NPC resolution sent to UN human rights chief



March 18, 2017

The Chairman of the Northern Provincial Council, C.V.K. Sivagnanam, has forwarded the resolution adopted by the NPC with regard to the UNHRC Resolution 30/1 Co-sponsored by Sri Lanka in 2015, to the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, Prince Zeid Ra’ad Al-Hussein. 

 The Resolution, which was sponsored by TNA council member M.K. Shivajilingam, was adopted by the Northern Provincial Council at its sittings held on Tuesday (March 14).

 The resolution called upon the UNHRC and the International Community to require Sri Lanka to agree to an International accountability mechanism, ratify the Rome Statute as recommended by the OHCHR investigation on Sri Lanka (OISL) Report of September 2015 and offer the Tamils a political solution with the Mediation of the UN. 

Full text of resolution:

 RESOLUTION No: R/88/2017/355 

Adopted by the Northern Provincial Council at its sittings held on 14.03.2017 

“In reference to UN Human Rights Council Resolution 30/1 Co-sponsored by Sri Lanka in September 2015 Sessions 

Recalling that the Government of Sri Lanka was a co-sponsor and signatory to the Resolution 30/1 titled “Promoting reconciliation, accountability and Human rights in Sri Lanka” at the UNHRC session in Geneva in September 2015, committing itself to establish a judicial mechanism with a special counsel to investigate allegations of violations and abuses of human rights and violations of international humanitarian law ,as applicable and affirming that a credible justice process should include independent judicial and prosecutorial institutions led by individuals known for their integrity and impartiality; and also affirming in this regard the importance of participation in a Sri Lankan Judicial mechanism, including the special counsel’s office, of Commonwealth and other foreign judges, defense lawyers and authorized prosecutors and investigators; 

Noting with concern that the Government of Sri Lanka has not taken any meaningful steps to implement its own commitment to establish an impartial credible mechanism; 

Recognizing that the victimized Tamil people do not have any confidence on any domestic judicial mechanism that does not contain majority of foreign judges, lawyers, prosecutors and investigators; 

The Northern Provincial Council of Sri Lanka resolves that: 

1) The Government of Sri Lanka has not taken adequate measures to fully implement the Resolution 30/1 that it co-sponsored at the UNHRC Session in September 2015, especially with regard to the accountability, establishment of a Commission for truth, reconciliation; non–recurrence of oppression, return of lands to its rightful civilian owners and an office of reparation

 2)The Government of Sri Lanka has not taken any meaningful steps for a credible justice process and an accountability mechanism that it had accepted, promised and committed to the UNHRC and to the International Community.

 3) Since Sri Lanka being unable or unwilling to implement its own commitment, this Council calls upon the UNHRC to refer the case to an International judicial mechanism; 

4) This Council emphasizes that without truth, justice and an equitable political solution, neither reconciliation nor permanent peace is possible in Sri Lanka; 

5) This Council calls upon the UNHRC and the International Community to require Sri Lanka to agree to an International accountability mechanism, ratify the Rome Statute as recommended by the OHCHR investigation on Sri Lanka (OISL) Report of September 2015 and offer the Tamils a political solution with the Mediation of the UN; 

6) Recognizing that the Tamil People are a Distinct Nation with their traditional homeland in the contiguous North–East region of Sri Lanka, and they are entitled to self–determination, the Government of Sri Lanka must offer the Tamils an equitable political solution which at the minimum shall consist of the merged Northern and Eastern Provinces offering full and complete federalism with explicit declaration and recognition of such system in the Constitution.”

Now Maithri sends his National list lackey to save the Navy criminals who killed innocent students..! Why is Maithri at pains to wash away the blood stains for others’ sake?

-Wimal Dheerasekera

Expose` : Navy criminal team that killed innocent students for extortion payments ! hitherto unrevealed bloody nightmare !!

(Lanka-e-News -18.March.2017, 11.55PM) It is by now a well and widely known fact that  incumbent president Miathripala Sirisena took most odious and obnoxious steps  to save the group of  murderers of the Navy which  abducted innocent Sinhalese , Tamil and Muslim students and killed them most brutally after collecting extortion payments. It is also an indisputable fact, subsequently , he  relented and retracted his orders  in the midst of mounting  pressures against his  villainous and anti national moves despite being the president of the country. Now , his latest ploy is making clandestine attempts using his lackeys to rescue the ruthless bestial murderers , based on reports reaching Lanka e news .

