A full tally of the war’s horrific violence requires estimates, models, and sophisticated pattern analysis to understand who’s responsible and why. by Patrick Ball, ‘Foreign Policy,’ Washington, DC, October 19, 2016 Nearly 18,000 people died in Syrian government prisons between March 2011 and December 2015. My colleagues and I at the Human Rights Data Analysis Group(HRDAG)… Read more »
Posts Categorized: Demography
Land Grabbing & Accountability
by South Asia Centre for Legal Studies, Colombo, September 27, 2016 Despite land grabbing being a common feature of many armed conflicts and an integral part of discriminatory policies against minority groups, it is insufficiently addressed in post-conflict or transitional justice accountability processes. While truth-commissions, in particular the Truth Commission in El Salvador, have highlighted… Read more »
Still Missing in Mullaitivu
by Meera Srinivasan, ‘The Hindu,’ Chennai, October 1, 2016 More than seven years after the brutal three-decade-long civil war ended in Sri Lanka, people are still picking up the pieces and searching for their loved ones. The last time Mary Sabamalai saw her son Mayuran was in 2008, when he came home for his 21st birthday…. Read more »
Sirisena’s Mahaweli Ministry Spearheads Massive-scale Sinhala Colonisation in Batticaloa
In the first place, the Tamils were not even given the so-called ‘national ethnic ratio’ in the distribution of lands. Secondly, the Mahaweli Ministry was completely ignoring the Tamils in the allocation of lands. Thirdly, most of the lands being seized in the border areas of the three districts are pasturelands. The farming activities of… Read more »
Deforestation Now Urgent Concern in Post-War Sri Lanka
By Johann Rebert, Asia Foundation, San Francisco, March 16, 2016 Following parliamentary elections in August 2015 and six years after the end of a bloody, decades-long civil war, Sri Lanka’s newly elected president, Maithripala Sirisena, has made the important decision to keep the Ministry of Environment directly under his wing. The move, which also positions the… Read more »
Asia Foundation: Sri Lanka Strategic Assessment 2016
by Asia Foundation, San Francisco, March 2016 Asia Foundation Sri Lanka Strategic Assessment 2016 Sri Lanka underwent a major political transition in 2015 with the election of President Maithripala Sirisena and the establishment of a new coalition government between the United Front for Good Governance (UNFGG) and one faction of the United Peoples’ Freedom Alliance… Read more »
BTF: Land Grab and Cultural Genocide of the Tamils‘ Homeland on Sri Lanka
by British Tamil Forum, June 2016 Press release re numbers included in report April 2016 Land grab and cultural genocide of the Tamil land in Sri Lanka BTF Land grab and cultural colonisation of the Tamil land in Sri Lankav v7 1. Introduction. Reliable field data obtained by BTF indicates that the land currently occupied… Read more »
Colombo Beefs Up Naval Installations along Eastern Coast
by TamilNet, June 3, 2016 Emboldened with the blessings coming from the diplomatic US Establishment and its increased ‘military-to-military’ rapport with the Sinhala navy in the island, the military Establishment of genocidal Sri Lanka has stepped up its programme of militarisation and Sinhaliciation of the strategic belt in the three coastal directions of the country… Read more »
Waiting to Return Home
by Oakland Institute, California, May 31, 2016 http://www.oaklandinstitute.org/sites/oaklandinstitute.org/files/SriLanka_Return_Home_final_web.pdf Press release Introduction Sri Lanka’s 26-year-long civil war officially ended in 2009 with the defeat of Tamil separatists, led by the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE), through a bloody military offensive that led to widespread destruction, the killing of tens of thousands of civilians by government… Read more »
Action on Mahaweli System B in Batticaloa
[TamilNet, Wednesday, 16 March 2016, 23:47 GMT] Maithiriapala Sirisene, the president of genocidal Sri Lanka, who visited his native district of Polonnaruwa last week, has vowed to ‘develop’ the villages that are being Sinhalicised along the border of Batticaloa and Polonnaruwa through ‘Mahaweli System B’, which is being accelerated according to his latest instructions. Hailing… Read more »
State-aided Sinhala Colonisation
submitted by International Human Rights Association Bremen Before the armed resistance of the Tamil people took the centre stage, three major processes could be identified aimed at the marginalisation and destabilization of the Tamil nation. The first was the state sponsored colonisation schemes, which under the pretext of development, settled depressed peasants and later lumpen… Read more »
Sinhalisation of the North-East
http://www.sinhalisation.com/ About Since time immemorial the island of Sri Lanka has been largely divided into two linguistic regions, the Tamil North-East and the Sinhala south. The North-East region encompasses the districts of Jaffna, Kilinochchi, Mullaitivu, Vavuniya, Mannar, Batticaloa and the littoral areas of Trincomalee and Amparai. It is a contiguous region that has traditionally been inhabited by Tamil speakers. This… Read more »
ICES: Impact of Displacement on Dowries
ICES Impact-of-Displacement-on-Dowries-in-Sri-Lanka-Feb-2015-1-FINAL-POSTED Four Case Studies The below four small case studies conducted for this desk research corroborate the literature and illustrate some of the issues women recurrently face due to conflict-induced displacement. Their stories provide evidence that marriage, dowries, loss of guardians and assets have major implications on leading a normal life. Trincomalee Case… Read more »
Sri Lankan President Assures Completion of Country’s Largest Irrigation Project on Schedule
[T]he President said it is a fulfillment of an expectation of the people in North-Central Province. He assured that when the project is successfully completed the water required for the farmers in North-Central Province for their farming activities will be provided from the Moragahakanda irrigation system. Recalling that he laid the foundation for the project in 2007 as the Minister of Mahaweli Development, he said funds for the project were not given for a period of five and half years.
He also held discussion with the project engineers, officials and all other resource personnel at the site. The Chinese Ambassador also joined the occasion.
The largest reservoir project under the Mahaweli River Development Program was launched to provide a domestic and industrial water supply to Anuradhapura, Trincomalee, and Polonnaruwa and Matale districts for the development of agriculture in the north, east, and northwestern provinces.
The Tangled Roots of English
Tracing a Mother Tongue A newly revised family tree of Indo-European languages supports the theory that the root language, proto-Indo-European, originated in the steppes of eastern Europe. The peoples of India, Iran and Europe speak a Babel of tongues, but most — English included — are descended from an ancient language known as proto-Indo-European…. Read more »
Livelihoods Lost while Military has Land says NPC Member
Northern Provincial Council member Thurairasa Ravikaran said Tamils in Mullaitivu have lost their livelihoods without access to their land, which remains under Sri Lankan military control. The people of Mullaitivu have faced continuous difficulties in temporary settlements, despite Sri Lankan government claims that they were resettled 4 years ago, the Uthayan reported him as saying. Without the… Read more »
Demographic Projection And Implications For Sri Lanka
by Mural Vallipuranathan, ‘Colombo Telegraph,’ August 15, 2014 I write with reference to an article written by Mr.Rajan Philips in two parts under the titles of “Politics getting nuttier: Muslim Fertility Myths And Misplaced Polygamy Advocacy” (1) and “Politics Getting Nuttier – II: The Impact Of War On Demography And The Implications For Women” (2) …… Read more »