Lanka govt opposed to federalism for devolving political power

PTI | 10:07 PM,Jul 07,2011

Colombo, Jul 7 (PTI) The government is opposed to federalism to devolve power to the Tamil community in Sri Lanka in a bid to address the political aspirations of the minority ethnic community in the country.The government would not offer a federal solution to the country's ethnic problem, senior minister Nimal Siripala de Silva told parliament today.De Silva, who is a member of the government's panel which is currently engaged in talks with the main Tamil party Tamil National Alliance (TNA), said the government stands opposed to federalism as a form of devolving political power to Tamil minority."However we are for a negotiated solution by talking to all parties and seeking their views. It must be a sustainable solution," the minister stressed.De Silva said a majority in the country would oppose a federal solution.He was responding to a remark by the main opposition UNP MP Lakshman Kiriella who said that UNP was not averse to a federal solution.The UNP under Ranil Wickremesinghe's leadership between 2002 and 2004 talked to the LTTE through Norway's facilitation.The LTTE had agreed during the talks that they would explore a federal solution to end the ethnic strife.However, the UNP's willingness to arrive at a federal solution saw them being ousted from power with the majority Sinhalese overwhelmingly disapproving the Norwegian facilitation and the federal solution it sought to achieve.The LTTE waged a bloody three-decade civil war for a separate state for the Tamils of Sri Lanka, alleging discrimination against the minority community at the hands of the majority Sinhalas.But the Lankan military crushed the rebels and ended the ethnic conflict that killed between 80,000 and 100,000 people.
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Sangakkara speech lands Sri Lanka Cricket in trouble

British Broadcasting Corporation 
Wednesday, 6 July 2011 By Saroj Pathirana
 

 

When Kumar Sangakkara took to the podium to deliver the annual Cowdrey lecture at Lord's he was fully aware that the words he had prepared would send a shockwave through Sri Lanka's cricket establishment.

But by voicing his belief that the development of the game in Sri Lanka has been hindered by constant turmoil off the pitch, he was merely echoing the thoughts of many fans.
Cricket in Sri Lanka has been overseen by interim administrations regularly hired and fired by ministers who have also launched many investigations into allegations of corruption.
None of the subsequent reports were ever made public, though, and no former official has ever been charged.
Full Story>>>

Kumar Sangakkara attacks political battles marring Sri Lankan cricket

Former captain uses MCC Spirit of Cricket lecture for speech
(Lanka-e-News -05.July.2011, 4.45P.M.) Kumar Sangakkara has chosen the MCC Spirit of Cricket lecture to launch a scathing attack on the endless political power-struggles that bedevil Sri Lanka Cricket and to reflect upon the heavy responsibilities on Sri Lankan cricketers to promote reconciliation after the end of the civil war that blighted the country.

Sangakkara, in a hugely impressive speech scribbled out during occasional spare hours during the one-day series against England, provided a vivid explanation that will go a long way to explaining why he resigned from the captaincy after Sri Lanka’s defeat in the World Cup final, exhausted after only two years in charge. He described how, since Sri Lanka’s 1996 World Cup victory, their cricket administration had changed “from a volunteer-led organisation run by well-meaning men of integrity into a multimillion-dollar organisation that has been in turmoil ever since”.

His criticism could hardly have been more pointed. “Players from within the team itself became involved in power games within the board,” he said. “Officials elected to power in this way in turn manipulated player loyalty to achieve their own ends. At times board politics would spill over into the team causing rift, ill feeling and distrust.  Full story »
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PM admits some politicians involved in drug trade

July 6, 2011, 12:00 pm


By Saman Indrajith

Prime Minister D. M. Jayaratne admitted in Parliament today that some politicians are involved in the illegal drug trade in the country.

"There are one or two black sheep among the white," the premier said in response to a special statement made by Chief Opposition Whip John Amaratunga on the increasing proliferation of drugs in the country.

