The 22nd remembrance of slain senior Tamil journalist Aiyathurai Nadesan was held on Sunday at the memorial for murdered journalists in Gandhi Park, Batticaloa, with journalists, politicians and civil society representatives paying tribute and renewing calls for justice.

The commemoration, held on 31 May, was jointly organised by the Batticaloa Media house (Maddu Oodaha Maiyam), the Batticaloa District Tamil Journalists Association and the Eastern Lanka Journalists Association.

The occupying Sri Lankan police force has arrested two Tamil youths from Jaffna after reportedly taking photographs in the vicinity of the controversial Thaiyiddy Vihara, a Buddhist shrine at the centre of a long-running dispute over the colonisation of Tamil land in the Valikamam North region.

The arrests were carried out by officers attached to the occupying Palaly Police Station during special Vesak observances held at the vihara on Friday.

A commemoration marking the 45th anniversary of the burning of the Jaffna Public Library was held there today, to remember its destruction by Sri Lanka's security forces and state-backed mobs.

Colombo Fort Magistrate Court has ordered the arrest of former minister and founder of the Sri Lanka Podujana Peramuna (SLPP), Basil Rajapaksa, in connection with a case involving the alleged misuse of public funds amounting to more than Rs. 7.8 million.

^{Cover art by Sagi Thilipkumar}

At midnight on May 31, 1981, the Jaffna Public Library, the crucible of Tamil literature and heritage, was set ablaze by Sri Lankan security forces and state-sponsored mobs. The burning has since been marked by Eelam Tamils as an act of genocide.

Tamil families of the disappeared staged a protest in Vavuniya on Saturday (30), insisting that they do not need financial compensation but justice and an international investigation to uncover the fate of their forcibly disappeared loved ones.

Sri Lanka’s Court of Appeal has overturned the conviction of a Buddhist monk who had been sentenced to 10 years’ rigorous imprisonment for grave sexual abuse, ruling that the complainant’s evidence was unreliable due to inconsistencies, according to Newswire.