Following widespread criticism from over 80 civil society organisations and human rights experts of Sri Lanka’s proposed reforms to the Prevention of Terrorism Act, State Minister of Regional Cooperation, Tharaka Balasuriya claimed that the government would replace the measure with a new bill.

Speaking with the Sunday Morning, Balasuriya stated that no steps had been taken to introducing this bill as the government was focused on reforming the Prevention of Terrorism Act.

As Sri Lanka's economy continues to collapse, prices of staple foods have reached a record high, restricting vulnerable households to access food says the Food and Agriculture Organisation of the UN.

Since the coronavirus outbreak, Sri Lanka's economy has been in dire straits as revenue from the tourism sector and exports have dwindled, causing the Sri Lankan rupee to depreciate. As a result, prices of imported food items and locally produced food items have increased, reaching record levels in January 2022. 

Murugathasan Varnakulasingham, the Tamil youth who self-immolated in protest outside the United Nations in Geneva over the inaction of the international community in the face of the genocide of Tamils, was remembered in London and in Jaffna yesterday. 

Selvakumar Nilanthan, a Tamil journalist and Batticaloa Press Club secretary, was interrogated for two hours by officers from Sri Lanka's Criminal Investigation Department (CID) earlier this week. 

Two CID officers from Eravur police station visited Nilanthan's house twice ordering Nilanthan to go to Eravur police station for questioning over his alleged links to the Tamil diaspora. 

Some of the questions Nilanthan was asked were: 

Tamil journalist Punniyamoorthy Sathiyamoorthy, who was killed by a Sri Lankan artillery barrage inside the ‘No Fire Zone’ in February 2009, was remembered today in the North-East. 

Human Rights Watch has published a statement calling on Sri Lanka to introduce a moratorium on the use of the draconian Prevention of Terrorism Act (PTA) and for the “release of those unjustly jailed in its application”.

“Cosmetic interventions won’t suffice”, writes EU Advocate Claudio Francavilla.

The 26th anniversary of the Kumarapuram massacre, in which the Sri Lankan army killed twenty-six Tamil civilians and gang-raped a 15 year old girl, was remembered in Trincomalee earlier today. 

Tamil families of the disappeared marched through Vavuniya this morning, as they demonstrated against Sri Lankan president Gotabaya Rajapaksa’s visit to the North-East accusing him of being responsible for the disappearance of their loved ones.

Australian Tamils protested against Sri Lanka’s cricket team outside Sydney Cricket Ground today over Sri Lanka’s abysmal human rights record. 

Protesters drew attention to Sri Lanka’s ongoing abuses against the Tamil people in the North-East as well as the genocidal offensive that killed tens of thousands of Tamil at the end of the armed conflict in 2009. 

This week, after almost 2 years in detention, Hejaaz Hizbullah was finally allowed to walk out of Sri Lankan jail. It was a welcome sight. However, the lawyer is not yet a free man. Hizbullah was only released on bail and still has an uphill battle against charges that are widely seen as trumped up. Like so many other Muslims and Tamils across the island, he remains at risk of being imprisoned again under Sri Lanka’s notorious Prevention of Terrorism Act (PTA). The draconian legislation has been a key weapon in furthering the state's Sinhala-Buddhist authoritarianism since its inception decades ago. It must be repealed.