Amaratunga in his statement said that that some politicians are involved in smuggling drugs into the country and in some instances pressured the police to release drug dealers with whom they had connections.

He said that nearly 29,000 persons have been convicted and had been sent to prison for drug related offences in 2010. This, he said, was a sharp increase compared to the previous year as only 18,743 persons were subjected to jail sentence in 2009 for the same kind of offences.

The Chief Opposition Whip said the airport, harbour, and the coastal areas were alive with reports of drug transportation almost daily.

He called on the government to use Singapore as a role model in converting Sri Lanka into a nation without drug mafias.

Amaratunga said that 6,430 kg of Ganja and 14kg heroine had been seized by the police during the period from January to June 2011.

He said politicos are involved in the importation of narcotics into the country. He recalled that a certain politico had applied undue influence on the police which recovered a consignment of drugs recently.

The prime Minister said that the support of all political parties was essential to build a country without drug mafias.

Norway’s deafening silence on Sri Lanka is wrong: Aftenposten

[TamilNet, Thursday, 07 July 2011, 00:24 GMT]
Sri Lanka is in the middle of a power-game played by India, China and the USA. Norway’s interests in Sri Lanka are insignificantly few. There is no reason why Norway should maintain a deafening silence over the need for an international tribunal on the war crimes that took place in the island. The silence is due to a line of thinking in the Norwegian foreign ministry and especially in Mr Erik Solheim, that it would ‘normalise’ Norway’s relationship with Colombo. Rather than being in the driver’s seat in demonstrating how concerned Norway is about human rights, it is wrong on the part of Norway’s government to stand along the roadside with a mouth full of dust, says Kristoffer Rønneberg, a foreign affairs journalist of the prominent newspaper Aftenposten, in a commentary column published on Tuesday.      Full Story>>>
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Thursday, July 7, 2011

Rajiva: UN expert panel copied from Weiss’s book, Channel 4 documentary

[TamilNet, Thursday, 07 July 2011, 09:33 GMT]
Speaking on BBC’s HardTalk program Tuesday, Prof. Rajiva Wijesinghe, advisor to the Sri Lankan President on reconciliation, claimed the UN panel of experts’ report on Sri Lanka’s war crimes had “taken stuff, some of it verbatim” from former UN spokesperson Gordon Weiss’s recently published book, and from Channel 4’s recent documentary. When asked why the Sri Lankan government wasn’t agreeing to demands by the British government, US government and the EU for a thorough, independent, investigation into alleged war crimes and crimes against humanity, Prof. Wijesinghe said: “Because we are not here to keep your electorate happy.”

Speaking about the UN expert panel’s report Prof. Wijesinghe asserted:

“If you go through the [UN] report, a lot of it is based on two sources, one is the Channel 4 material - because a lot of what they [UN experts] say, without saying where it came from, is precisely what was on the Channel 4 stuff; the second is a lot of stuff is taken, some of it verbatim from a book by a man called Gordon Weiss who worked for the UN in a rather junior capacity in Sri Lanka, and who tends to corroborate what they say.”          Full Story>>>
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Thursday, July 7, 2011

War and aftermath raise questions over Tamil strategy of engagement with powers

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 05 July 2011, 05:41 GMT]
LTTE and Tamil nationalism were perceived by some powers as getting into the way of their geo-strategic interests. Therefore ‘peace and stability’ means stabilising the Sinhalese regime by crushing LTTE’s military challenge – that was done – and bringing Tamil nationalism to heel, which process is ongoing both in Sri Lanka and among the Tamil diaspora, writes Dr. S. Sathananthan in an article he sent to TamilNet. The power-abetted genocidal war and the aftermath facilitations given to Colombo to complete the genocide into a structural one, raise serious questions among Tamils over the nature of their strategic engagement with some powers.

