Commonwealth asked to urge Sri Lanka to investigate attacks on media

 Thursday, 07 November 2013 

The Commonwealth has been urged by the Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) to ensure the Sri Lankan government investigates attacks on the media.

CPJ Executive Director Joel Simon has said that the Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting (CHOGM) was set up more than 40 years ago with the aim of working together toward shared goals of democracy, freedom, peace, and the rule of law.

In a letter to the Commonwealth heads, Simon has pointed out that in the past, formal meetings and private retreats at the summit have served as a platform for member states to discuss issues that affect all nations, such as apartheid in South Africa and the electoral dispute in Zimbabwe.
But as leaders from more than 50 nations converge in Sri Lanka for the biennial summit this month, CPJ has noted that it would like to highlight grave concerns about the perilous climate of press freedom in the country and urge meaningful action.

“Critical or opposition journalists continue to face intense intimidation in Sri Lanka. Our research shows that at least 26 journalists have gone into exile in the past five years, which is one of the highest rates in the world. And while work-related murders have declined since 2009, the slayings of nine journalists have gone unpunished over the past decade, which is one of the worst records of impunity in the world. CPJ is investigating other cases of journalists killed in Sri Lanka to determine whether the murders were related to their work. At least one journalist has simply disappeared,” Simon has said.

CPJ research has shown that since the end of the civil war, President Mahinda Rajapaksa’s administration has failed to prosecute a single case of a murdered journalist, including the assassination of prominent newspaper editor Lasantha Wickramatunga in 2009. Many of the victims, like Wickramatunga, had reported on politically sensitive issues in ways that were critical of the government.

“Sri Lanka remains a highly unsafe place for journalists to work, a circumstance that is exacerbated when killers have impunity. We ask that in formal and private meetings with President Rajapaksa, you urge him to ensure a credible, independent investigation into the cases of disappeared and murdered journalists, make the findings public, and efficiently prosecute the perpetrators in an effort to help reverse the pattern of impunity,” CPJ has said.

Mahinda will be stripped of chair if he plays hell – Kamalesh Sharma!

 Thursday, 07 November 2013 

Commonwealth secretary general Kamalesh Sharma has assured that Sri Lankan president Mahinda Rajapkasa would be stripped of the chair of the commonwealth, which he would assume for the next two years at the CHOGM in the coming week, if he engaged in authoritarian, anti-democratic activities without safeguarding Commonwealth principles. He gave the assurance yesterday (06) at a meeting with a delegation from the All Party Parliamentary Group for Tamils (APPGT) at the Comonwealth headquarters in London.

The APPGT delegation comprised its chairperson Lee Scott, deputy chairperson Siobhain McDonough, secretary Hazel Weinburg and two representing the Tamil Diaspora.

Mr. Sharma was told by the APPGT delegation that handing over the CHOGM chair to such a person was like giving a girl in marriage to a criminal despite objections by the entire society and later divorcing her after understanding the real situation. Thanking them for their example, Mr. Sharma said that despite being the secretary general, he has to work in accordance with the forces higher than him.