Now Maithri sends his National list lackey to save the Navy criminals who killed innocent students.docx by Thavam Ratna on Scribd

UK insists on credible war crimes probe

Government playing with words

by Zacki Jabbar-March 18, 2017, 7:27 pm 

While the government says that there are variations to the manner in which allegations of war crimes against the security forces and the LTTE could be investigated, the United Kingdom yesterday emphasized the importance of independent and impartial institutions to ensure credibility of the process.

Asked as to what the United Kingdoms’s (UK) position was in the light of recent statements by leading figures in the Sri Lankan government ruling out the establishment of a Hybrid Court and how it would set about implementing the October 2015 United Nations Human Rights Council(UNHRC) Resolution 30/1, titled "Promoting Reconciliation, Accountability and Human Rights in Sri Lanka", a spokesperson for the British High Commission in Colombo, told the "Sunday Island" that the UK remained committed to seeing Resolution 30/1 implemented in full through the establishment of a credible judicial mechanism.

"The UNHRC Resolution welcomed the proposal of the Government of Sri Lanka to establish a judicial mechanism to investigate allegations of abuses of human rights and violations of international humanitarian law. It affirmed the importance of independent and impartial institutions to the credibility of the mechanism and in this regard highlighted the importance of the participation of Commonwealth and other foreign judges, defence lawyers and authorized prosecutors and investigators", she said.

Asked if the U.K was satisfied with implementation of  Resolution 30/1, which the U.S , U.K ,Yugoslav , Macedonia and Montenegro sponsored, along with co-sponsors Sri Lanka and 25 other countries, the spokesperson observed that welcome improvements had been made to the human rights situation since January 2015 but  much remained to be done.

"The UK will continue to support and encourage the Sri Lankan government to fully deliver the commitments it made," she said.

She recalled that in November 2015, the UK had committed £6.6 million over three years to support the Sirisena-Wickremesinghe administration’s ambitious reform agenda. That included work on police reform and training, defence engagement, supporting the UN’s work on reconciliation and peace building, inter-religious dialogue and mediation, capacity building on anti-bribery and the fight against corruption and de-mining in the northern province.

Emphasizing the need for equitable and just governance for all Lankans, the spokesperson noted that the UK and wider international community  were supporting the government’s efforts to implement its commitments on reconciliation, accountability, human rights and a political settlement to the national question.

Foreign Minister Mangala Samaraweera said in Colombo on Thursday that the UNHRC’s call for Commonwealth or other foreign judges to be included in a Hybrid Court was a recommendation and should not interpreted to mean insistence.

The UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, Zeid Ra’ad al Hussein himself had admitted that there could be variations on how Resolution 30/1 would be implemented, he said. The establishment of an Hybrid Court, Samaraweera observed would involve constitutional changes which will not be feasible in the current context.

He said that the government had requested the UNHRC for  two more years to implement its recommendations.

How To Spot A Potential Public Intellectual

By Rohan Samarajiva –March 18, 2017

Prof. Rohan Samarajiva

Recently I wrote about who a public intellectual is. This complementary piece seeks to attenuate its pessimistic conclusion by suggesting some rules that may help gatekeepers perform their function better.

Today, all sorts of people are positioned as public intellectuals by gatekeepers of various kinds, principally those in the media. Because one cannot become a public intellectual without the public having an opportunity to assess one’s intellectual contribution, getting through the gatekeepers is critical. I expressed doubt about whether our gatekeepers had the wherewithal to exercise their power in a responsible manner.

What rules of thumb or filters may an editor or equivalent apply to choose between different intellectuals seeking opportunities to communicate to the public?  The public’s attention is limited; and so is the “speaking time” that could be offered. Giving time on TV/radio or space in an online or print publication necessarily involves judgment.  One putative intellectual gets the opportunity; another does not. How should that judgment be exercised?

The easiest rule, or the first filter, is to see whether the intellectual is basing his or her contribution on some kind of evidence. Many of those who are permitted to make demands on the public’s limited attention do so on the basis of who they are, and not on what they have to say. 

The previous discussion, including Dr Siri Gamage’s contribution, ruled out the possibility that one could make a claim to be a public intellectual simply on the basis of holding a university appointment or an academic qualification.  The first filter must therefore be not who the writer/speaker is, but what the writer/speaker has to say. Is it plain and pure opinion, unadorned by evidence?  If yes, it should be excluded except in exceptional circumstances, discussed below.