Dr. Sathananthan’s article is presented here as an example of a shade of opinion among Tamil academia in this regard. The views are that of the writer:

MULLIVAAIKKAAL: TRAPPING THE LTTE
By: Dr S Sathananthan

The issue most debated by intelligent Tamils last May, the 2nd Anniversary of Mullivaaikkaal, was the following: why did the leadership of Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE), possessing more than three decades of military experience and expertise, stay in their last and shrinking base in Mullaiteevu until it was too late to escape into the Vanni jungle?    Full Story>>>

Colombo must act now

July 06, 2011   11:19:49 PM

G Parthasarathy

Two years after the elimination of the Tamil Tigers, President Rajapaksa is yet to fulfil his promise of meeting the aspirations of Sri Lankan Tamils.

When Tamil Nadu Chief Minister J Jayalalithaa paid her first visit to New Delhi after assuming office, she forcefully articulated her concerns on Sri Lanka. Two issues concerning Sri Lankan Tamils stir passions in Tamil Nadu. The first is the conviction that ever since the elimination of the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam in 2009, Sri Lankan Tamils have remained displaced from their homes and been denied basic human rights. The second concern is the attacks on Tamil Nadu fishermen by the Sri Lankan Navy on grounds of their encroaching into Sri Lankan territorial waters, beyond the 285 acre, uninhabited, Kachativu Island.

Records of the British India Government since 1876 have showed Kachativu as part of Ceylon. The Raja of Ramnad in the then Madras Presidency, however, laid claim to the island in the 1920s. Kachativu was recognised by India as Sri Lankan territory in agreements signed in 1974 and 1976. The demarcation of the maritime boundary, under which India acknowledged Sri Lankan sovereignty over Kachativu, was based on the internationally recognised principle of the median line and in consonance with Article 15 of the Law of the Seas.        Full Story>>>
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Spotlighting Lankan Tamils

expreess buzz

Anuradha M Chenoy

Last Updated : 06 Jul 2011 11:28:41 PM IST

Jayalalithaa has submitted a memo to Prime Minister Manmohan Singh that lists demands from post-conflict Sri Lanka. She has said that the Sri Lankan regime should be held accountable for war crimes during the last days of the fratricidal war with the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE), where thousands of civilians were killed, hundreds of thousands became refuges, Tamil areas of the north were reduced to rubble, and humanitarian assistance to Tamils were denied. Jayalalithaa has asked that the Colombo to immediately transfer adequate powers to the north and east of the island nation so the Tamils can have autonomy of governance, a long-standing demand of Tamils. Jayalalithaa has insisted that India should impose economic sanctions against Sri Lanka if they do not comply. In effect India should change its policy to Sri Lanka.    Full Story>>>

Sport cannot turn a blind eye

Peter Roebuck July 7, 2011

Cry for help: Wounded Tamils in a makeshift hospital in Vanni in 2009. There have been calls for Australia to cancel its tour of Sri Lanka. Photo: Reuters

Chilling images of slaughter demand firm action.
IF THIS column has contributed anything to the game it has been to push it towards recognising a wider responsibility. Sport is not a trivial distraction but part of our daily lives. It is not an escape but an embrace. Cricket, especially, has an opportunity to advance racial and religious tolerance. Have not these causes united all men and women deemed great?       Read more
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Beyond the horror, seeking voiceless victims of Sri Lanka’s Killing Fields

By Elisha Yoon
ShareThis

Channel Four’s film on Sri Lanka’s civil war. (Photo credit: Channel Four Television Corporation)

6 July 6, 2011 [MediaGlobal]: The documentary screening of Sri Lanka’s Killing Fields, held in New York, laid bare disturbing images of execution, death, and murder.
“I think this is a blatant lie,” Palitha Kohona, the Sri Lankan Ambassador to the United Nations, declared before gathered journalists, diplomats, and human rights activists.
Sponsored by Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch, the screening inflamed passionate debate. “Because it provokes independent observers like you, it clutches at your heart-strings and provides the feeding ground for propagating this myth,” said Kohona. “It is easy to provoke people, get them emotional with this type of video.”              Read More   

'Possibility of SL taken to Int'l Court'

Wednesday, 06 July 2011
UNP MP Mangala Samaraweera said today that there is a possibility of Sri Lanka being taken before the International Criminal Court (ICC) before the end of this year by the International Community on the allegations of human rights violations leveled against the country during the war.
Addressing a press conference he said that the government has resorted to laughable acts in rejecting the allegations without conducting a proper investigation. He added that the government should be thankful to Opposition Leader Ranil Wickremesinghe as it was because Sri Lanka did not become a signatory to the ICC when he was the Prime Minister that the present government is safe for the moment.

