The NPP’s clear betrayal of campaign promises by Kishali Pinto-Jayawardene, Sunday Times, Colombo, December 28, 2025 President Anura Kumara Dissaayake’s determination to ‘repeal and replace’ Sri Lanka’s Prevention of Terrorism Act (PTA) with a law that balances security concerns and civil liberties for ‘rights focused governance’ was explained in great detail when interviewed by Newsweek… Read more »
Nobel Peace Prize Nominees and Wannabes from Sri Lanka
by Sachi Sri Kantha, February 2, 2026 In the past 125 years of its existence, unlike other countries, Sri Lanka (or it’s previous incarnation, Ceylon, until 1971) was never represented in any of the original five Nobel Prizes. But, according to the Nobel Prize nomination archives, only the Nobel Peace Prize and the Nobel Physiology/Medicine… Read more »
What is Local Governance?
[This article is interesting because it is by a Sinhalese author. Tamils have been advocating for more decentralized government since independence, to no avail. Note that in the early 1980s the Sri Lankan government proposed District Development Councils to counteract calls for more autonomy for the North and Eastern Provinces. The Tamils were not in… Read more »
Can a Corporation Be Complicit in War Crimes?
Sweden Is Trying to Find Out by M. Gessen, Opinion Columnist, The New York Times, Dec. 30, 2025 At the end of the 1990s, a Swedish company called Lundin Oil started drilling in a war-torn region of what was then Sudan. To secure the drilling sites, the company contracted with the Sudanese government. Over the… Read more »
One of America’s Most Successful Experiments Is Coming to a Shuddering Halt
by Lydia Polgreen, The New York Times, December 29, 2025 It was a joyous day, the fulfillment of a quarter-century of hard work and relentless fund-raising. Srinivasachary Tamirisa, a retired doctor living in Sugar Land, Texas, beamed with pride as his dream — to erect a statue of the Hindu deity Hanuman on the grounds… Read more »
M.S. Subbulakshmi in the ‘Meera’ Movie‘s 80th Anniversary
by Sachi Sri Kantha, December 9, 2025 Introduction This year marks the 80th anniversary of the release of the Tamil version of the Meera movie on November 3rd 1945 in Chennai. Also, December 11th marks the 21th death anniversary of Carnatic Music diva Madurai Shanmugavadivu (M.S.) Subbulakshmi (1916-2004). It also happens to be the birthday… Read more »
HRW: Sri Lanka Struggles in Aftermath of Devastating Cyclone
Longstanding Discrimination Against Marginalized Communities Worsens Catastrophe by Meenakshi Ganguly, Deputy Asia Director, Human Rights Watch, New York, December 11, 2025 Sri Lanka is suffering a series of floods and landslides brought upon by Cyclone Ditwah this past November. Climate experts believethe intensity of seasonal storms, which also recently devastated Indonesia, Thailand, and Malaysia, are likely… Read more »
Who Gets Warned? Language, Discrimination, and Disaster Communication in Sri Lanka
by Sanjana H., LinkedIn, Colombo, Nov.29, 2025 In a recent article related to the devastating impact of Cyclone Ditwah on Sri Lanka, the Tamil Guardian noted that, Officials describe the impact of Cyclone Ditwah as one of the deadliest weather-related disasters in recent years. Yet even as Tamils in the North-East grapple with the impact of of the… Read more »
Rivers of Sri Lanka
by Nuwan I. Senaratna, Dec, 6, 2025 From his X account: We cannot hope to understand floods without first understanding the #rivers that shape them. This repository offers GeoJSON maps of Sri Lanka’s rivers, extracted from from https://hydrosheds.org. (Each color in the map represent a river basin. The colors have been picked at random) @Github… Read more »
The Great Flood
by B. Skanthakumar, Polity, Colombo, December 5, 2025 Cyclone Ditwah ripped through Sri Lanka between 27 and 29 November. The toll is devastating. Seven days later, the official count is 486 deaths and 341 missing. To which should be added five navy and one air-force officer killed in rescue operations; and an electricity board technician… Read more »
