• Tamil political prisoners on hunger strike over mistreatment

    Aug 20

    Three Tamil political detainees in Anuradhapuram Prison have been on hunger strike for 8 days, after ongoing mistreatment by Sinhala inmates, a source close to the family of one of the men told the Tamil Guardian.

  • Australian High Court to hold special hearing over asylum seekers detention at sea
    An Australian High Court is to hold a special hearing in October over the detention of asylum seekers at sea.

    The legal team representing 157 Tamil asylum seekers who were held at sea for over 4 weeks and then brought to a detention centre in Western Australia before being transferred to Nauru, have challenged the legality of such a detention.

    The hearing has been set for October 14 and 15 by Justice Kenneth Hayne.

    “What Australia does on the high seas does affect international law and the approach of other countries,” George Newhouse, a lawyer for the asylum seekers told the Guardian.

  • Sinhalese becoming a minority warns SL Minister
    The Sinhala community will become a minority in Sri Lankan within a century warned the Sri Lankan minister Champika Ranawaka, the Asian Mirror reports.

    "It will take another 160 years to double the population of the Sinhalese in Sri Lanka," said Ranawaka, the minister for technology and research, and leader of the government's coalition partner, the JHU.

    Warning that the population rates amongst different ethnicities was asymmetrical, he stated that the growth of the Sinhala population was slowest.

    His comments echo that of Minister Mervyn Silva who said in June that the "Sinhala race is rapidly becoming a minority".

  • Sinhala settlements intended to destroy Tamil nation – TNA
    The TNA’s Selvam Adaikkalanathan said that the continued settling of Sinhalese in Tamil areas is intended to destroy the Tamil nation.
  • Sri Lanka owes $2.6 billion to one Chinese bank

    The Sri Lankan government has borrowed $2.6 billion from China’s state-owned Exim Bank, between 2009 and 2013, reports Ceylon Today.

  • Diaspora and foreign states are threats to country – Sri Lanka’s UN rep

    Sri Lanka’s permanent representative to the UN in Geneva Ravinath Ariyasinha has highlighted the Tamil diaspora as a potent danger to the country and accused western countries of turning a blind eye to their activities.

    “While we have defeated the LTTE in Sri Lanka, the organization, its ideology and its operations are very much alive in a number of western countries. Immediately, this remains a challenge to speeding up the pace of reconciliation in Sri Lanka, and eventually, a potent danger to Sri Lanka as a rising nation,” Aryasinha said while speaking at the Sri Lankan Army’s Defence Seminar 2014.

    “Even as most countries have acted with understanding and have respectfully shared concerns and been able to contribute to the processes of reconciliation in a tangible manner, unfortunately particularly a few Western countries fuelled by political motivations and electoral compulsions have continued to relentlessly pursue Sri Lanka," he added.

  • TNA MP condemns government for arrest of Tamil students
    Tamil National Alliance MP Suresh Premachandran has slammed the Sri Lankan government for the arrests of Tamil students at Sabaragamuwa University, following an attack at the Southern university earlier this month.

    Premachandran stated that "everyone is aware of the incident at the Sabaragamuwa University,” adding, “The police spokesperson has told the media that he tied his hands to his back himself and self-harmed.”

    Commenting on the arrest of the second Tamil student, Uthayan quoted Premachandran as going on to say,
    "Fellow student Yoganathan Nirojan, from Vavuniya was arrested for visiting the injured student, and he has been released on bail by Colombo Magistrate court. Is meeting a fellow student a crime? Do the police not see it as a humanitarian norm? Why was he arrested? All activities of police have political influences."
  • Sri Lanka should cooperate with UN inquiry – Ban Ki-moon

    The UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon asked Sri Lanka to cooperate with the inquiry, led by the High Commissioner for Human Rights.

  • Girl raped by soldier in Mannar
    A Sri Lankan army soldier has sexually assaulted a Tamil girl in Mannar, the Uthayan reports.

