Sri Lanka's upcoming presidential election may bring a new face to power, but concerns remain from Tamils on the island and around the world that their plight may remain unchanged.

Memorial services for the slain Tamil journalist, Mylvaganam Nimalarajan, was held in Vavuniya, Batticaloa and Jaffna, on the 19th anniversary of his death. 

The event in Vavuniya was attended by the families of the disappeared who have continued their protests across the North-East. Current journalists in Jaffna and Batticaloa also held vigils for their slain colleague.

The vigil in Batticaloa was attended by the mayor of the city and other politicians.

In response to the retrial of Brigadier Priyanka Fernando, which will be adjourned by the 19 November, Sri Lanka’s Foreign Ministry has defended the Brigadier, maintaining that under the Vienna Convention on Diplomatic Relations of 1961, he is entitled to diplomatic immunity.
 

Families of the disappeared in Vavuniya protested on Wednesday, condemning presidential candidate and former defence secretary Gotabaya Rajapaksa’s denial of hundreds of cases of disappearances of surrendered Tamils from the end of the war.

Staging a rally at their roadside spot in Vavuniya town where they have been for over 970 days, families of the disappeared slammed the “various opinions that have been expressed with the aim of sabotaging [our] struggle in the run-up to the presidential election”.

Mangala Samaraweera, Sri Lanka’s finance minister and leading UNP member, called on Sri Lankan voters to reject Gotabaya Rajapaksa and warned that Sri Lankan soldiers may face prosecutions abroad through universal jurisdiction cases if “a Sri Lankan judicial mechanism” is not enacted.

Sri Lankan Prime Minster, Ranil Wickremesinghe, says Jaffna will return to normalcy and become an economic hub within five years.

Speaking at the opening ceremony of Jaffna International Airport yesterday, the Prime Minster said opening the airport was just the first step and several other steps are to follow. Once the runway is extended, “flights from the Middle East, Singapore, Malaysia and Thailand will be available to Jaffna.”

“There is no doubt that in the next five years Jaffna will return to its original status and become and economic centre,” he added.

President Maithripala Sirisena and Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe declared Jaffna International Airport open yesterday.

The airport, formerly known as Palaly airport, landed its inaugural flight from Chennai, Tamil Nadu at its opening ceremony. Alliance Air will operate seven flights a week from Chennai to Palaly. Daily air operations will begin in November.

The Sri Lankan military occupied the airport and was used as an air force base for its fleets of jets which were extensively used in bombing raids throughout the armed conflict.

The Pirampadi massacre in Kokkuvil, when over fifty Tamil civilians were shot dead or crushed with an armoured vehicle by Indian Peacekeeping Forces (IPKF) was remembered in the village on Saturday, 32 years after the massacre.

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