<p> </p>
<p> </p>
<p>Harini Sivalingam, lawyer, community activist and PhD candidate at York University, wrote about the arrival of the <em>Ocean Lady</em> and <em>Sun Sea </em>in Canada ten years ago, carrying Tamil refugees who "fled horrors in their homeland in search of safety, security and stability."</p>
<p>"Immediately upon arrival, these refugees were detained, locked up, and interrogated, many of them for lengthy periods of time. In the case of the<em> MV Sun Sea </em>(which arrived carrying 492 Tamil men, women, and children 10 months later in August 2010), families were separated, and children were detained."</p>
<p>"In contravention of international refugee norms, the Canadian government shared personal information about these refugees with the very government they were fleeing: the Sri Lankan state. Once released from detention, most of the claimants waited in limbo for years for their first refugee hearing."</p>
<p>"Ten years later, the vast majority have settled well, but some have slipped through the cracks facing difficult challenges of integration. Most of those who came on the <em>Ocean Lady </em>and <em>Sun Sea </em>carry with them deep-seated trauma having witnessed and experienced horrendous human rights violations, war crimes, crimes against humanity, and genocide during the armed conflict in Sri Lanka."</p>
<p>"What can we learn from the experiences of mass maritime arrivals of refugees? We discover that we are not all in the same 'boat.' Apart from Indigenous peoples, we all came on differents 'boats' and at different times. While some of us are now safely on land, asylum seekers are still at the outskirts in rocky lifeboats."</p>
<p>"Understanding who these people are and why they came here is pretty straightforward. They are like any of us, just in different 'boats.'"</p>
<p>See the full piece on The Star <a href="https://www.thestar.com/opinion/contributors/2019/10/08/refugees-are-no…">here</a>.</p>
We need your support. Every contribution counts.
Sri Lanka is one of the most dangerous places in the world to be a journalist. Tamil journalists are particularly at threat, with at least 41 media workers known to have been killed by the Sri Lankan state or its paramilitaries during and after the armed conflict.
Despite the risks, our team on the ground remain committed to providing detailed and accurate reporting of developments in the Tamil homeland, across the island and around the world, as well as providing expert analysis and insight from the Tamil point of view
We need your support in keeping our journalism going. Support our work today.