by A. Jathindra, Eurasia Review, USA, March 16, 2023 Blaming foreign conspiracies engineered by the CIA, RAW and MI6 is commonplace in local politics. The nationalists in the Sinhala and Tamil camps invoke this trite trick when they find themselves with something of a hot potato. On Feb 22, former SLPP mouthpiece and leader of… Read more »
The Elusive Political Solution in Sri Lanka
by Meera Srinivasan, The Hindu, Chennai, India, March 9, 2023, undated March 10 Early February, a group of saffron-clad Buddhist monks gathered near the Sri Lankan Parliament and burnt a copy of the 13th Amendment. They were registering their rage and protest after President Ranil Wickremesinghe vowed to implement the law in full. He had… Read more »
HRW: Recurring Nightmare – State Responsibility for “Disappearances” and Abductions in Sri Lanka 2008
by Human Rights Watch, New York, March 8, 2008 HRW Recurring Nightmare-Full_Report srilanka0308cases This report was originally posted with links to HRW, but those links are being moved, so the report is being reposted here. The current link is Recurring Nightmare: State Responsibility for “Disappearances” and Abductions in Sri Lanka | HRW See HRW statement… Read more »
Overseas Temples & Tamil Migratory Space
by Pierre-Yves Trouillet, South Asia Multidisciplinary Research Journal, 2012 Abstract Temples have been places of major importance for Tamil societies for more than fifteen centuries. Following the migration of Tamilians from South India, the perpetuation overseas of their tradition as temple builders and the creation of a Tamil diaspora, they can now be found on the… Read more »
Author A. Muttulingam
by Tamil Wiki, accessed March 7, 2023 A. Muttulingam (January 19, 1937) is one of the pre-eminent writers in modern Tamil literature. His contributions, which include short stories, essays, interviews and novels, are characterized by humour, aesthetic appeal and perfection in form. Born in Sri Lanka, he is a storyteller who travelled the world on… Read more »
HCHR on Sri Lanka
by UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Volker Turk, UN Human Rights Council, Geneva, March 7, 2023 Global update: High Commissioner outlines concerns in over 40 countries In Sri Lanka, debilitating debt, and economic crisis, have sharply restricted people’s access to fundamental economic and social rights. Recovery policies will need to redress inequalities, and invest in social… Read more »
Court Orders Army to Produce Three Former LTTE Cadres who Surrendered in Mullaitivu
by Sunday Times, Colombo, March 5, 2023 The Sri Lanka Army has been ordered to produce in court before March 22 three former LTTE cadres who had surrendered to the Mullaitivu army camp in the last stages of the war in May 2009. The order was delivered by the High Court of Vavuniya following three… Read more »
Army Bigwigs Have Made Shameful Attempts to Bury the Truth
by Vellupillai Thangavelu, Colombo Telegraph, March 1, 2023 The quote “Wheels of justice grind slow but grind fine” is credited to Sun Tzu, the author of The Art of War, an influential work of military strategy, But in Sri Lanka this quote should be taken with a pinch of salt. Cases filed in courts gets… Read more »
A Soldier’s Dream
by A. Nillanthan, March 4, 2023 [translated from the original Tamil by Google Translate, with some improvement by the Editor.] The soldier said on the last day that Buddha had appeared in a dream to him in a army camp in Nilavara on the island of Sri Lanka. As Rauf Hakeem once said, the statues… Read more »
Why Is South Asia’s Finest Natural Harbor Still Undeveloped?
by P.K. Balachandran, Eurasia Review, Oregon, USA, February 27, 2023 While the Trincomalee port’s intrinsic value is well-known, its exploitation has been stymied by a variety of factors The natural endowments and the strategic value of Trincomalee port have been well-known for long time. Yet, to date, very little concrete has been done to… Read more »
Reviving the Northern Economy in Sri Lanka
Speech made by Dr. Indrajit Coomarasamy Colombo, February 21, 2023
Childhood Memories of Telok Pulai, the Chinna Yaalpaanam
Of Klang, Malaysia by Sivananthiram Alagandram, Geneva, February 26, 2023 Many who lived in the Chinna Yalpanam have gone abroad . Kindly consider posting at sangam, so that it would enable many to share their experience in Telok Pulai as well as the social change that has happened, I have given my e mail for… Read more »
Disappeared Tamil Babies of Sri Lanka
by Association for the Relatives of the Enforced Disappearance (North and East Provinces), October 1, 2019 Disappeared Tamil babies of Sri Lanka 2019 by Mothers of the Disappeared Sri Lanka stands out as the only country in the world where babies, as young as eight months old, have enforcedly disappeared by a Government. All these… Read more »
It’s Time to Rethink the Idea of the “Indigenous”
by Manvir Singh, The New Yorker, February 20, 2023 Many groups who identify as Indigenous don’t claim to be first peoples; many who did come first don’t claim to be Indigenous. Can the concept escape its colonial past? The term was shaped by social-evolutionist thinking; white settlers used it to designate the “primitive” other. Podcast… Read more »
Elite Capture and Corruption of Security Sectors
by United States Institute for Peace, Washington, DC, February 17, 2023 Executive Summary Closing the Effectiveness Gap The objective of US security sector assistance is to help build effective, accountable, responsive, transparent, and legitimate security sectors in partner nations to address common security risks. Such action ultimately benefits US national interests, as when the United… Read more »
An Archive for the Dispossessed
Creating spaces for multiple truths by Shankari Chandran The Griffith Review, Australia, May 2022 Shankari Chandran is a Tamil-Australian lawyer and the author of three books: Song of the Sun God (Perera-Hussein Publishing, 2017), The Barrier (Pan Macmillan Australia, 2017) and Chai Time at Cinnamon Gardens (Ultimo Press, 2022). She is the deputy chair of Writing NSW and a member of the Sweatshop Literacy Movement…. Read more »
No Power Cuts and No Elections?
by A, Nillanthan, February 25, 2023 [translated from the original Tamil by Google Translate, with some improvement by the Editor.] The power cuts have been stopped since the 16th, but the electricity bill has increased by 66 percent. What does the government want to convey to the people through this? Stopping power cuts means you… Read more »
Report on Norochcholai Power Plant
A dark side by Centre for Strategic Studies, Trincomalee, February 2023 The Power Plant The Lakvijaya Power Plant, also known as the Norochcholai Power plant, is situated in Norochcholai, Puttalam in the Northwestern province of Sri Lanka, at the southern end of Kalpitiya peninsula. It is the largest thermal power plant in Sri Lanka. The… Read more »
Pervez Musharraf, an Adversary of the Eelam State
Knocked out by the Grim Reaper by Sachi Sri Kantha, February 10, 2023 After evading more than four assassination attempts during his term of office as the President- strong man of Pakistan (2000-2008), Gen. Pervez Musharraf (1943-2023) was eventually knocked out by the Grim Reaper on February 4th. The cause of his death is attributed… Read more »
Essense of Entrepreneurship
by Raj Rajaratnam, Jaffna, January 14, 2023