering with the Muslim world is any indication.

Be that as it may, it is a pity that powerful nations whose help is essential for defeating global terror have turned a blind eye to the fact that terrorist organisations hijack not only airplanes and other vehicles but legitimate grievances and missions of others to further their macabre causes. Thus, we are yet to see a terrorist group sans some cause to justify its violence. Terrorism, they should see, is no means to an end. It is both the end and the means.

So long as the developed nations refuse to shed their double standards in fighting terrorism, terrorists will continue to have a field day and bombs will go off at their airports. Hoist with their own petard, they must at least now realise that they, too, are no islands and give unstinted support to the countries battling terrorism single-handed.