“Not all Sinhalese are evil. Neither is every Tamil a saint. But the fact remains that every soldier in the Sri Lankan army who fought the war against the LTTE during 2008-2009 was a Sinhalese.

“This background information is essential for any non-Tamil to understand how the Sri Lankan army can be so brutal against its own civilians.”

At the screening last week in New York of the Channel 4’s documentary ‘Sri Lanka’s Killing Fields’ to UN diplomats and US media, representatives of Sri Lanka’s government insisted on responding to it.

One of those who challenged the documentary, which examined the mass killings by government forces of over 40,000 Tamil civilians, was Sri Lanka’s Deputy Permanent Representative to the UN, Maj Gen (retd) Shavendra Silva.

On Friday Sri Lanka hailed $1.2bn of investment in its tourist industry so far in 2011.

But $1bn of this is for a hotel and a shopping mall, both in Colombo, on prime land purchased from Sri Lanka’s Defence Ministry. And both investments have been attracted with major tax concessions.

“Only a fool thinks that sport and politics do not mix. But I can understand the desire to try and keep the two things separate, to stick your fingers in your ears and insist that the worries of the real world should not intrude of the field of play.

The argument that cricket and politics are separate was always dubious – not least given what a ‘national’ team represents. (See this, and also this and this).

In April, Sri Lanka’s cash-strapped government suddenly raised taxes on imported cars – from 95% to 120%.

The overnight raise drew this comment from ‘fp’, a reader of Lanka Business Online:

“No warning will be given. An arbitrary state essentially operates by making the lives of citizens uncertain and making it difficult to plan long term.

"The video showing summary executions during the final days of Sri Lanka's war in May 2009 provides clear-cut evidence of war crimes.

"Beyond what is evident in the video, Human Rights Watch (HRW) has gathered information on the likely time and place of the executions, the identity of one of the victims, and the specific army unit likely to have been involved.

President Mahinda Rajapaksa’s militarized rule of Sri Lanka’s Tamil areas is so severe, even Sinhala nationalist parties opposed to the government are finding it difficult.

"I tried to die. That was better for me. But then I found that I was being revived so that I can be killed by torture in Sri Lanka. I don't feel any animosity towards anyone but I cannot understand why the British authorities saved my life only to send me back to where I would be killed."

- Nagendrarajah Suthakaran, an asylum seeker who attempted suicide to avoid being deported to Sri Lanka by Britain.