Sri Lanka’s government Wednesday denounced the US-led air operation against the Libyan regime with a familiar refrain.

“These strikes are harming civilians and are also a violation of the territorial integrity of an independent country,” External Affairs Minister G.L.Peiris told Parliament.

The air strikes were contrary to the United Nations resolution 1973, he claimed.

The irony is incredible. Sri Lanka, whose governments over three decades murdered over a hundred thousand Tamil civilians throughout bombardment, blockade, extra-judicial killings and disappearances (and that was before the mass killings of forty thousand more in 2009), has something to say about Libya.

The Foreign Ministry statement says the "issue of protection of the civilian population in Libya remains a concern for Sri Lanka, as indeed for the rest of the international community."

(From Reuters' report Wednesday)

Sri Lanka’s bourse is Asia's best performer so far in 2011 with an 8.6 percent gain, after a 96 percent rise last year.

But foreign investors have sold a net $55 million (Rs 6.1 billion) in 2011, after selling a record net $240 million (Rs 26.4 billion) in 2010.

The sixth annual Tamil Studies Conference, "Parimaanam: Images, Embodiments and Contestations" organized by the University of Toronto and the University of Windsor, will be held at the University of Toronto from May 13-14, 2011.

Registration to the public is open. Click here. 

See comments from 2010’s participants below:

Extracts from US Assistant Secretary for South and Central Asian Affairs Robert Blake’s speech to the Asia Society on Monday:

(see full text here, and video of the whole event here)

This is one of the pictures at a recent exhibition in London billed as the “first international showcase of Sri Lanka's leading contemporary artists since the end of the civil war in 2009”:

President Mahinda Rajapaksa this week grumbled that Western countries were refusing visas to Sri Lankan minister, but were issuing them to ‘terrorists’ – his word for Tamils who seek refuge abroad from his militarized rule.

See The Sunday Leader’s report here

On International Women’s Day (March 8), the Global Tamil Women Forum (GTWF) appealed to international governments, parliamentarians, institutions and human rights defenders over the plight of Tamil women in Sri Lanka.

The appeal urged the international community to ensure:

“An international, independent war crimes investigation to be established,