What gets through the first filter must also get through the second. Is the presented evidence of adequate quality?    

The second filter requires more effort. I recently described the problem:

A Professor from the country’s oldest Department of Mass Communication was asked to make some comments from the floor at a recent panel discussion I participated in. I was shocked to hear him say that the country needed an industrialization policy because we were importing vehicles that needed tyres manufactured abroad while we still exported raw rubber. 

He appeared to be unaware that most of Sri Lanka’s rubber has been exported in value-added form as gloves, tyres, etc. for several decades and that their total value exceeded USD 1.7 Billion in 2014.  He was ignorant of the facts that Sri Lanka is the world’s leader in solid rubber tyres and actually imports rubber to meet the demand for the tyre factory. This was just one of the misstatements the Professor made.

Other examples are the oft made claims about housemaids in the Middle East. It is no longer true to claim that we export more housemaids than skilled workers or that more women leave for short-term employment than do men. These erroneous claims are repeated ad nauseam by all sorts of so-called experts and are rarely challenged, adding to the pollution of public discourse.

The data necessary to fact check such claims exist on the web, but one must want to, and know how to, search for them. 

But the costs of fact checking have been dramatically lowered by the Internet. Editors/producers do not have to pay for the contributions of the putative pundits. The least they can do is to spend some money and time checking the quality of the punditry and asking a few questions.

Some pundits will undoubtedly be offended on being challenged by editors/producers, especially because of the easy ride they’ve had so far. But in fact, they should be thankful. I have found that questions by journalists always sharpen my arguments and help me avoid mistakes.

The discerning reader should by now be asking whether this article would make it through the two filters. What evidence have I presented to support my recommendation regarding the application of two filters? Some may consider my factual claims to be illustrations, not amounting to evidence supporting the principal claims.

This is where the exception has to come in.

A writer/speaker with a track record of contributions that meet the criteria embodied in the two filters should be permitted to make contributions that are more opinion than evidence. These kinds of summative pieces have to be judged in relation to the overall body of work of the writer/speaker. 

The exception should be based on the overall track record of the writer, which means that those who are in the early stages of making intellectual contributions would have to place more weight on evidence than those who have been in the game long. Sir Arthur C. Clarke supported his 1945 proposal for satellites in the geostationary orbit with mathematical calculations. When he was proposing a single time zone for the world in the last two decades of his life, he provided little or no evidence. In my view, he had earned that right.

Ideally, the editor/producer will apply some criteria of quality even to the opinion-heavy pieces. Is the argument well-constructed? Is it internally consistent? Is it consistent with the previous positions of the writer/speaker? Are the positions of others who are quoted being presented fairly?   

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SRI LANKA HAS THE OBLIGATION TO ENSURE EQUAL RIGHTS AND EQUAL OPPORTUNITIES FOR MUSLIMS

Image: Jensila Majeed speaking at a side event organised by IMADR at HRC 34 on Women and Minority Rights in Sri Lanka’s TJ process. ©s.deshapriya

By Jensila Majeed, Former CTFSL member, Mullative.-18/03/2017


75,000 Muslim were evacuated by the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) in 1990, just because we were Muslims. Government of Sri Lanka (GoSL) or UN didn’t intervene when Muslims were chased out from the North within 48 hours. Only 8 Sri Lankan Rupees for dry rations were provided by the Government.

After the end of the war in 2009, Muslims in the Northern Province were able to go back to our lands. But the GoSL or representatives of the Tamil community haven’t invited us to come and settle in our lands until today. In 20 years the number of families has multiplied in many folds. Now it is not easy for us to go and settle in by ourselves. So far the Government hasn’t given us any support to resettle with basic needs.

Speakers of the side event: S.Saroja. Nimlka Fernanda. Anasthasia Crikely (moderator) ,R.Izak Ndiaya. and Jensila Majeed ©s.deshapriya

Therefore the Government is not showing any concern to provide lands for the returnees. Compare to the other four districts of the Northern Province, only Muslims in Mannar district got lands. But not everyone.

1. Land is a source of income generation for Muslim women, therefore not having land means no livelihood for Muslim women.
2. Due to the land issues, we also lost the voting right.
3. Due to this landless issue, returnees have gone back to their previous district while being registered in their home. Difficulties arise when they want to receive official letters.
4. While the issues of Tamils are discussed in the minority rights perspective, Muslims and our challenges are overlooked. This is the serious issue which needs the attention of the Government.

