Sri Lanka has an increasing number of tourist arrivals which could be very good for the development of the island. Therefore, of course, the local communities should benefit from the tourism above all. This does not seem to be always happening. The Society for Threatened People (STP) Switzerland, together with the National Fisheries Solidarity Movement (NAFSO), published a report ...
This is a response to an article written by Udaya Gammanpila which appeared in the Ceylon Today newspaper (6 July 2014). This response was emailed to Ceylon Today two days later (08 July 2014), but it has not been published to date. Photo by Shilpa Samaratunge. ### The campaign of hate, intimidation and violence directed against Muslims in post-war ...
Photograph: Lakruwan Wanniarachchi/AFP/Getty Images from Guardian The breaking news that JR Jayawardana had won the 1977 general election by a 5/6 majority is one of my vivid childhood memories. Perhaps, the fact that my father was an ardent supporter of the United National Party led by Junius Richard Jayawardana, commonly known as JR, compounded the significance of that memory. ...
Photo by Reuters via Al Arabiya News Puzzling Decisions and worrying trends The recent government decision to appoint a special police unit to deal with inter-religious conflict adds to the prevailing confusion on the freedom of religion and the rule of law. While the decision implies seriousness in arresting the current religious tensions, the government’s reluctance to achieve this very ...
Photo via IBN Live, taken by Reuters The Buddhist –Muslim relationship in Sri Lanka is centuries old. It grew from the pre-Islamic Arab relationship with Sri Lanka and continued beyond the advent of Islam. Principally, the Arabs who built vibrant trade relation with Sri Lanka put their roots here and made Sri Lanka a second home. With the advent ...
There are a lot of websites in the US that have gone black to protest against the proposed Stop Internet Piracy Act (SOPA) and the Protect IP Act (PIPA). Wikipedia has gone to the extent of taking down its site for the day, and lists its reasons here. Action across such a large number of key internet companies based ...
Background Ms. JeyaGanesh Pakeerathy was a member of the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) Sea Tigers unit for around four years (exact years unknown). She was heavily injured and was discontinued in 2000. After receiving intensive treatment at home, she recovered. However, even today she is unable to do heavy work. In 2003, she married a man who ...
Photo courtesy Dawn.com/AFP The Vesak Poya day has come and gone several times since May 2009 when the prolonged war with the LTTE ended. And we Sri Lankans are yet trapped in post-war rhetoric and caught up in punches and counter-punches arising from different visions of what post-war Sri Lanka ought to be. Some think that we should continue ...
Image courtesy Sri Lanka Brief Introduction Before the war, we were all together. Now, we are widows with no security, and no one sees what we have to live through. But we go on, try to find some money to get us through the day…we have to eat, no? The cooking and cleaning needs to be done, the children ...
Photo by Abdul-Halik Azeez courtesy The Picture Press There is a new energy to the beautification and development of urban areas in Colombo with a surge in construction, reconstruction and opening up of new spaces. The other side to this is the demolition of private properties and the eviction of thousands of people. In August 2014 media showed the ...
Editors note: Through Nelson Mandela International Day, the UN General Assembly resolution A/RES/64/13 of 2009 recognizes Nelson Mandela’s values and his dedication to the service of humanity, in the fields of conflict resolution, race relations, the promotion and protection of human rights, reconciliation, gender equality and the rights of children and other vulnerable groups, as well as the upliftment of poor and underdeveloped ...
Photo courtesy Avaaz I’d been in Sri Lanka just three weeks when I first heard of someone disappearing. It was May 2009 and I got an anonymous email telling me that Stephen Sunthararaj, a human rights worker from northern Sri Lanka, had been abducted at gunpoint and taken away in a white van in the heart of Colombo. He ...
Photo by Kannan Arunasalam, The Kattankudy mosque massacre in Sri Lanka: 22 years after Twenty five years ago, Batticaloa district experienced some of the most brutal violence of Sri Lanka’s long ethnic conflict, with a series of mass killings, large scale disappearances, damage and loss to property and forced displacement taking place in the months of June, July, August ...
Assorted charlatans and religious zealots across the island of Sri Lanka must have heaved a collective sigh of relief when they heard that Dharmapala Senaratne was no more. He had made it his business to make life difficult for those preying on the gullible public. Rationalist and myth-buster Dharmapala made his final exist a few days before 2012 dawned. ...
A talk given at ICES, 17th December 2014. Photo courtesy Al Jazeera. I want to thank Mario and the family of ICES for asking me to make this presentation on what should be the priorities for the next president. There are of course many issues but I will present what I think are the most important aspects. To begin ...
Picture courtesy the Prime Minister’s Office of Canada. I write this on the day of elections in Canada, a country excited about change after a dark period of conservative rule. I have no issue with conservatives as over the years I have supported conservative candidates. However, it is about leadership – a leader who has tried to control everything ...
Last week, I went to Mullikulam, a beautiful and resourceful village in the Mannar district, which has been illegally occupied by the Navy for more than 7 years. It was my first visit for more than a year. The people didn’t seem to have any fresh hopes of reuniting as one community, regaining their lost lands, houses, fishing and ...
Social Indicator, the survey research unit of the Centre for Policy Alternatives conducted an island wide pre election opinion poll with the objective of identifying Sri Lankan voter perceptions and attitudes on key topics being discussed in the lead up to the election and thereby contribute to the current political discourse. Only 4 % of Sri Lankans believe that ...
The Lessons Learnt and Reconciliation Commission (LLRC) report, along with the National Action Plan to implement the recommendations of the LLRC (Action Plan), are the two key documents produced by the Government of Sri Lanka (GoSL) outlining its process of reconciliation after three decades of war. Over two years have passed since the Cabinet approved the Action Plan in ...
Photo courtesy Human Rights Solidarity 30th August is the International Day of the Victims of Enforced Disappearances. Tens of thousands have disappeared in Sri Lanka in last few decades[1]. On this day, families of disappearances in Sri Lanka will gather in Vavuniya in the North, to once again publicly appeal to find their loved ones, at least know the ...
