Sri Lanka’s Presidential Commission on disappearances made its final sitting in Kilinochchi last week, calling over a thousand witnesses to testify about their missing relatives. The wife of former LTTE member Kannan, alias Gnanaselvan Uthayarasa, testified after seeing a photo of her husband with other captive LTTE cadres stripped naked and alive at the hands of the Sri Lankan military. “My husband is an LTTE member that surrendered to the army on May 18, 2009. I and my two children witnessed it in person. Thereafter there is no information about my husband Under these circumstances I got photo evidences of war crimes telecast by Channel 4. There were photos of my husband taken while he was taken by the army in stripped condition, and was seen sitting near a ditch.”
Updated 2300 GMT Sri Lanka's Supreme Court has ordered Chief Minister CV Wigneswaran and other Tamil politicians to appear before it with regards to the resolution calling for a federal solution in a merged North-East passed by the NPC last week. The chief minister, NPC Chairman CVK Sivagnanam, Chief Secretary A. Paththinathan, and President of the Ilankai Tamil Arasu Kachchi (ITAK) and MP Maavai Senathiraja were asked to submit explanations. Officials must appear before the court after the 12th of May, according to Mr Sivagnanam. TNA MP M A Sumanthiran tweeted that the court had not issued a...
The chief minister of the Northern Province rejected assertions that the call for federalism was racist and aimed at secession, stating that it was "madness" to suggest so. In an interview with the Tamil newspaper, Virakesari this week, Mr Wigneswaran said, "For many years politicians have been ceaselessly saying federalism would secede the nation. That makes you also believe in those lines. You have become accustomed to such remarks. Read newspapers and books to understand about federalism. Federalism is in vogue in India. It is followed in Canada and Switzerland also. A country will never be divided because of federalism."
Over a hundred journalists and media workers based in Colombo staged a demonstration on Friday, calling for justice for murdered Tamil journalist Dharmeratnam Sivaram. Members of the Working Journalists Association, Tamil Media Alliance, Free Media Movement, Muslim Media Forum and the Federation of Media Employees Trade Union took part in the protest alongside other trade unions. Speaking to AP Media rights activist Lasantha Ruhunage said the Sri Lankan government must do more to punish those responsible for attacks on journalists. “More than compensation, the attacks on journalists, media workers and media institutions should be properly investigated and those responsible for the attacks should be punished, in order to ensure justice to the media community," he said.
Sri Lankan Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe lashed out at the island’s media institutions on Saturday, accusing them of attempting to revive the LTTE. Addressing the 20th anniversary of the Muslim Media Forum, ColomboPage reported Mr Wickremesinghe as stating the “biggest threat to media freedom in Sri Lanka is media itself” during a speech in which he pulled out copies of Sri Lankan newspapers The Island and Divayina to criticise them. Mr Wickremesinghe went on to criticise reports of the LTTE regrouping by referencing the ancient Sinhalese ruler Dutugemunu who defeated the Tamil king...
British Tamil school children are outperforming their peers who have registered English as their first language in reading, writing and mathematics, reports The Express . Looking at exam results from the previous year for children aged 10 and 11, the Express reported that children who reported Chinese and Tamil as their mother tongue outperformed children whose first language is English in all tests.
Remarks made by US Permanent Representative to the UN, Ambassador Samantha Power, calling Sri Lanka a "global champion for human rights" have come under fire. Writing in The Diplomat , commentator Taylor Dibbert said the Obama administration's rhetoric "continues to be wildly out of step with reality". "Sri Lanka watchers will notice that instead of the United States clearly calling for accountability for wartime abuses (a hugely controversial issue in post-war Sri Lanka), the language seems to have shifted to 'accountable democracy.' This is something to watch going forward. Is Washington still genuinely pushing for wartime accountability?" he wrote. Highlighting the recent increase in abductions, Mr Dibbert further said, "Global champion of human rights and accountability? That’s quite an assertion.
Officials from the French navy said that it was time to start a "solid" partnership with Sri Lanka, the Daily Mirror reported. “This is a good time to start the partnership between our two nations,” Captain Laurent Machard De Gramont, the Commanding Officer of the French Naval Ship ‘Aconit’, which arrived in Colombo on Friday, said. “After six years, this is the first visit by a French ship to Sri Lanka and more visits are to follow,” he further said. The navy delegation will take part in several programmes organised by the Sri Lanka Navy to strengthen mutual relations during their stay in...
Attempts are being made to acquire 551 acres of private land in Kilinochchi from the Tamil people, the Tamil National Alliance (TNA) MP, S Sritharan said this week. Writing a letter to the TNA leader, R Sampanthan and to the president, Maithripala Sirisena, Mr Sritharan called for the land grabs to be halted. Private land is also be acquired for the use of the army in six places in Jaffna, as well as 42 places having been earmarked for the use of the navy. Highlighting the strong opposition from the Tamil land owners and politicians, Mr Sritharan also pointed out the land of 817 families in...
The Vavuniya Citizens Committee, together with the Mullaitivu Citizens Committee and the Forum for Searching, Handed, Kidnapped and Forcibly Disappeared Relatives - Tamil Homeland), called for a public remembrance event on May 18th to mark the genocide of the Tamil people in 2009. Reiterating the need for justice, the three groups urged people to come to Mullivaikkal to make their demand for justice heard.