CNN news video of PM David Cameron in Jaffna at http://www.cnn.com/2013/11/16/world/asia/sri-lanka-commonwealth-cameron-march/index.html British Prime Minister David Cameron has given Sri Lanka a March 2014 deadline to hold an independent international inquiry into alleged war crimes during the country’s 26-year civil war. Cameron held talks with Sri Lankan President Mahinda Rajapaksa while in the capital of Colombo for… Read more »
Posts Categorized: International
Abuse Accusations Overshadow Commonwealth Meeting in Sri Lanka
NEW DELHI — Sri Lanka’s president, Mahinda Rajapaksa, tried to pre-empt criticism of his government’s human rights record on Friday as he welcomed leaders of Commonwealth countries to asummit meeting in the Sri Lankan capital, Colombo, that was overshadowed by persistent allegations of state-sponsored abuse during a long civil war by the Sinhalese-dominated government against ethnic Tamils…. Read more »
Sri Lanka’s Climate of Fear
Since the end of Sri Lanka’s civil war in 2009, the government of President Mahinda Rajapaksa has had a record of serious human rights violations and failed to provide accountability for wartime abuses. In August, the United Nations high commissioner for human rights, Navi Pillay, issued scathing observations on the state of human rights in Sri Lanka after her… Read more »
Sri Lanka’s Potemkin Peace
by International Crisis Group, Belgium, November 13, 2013 Full report at http://www.crisisgroup.org/~/media/Files/asia/south-asia/sri-lanka/253-sri-lankas-potemkin-peace-democracy-under-fire.pdf EXECUTIVE SUMMARY AND RECOMMENDATIONS Sri Lanka’s ethnically-exclusive regime continues to close political space and consolidate its power. Recent moves that create a perception of progress have not weakened the power of the president, his family or the military or brought reconciliation, ended human rights… Read more »
Channel 4’s ‘No Fire Zone’
http://www.channel4.com/programmes/no-fire-zone/4od ABOUT THE PROGRAMME The team behind the Nobel Peace Prize-nominated Sri Lanka’s Killing Fields tell the story of the 138-day-long final offensive in Sri Lanka’s bloody civil war Available for a limited time only at Channel 4 site. —————— Channel 4 Nov. 9 blog on interview with Isaipriya’s mother and sisters http://blogs.channel4.com/miller-on-foreign-affairs/sri-lanka-tamil-familys-distress-footage-daughter/430
Interview with TGTE PM
Published on Nov 9, 2013 This is the full interview with Viswanathan Rudrakumaran for the documentary ‘That Tamil Issue’. Interviewers : Tejinder Singh and Rajesh Sundaram. Shot in New York, USA. Co-Producer : Prakash Ezumalai —————————- CHOGM 2013 Walking into Genocidal Sri Lanka http://naathamnews.com/?p=32 A Booklet by Transnational Government of Tamil Eelam (TGTE) 1) … Read more »
India’s PM Under Fire For Boycotting Commonwealth Conflab Under Tamil Pressure
He had a summit with President Obama in the White House, and he saw China’s President Xi Jinping in Beijing and Russia’s President Vladimir Putin in Moscow all in a period of a few weeks. Yet Manmohan Singh, approaching the end of a decade as India’s prime minister, won’t be hobnobbing this week with the leaders of the… Read more »
New Delhi Experiments Eezham Model ‘Counterinsurgency’ on Its Own People
Indian State now consolidates a policy that extraordinary political movements of mass basis, coming from peoples long exposed to social oppression, material deprivation, un-freedom and stark poverty in India, have to be eliminated with the deployment of an increasing number of armed forces. The more the forces are special and armed-to-the-teeth with impunity, the more… Read more »
An Uncommon Disrespect for Human Rights
by Jack Healey, ‘The Huffington Post,’ October 31, 2013 Founder, Human Rights Actions Center The Commonwealth of Nations was established in 1949 during the decolonization process of the British Empire. Meeting biennially in various of the fifty four member states, the Commonwealth is a voluntary and equal association of nations that is theoretically bound by… Read more »
Credible Sri Lankan War Crimes Investigation on the Horizon
At the United Nations General Assembly’s (UNGA) 68th session in late September, a major stipulation was laid out by UN High Commissioner on Human Rights, Navi Pillay, in reference to the shocking slaughtering of tens of thousands of Sri Lankan Tamil civilians in the spring of 2009. Given strong evidence that Tamil civilians were killed primarily by… Read more »
Tamil Nadu Assembly Passes Resolution
by Julie Mariappan, TNN, from ‘Times of India,’ October 24, 2013 video report at http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/india/Tamil-Nadu-assembly-passes-resolution-demanding-India-boycott-Commonwealth-meeting/articleshow/24650700.cms CHENNAI: The Tamil Nadu legislative assembly on Thursday unanimously passed a resolution urging the Union government to boycott the Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting slated to be held in Colombo in November. Prime Minister Manmohan Singh had reportedly informed the DMK leadership recently that a decision on India’s… Read more »
India for Lasting Political Solution in Tamil Areas: Khurshid
When the Indian Foreign Minister brought up the issue of meaningful political devolution in his meetings, the Sri Lankan side – both President Rajapaksa and Foreign Minister G.L. Peiris, in response, seem to have pointed to the Parliamentary Select Committee (PSC)…
Speaking to the Indian media in Jaffna before his meeting with Mr. Khurshid, Chief Minister Mr.Wigneswaran said it was important that the PSC lay down explicitly its parameters and matters related to its forward movement…
Having indicated to Sri Lanka that it was a “historic opportunity to start dialogue afresh”, he said India would be there to “help, assist and advise.”