    The incident occurred when the girl went to buy rotti (flat bread) at a shop run by the army, by the army camp.

    Locals report seeing the girl being taken into bushes by the soldier.
  • Modi to meet TNA delegation
    A delegation of the Tamil National Alliance (TNA) will be travelling to New Delhi to meet with the Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi on August 23, The Hindu reports.

    The delegation will be headed by the TNA leader R. Sampanthan, and will include five senior members.
  • Indian Prime Minister to discuss solution to fishermen issue
    Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi is holding a meeting tomorrow to explore a solution to the repeated arrests of Indian fishermen by the Sri Lankan Navy, according to reports.

    A senior government official told PTI,
    "The PMO has called a meeting tomorrow to deliberate on India-Sri Lanka fishermen issues like illegal poaching and welfare of Indian fishermen among others."
    Frequent attacks on Indian fishermen by the Sri Lankan Navy has led to the Chief Minister of Tamil Nadu Jayalithaa writing several letters to the Prime Minister, expressing her concern and calling for a “strong and robust" response to the arrests.

    The Prime Minister's announcement that he will discuss the issue comes as 11 fishermen associations in Tamil Nadu declared they would “lay siege” to Pamban road, which connects Ramneswaran to mainland India. The fishermen are protesting against the continued detention of Indians by the Sri Lankan government and demand that their boats, which the Sri Lankans are refusing to release, be given back to them.

    See more from the Hindu here.
  • Suicide rate in Jaffna increases since end of armed conflict
    The number of suicides in Jaffna has increased since the end of the armed conflict in May 2009, according to statistics compiled by the Professor of Psychiatry at Jaffna University.

    Data gathered by Dr Daya Somasundaran showed that in 2009, when the armed conflict was at its peak, the suicide rate in the Northern Tamil peninsula was 15 per 100,000. However, since the armed hostilities ended, the suicide rate has risen sharply to 25 per 100,000 in 2011. The figure dipped slightly in 2012, but by 2013, was back at its highest level.

    The New Indian Express that Dr Somasundaran said during the war there was “a strong social support system” as “under the Lankan military siege, civilians clung together”. Since the end of the fighting though, “social cohesion and social support systems began to wear thin as families got splintered.”

    Somasundaran reportedly went on to add that collective rehabilitation was needed for the Tamil population, since they experienced the trauma of war as a collective. Acts such as mourning, he added, had to be done collectively.
  • LTTE groups' encouraging students to protest says Gotabhaya
    Sri Lanka's Defence Minister Gotabhaya Rajapaksa said groups linked to the LTTE were attempting to "create further problems in Sri Lanka" and pose a potential terrorist threat, the Business Standard reports.

    "Some of these groups are trying to reorganise within Sri Lanka and mobilise people to once again take up their extreme left wing causes. There is information that some of these groups have started to establish ties to LTTE-linked agents to create further problems in Sri Lanka," he was quoted as saying.

    "Some of their activities include radicalising students and encouraging them to take to the streets in various protests. Though such activities are still in their early stages, they pose another serious national security concern that must remain a consideration," he added.

  • Government should not 'pander to multi-ethnic obscenities' to gain support - BBS
    The BBS leader told the Sri Lankan president to ‘not pander to multi ethnic obscenities’ and understand ‘the roots of the country and the value of the nation and who it rightfully belongs to,’ to gain the support of nationalist organisations, reports Colombo Page.
  • International pressure for human rights probe harmful to Sri Lanka - GL Peiris
    The Sri Lankan Minister of External Affairs said that international pressure on Sri Lanka to probe human rights violations and foreign funding for 'capacity building' were harmful to the country, reports Colombo Page.

    "Because of the intensity of this pressure there is a disincentive to engage in earnest in a domestic process. Because of the conviction that far more is forthcoming by the application of pressure at an international level. And that is why this international pressure is not only not helpful, but is absolutely harmful," said GL Peiris at a Ministry of Defence seminar, on Monday, in Colombo.

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