Sri Lanka Core Group statement for the Interactive Dialogue on the High Commissioner’s Annual Report. Delivered by the UK’s Human Rights Ambassador, Eleanor Sanders. From: UK Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office and Eleanor Sanders Published 17 June 2025 Delivered on: 17 June 2025 (Transcript of the speech, exactly as it was delivered) Thank you Mr… Read more »
Amnesty: HRC59 Statement on HCHR’s Report
IOR 40/9564/2025 17 June 2025 ITEM 2: INTERACTIVE DIALOGUE ON THE ANNUAL REPORT OF THE HIGH COMMISSIONER HUMAN RIGHTS MUST POINT THE WAY OUT OF OUR CURRENT PERIL UN Human Rights Council Fifty-ninth regular session 16 June – 9 July 2025 High Commissioner, We thank you for your report and update raising alarm across a… Read more »
Oral statement of the International Commission of Jurists (ICJ)
United Nations Human Rights Council 59th Regular Session Agenda Item 2 Oral statement of the International Commission of Jurists (ICJ) in the Interactive Dialogue on the High Commissioner’s Annual Report 17 June 2025 High Commissioner, The International Commission of Jurists (ICJ) thanks you for your report and address today. We particularly share your concerns regarding… Read more »
New Sri Lanka Mass Grave Discovery Reopens Old Wounds for Tamils
by Jeevan Ravindran, AlJazeera, Doha June 16, 2025 So far, 19 bodies have been found. Thousands of Tamils were disappeared during the civil war that ended in 2009. A rusted gate behind which Sri Lankan excavators are digging the latest mass grave they have found from the country’s 26-year-long civil war, in Chemmani, Sri Lanka… Read more »
Adaptation of Archaeological Techniques in Forensic Mass Grave Exhumation: Chemmani
The experience of ‘Chemmani’ excavation in northern Sri Lanka by PR Ruwanpura, UCP Perera, HTK Wijeyaweera and N Chandrasiri, Ceylon Medical Journal, 2006 Sep;51(3):98-102 1251-1-4695-1-10-20091023 Abstract There have been several mass grave excavations in Sri Lanka during the period of 1995 to 1998. Excavation of mass graves in the Chemmani area of northern peninsula of… Read more »
Have You Read Zahid Rafiq?
by Ajaz Asaf, Mid-Day, Mumbai, June 9, 2025 The Srinagar native’s short story collection, The World With Its Mouth Open, stirs readers’ conscience while vividly depicting the lives of characters who appear broken in a world unhinged by a bloody past Security personnel stand guard outside Eidgah ground as people arrive to offer prayers at… Read more »
James T Rutnam (1905-1988), Part 2
Noted Bibliophile and a Valued Mentor by Sachi Sri Kantha, June 7, 2025 Part 1 Introduction My destiny to meet and interact with James T Rutnam came in the aftermath of the August 1977 anti-Tamil riots. Previously, I had written a little about the anti-Tamil riots that engulfed the island then, and my initial attempts… Read more »
Pew: Facts about Sri Lankans in the U.S.
