‘A Memory of War’ by Vidu Gunaratna When Sri Lanka’s legendary bowler Muttiah Muralitharan was repeatedly accused of chucking by an Australian umpire, captain Arjuna Ranatunge protested by walking out with his team in an Australian stadium. Sri Lankan cricket fans not only disagreed with the umpires, but also generalized resentment towards Australian cricket in general. Some even spread ...
Residents in and around Colombo endured very strong winds over night, with no warning or alert from the Met. Dept. The only warning on the Met. Dept. website is this. The force of the winds was evident on the roads of Colombo in the morning. The following images were taken at Maitland Crescent around 9.15am. The trees depicted in ...
Groundviews interviewed the renowned Sri Lankan artist Anoma Wijewardene on her up-coming exhibition ‘Deliverance’, which opens in Colombo tomorrow at the Saskia Fernando Gallery and Paradise Road Galleries. The exhibition will run till the 18th of July. As noted in the outline for the exhibition Groundviews was sent by Anoma, Rio + 20, the Earth Summit is the largest ...
Photo courtesy ISHARA S.KODIKARA/AFP/GETTY IMAGES, via The Global Mail [five times five things to try to say quickly] 1. The misters assisted in shelling these shells on the seashore war, The shells they shelled were not sea-shells, I’m sure. Some of the people they shelled aren’t there any more. And if they shelled the seashore during the war Then ...
AFP PHOTO/ Ishara S. KODIKARA via The Straits Times Mobs on the streets, houses being burnt, people being attacked due to their race or religion, some being killed, the law enforcement and security services unable or unwilling to arrest the situation, that describes the streets of Colombo and the rest of the country in July 1983 and thirty years ...
Click here for larger version. ### This article is part of a larger collection of articles and content commemorating five years after the end of war in Sri Lanka. An introduction to this special edition by the Editor of Groundviews can be read here. This, and all other articles in the special edition, is published under a Creative Commons license that ...
Image courtesy Sri Lanka Guardian “Now intolerance is the badge of the tribe and the scribe. A papier-mâché patriotism is the last refuge of a petrified elite that has lost its nerve, and is alarmed at the prospect of losing its power, its privilege and whatever else it has accumulated. In the name of keeping faith with the past, ...
Mercenaries with misplaced consciences appear to be leading Sri Lanka’s latest band of apologists. Seldom does a hired hand leave such a damning trail as does Tamara Kunanayakam, Ambassador/Permanent Representative of Sri Lanka to the United Nations Office at Geneva and other International Organizations in Switzerland. During the General Debate u
Review of Harshan Kumarasingham’s A Political Legacy of the British Empire In our long discussions about Sri Lanka’s post-independence political history, India’s large shadow falls inevitably upon us, bringing with it a curious and mixed effect; it is both alarming and inspiring at times, but also quite disheartening and dispiriting on other occasions. We were both part of the ...
AFP PHOTO STR/AFP/Getty Images via The Guardian I don’t know much about Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s reliance on astrology, despite India being a land full of astrologers – those with credibility and those of dubious repute – with millions of followers. But in the recent years, Sri Lanka put superstitious India to shame. We have just voted out ...
Editors note: On the day Menik Farm was officially closed, an urgent memo was circulated widely on the fate of the IDPs from Keppapilavu. The memo adds vital context to the following story, which also needs to be read in light of Government and Ministry of Defence claims that, there are no longer any IDPs in Sri Lanka. that they ...
Frame grab from News 1st TV broadcast As noted by Raashid Riza, the Multimedia Editor of The Platform, Last Friday a mob of about 2,000 Sinhalese, led by a group of Buddhist monks, stormed into a mosque in the historical city of Dambulla. They caused disturbances so severe that Friday prayers had to be cancelled. Reports suggest that the ...
Groundviews is pleased to announce that ‘Black July‘, an edited volume anchored to articles originally published on this site, is now available for download on Apple’s iTunes bookstore in 51 stores globally. The volume is available for free and is designed for Retina iPhones and iPads, though it will also render perfectly on non-Retina and older iOS devices. Unfortunately, at the ...
Six years after the end of war in Sri Lanka, the four main ethnic communities are still divided when it comes to issues related to reconciliation. ‘Sri Lankan perceptions on life post war’ is a series of infographics looking key public opinion data from CPA’s ‘Democracy in Post War Sri Lanka’ survey (conducted annually since 2011) on the theme ...
An archive of material around the Resolution titled ‘Promoting reconciliation and accountability in Sri Lanka’ passed at the UN Human Rights Council today. Final text below, and available as PDF here, and as Word document here. ### Human Rights Council Twenty-second session Agenda item 2 Annual report of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights and reports of the ...
Image courtesy Ishara S.KODIKARA/AFP/Getty Images, via RightsNow This is among the many important challenges to the “democratically elected” Government of “democratic Socialist Republic of Sri Lanka” (GOSL). There may be various answers but let me offer five reasons why the present Government in the present frame of mind cannot win the support of the international community at the present moment. ...
Portrait of a card-carrying Sri Lankan patriot. ### I am not a patriot. I am not a patriot if it means that to be a patriot I must deny that innocent people have been killed. I am not a patriot if it means that I have to turn a blind eye to the ...
Photo courtesy National Fisheries Solidarity Movement In 2011, a young Advanced Level student from Mullikulam in the district of Mannar, living as an Internally Displaced Person (IDP) in a camp in Thalvupadu, Mannar, shared with me an assignment she had done about her village and effects of displacement. She proudly described the richness of her hometown in terms of ...
Photo by Dinouk Colombage, Al Jazeera I am deeply perturbed and concerned at the large scale violence unleashed on members of the Muslim community last weekend (15th June 2014), in the Aluthgama, Beruwala, Dharga Town, Walpitiya and Welipenna areas. My thoughts and prayers are with all those affected in their time of sorrow. This violence was wholly avoidable; that ...
Photo courtesy Daily Maverick “How do we keep the past alive without becoming its prisoner? How do we forget it without risking its repetition in the future?” Ariel Dorfman, ‘Death and the Maiden’ The Chilean playwright Ariel Dorfman poses these questions in his play Death and the Maiden after witnessing massive human rights violations in his home country and ...