Healing Sri Lanka Begins with a New Deal for Tamils
The Tamil National Alliance won a solid victory over the weekend in Sri Lanka’s Tamil-majority Northern Province, giveing it the credibility to lobby for political devolution and for sufficient funds to rebuild the shattered region. Sri Lanka’s Tamil heartland has finally regained its political voice, four years after a brutal civil war that tore apart… Read more »
UN Failed during Final Days of Lankan Ethnic War
New York: In a rare admission of “systemic failure” of the UN, its chief has said the world body had failed during the final stages of Sri Lanka’s ethnic war in 2009 that saw military defeat of the LTTE. Secretary General Ban Ki-moon also blamed member countries for not providing the UN with support to… Read more »
Pasumai Thaayagam UNHRC Statement
24th Session of the United Nations Human Rights Council 24 September 2013 Geneva Item 9: General Debate Organization: Pasumai Thaayagam Presenter: Dr. Anpumani Ramadoss Pasumai Thaayagam condemns all forms of racism and related intolerance. There are many repercussions of racism, ranging from the daily oppression of an intolerant society, to outright genocide. Unfortunately, the latter is… Read more »
M Karunanidhi Bats for Referendum in Sri Lanka
M Karunanidhi bats for referendum in Sri Lanka to end woes of Tamils CHENNAI: A referendum under the aegis of the United Nations alone would give a fresh lease of life to “beleaguered” Tamils in Sri Lanka, DMK chief M Karunanidhi said here today. “Tamils all over the world earnestly expect that the UN would come forward for such… Read more »
Establish a Syrian War Crimes Tribunal
Smith: Switch gears, Mr. President. Fight to establish Syrian war crimes court &hold both Assad and the rebels who commit egregious crimes accountable There is a non-lethal way to help ensure that Bashar al-Assad and other perpetrators of atrocities in Syria are held to account not someday far in the future but beginning now. The… Read more »
A Visual History of Guerrilla Warfare From 1775 to 2012
The Invisible Armies Insurgency Tracker presents a database of insurgencies from 1775 to 2012. It supplements the comprehensive historical narrative in Invisible Armies: An Epic History of Guerrilla Warfare from Ancient Times to the Present, by CFR Senior Fellow Max Boot. ‘Invisible Armies’ Insurgencies Tracker map & graphic http://www.cfr.org/wars-and-warfare/invisible-armies-insurgency-tracker/p29917# ————————————— … Read more »
Bad History Mars Indian Movie On Rajiv Gandhi’s Assassination
Divyakant Solanki/European Pressphoto AgencyDemonstrators in Mumbai, Maharashtra, demanding a ban on the film “Madras Cafe” on Aug. 22. The movie “Madras Cafe,” which opened in India and elsewhere in the world recently, seeks to chronicle the Sri Lankan civil war through the events leading up to the assassination in 1991 of former Prime Minister Rajiv… Read more »
Bloody Footprints on Sri Lanka
The bloody episode is cited as the latest example of violent repression that threatens to overshadow the Commonwealth leaders’ summit in Colombo in November.
Today Navi Pillay, the United Nations human rights commissioner, arrives in Sri Lanka, amid hopes she will address allegations that President Mahinda Rajapaksa’s regime has intimidated its opponents in the four years since the showdown with Tamil rebels that ended the civil war.