He noted that even a country that is not a signatory to the ICC could be hauled before it on the recommendations of the UN Security Council. 
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World Tamil Writers Conference to be held in Singapore

PTI | 05:07 PM,Jul 06,2011 Chennai, Jul 6 (PTI) A three-day World Tamil Writers Conference will be held between October 28 to 30 in Singapore and would focus on diaspora Tamil literature. "For the first time, we are organising a world level Tamil writers conference. This is part of the Singapore Writers Festival," N Andiappan, a writer and of the Association of Singapore Tamil Writers, told reporters here. The conference would focus on diaspora Tamil literature and more than 300 delegates from India, Germany, Korea, Canada, France and Australia are expected to participate. Observing that the Tamil literature in Singapore was about "100 to 150 years" behind that of Tamil Nadu, Andiappan said the conference would help writers from across the world interact and discuss major discourses in Tamil literature. The conference would also focus on literature through blogs, translation issues and non-Tamil academics from University of California were also expected to take part, writer Malan said. The conference is supported by the Government of Singapore, where Tamil is one of the official languages along with Chinese, English and Malay.

PM hit the other neighbour harder

PM hit the other neighbour harder Jyoti Malhotra / New Delhi July 06, 2011, 0:26 IST Very few grasped the significance of his critical remarks on Lanka’s handling of its Tamils Prime Minister Manmohan Singh’s remarks on Bangladesh during his interaction with senior editors last week have received extraordinary attention, both in Dhaka and in Delhi, but his forthright comments on Sri Lanka are equally deserving of scrutiny.  In contrast to the widespread unhappiness in Dhaka and subsequent damage control undertaken by the Indian establishment over his Bangladesh remarks — which culminated yesterday in a phone call by the PM himself to his Bangladeshi counterpart, Hasina — there has been a deafening silence in Colombo over the PM’s remarks on Sri Lanka’s Tamil population as “second-class citizens”. For the first time since the end of the Lankan civil war in 2009, the PM has gone public with criticism of Mahinda Rajapakse’s government, saying “Sinhala chauvinism is a reality” and these “hotheads” refuse to allow the Tamil population to live with equal dignity and respect.      Read More     ======================================= Tuesday, July 5, 2011 The attack on TNA Parliamentarians in Jaffna: A timeline of outrageous denials (Updated) groundviews journalism For citizens TNA MPs at the assault location. Photo courtesy Transcurrents A comment left on Groundviews left recently by a well-known commentator David Blacker, notes, “When you attempt to use terrorism to further your goals, it is then silly to whine about the other side giving you a taste of your own medicine. Every step of the way from 2001, the Tamils have no one to blame for their plight but the Tigers and those who financed and supported them. From breaking the CFA, walking out of talks, boycotting the presidential elections, chasing out the SLMM, and aggressively pushing for a military solution, the Tigers opened Pandora’s box. The legacy of this is that there will not be Eelam or even justice for the SL Tamils ever.“ Emphasis ours. Arguably, if there is to be no Eelam, then the people of Jaffna have to be presented with a range of democratic alternatives and enjoy an environment conducive for representatives of all political parties to contest ideas as well as elections. If there is to be a modicum of justice, voters in these areas need to be allowed to exercise their franchise, which in the past was denied by the LTTE in particular. This is clearly not happening. The recent attack on TNA MPs by the Sri Lankan Army occurs in a context of relative peace, not war. Condemning the brutal attack, the Island newspaper noted (and readers in Sri Lanka will recognise that this was emphatically not newspaper that was opposed to the war),     Continue reading »

