A further lack of perspicuity By K T Rajasingham, ‘Asian Times,’ Singapore Chapter 1 Chapter 20 Dudley Senanyake was sworn in as the prime minister for the fourth time on March 25, 1965. A few weeks after resuming office, he was again afflicted with his peculiar stomach ailment. The pain affected him to the point… Read more »
Sri Lanka, MSF Amidst All-Out War
by Fabrice Weissman, Academia.edu, accessed June 2019 In Claire Magone et al. (ed.), Humanitarian Negotiations Revealed. The MSF Experience, London, Hurst & Co, 2011. Sri_Lanka_MSF_Amid_All-Out_War 2011 On 18 May 2009, the Sri Lankan government’s crushing victory over the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) put an end to twenty-six years of civil war. Described by… Read more »
MGR Remembered – Part 52
Concepts on Humor and Comedians by Sachi Sri Kantha, June 9, 2019 Part 51 Correspondence with Kannan on Karunanidhi For additional clarification on the theme covered in Part 51, I provide the email correspondence (4 items) I had with fellow MGR biographer Kannan. I reproduce these below with his permission. Item 1: From Kannan to… Read more »
Tamils Are Haunted By Hope For Relatives’ Return
In War’s Aftermath by Laura Beltran Villamizar, National Public Radio, Washington, DC, June 2, 2019 https://www.npr.org/sections/pictureshow/2019/06/02/651883770/in-wars-aftermath-tamils-are-haunted-by-hope-for-relatives-return In the past 30 years, some 60,000 to 100,000 Sri Lankans have disappeared, Amnesty International reports. Ethnic and religious tensions have always been a part of Sri Lanka’s history, which includes a decades-long war between government security forces and… Read more »
Sri Lanka: The Untold Story, Chapter 20
Tamil leadership lacks perspicuity By K T Rajasingham, ‘Asian Times,’ Singapore, December 22, 2001 Chapter 1 Chapter 19 This is a story of another agreement. This time between S J V Chelvanayakam, the leader of the Ilankai Thamil Arasu Kadchi and Dudley Senanayake, the leader of the United National Party. In short, another agreement entered… Read more »
Sri Lanka: The Untold Story, Chapter 19
Anguish and pain By K T Rajasingham, ‘Asian Times,’ Singapore, December 15, 2001 Chapter 1 Chapter 18 The government led by Srimavo Bandaranaike, issued a Treasury circular No 560 of December 1961, which stated that government servants appointed since 1956, should obtain minimum proficiency in the official language – Sinhala, to retain their posts, as… Read more »
Sri Lanka: The Untold Story, Chapter 18
Srimavo – Weeping arrogance By K T Rajasingham, ‘Asian Times,’ Singapore Chapter 1 Chapter 17 The defeat in the parliamentary elections of March 1960, clearly indicated that the Sri Lanka Freedom Party needed a popular leader, who could put the party back in the saddle. Accordingly, the SLFP stalwarts, on May 24, 1960, elected Sirimavo… Read more »
Island of Racial & Religious Extremism
With culture of impunity by Thambu Kanagasabai, LLM [Lond. Former Lecturer in Law, University of Colombo, Sri Lanka], May 28, 2019 April 21st attacks on three Churches and three star Hotels by radicalized Muslims surprised Sri Lanka’s Government, its citizens and the world. They were well pre-planned and co-ordinated to unleash the killings on worshippers… Read more »
U.S. Should Not Repeat its Post 9/11 Counter-terrorism Mistakes in Sri Lanka
by Ronnate Asirwatham, ‘Medium,’ May 28, 2019 The U.S. government’s hurried moves to expand military-to-military cooperation with Sri Lanka to fight terrorism after Easter Sunday’s bomb blasts is ill-advised because, Colombo’s counter-terrorism policies are shambles. Sri Lanka targets ethnic communities for acts of terrorist groups, and its military, enjoying impunity, uses torture as the main… Read more »
What the Holocaust Can’t Teach Us about Modern-Day Genocide
Never Again? by Andrew Stroehlien, International Crisis Group, December 2, 2009 (originally published in ‘Foreign Policy’) It was cold, misty, and miserably wet the day we visited Auschwitz-Birkenau, but no one wished for better weather. My companions — mostly midlevel diplomats from more than a dozen countries around the world — all seemed to agree… Read more »
