BTF & USTPAC call for UNHRC intervention re intimidation at missing person protests_May302017 BTF and USTPAC call upon the UN Human Rights Council to, a) Request the High Commissioner or his high-level representatives to visit the protestors in Killinochchi to stop the intimidation of the people who are already traumatised… Read more »
Monthly Archives: May 2017
Remembering Sivaram
by Amna Jatoi, ‘Groundviews,’ Colombo May 25,2017 His biographer speaks of the unimaginable cultural consequences of living continually under the gun. Although this comment was made about Tamil communities living in Sri Lanka more widely, it provides the basis for understanding Dharmaretnam Sivaram’s core beliefs about the role of intellectuals, or those with knowledge (and… Read more »
Violence against Religious Minorities in Sri Lanka
by UCAN (Catholic News Asia) in Vatican Radio, May 26, 2017 http://en.radiovaticana.va/news/2017/05/26/violence_against_religious_minorities_in_sri_lanka/1314905 Human rights groups, religious leaders, lawmakers and the United Nations have all called on the Sri Lankan government to take immediate action against sectarian violence and growing tensions in northern and eastern Sri Lanka. The groups blame the government for failing to halt… Read more »
How a Haiti Child Sex Ring was Whitewashed
UN PEACEKEEPERS: HOW A HAITI CHILD SEX RING WAS WHITEWASHED by Katy Daigle and Paisley Dodds, Associated Press in ‘The Washington Post,’ May 26, 2017 COLOMBO, Sri Lanka (AP) — The general sat on a plastic lawn chair in the garden of his mother’s home, the scent of tropical blooms filling the air as he… Read more »
Sri Lanka’s Genocidal War as Seen by the World
By: Thambu Kanagasabai LLM [London], Former Lecturer in Law – University of Colombo, May 30, 2017 Though Sri Lanka unleashed its agenda of marginalization of Tamils starting in 1956 through a program of Budddhisisation and Sinhalisation and a hidden genocidal process, the climax was reached during the war against Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam from 2006… Read more »
Amnesty: Act Now to Prevent Further Anti-Muslim Violence
by Amnesty International, May 25, 2017 Sri Lankan authorities must act immediately to end attacks on Muslims in the country, and to rein in violent groups that target religious minorities, and take action against perpetrators, Amnesty International said. Index number: ASA 37/6361/2017 Amnesty Anti Muslim Violence May 2017 Sri Lanka: Act now to prevent further… Read more »
Amnesty: Priest Harassed over Memorial to Dear War Victims
by Amnesty International, May 25, 2017 May 25, 2017 URGENT ACTION: PRIEST HARASSED OVER MEMORIAL TO DEAD WAR VICTIMS (SRI LANKA: UA 116.17) Sri Lankan priest, Father Elil Rajendram, is being harassed by the police over his efforts to help families memorialize their loved ones lost during the armed conflict. 1) TAKE ACTION Write a… Read more »
Facing Sri Lanka’s Ghosts
by Devon Haynie, ‘US News & World Report,’ May 18, 2017 With thousands still missing, Sri Lanka’s postwar progress comes to a halt. VAVUNIYA, Sri Lanka — At some point during its brutal 26 years, the Sri Lankan civil war brought terror or loss to virtually everyone in the country. For Kasipillai Jeyavanitha, a mother… Read more »
The Women Left Behind
by Devon, Haynie, US News & World Report, May 18, 2017 Sri Lanka’s civil war ended eight years ago today, but for its 90,000 war widows, the battle continues. VAVUNIYA, Sri Lanka — It was midnight in 2008 when several members of Sri Lanka’s security forces barged into Rajendran Geetha’s house and took her husband,… Read more »
‘Demons in Paradise’
SYNOPSIS Sri Lanka 1983, Jude Ratman is five years old. On a red train, he flees the massacre of the Tamils instigated by the Pro-Sinhalese majoritarian government. Now a filmmaker, he takes the same train from South to North. As he advances, the traces of the violence of the 26-year-old war and the one which… Read more »
Sri Lanka’s Transition to Nowhere
by International Crisis Group, Brussels, May 16, 2017 ICG Sri Lanka’s Transition to Nowhere Executive Summary Two years into President Maithripala Sirisena’s term, Sri Lanka’s fragile hopes for lasting peace and cooperation across party and ethnic lines are imperilled. Despite significant achievements in the coalition government’s first nine months, progress on most of its reform… Read more »
Submission to the UN Committee on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights
by Minority Rights Group International (MRG), the International Movement Against All Forms of Discrimination and Racism (IMADR) and Women Development Innovators (WDI), May 11, 2017 *** Sri Lanka: Issues of land and sea grabbing on minorities brought to UN In order to reflect the current situation of minorities in Sri Lanka, IMADR, Minority Rights Group International (MRG)… Read more »
Biting the Bullet
Demilitarizing Economic Relations in Post-War Sri Lanka by Law and Society Trust, Colombo, May 2017 Biting the Bullet 20170508 The Law & Society Trust (LST) is a not-for-profit organisation engaged in human rights documentation, legal research and advocacy in Sri Lanka. Our aim is to use rights-based strategies in research, documentation and advocacy in order… Read more »
UN Peacekeepers: Keeping the Peace or Preventing it?
The UN peacekeepers’ capacity to commit rape with impunity undermines prospects for sustainable peace around the world. by Nimmi Gowrinathan & Kate Cronin-Furman, Al Jazeera, May 2, 2017 In 2007, more than 100 Sri Lankan peacekeeping troops were sent back to their home country from Haiti in disgrace as a result of sexual abuse allegations,… Read more »
European Union, GSP+ and Sri Lanka
Promoting or Demoting Human Rights? by Kumarathasan Rasingam, May 7, 2017 The European Parliament in its session on 26th April, 2017 has voted in favour of Sri Lanka rejecting a motion tabled by 52 European Union members to deny the additional tariff concessions approximately 66% on several products including textiles and fisheries imported by European… Read more »
MGR Remembered – Part 38
Testimony of producer K.N. Vasu by Sachi Sri Kantha, April 25, 2017 Part 37 Front Note: I apologize to the readers, for the six month interruption, in continuing this series. Main reason was semi-retirement related loss of my own office room, and its after-effects. Second reason was the assumption of an editor-in-chief position of a… Read more »
‘Tamils & the Nation:’ India & Sri Lanka Compared
by Madurika Rasaratnam, Oxford University Press, 352 pages, published August 15, 2016 ISBN 9780190498320 ABSTRACT Why are relations between politically mobilized ethnic identities and the nation-state sometimes peaceful and at other times fraught and violent? This book sets out a novel answer to this key puzzle in world politics through a detailed comparative study of… Read more »
TNA Statement on CTA
Civil Society Joint Statement on CTA
Joint Civil Society Statement: Sri Lanka’s draft Counter Terrorism Act: a license for continued state oppression, intimidation and torture May 4, 2017 The Sri Lankan cabinet’s approval of the new Counter Terrorism Act (CTA) is further confirmation of the state’s unwillingness to meet its obligations on human rights, to its citizens and the international community…. Read more »
Sri Lanka’s Crumbling Credibility
By: Kumarathasan Rasingam, April 29, 2017 — The credibility of Sri Lanka in relation to the settlement of the 60 year old ethnic problem of Tamils can be judged from the fate of several pacts, agreements and undertakings which were made from 1956 to 2009 and the Sri Lankan Governments unwillingness to comply with the… Read more »