• We are Eelam Tamil'

    "As youth, we are the future of our nation and in the face of genocide, I am proud to say we stand strong and united."

  • Not for outsiders to impose their values or their judgments' - Gotabhaya

    Addressing delegates in the National Conference on Reconciliation, Sri Lanka's defence secretary, Gotabhaya Rajapaksa said,

  • Jaffna uni students mark Remembrance Day, defying military

    Posters, honouring the sacrifice of Eelam's heroes and proclaiming the continuation of the struggle for independence, were found across Jaffna University campus on Wednesday.

    The posters, seen at the student's common room and parking area, had increased in number by the following morning.

    Students reported that the posters read,

    “We take a vow that we will travel in the ultimate path of our heroes who sacrificed their life for the truth.”

    Jaffna university students are understood to have been behind it.

    One student, who wished to remain anonymous, stated,

    "Repression and murders will not wipe out our maaverar from our hearts, nor will it diminish the sacrifice they made for Tamils’ struggle and their goal. This is our clear message from these posters, SL Gov and the international community should understand that.”

    "No matter how the SL gov continues its repression, our struggle for liberation will not diminish."

  • ‘Competent authorities’ for takeover appointed

    The Sri Lankan government has appointed six “Competent Authorities” that will handle the 37 enterprises that are due to be taken over by the recently passed Assets Acquisition Bill.

  • Gas reserves ‘un-economical’

    The much celebrated discovery of natural gas in the Mannar basin may turn out to be a damp squib.

    The Daily Mirror reported that one of the wells discovered recently has been assessed and proven to be inadequate for extraction.

  • US Senators write to Clinton on LLRC
    Three US Senators have written to Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, urging her that if the LLRC report was found to be neither credible nor independent, that an “independent international accountability mechanism” be established.
  • Number of SL dead ‘too small’ to be war crimes – Gothabaya

    Sri Lankan defence secretary Gothabaya Rajapakse has told a conference on reconciliation in Colombo that the number of civilians killed during the final phase of the military conflict was far too small to be classed as war crimes or genocide.

  • Navy attempts to quash Remembrance Day events in Kaarainagar

    Reports have emerged that the Sri Lankan Navy has explicitly banned Hindu temples in Kaarainagar from tolling their bells, in the week leading up to Remembrance Day on 27th November.

  • Expropriations concern foreign investors – EIU

    The Economist Intelligence Unit has stated in a report that Sri Lanka’s latest expropriation laws would only serve to further harm the economy and scare off any potential investors.

    It comes as the Sri Lankan President Mahinda Rajapakse announced plans to acquire 37,000 acres of land from plantation companies and redistribute them among certain farmer families in the country.

  • Rajapaksa warns against 'cover of human rights'

    Mahinda Rajapaksa warned that "terrorists" were using the "cover of human rights" to attack Sri Lanka, when addressing the graduation ceremony at the General Sir John Kotelawala Defence University (KDU) at Temple Trees on Tuesday.

    Rajapaksa said,

    "Terrorists who attacked us once hiding in the civil society, attack us in the cover of human rights today."

    “If this was a personal attack, it would have been easy for me to tolerate. But this is not so. These attacks are against the motherland. You need to understand that it is a threat posed to national security."

    “It is the duty of all of us to work towards taking the country to a top position in the world. After the liberation of the country we did not forget our war heroes. We love them respect them and trust them forever”.

    According to the Sri Lankan government's official news portal, Rajapaksa added,

  • Army escort South African and Chinese delegation around Vanni

    The Sri Lankan army escorted a South African and Chinese delegation around Vanni on Friday.

  • Rajapakse receives LLRC report

    Sri Lankan President Mahinda Rajapakse received the long-awaited Lessons Learnt and Reconciliation Committee report today, but it is still unclear when it will be made available to the public.

  • MSF’s 'ugly compromises' in Sri Lanka

    One of the world’s best known aid agencies, Médecins sans Frontières, has released a collection of essays which has revealed some of the controversial policies that they undertook when negotiating with governments during their work.

  • UK Foreign Office Minister calls for release of LLRC report

    Alistair Burt, British Foreign Office minister has today called on Sri Lanka to release the report on the findings of the controversial Lessons Learnt and Reconciliation Commission.

  • The Figment of ‘Post-Conflict’ Sri Lanka

    Sri Lanka’s present political predicament is already somewhat hastily being described as ‘post-conflict’ by both international and local actors, for example by both the Government of Sri Lanka and the IMF.

    However, there are very good reasons for remaining sceptical about the use of this terminology, not just because of the nebulousness of definitions of conflict (and a simplistically assumed opposition with peace), and its injudicious past use in places like Afghanistan, but also due to present dynamics in Sri Lanka which are being deliberately papered over and viewed through a skewed lens.

    Indeed, ‘post-conflict’ is a misnomer that flows from the predominance of a particular international common sense knowledge and the way it understands the power dynamics in the interface of the global and local that we find in Sri Lanka.

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