by Carolyn Im, Pew Research Center, Washington, DC, May 1, 2025 (based on U.S. Census Bureau tabulations of the 2023 American Community Survey) [Note: based on those who reported their identity as Sri Lankan ONLY, so probably excludes who identified as Sri Lankan Tamil, etc. Hopefully, another demographer can tease out these numbers from the… Read more »
Letter re Repeal of PTA from Civil Society
Letter re PTA May 2025 English Letter re PTA May 2025 Tamil Letter re PTA May 2025 Sinhalese 29th May, 2025 Secretary, Ministry of Justice and National Integration, Colombo 10 Re: The Repeal of the PTA – Do not replace with a new terror law We, as concerned peoples of Sri Lanka, respond to the… Read more »
TG: Sri Lanka’s Genocide Blueprint
Tamil Guardian editorial, June 2, 2025 There was a marked shift in global politics last week as states around the world, including staunch allies of Israel, began to criticise its ongoing military offensive in Gaza. It comes as a senior United Nations humanitarian official repeatedly issued a stark reminder of the international community’s failure to… Read more »
Why Citing Sri Lanka to Justify Gaza Is Strategically and Legally Dangerous
The problem is that Sri Lanka is not a model of anything durable. It is a case study in how military triumph achieved through mass atrocity leads to long-term state failure. Genocide may remove an armed group, but it also erodes legitimacy, triggers unintended consequences, and breaks the systems that sustain governance. by Maxwin Paul… Read more »
TG: A Global Reckoning
Tamil Guardian editorial, May 27, 2025 Last week, thousands of Tamils gathered at Mullivaikkal, on the very beaches where tens of thousands were massacred by the Sri Lankan state in 2009, to mark the 16th anniversary of the genocide. The turnout was remarkable, the largest since the end of the armed conflict, and a powerful testament… Read more »
TG: There Can Be No More Denial
Tamil Guardian editorial, May 19, 2025 Today, Tamils around the world are commemorating 16 years since the massacres at Mullivaikkal. Though more than a decade-and-half has passed, the situation on the island for Eelam Tamils seems as precarious as ever. There has been no accountability for the atrocities that took place. The seizure of historic… Read more »
Mullivaikkal Declaration 2025
by Tamil Guardian, London, May 21, 2025 See in original Tamil at TamilWin தமிழீழ வரலாற்றின் சாட்சியாக முள்ளிவாய்க்கால் பிரகடனம் 2025 – தமிழ்வின் Marking sixteen years since the Mullivaikkal genocide, the Mullivaikkal Remembrance Public Forum released a statement on 18 May 2025, reaffirming the Tamil nation’s unwavering commitment to justice, self-determination, and resistance against continued structural oppression… Read more »
The Story of Eelam Tamils in South Indian Cinema
by I.V. Mahasenan in his blog, May 12, 2025 [translated into English from the original Tamil by Google Translate with corrections by the Editor.] The Tamilaham (Tamil Nadu) and Eelam-Tamil relationship is essential to the existence of Tamil national politics. Since the Sri Lankan and Indian governments have interpreted the rise of Tamil nationalism… Read more »
James T. Rutnam (1905-1988)
A Radical Activist in Ceylon Politics by Sachi Sri Kantha, May 25, 2025 Introduction Previously, I had studied the electoral performance of three prominent Sri Lankan Tamil politicians, namely Ganapathipillai Gangesar Ponnambalam (1901-1977), Appapillai Amirthalingam (1927-1989) and Murugesu Sivasithamparam (1024-2002). All three were electorally successful in most of their attempts, though suffering defeats intermittently. But,… Read more »
BBC: After Decades of Bloodshed, is India Winning its War against Maoists?
by Suvojit Bagchi, BBC, London, May 28, 2025 Could India’s decades-long jungle insurgency finally be approaching its end? Last week, the country’s most-wanted Maoist, Nambala Keshava Rao – popularly known as Basavaraju – was killed along with 26 others in a major security operation in the central state of Chhattisgarh. Home Minister Amit Shah called… Read more »
FT: India Corners Maoist Rebels after Decades-long Struggle
Death of Naxalite insurgency’s leader a moment of triumph for Narendra Modi’s government by John Reed and Jyotsna Singh in New Delhi, Financial Times, London, May 23, 2025 Indian communist rebel Nambala Keshava Rao was one of the country’s most wanted men, but few images of him are publicly available. A photograph from his college days,… Read more »
UN Committee on the Rights of the Child 2002
by Sri Lankan government, November 2002 and the UN Committee on the Rights of the Child, July 2003, Geneva Report by the Sri Lankan government (CRC/C/70/Add.17) covers the period 1994-1999. CRC_C_70_Add-17-EN.pdf Committee on the Rights of the Child in its final report (CRC/C/15/Add.207) responds to contemporary events also. g0342764.pdf
Bose: How Tamil Nadu Keeps the Fire for Tamil Eelam Burning
Sixteen years after Mullivaikkal by Subash Chandra Bose, South First, Hyderabad, India, May 16, 2025 While the international community has not formally recognised the May 2009 events in Sri Lanka as genocide, Tamil diaspora groups and Eelam supporters firmly assert that it was a planned extermination of Tamils. Synopsis: Tens of thousands of Sri Lankan Tamils… Read more »