India sensitive to TN concerns: Rao

Wednesday, 06 July 2011 The Indian government cannot remain insensitive to the sentiments expressed by the Tamil Nadu government, the Tamil Nadu people and politicians about issues affecting the Tamil-speaking people in Sri Lanka,Indian foreign Secretary Nirupama Rao told journalists. 
“That is something you have to understand. It will always be there and I think you cannot dismiss those concerns. As far as the Indian government is concerned, Tamil Nadu is an integral part of India. We cannot be insensitive to what the Tamil Nadu people say. I am being frank and honest on this and we are in touch with the Tamil Nadu government to tell it about what we are doing in Sri Lanka, and about the discussions with the Sri Lankan government about helping the war-affected people. How best to help them rebuild their lives and rehabilitate them. About the development assistance and the infrastructure work that is being done.

The Sri Lankan government and the Tamil parties in Sri Lanka are talking about a political settlement. So I think our approach will be to try and inform the people in Tamil Nadu and the Tamil Nadu government about what we are doing in Sri Lanka and to emphasise that since the Indian government is responsible for foreign relations it will act in the best interest of all concerned in discussing and dealing with these issues,” Ms. Rao told the visiting journalists from Sri Lanka and the Maldives in New Delhi on Monday.
She said the Tamil Nadu government and the authorities there were conscious about the sensitive nature of India’s relations with Sri Lanka and they understood that the Indian government was doing its best do deal with these issues.

“So I will say that you must understand that such concerns may be expressed from time to time. It is only natural because as Tamil-speaking people they will express their point of view in a democracy such as ours, just as opinions are freely expressed in your country. So I think we must take all this in our stride,” she said. (KB)

In Ban's UN, Press Barred from Photo Op with Sri Lanka Opposition Leader

By Matthew Russell Lee

UNITED NATIONS, July 5 -- That UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon “runs scared,” as one of his staffers puts it, more on Sri Lanka than other countries was again on display, but not to be photographed,  on July 5. Ban was to meet with Ranil Wickremesinghe, described in Ban's schedule as “Leader of the Opposition.”

But when Inner City Press asked to attend the photo opportunity at the beginning of Ban's meeting with Ranil, the double standards began.

  Only last week, with “Leader of the Opposition” of Israel Tzipi Livni met with Ban, Inner City Press was allowed to go to the photo op, observing the banter between Ban and the Israeli delegation.

  At the July 5 noon briefing, Inner City Press asked Ban's spokesman Martin Nesirky: 

Full Story>>>
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Conflict Gives Way to Hardship

 

SRI LANKA Conflict Gives Way to Hardship
By Amantha Perera

In Allankulam in the Mulaitivu District, deep inside Sri Lanka's former conflict zone. Credit:Amantha Perera/IPS. Buy this picture

ALLANKULAM, Jul 6, 2011 (IPS) - Like many Sri Lankans, Kandiah Selvadurai measures the improvement in his life by the amount of money he spends on essentials. When basic goods were scarce more than two years ago, he paid dearly for them. These days, he buys them for a tiny fraction of what they used to cost.

Still, life is hard.

In early 2009, a kilo of rice was so scarce Selvadurai was spending 2,500 rupees (25 dollars) or more to buy it. That was when he and tens of thousands of other civilians, almost all from the minority Tamil community, were forced to live in a narrow swath of land on the northern shoreline as Sri Lanka’s bloody civil war reached its final act.                  MORE >>

Sri Lanka minister orders probe into Sangakkara comments

Shihar Aneez Reuters

July 5, 2011COLOMBO (Reuters) - Sri Lanka's sports minister has ordered a probe into former captain Kumar Sangakkara's comments about the island nation's cricket administrators and political meddling during his speech to Marylebone Cricket Club (MCC) members at Lord's on Monday.