Challenges of the Muslim community are not taken seriously. It is unheard and submerged in the Tamil minority issues. While the land re-distribution is taking time due to the interference of both Muslim and Tamil politicians, disputes have occurred frequently.

1. When we talk about reconciliation and rehabilitation processes, the forced displacement of Muslim community has to be recognized as an atrocity against Muslims by the GoSL and Tamil political parties. In the North, Muslims are minorities among minorities.
2. Resettlement policy and a commission should be formed to investigate Muslims struggles to get justice.
3. To rebuild the relationship among the Tamil and Muslim communities in the North, reconciliation processes should take place.
4. Muslim Marriage Divorce Act should be reformed to eliminate polygamy and increase the minimum age of marriage to 18 years old from 12 years old. Not only we are affected by Muslim extremists, but also we are attacked by Sinhala Buddhist extremists.

Therefore, the Government of Sri Lanka has the obligation to ensure equal rights and equal opportunities for Muslims to live in our own land with dignity.

• Translated summary of the speech delivers by Jensila Majeed at HRC 34 side event on 17th March 2017.

The truth about supplementary scam

March 18, 2017

The supplementary estimate presented to Parliament regarding government expenses for the month of January has divulged very important information.

While nearly 5 million people from 1.2 families were affected due to the drought Rs. 50 million was allocated on 14th January as extra expenses for the Ministry of Disaster Management. Rs. 24000 million has been allocated to restore financial companies that tumbled down due to being used for financial frauds during the former regime and pay compensation for those who deposited money in such companies.
Out of these funds Rs. 10010 million has been allocated to restore bankrupt financial companies and to establish a financial assets management agency. Another Rs. 14000 million has been allocated to pay those who deposited in Ceylinco Golden Key Company that was used for a large scale financial racket, to establish Exim Bank in Sri Lanka and for the development of tourist industry.
When only Rs. 50 million is allocated to pay compensation for those affected due to natural disasters and the explosion at Kosgama Army camp and issues that directly affect masses Rs. 24000 million is allocated for expenses connected with financial frauds.
Also, Rs. 546,123, 790 is to be spent to import luxury vehicles for 14 ministers. One vehicle to be imported for a minister would cost Rs. 42,000,000.
Source: ‘Irida Lanka’

My SAITM Story

By Chamalka Rathnayake –March 19, 2017

Chamalka Rathnayake

This is not to hurt anyone’s feelings but just to share my side of the story. Thought it’s the right time to open up. Hope you’ll spare few minutes to read 

Having done A/L’s for the second time in 2012 from Pushpadana Girls’ College Kandy, I got A (Physics), B, B with a Z score of 1.7868 and with the district rank 87. The cutoff mark being 1.86 (new syllabus) for medicine in Kandy district, shattered my childhood dream of getting into a government medical faculty.

I was thinking,

1. Should I give up on medicine

2. Should I do the exam again

3. Should I chose private education

1 – Should i give up?

Being a child from a middle class family whose parents are doctors, trust me our lives were not a bed of roses. I’ve seen the darkest years of my parents career. All the struggles they went through to raise 3 kids despite their stressful busy schedule is unbelievable. Seeing all this and still wanting to do medicine was not because they were doctors or for the sake of money. But how they enjoyed watching their patients genuine smile made me wonder how sacred is this profession and the struggle is worth it. So why giving up here?

2 – Do the exam again?

Having ended up in the margin of the cutoff hit me deep into the core. It was really hard to get over. The fear of not getting selected again drew me back from trying again. My utmost gratitude to all my friends who tried again and fulfilled their goals. Such courage should be admired.

3 – Private education?

This left me with the final option, which was the private education. With my sister studying abroad, I would have easily chosen a foreign medical faculty. But seeing my mother crying each and every time akki’s leaving the country and all the suffering they are going through thinking of her day and night was hard to bear up. So SAITM was the ultimate best choice.

Despite the economic burden rising head over, for letting me decide what I want, I would never ever be able to finish paying back the gratitude for my parents. As I stepped into SAITM on March 2013, I promised myself not to let them down again, and here I am at the end of 4th year successfully completing the exams and giving them all the happiness they deserve.

I strongly believe that you cannot decide the future of a child by just the A/L results. Dedication, hardwork and patience are the pillars of success and can take them anywhere in the world as long as they love what they are doing.

