Sri Lankan police intelligence officer wields gun at TNPF leader following commotion at meeting in Maruthankerny by Tamil Guardian, London, June 2, 2023 A Sri Lankan police intelligence officer pointed his gun to Tamil National People’s Front (TNPF) leader Gajendrakumar Ponnambalam after he was attacked during a meeting in Maruthankerny. Ponnambalam was at a meeting… Read more »
Monthly Archives: June 2023
Sri Lanka’s TRC Draft Has Nothing to Solve Tamils’ Concerns – Sumanthiran
by Shihar Aneez, EconomyNext, June 2, 2023 A new draft on Sri Lanka’s Truth Reconciliation Commission (TRC) has failed to meet minimum expectations in addressing the concerns of ethnic minority Tamils who have lost their loved ones in what they allege as forced disappeared, in the final stage of the war, the Tamil National Alliance… Read more »
Defence Sector Claims Nearly Half of State Salaries
by PublicFinance.lk, June 2, 2023 According to the 2023 Budget Estimates, 15% of total recurrent expenditure of the government will be spent on salaries for government employees for the year 2023. As of 2023, the defence sector is estimated to claim nearly half (48%) of state salaries. Here is a breakdown of the estimated sector-wise… Read more »
Deja Vu ‘Truth and Reconciliation’ in Sri Lanka?
by Kishali Pinto-Jayawardene, Sunday Times, Colombo, June 3, 2023 Truth and Reconciliation is now again in the air, we are sublimely told by the Government of Sri Lanka. President Ranil Wickremesinghe, along with his merry men and women in Parliament in the Pohottuwa ranks are singing to the eminently hypocritical refrain of truth and reconciliation commissions… Read more »
‘Politics of Hate’ Review
Two thoughtful contributions by Sri Lankan academics Neil DeVotta and Gehan Gunatilleke show how majoritarianism’s relentless othering is less about the majority’s imagined ideal minority-free state, and more about the satisfaction derived from blaming, punishing and depriving the “others” — the Sinhala Buddhist majority’s first target was the Indian Tamils. by Nirupama Subramaniam, Indian Express,… Read more »
MGR Remembered – Part 71
Essaying the Folk Heroes in Films and Becoming One by Sachi Sri Kantha Fellow MGR biographer R. Kannan’s observations, on Part 70, received on Mar 27th , was as follows: “The article was fascinating. I did not know anything about Kalai Arasi and was quite taken with the fact that it was a sci-fi movie in Tamil… Read more »
Kilinochchi Maveerar Thuyilum Illum, February 2023
by N. Ethirveerasingam, May 17, 2023 I took these pictures in Kilinochchi Maveerar Thuyilum Illum during a visit in February 2023. * When Kilinochchi fell in 2008 the army bulldozed about 4 acres of gravestones – a war crime. Other LTTE graveyards in the North met the same fate. * I was there at the… Read more »
The Current Financial & Political Crisis and Possibilities for Fundamental Change
by Fr. Emmanuel Sebamalai, US Congressional Caucus briefing on Sri Lanka, May 11, 2023 First of all, I sincerely thank Congressman Bill Johnson and Congressman Danny Davis for organizing this event. I am privileged to air my grievances on behalf of the Tamils living in Sri Lanka and abroad. For Tamils, May 18 is the… Read more »
MP Charles: Mahaweli Project J Zone
by Sri Lanka MP Charles Nirmalanathan, TrendReport.lk, May 29, 2023 [Translated from Tamil by Google Translate with minor edits — Editor] “The Mahavali Project is a long-term strategy to destroy the ethnic heritage of the Tamils, settle the Sinhalese population, and make the Tamils ethnically non-existent,” Charles MP charged. He also warned about Sinhalese immigration… Read more »