Sangakkara was given a standing ovation after delivering the annual Spirit of Cricket Cowdrey Lecture in which he recounted the history of cricket in Sri Lanka, ranging from the country's emergence as a test-match playing nation, their 1996 World Cup triumph and the attack on their team bus in Pakistan in 2009.

Full Story>>>
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Kumar Sangakkara attacks political battles marring Sri Lankan cricket

Monday 4 July 2011 David Hopps

Kumar Sangakkara cricket can help reconciliation after Sri Lanka's bloody civil war. Photograph: Anthony Devlin/PA

Kumar Sangakkara has chosen the MCC Spirit of Cricket lecture to launch a scathing attack on the endless political power-struggles that bedevil Sri Lanka Cricket and to reflect upon the heavy responsibilities on Sri Lankan cricketers to promote reconciliation after the end of the civil war that blighted the country.        Full Story>>>

Channel 4 rejects Sri Lanka 'war crimes' film criticism

South Asia    5 July 2011

Sri Lanka maintains that no civilians were killed by troops during the war

Continue reading the main story

The British TV station Channel 4 has strongly rejected claims by Sri Lanka's government that footage broadcast in a recent documentary is false.

The film in question appears to show troops executing Tamil prisoners, but Sri Lanka's government now says the killers were rebels in army uniform.
Channel 4 rejected the idea, saying its work had been meticulously checked.
It also stressed the film had made clear that both the army and Tamil Tiger rebels had committed atrocities.
The BBC's Charles Haviland in Colombo says that the latest claims are part of a broad government campaign to discredit the Channel 4 documentary, entitled Sri Lanka's Killing Fields, which was broadcast last month.
Continue reading the main story

SRI LANKA: Returnees struggle in post-war zone

Thousands of returnees are struggling to get by

THUNUKKAI, 5 July 2011 (IRIN) - More than two years after Sri Lanka's decades-long civil war officially ended, returnees to remote villages face tough times and uncertain futures, despite governmental and international efforts at reconstruction.

"Everything that we had earned in 50 years, we lost in months," Supiah Arumugam, 52, and a father of two, told IRIN. Arumugam returned to his home village of Thunukkai, deep in Mullaitivu District in the island's north and once under the control of the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE), in March 2010. He and his family had fled the violence two years previously.     Full Story>>> 
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‘Sri Lanka’s Killing Fields'

3AW 693 News Talk    5 July, 2011

Listen to Derryn's powerful editorial and interview with Gordon Weiss, former UN spokesman in Sri Lanka below 
HINCH: On a similar Tuesday a few weeks ago Twitter was over-heating, emails were pouring into Canberra by the thousand and radio talkback lines were justifiably red hot.
All of it triggered by a devastating 4 Corners program the night before about  cruelty to animals in Indonesian abattoirs.
Last night the ABC aired another documentary. Another even more disturbing  4 Corners report from Britain’s Channel 4  showing the rapes and executions and hospital bombings at the end of the civil war in Sri Lanka in 2009.                      Full Story>>>

Footage sparks calls for Sri Lanka war crimes probe

By Stephen Dziedzic

Updated 1 hour 23 minutes ago

A UN panel of experts found there was credible evidence that up to 40,000 civilians were killed in the conflict (Reuters: Sri Lankan military)

Australian politicians are calling for an international investigation of apparent war crimes in Sri Lanka.

A documentary aired on ABC1's Four Corners on Monday night showed evidence of rape, torture and murder of civilians during Sri Lanka's civil war.
Last year, a United Nations panel of experts found there was credible evidence that up to 40,000 civilians were killed in the conflict.
The British television documentary shows Tamil Tigers using civilians as human shields but it also reveals government forces shelling civilians who had been offered sanctuary in no-fire zones.
MPs on both sides of politics are agitating for an inquiry.        Full Story>>>
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Whose language is it anyway?