The fact that I couldn’t enter a government medical faculty was not because I was a failure, but because I couldn’t get into the district quota, while there were plenty of students who did A/L’s from various other districts, with z score values less than mine entered university while I was left behind. It’s not just me. There are 1000s out there who faced this situation and who WILL face this in near future too.

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Is Vasu involved in human smuggling?

Mar 18, 2017

Joint opposition MP Vasudeva Nanayakkara, in a suspicious manner, has been raising in parliament the matter of illegal immigrants, according to reports reaching Lanka News Web. The reason is that he is having close links with a person accused of human trafficking.

It is reported that there are more than 6,000 illegal immigrants in Sri Lanka. All of a sudden, Vasu has come out of his sleep and is raising this matter. He asked minister Sagala Ratnayake in parliament about the action to be taken to send these people back to their countries.

A LNW investigation revealed why Vasu was so concerned about illegal immigrants.

Trade unionist Titus Saparamadu is a very close associate of Vasu, who does all his bidding. Recently, law enforcement authorities arrested 118 foreigners in Trincomalee, as Saparamadu was planning to smuggle them out of the country. He is now accused of having facilitated human smuggling, as per clause 45C of the immigration and emigration act. These foreigners are demanding that they be given back the money they had paid to him. It is in this scenario that Vasu is asking in parliament as to when illegal immigrants will be sent back to their countries.

Saparamadu is a human trafficker facing many accusations. This is the latest charge he is facing. Vasu is a veteran in Sri Lankan politics. He is no ‘baby.’ Therefore, the so called JO’s having forgotten the racism it is trying to provoke in the country and all of a sudden finding a new issue in illegal immigrants is no coincidence. Therefore, it raises very valid suspicion if Vasu too, is involved in human trafficking.

SRI LANKA: TWO MORE EXTRAJUDICIAL KILLINGS

mage: Chadik’s Wife, son and daughter; Chadik Shyaman Wickramarachchi was killed at the Peliyagoda police on 25th Feb 2017. ( Newsfirst photo)

Bijo Francis.

18/03/2017

Two more extrajudicial killings at police stations have been reported in Sri Lanka. One of the alleged killings was at the Peliyagoda Police Station, and the other was at the Gampaha Police Station. Even while Sri Lanka’s record on torture and extrajudicial killings is being discussed at the Human Rights Council in Geneva and even while the government has been giving undertakings to eradicate torture and extrajudicial killings in Sri Lanka, events such these two killings have been taking place.

The characteristic response of the government is to prevent serious investigations into such killings. The investigation process is usually stymied in the following manner:

(i) The investigations are handed over to the Assistant Superintendents of Police and other senior officers in the same area, rather than the Criminal Investigation Division, which is more likely to conduct an impartial inquiry;

(ii) During the investigations, family members and other relatives are intimidated and discouraged from revealing what they know about these killings;

(iii) A tall tale is invented by the police. They claim that the person has committed suicide or something similar, assigning the blame for the killings onto the victims themselves;

(iv) Pressure is put on magistrates by senior police officers in order to save ‘their boys’. 

This is a common characteristic in most of the inquiries into extrajudicial killings, and there are retired magistrates and district court judges who have frankly admitted the extent of pressure they were exposed to in dealing with extrajudicial killings that took place at police stations; and

(v) In the rare cases where police officers are arrested for such crimes, they are often not subjected to the full and impartial trials and sentences required by law.

As seen in the first of the two cases below, to the credit of the Inspector General of Police (IGP), there appears to be more space for investigations when those at the top directly intervene. It is hoped that the government will move to eradicate the practices that have become entrenched in Sri Lanka’s system of policing by reforming the system itself, and ensuring that there are impartial and thorough investigations into such heinous crimes.

The Killing of Mr. Chadik Shyaman Wickramarachchi

On the night of 25 February 2017, a group of police officers visited the residence of Chadik’s mother. The officers claimed they wished to take Chadik to the police station to record a statement from him. 

However, he was not at his mother’s residence. The officers then went to Chadik’s house.

When the officers reached Chadik’s house, they knocked on the door. His wife, who was frightened, said that she was alone and would not open the door. She also questioned who they were, and said she would call 119. The officers told her to “go ahead”. Then, just as she turned away from the door to pick up the phone, the officers smashed through the back door.

