A retired Sri Lankan army major was charged of sexual assault in Hawaii whilst he was there on a training programme with the Disaster Management Center (DMC). 

The army major, who has not been named, was charged of sexually assaulting a female employee of the hotel where he was staying. 

He was arrested by local police before being charged and deported from the country. 

According to Colombo Page, the secretary of the ministry of disaster management said the army major had been temporarily suspended and an institution level inquiry would be conducted. 

A protest was held in Vavuniya last week run solidarity with the people of Mullaitivu, calling for the return of their lands.

Murdered journalist Sugirtharajan was remembered in Batticaloa following the 11th anniversary of his death on January 24th.

A former LTTE cadre was found dead in his Vavuniya home on Sunday.

31-year-old Ilangarasa Ilangovan, known as Kopu, had undergone rehabilitation and was living in Kothanda Nochchikulam, Vavuniya with his wife and three children.

The death is being investigated by Vavuniya police.

A video series and publication supporting those impacted by childhood sexual abuse (CSA) within the Tamil community was released by Toronto-based non-profit organization Abuse Never Becomes Us (A.N.B.U.).

The publication showcases the lived experiences of five individuals that were impacted by CSA.

One contributor writes,

Three army officers were arrested on Saturday over the assault of a Sri Lankan journalist in 2008. 

Keith Noyahr, an associate editor of The Nation was abducted from just outside him home in Colombo and tortured before being released in May 2008. 

Major Prabath Bulathwatte, Sergeant Duminda Weeraratne and Sergeant Hemachandra Perera were summoned to the CID headquarters on Friday for questioning. 

See more here. 

The Sri Lankan army has taken exception to a former president’s acknowledgment that Tamil war widows face sexual exploitation.

On its website the army refuted allegations of sexual exploitation of Tamil women, made by former president Chandrika Kumaratunge, as a “baseless allegation”.

Claiming to have a zero tolerance policy on sexual abuse, the army said on Chandrika’s claims, “regrettably, the author of this statement has made unsubstantiated and baseless assertions without specifying any incident of sexual exploitation or abuse.”

Pilavu protests continued for the 19th day today despite pressure for protestors to stop and ongoing military surveillance.

The former president Chandrika Kumaratunge this week acknowledged that Tamil war widows continued to face sexual exploitation from those in power, including by army officers and local government servants. 

“There is a lot of sexual abuse still going on by officials, even Tamil officials and even at lower levels, the grama sevakas,” Ms Kumaratunge told Sri Lanka’s Foreign Correspondents’ Association. 

“Even to sign a document, they abuse the women and of course some people in the (armed) forces” continue to commit sexual abuse," she added. 

Tamils in Australia this week rejected a statement made by the Sri Lankan prime minister Ranil Wickremesinghe in Canberra that it was now safe for Tamil asylum seekers to return to the country, saying instead that Sri Lanka was far from reaching such a point. 

"The Australian Tamil Congress (ATC) would like to categorically state that Sri Lanka has not reached a point where every Tamil asylum seeker can just return without worrying about the consequences; indeed Sri Lanka is far from it," the ATC said in a statement.