Mervyn de Silva on Prabhakaran and Tamil-Muslim Antipathy
by Sachi Sri Kantha, May 17, 2019 Front Note by Sachi Since the last April 21st Easter Sunday’s multiple suicide attacks by the Muslim participants on Christian Churches and hotels in Colombo, there have been lopsided comparisons by ignoramus journalists and knee jerk commentators covering the major media outlets to the LTTE’s separatist war with… Read more »
Congressional Caucus Briefing May 1 2019
by Congressional Caucus on Ethnic & Religious Freedom in Sri Lanka, Washington, DC, May 1, 2019
Sri Lanka: The Untold Story, Chapter 17
Assassination of Bandaranaike by K T Rajasingham, ‘Asian Times,’ Singapore Chapter 1 Chapter 16 Bandaranaike, Solomon West Ridgeway Dias (1899-1959), the prime minister of Ceylon (1956-59), whose election marked a significant change socially and ethnically in the political history of modern Ceylon, was born on January 8. His father was the only son of Gate… Read more »
Sri Lanka: The Untold Story, Chapter 16
‘Honorable wounds of war’ by K T Rajasingham, ‘Asian Tribune,’ Singapore Chapter 1 Chapter 15 “If Sinhalese lips will not speak the Sinhalese language, who else is there to speak? How is a nation to be lifted out of error, reformed and advance into plains of higher knowledge, except by its own language?” These were… Read more »
The Men Now Patrolling Sri Lanka
by Journalists for Democracy in Sri Lanka, Europe & International Truth & Justice Project Sri Lanka, South Africa, May 2019 http://www.jdslanka.org/images/documents/2019_may_the_men_%20now_patrolling_sri_lanka_itjp__jds.pdf On Easter Sunday 2019, a series of coordinated bomb blasts struck hotels and churches in Sri Lanka killing more than 250 people, including many tourists. The targets were churches in Colombo, Negombo and Batticaloa… Read more »
A State of Disorientation
Dispatch from Sri Lanka after the Easter Bombings by Anuk Arukpragasam, TIME, May 22, 2019 Anuk Arudpragasam is a novelist from Colombo and is the author of The Story of a Brief Marriage. In Colombo, as though there is war once more, the ominous presence of heavily armed soldiers is everywhere. Ever since the Easter Sunday bombings,… Read more »
Sri Lanka: The Untold Story, Chapter 15
Turbulence in any language By K T Rajasingham, ‘Asian Times,’ Singapore Chapter 1 Chapter 14 When the Western colonial powers, the Portuguese, Dutch and British, captured the littoral regions of Ceylon, they administered the North and East, the traditional habitat of the Tamils, as a single, whole and distinct unit, keeping intact the homogeneity and… Read more »
Statements by US Congress on 10th Year after End of War in Sri Lanka
Rep. David Price (D-NC), Co-Chair House Democracy Partnership — Rep David Price Mullivaikkal Remembrance Day 2019 Rep. Bill Johnson (R-OH), Co-Chair of the Caucus on Ethnic & Religious Freedom in Sri Lanka —https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KZYKeC4uMvc&feature=youtu.be Rep. Brad Sherman (D-CA), Chair, Asia & Pacific Subcommittee — Rep. Brad Sherman statement end of war May 16 2019 &… Read more »
Sri Lanka: The Untold Story, Chapter 14
Post-colonial realignment of political forces By K T Rajasingham, ‘Asian Times,’ Singapore Chapter 1 Chapter 13 The Minister of Trade and Commerce, C. Suntheralingham, the independent Member of Parliament representing Vavuniya and the long time associate of D.S. Senanayake, walked out of the Parliament chamber when a division was called on the second reading of… Read more »
Sri Lanka: The Untold Story, Chapter 13
A nightmarish British legacy By K T Rajasingham, ‘Asian Times,’ Singapore Chapter 1 Chapter 12 In Britain, according to Brooke Bond Tea survey, people drink nearly 187 million cups of tea per day. It is understood that they normally drink the best – Ceylon Tea. A recent survey disclosed that, drinking at least one cup… Read more »