Sutirtho Patranobis, Hindustan Times
Colombo, July 05, 2011
Last weekend, many Lankans saw parts of the Channel 4 documentary, `Sri Lanka’s Killing Fields’ with its gruesome execution footage, for the first time. It was repeatedly telecast on prime time, between serials and Bollywood song shows, on a privately owned but considered to be pro-government channel. With one little difference with the disturbing documentary though – in this “original, unaltered” video those carrying out military-style executions were speaking, laughing and smirking in Tamil and not in Sinhala.Full Story>>>

JDS challenges Sri Lanka 'new video'

	Government says another footage with Tamil voice has now emerged

A group of exiled journalists from Sri Lanka have dismissed the "new executions video clip" with Tamil speech aired in a pro government television channel as "fake" and one that emerged two years ago.

Journalists for Democracy in Sri Lanka (JDS) say that the "newly emerged" video was first published in a pro government website on 18 September 2009.

JDS also calls upon the government to submit the clip to an international investigation for authentication.

The Sri Lankan government claims that the video contains Tamil Tigers committing a crime against Sri Lankan soldiers.

Sanath Balasuriya, a spokesman for JDS told BBC Sinhala service that the new claim invalidates the government's previous claim that such an incident never occurred.

'An admission'   
"In a report by a so-called group of experts, the government said it was staged and not something that actually happened. If the government now says that the video shows a crime committed by the LTTE, it is an admission that such an incident did actually happen," he said.                                                                      Full Story>>>

Sri Lanka lifts foreign travel ban to ex-war zone

COLOMBO | Tue Jul 5, 2011 1:04am IST

(Reuters) - Sri Lanka lifted a ban on Monday for foreigners travelling to former war zones in the island nation's north as tourism has boomed following the end of a three-decade war in May 2009.
The Defence Ministry said it had lifted the requirement for foreign passport holders to get prior approval for travel to the north, effective immediately.
The restriction was imposed during the final phase of the war, from 2006.
"As normalcy is flourishing in the country we see...travel restrictions to foreign passport holders as no longer required," the Defence Ministry said on its website www.defence.lk, quoting an unnamed official.
The Sri Lankan military fought a quarter-century-long war against separatist Tamil Tiger rebels.
The travel restriction to former war zones had applied to foreigners, journalists and independent observers even after the Tamil Tigers were defeated.
The international community and human rights groups said the restriction prevented them from getting independent information on alleged incidents of post-war human right violations, which the government repeatedly denied had occurred.
The government wants to attract foreign visitors to the former war zones as part of an ambitious strategic plan aiming woo 2.5 million tourists and earn $2.5 billion from the industry by 2016.
(Reporting by Ranga Sirilal; Writing by Shihar Aneez; Editing by Michael Roddy)
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Navy accused of land grab in Ampara

04 July, 2011  

 

Villagers in the eastern Sri Lankan district of Amapara have been protesting against the moves by Sri Lanka Navy (SLN) to acquire their ancestral land in order to establish a new camp.

Panama, Kumana, Helawa and Ragamwela residents who have tried to resettle after the war say they were prohibited by the SLN, which the villagers charge of land grabbing.    Full Story>>>

UN urged to review Sri Lankan civil war

Last year, a United Nations panel of experts found there was credible evidence that up to 40,000 civilians were killed in the war. [Reuters]

Last Updated: 19 hours 20 minutes ago

Australian Foreign Affairs Minister Kevin Rudd says new information about atrocities against Sri Lankan civilians at the end of the civil war is appalling.

A new British television documentary has shown evidence of civilians being killed by government troops.

The 26-year war, which ended in 2009, was waged between Tamils seeking to create their own state and the Sri Lankan government and military.

Last year, a United Nations panel of experts found there was credible evidence that up to 40,000 civilians were killed in the war.

Mr Rudd says the UN's Human Rights Council needs to reinvestigate the issue.

