Buddhist monks led a Sinhala nationalist rally in support of Israel and its offensive on Gaza this week, reiterating Israeli military support during Sri Lanka’s war on Tamils.

“At that time when the international community was not helping us, the Israel state assisted us unconditionally to save us from terrorism,” claimed Senapathiye Ananda, a Buddhist monk from the little-known North & East Sinhala Association.

^{Photograph: Sunday Times}

As many as three different protests have taken place in Colombo this week, denouncing Israel’s assault on Gaza and expressing solidarity with Palestine.

Sri Lanka’s president Ranil Wickremesinghe “urged a fresh approach” to solving the Israel-Palestine conflict and aired the idea of “four-state solution involving Israel, Palestine, Gaza, and Lebanon,” in public remarks last week.

Speaking at an event held by a think tank that he founded, the Geopolitical Cartographer, Wickremesinghe first told the audience that he had concerns over whether the United States could “multiple international issues simultaneously”.

In a historic moment, the ferry service between Nagapattinam in Tamil Nadu, and Kankesanthurai (KKS) in Jaffna, was inaugurated on October 14, 2023. The high-speed ferry, operated by the Shipping Corporation of India, marked the revival of sea connectivity between Tamil Eelam and Tamil Nadu after a hiatus of 40 years.

The journey commenced from Nagapattinam port in the morning with 50 passengers and staff on board, reaching Kankesanthurai at 12:20 pm.

An Eelam Tamil family, who had been displaced from their homes and were residing in Tamil Nadu for more than 30 years, have been arrested as they returned to Jaffna this week.

The family, which consists of a woman, her husband and her mother, originally fled from Eelam in 1990 during the midst of the armed conflict.

The Bar Associations in the North-East have called off their ongoing strike but will continue to stage their protest to highlight the eroding independence of the judiciary and the lack of safety for judicial workers on the island, after a judge was forced to flee last month.

The Office of the High Commissioner of Human Rights (OHCHR) has raised “serious concerns” over the Anti-Terrorism Bill and the Online Safety Bill, two pieces of legislation that are currently being considered in Sri Lanka’s parliament.

The UN Human Rights Office warned that both bills “give the authorities a range of expansive powers and can impose restrictions on human rights, not in line with international human rights law”.

Sri Lanka’s Criminal Investigation Department (CID) submitted its report into the fleeing of a Tamil judge who faced death threats on the island, and claimed that “there was no threat to life” in its conclusion.

Mullaitivu District Judge T. Saravanarajah resigned from his posts and fled the island due to death threats and mounting pressure from the Sri Lankan government last month.

Sri Lanka has reportedly reached a deal with China’s Exim Bank to restructure $4.2bn of debt, as it looks to release the second tranche of an International Monetary Fund (IMF) bailout package that was withheld last month.

The island was plunged into an economic crisis last year and defaulted on billions of dollars of foreign debt, forcing it to reach out to the global financial body for assistance.

The 36th anniversary of the Kokkuvil Pirambadi massacre, when over fifty Tamil civilians were shot dead or crushed with an armoured vehicle by Indian Peacekeeping Forces (IPKF), was commemorated in Jaffna on Thursday.

The massacre is claimed to be the first of many by Indian troops during their occupation of the Tamil homeland in the late eighties.

During the event, a lamp was lit, and flowers were offered to remember the lives lost in the massacre.