Ten Jolting Takeaways from Trump’s New National Security Strategy
by Rick Landgraf, War on the Rocks, Washington, DC, December 5, 2025 The new National Security Strategy is out, and it’s a shock to the system. It is not just the latest public articulation of principles, ambitions, and priorities around which the United States organizes its foreign policy. Instead, it reads like a manifesto for a radically… Read more »
Sri Lanka’s Bloody Past is Re-emerging from the Soil
A blue schoolbag in a mass grave by Helen Regan, Kumanan Kanapathipillai, Kunal Sehga, Hanako Montgomery, CNN, Atlanta, GA, USA, November 29, 2025 https://www.cnn.com/2025/12/05/world/video/sri-lanka-mass-grave-hanako-montgomery-digvid . . EDITOR’S NOTE: This article contains images and descriptions that some readers may find distsurbing. Two human skeletons lie entangled on the rough earth – the arms of one wrapped… Read more »
MGR Remembered – Part 84
Health status – A Decisive Factor by Sachi Sri Kantha, November 22, 2025 Comments from R. Kannan After nearly 12 years of email correspondence, Kannan and I met face to face on Oct 17, 2025 in Tokyo. It was a pleasurable meeting for us, and to our spouses. Kannan’s son, residing in Tokyo, was the… Read more »
Essential Jaffna Tamil
by N. Malathy, November 12, 2025 Sociological study of Jaffna Tamils is not extensive. We have not had a well-known academic among us in this area. Karthikesu Sivathamby’s books (“யாழ்ப்பாண சமூகத்தை விளங்கிக் கொள்ளல்,” கார்த்திகேசு சிவதம்பி, 1990; “Sri Lankan Tamil Society and Politics”, Karthikesu Sivathamby, 1995) about us are the best I have seen. All are… Read more »
Leonard Woolf– a British Jew in Colonial Jaffna
by Sachi Sri Kantha, November 17, 2025 Introduction Leonard Woolf (1880-1969) was the husband of influential British novelist Virginia Woolf nee Stepehen (1882-1941), who committed suicide. November 25th marks his 145th birth anniversary. He is one of the few writers of the 20th century, whose contributions were eclipsed by their wives. Still, five volumes of… Read more »
‘Uprooted — Voices of Tamil Dispossession and Resilience’
MEDIA RELEASE Uprooted — Voices of Tamil Dispossession and Resilience MP4 video of Mr. Ana Pararajasingham on his book — fa06ec34-bcfd-4e5c-8597-290df08410c0 Published in late September and now available on Amazon, Uprooted explores the displacement of Sri Lanka’s Tamil people through the voices of those who lived it — thirty-four individuals across the globe who, while… Read more »
War Crimes Indictment Reveals a Hard Road to Justice for Syria
Prosecutors say a Syrian security official accused of torture hid in plain sight in Europe for years, protected by Israeli and Austrian intelligence agents. By Carlotta Gall and Saad Alnassife, The New York Times, Nov.12, 2025, updated Nov. 14, 2025 Our reporters traveled all over Europe, including to Vienna, to interview survivors of torture who will… Read more »
LTTE and Women Warriors
by Sachi Sri Kantha, October 12, 2025 Front Note by Sachi In 2010, I wrote a humorous verse ‘Six Blind Women of Gringo Land who went to see the Tiger’ [https://sangam.org/2010/03/Blind_Women.php?uid=3867], about the six American journalist who covered the Eelam war. It was inspired by John Godfrey Saxe’s poem. Subsequently, I also wrote an appreciation… Read more »
UNHRC 2025 Resolution on Sri Lanka
UK Core Group Statement to introduce Item 2 Resolution on Sri Lanka. Delivered by the UK’s Permanent Representative to the WTO and UN, Kumar Iyer. From: Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office and Kumar Iyer CMG Delivered on: 6 October 2025 (Transcript of the speech, exactly as it was delivered) Thank you, Mr. President. I have the honour to… Read more »
ABC: More than 200 Skeletons Uncovered in Mass Grave
In Sri Lanka, exposing its haunting history by Nicholene Canisius, Australian Broadcasting Corporation, October 4, 2025 Saaratha Iruthayanathar was six years old when she last saw her father leaving to get groceries, during the Sri Lankan civil war. To this day, she still does not know whether he is dead or alive. While travelling by… Read more »