"I believe their deliberation on it was inadequate and I would call upon - as does the Australian Government through its mission in Geneva - the Human Rights Council to revisit this matter and to examine once again whether their original findings can any longer be regarded as well founded," he said.
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Sri Lankan situation: the truth must come out

4 July 2011  
                    

Sunili Govinnage 

 

Tonight, ABC's Four Corners will show Killing Fields, the UK Channel 4 documentary that claims to provide evidence of war crimes committed at the end of Sri Lanka's decades-long civil war.
But yesterday, the Sri Lankan High Commission asked the ABC not to broadcast the documentary. The program was shown to the UN Human Rights Council meeting in Geneva last month and has already aired in the UK. The Sri Lankan government claims the documentary contains manipulated videos and is biased. The Sri Lankan government is also claiming it now has the 'original' version of a video that it says has been doctored and sent to the documentary's producers by pro-Tamil groups.
The conflict between the government of Sri Lanka and the separatist Tamil Tigers, also known as the 'Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam' (LTTE), left the country in tatters. It also gave the world suicide bombing - the LTTE pioneered the use of suicide belts and introduced female suicide bombers. The LTTE fought for an autonomous homeland in the island's north and reacted with violence against government policies seen to have privileged the dominant Sinhalese population to the detriment of Tamil Sri Lankans.   More  

Posted by Thavam

Sri Lanka Tamil minority still being victimised

K Pragalath | July 3, 2011
Malaysian parliamentarians who visited Sri Lanka recently say no efforts have been made at reconciliation or improving the living standard of the minority Tamils.

KUALA LUMPUR: It has been two years since the civil war ended in Sri Lanka but there has been little effort made in reconciliation and helping the Tamil minority who were the main victims of the conflict.
Teluk Intan MP M Manogaran, Sungai Petani MP Johari Abdul, Selangor Senator S Ramakrishnan and two NGO members made a five day field trip to the island last month and their conclusion is that nothing much has been done to help the victims of the war.
They visited Colombo, Puttalam, Vavuniya, the north and northeast region of Sri Lanka.
“We expected to see some semblance of normalcy but there was none,” Manogaran said when relating his experience in Sri Lanka to FMT .
“Access to the many areas in the northern region which was formerly held by Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) is controlled by the military.
“Every civil action must receive military approval. Application has to be made via general agent,” said Manogaran .
A general agent is like a district officer.                . More»      
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UN report: 1,00,000 Tamilians killed in war

 

Jul 3, 2011BANGALORE: Nearly 1,00,000 Tamil civilians were killed in the war in Sri Lanka during the final stages of civil war against the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam, a report by a committee of the United Nations said.

The International Committee of the Red Cross ( ICRC) has estimated that nearly 14,000 wounded Tamil civilians were evacuated by ship from a no-fire zone in Sri Lanka during the end of war. Of which, the Committee said, 5,000 civilians were amputated and nearly 70,000 children died of starvation during the war in 2008.

Political Science professor Paul Newman from Bangalore University on Saturday presented these statistics quoting from a UN panel report headed by Marzuki Darusman, Steven Ratner and Yasmin Sooka.

In his presentation on the War Crimes and Genocide Investigation: Brief on Permanent People's Tribunal report and UN Experts Panel Report on Sri Lanka, Paul Newman underlined that reports show hospitals and schools were targeted by the military. Besides, even the LTTE had used civilians as human shields.

During the seminar on war crimes and genocide of Tamils in Sri Lanka organized by Forum Against War Crimes and Genocide, human rights activists in the city called on the international community to act swiftly and protect the rights of people.

Nagaragare Ramesh of People's Democratic Forum emphasized the need for an independent enquiry by UN. "The human rights abuse during the war is disturbing. It is not just the Tamils but everyone should raise their voice against the human rights violation in Sri Lanka," he said.

Writer G Ramakrishna urged for an immediate relief to the Sri Lankan Tamils. "The war has only devastated the lives of civilians in our neighbouring country. The people responsible for this disaster should be punished," he said.