Today marks 12 years since the death of Brigadier Balraj, a senior commander with the LTTE, who passed away from a sudden heart attack in 2008.

Brig. Balraj was famed for his courage, leadership and skills on the battlefield.

<p>Following an independent inquiry into Facebook’s impact on human rights in Sri Lanka, Indonesia and Cambodia; the company has put out a statement apologising for the role it has played in stoking anti-Muslim violence.</p> <p>The specific accusations against Facebook relate to an anti-Muslim Digana riot in Kandy. During the riots at least 8 homes and 50 businesses were destroyed. There were also reports that politicians and police backed by President Mahinda Rajapaksa joined the anti-Muslim&nbsp;riots.</p>

2015: Protest in Chunnakam, Jaffna against the Uthuru Janani thermal power plant for dumping waste oil and grease deposits in the local well. 

Sri Lanka’s ecology and biodiversity are threatened by the continued repression of Eelam Tamils. To protect the land, international mechanisms are needed “to ensure accountability and help pave the way for egalitarianism and self-determination”.

 

The legacy of the war

As thousands of Tamils around the world commemorated the eleventh anniversary of the Mullivaikkal Genocide, marked on May 18, Adayaalam Centre for Policy Research (ACPR) joined in mourning the lives that were lost while also emphasising the lack of justice, in a statement released yesterday.  

The statement acknowledged the lives lost during the war and in particular “the tens of thousands of Tamil lives that were taken by horrific atrocities perpetrated during the final phase of the war” and other multiple massacres due to the “Sri Lankan state’s genocidal campaign against the Tamil people spanning across more than three decades.”

<p>Marking eleven years since the end of the Sri Lankan war, Human Rights Watch (HRW) has put out a statement maintaining that there has been “no reconciliation efforts” and that state officials are stoking racial animosity.</p>

Tamil students from City University in London created a video tribute for the Mullivaikkal genocide that occurred in 2009.

The video was posted yesterday to mark the May 18 massacre that was carried out by the Sri Lankan government against Tamils.

A 16 year old Mullivaikkal survivor, who was just 5 years old at the time of the massacres, shared their experiences of the genocide on the eleventh anniversary of the atrocities.

Pakaloan Vamanan now lives in France.

The following pieces are reflections from Tamil children who all survived the massacres at Mullivaikkal.

Eleven years later, they are telling their stories around the genocide they faced and are reclaiming the narrative.

They have all lost at least one family member during the massacres of 2009. All are now living in the diaspora.

 

Marking eleven years since the massacres at Mullivaikkal, former UN Human Rights Commissioner, Navi Pillay, has issued a statement remembering the thousands of Tamils killed during their struggle for self-determination; the regression of the Sri Lankan government; and, the urgent need for the international community to support the struggle of the Tamil people. 

Sri Lanka’s president Gotabaya Rajapaksa warned that he would withdraw his government from global bodies if attempts to prosecute Sri Lankan soldiers for war crimes are pursued.

Speaking at a ‘National War Heroes Day’ event, Rajapaksa vowed that his regime “will take every measure always to protect the dignity of our heroic forces” and slammed “attempts to discredit and destroy the dignity” the Sri Lankan military.