The Human Rights Commission of Sri Lanka (HRCSL) has slammed the Sri Lankan military for deploying peacekeepers to take part in a UN mission in Lebanon, before human rights vetting of military personnel could be completed.

In a letter to the Sri Lankan president, HRCSL Chairperson Deepika Udagama said that though the military had agreed to vet 204 soldiers who were due to be deployed to Lebanon, a group of 49 were already deployed before the process could be completed. They only learnt of the deployment through a “media statement”.

Sri Lanka’s president once more reiterated that he would not allow any foreign judges to participate in an accountability mechanism to deal with mass atrocities, as he spoke with the heads of media institutions at the President’s House in Colombo on Friday.

Mr Sirisena has repeated several times that his government would not allow any foreign judges to take part in such a mechanism, since Sri Lanka agreed to set up a “credible justice process” with “Commonwealth and other foreign judges, defence lawyers and authorized prosecutors and investigators” in a 2015 UN Human Rights Council Resolution.

Tamil youth in Batticaloa will commemorate the memory of Annai Poopathy with a football tournament in her honour.

Sri Lanka’s President Maithripala Sirisena declared that International Workers’ Day, commonly marked as May Day, will now be shifted from May 1^st to May 7^th, after pressure from various Buddhist lobby groups.

The decision was made as May 1^st coincides with the Buddhist festival of Vesak. Mr Sirisena announced the decision on his Twitter and told Heads of Media institutions this morning that political rallies and processions are not to be held on that date.

The move comes despite the Ceylon Teachers Union stating that it was “a total disregard for the rights of the workers and their trade unions”.

The paramilitary group, EPDP have lost their grip on power in Delft (Neduntheevu) to the TNA.

The TNA candidate for chair of the Delft divisional council (prathesa sabai) defeated the EPDP candidate, causing the EPDP’s first loss on the islet in several years.

A ceremony was held in Batticaloa last week to mark the 120^th birth anniversary of S J V Chelvanayakam, fondly referred to as Thanthai (father) Chelva.

The Sri Lankan Army has re-seized land belonging to a Kilinochchi school after the school spent a substantial amount of money restoring the property.

6 April 2009 - Thousands of Tamil protestors occupy parliament square demanding international action as slaughter of Tamil civilians in North-East escalates

6 April marks the 9th anniversary of the parliament square protests. Following 2 weeks of protest outside British parliament the number of demonstrators escalated to thousands in response to the intensified shelling of Tamil civilians in the North-East of Sri Lanka. Thousands of protestors took to the streets and staged a sit down demonstration in front of the Houses of Commons.

For an eye-witness account of the events see here.

The demonstrations went on to be the largest ever protests outside parliament in its recorded history.

Photographs: The Guardian

 Medical officials in the Vanni reported continuous shelling of the No Fire Zone, where an estimated 100,000 Tamil civilians were trapped.

Sri Lanka’s Minister for National Dialogue Mano Ganesan announced that Sri Lanka’s Prime Minister did not agree to the Tamil National Alliance’s demands when soliciting the party’s support to defeat the no-confidence motion.

Mr Ganesan was speaking journalists after a function in Dehiwalal, Colombo, reports dailymirror.lk.

Displaced families given army-built houses in Varuththalai Vilaan, Telippalai this week, expressed concern over the coninued functioning of military checkpoints close to the new housing scheme. 

Thirty houses military built houses were handed over to families displaced from areas including Valikaamam North at an event yesterday. 

Residents were also forced to take out loans in order to invest in suitable windows, doors, bathroom fittings, as the Rs 800,000 allocated by the government for the houses was insufficient for adequate quality goods.