Marumalarchi Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (MDMK) leader Vaiko has slammed the Indian governments announcement that it will provide over $450 in credit for development and security despite concerns over the newly appointed Sri Lankan president’s human rights record.

Thirty-five years ago, while many slept and some were already in the fields, the Sri Lankan army declared a sudden curfew in the town of Cheddikulam and surrounding villages on the border of Vavuniya district.

As news of the curfew seeped through the town through radio and word of mouth, residents scrambled to their homes or the closest house of someone they knew so as not to be caught outside.

Makhdoom Shah Mahmood Qureshi, Pakistan’s Foreign Minister, has arrived in Sri Lanka for a two-day state visit after the election of Gotabaya Rajapksa.

The massacre of 12 civilians by the Sri Lankan air force was commemorated in Oddusuddan, Mullaitivu on November 27.

The twelve were killed in an air raid on Oddusuddan on November 27, 1990. 

The Sri Lankan government has dismissed information given by Swiss authorities regarding the abduction and threatening of an embassy employee in Colombo last week, and instead called for the victim to be questioned by the Sri Lankan security forces.

A senior police officer in Sri Lanka’s Criminal Investigation Department (CID) who had been investigating high profile cases, has been transferred reports Colombo Gazette, as fears of a purge under Sri Lanka’s new president Gotabaya Rajapaksa continue.

The National Investigation Agency of India (NIA) carried out raids in Thanjavur and Tiruchirapalli this week, as they detained two men over suspected links to the Easter Sunday bomb attacks in Colombo and Batticaloa that killed hundreds of people.

The two men are reportedly linked to accomplices of Zahran Hashim, the alleged mastermind behind the Easter bombing attacks.

Sri Lanka’s president Gotabaya Rajapaksa dismissed accusations that he had played a role in the thousands of abductions that took place through infamous ‘white vans’, claiming that they were all “bogus allegations”.

Rajapaksa spoke with The Hindu’s Suhasini Haidar and also said that he was against devolving police powers in accordance with the Sri Lankan constitution’s 13th amendment, instead claiming he was "willing to discuss alternatives”.

Tamil activists arrested by Malaysian authorities have complained of mistreatment, torture and intimidation from security forces, which includes forced confessions and threats to their families.

A lawyer for one of the arrested men, 57-year-old grocery store owner B Subramaniam, said “during the arrest and subsequent detention for 21 days, he was tortured and forced to say ‘I am an LTTE member’”.

The Sri Lankan army put up road-blocks in Batticaloa to prevent people from going to Vakarai for Maaveerar Naal on Wednesday and intimidated Tamil journalists who were reporting on the commemorations.

Journalists reported that they were stopped en route to Vakarai Thuyilum Illam (LTTE cemetery) by a Sri Lankan army road-block and turned away by the troops stationed there.

Canada announced that it will provide $8.3 million to support mine-affected communities, including $2 million to the North-East for de-mining work.

File photograph: Tamil women carrying out de-mining work in Thunukkai, March 2010 (Russell Watkins / Department for International Development)

India offers Sri Lanka $450 million in credit for development and security despite concerns over the newly appointed President’s human rights record.