When the officers entered the house, they again ask for Chadik, who stood up and asked who they were and what they wanted. Chadik was told that they were from the Peliyagoda Unit and that they needed to record a statement from him. The officers then took him away in a vehicle to the Peliyagoda Police Station.

Chadik’s relatives wanted to visit the Peliyagoda Police Station the next morning, but a family friend informed them that Chadik was not there. They were informed by another friend that Chadik had been taken to the Colombo National Hospital.

The family searched for Chadik at the hospital and eventually recovered his body at the Police Mortuary in Colombo. According to a relative, Chadik’s shirtless body, covered in sand and laying on a gurney, was handed over to the family.

Later, the police issued a communiqué stating that Chadik, who they said was a ‘suspect’, had fallen ill while in police custody and had been taken to the hospital, where he passed away. According to the officers, the deceased was arrested following information provided by someone who was arrested in connection with several robberies.

To his credit, the Inspector General of Police (IGP) ordered an immediate investigation into the death. Following the investigation, five police officers were arrested in connection with the death: a Police Sub-Inspector and four police constables were arrested at Police Headquarters by a ‘Special Police Team.’ Later, they were produced before a Colombo magistrate and remanded.

Thorough investigations must take place into this death. Chadik’s relatives maintain that he was illegally arrested and extra-judicially killed by police officers. It appears to be yet another example of the way the Sri Lankan police system functions. Extra- judicial killings of suspects, often innocent, are carried out in the guise of crime prevention. Numerous victims have been killed in police custody after being arrested.

The Killing of Mr. Sunanda Dias

On 2 November 2016, between 12.30pm-1pm, a team of police officers arrested Sunanda at his home. He was then severely tortured by the officers in front of his relatives and neighbors. Sunanda’s mother, Ms. K R Dhammika, pleaded with the officers to stop, but they ignored her and continued their assault.

Afterwards, he was brought to the Headquarters of the Gampaha Police Station by car.

In the evening, Sunanda’s friend, Mr. Anuja Pushpakuma, went to the police station to visit him while he was detained in a cell. Anuja learned about the incident from Sunanda’s mother. Although Anuja brought food and a milk packet for the victim, he refused the food and drank only few sips of milk.

On the third evening, Sunanda’s mother informed Anuja that her son had been admitted to the Gampaha General Hospital. The message had been delivered to the family by a police officer on his mobile phone. At 6pm Anuja, visited Sunanda in the hospital. He saw his friend in Ward No: 7 on the 5th floor. One hand was cuffed to the hospital bed and a he was on a saline drip. Sunanda was seriously ill and not able to get up from the bed or move on his own. Several police officers were guarding him. Although Anuja tried to give his friend some food, the officers would not allow it.

In the evening of the same day, Anuja went to the hospital again. This time, Sunanda tried to talk to him. He needed to go to the washroom to relieve himself. Anuja and a police officer partially lifted and carried him to the washroom, as he could not walk by himself. There he removed the bedsheet which was wrapped around his body. Then Anuja saw how both his knees were swollen. Sunanda told him that he had been severely tortured at the police station. The officers had beaten him with poles. Anuja also observed a large number of contusions on the victim’s back. Sunanda explained to him that all these were the result of the severe torture he suffered. The horror, stress and pain he was under made him breakdown and cry in front of Anuja.

On the fourth morning, at 5.30am, Anuja went to the hospital again, but Sunanda was not in his same. 

Anuja asked the other patients the whereabouts of his friend. Finally, the ward nurse said that Sunanda had been taken to the National Hospital of Colombo after a fall. Anuja went to Sunanda’s parents and informed them of the situation. Later, the victim’s sister, J B Suwendani Dias, asked the police how her brother was. The officer abruptly informed her that Sunanda was dead.

At 12.30pm, Sunanda’s father, J B Gunawardana, went with Anuja to go to the NHSL. Several prison officials approached them and told them that Sunanda had jumped out of a window and ran, and that he had been brought to the NHSL after a hospital attendant noticed him lying on the floor. Anuja vehemently refuted this explanation. Firstly, as Sunanda was handcuffed, how could he get out of bed? Secondly, both of the victim’s knees were swollen and he was unable to move, so how could he walk, never mind run? Anuja and the victim’s father both accused the officers of killing him by pushing him out the window to cover up the evidence of their torture. The officers then left.

Anuja was called to give evidence before the Judicial Medical Officer before they conducted a post-mortem examination. He testified before the coroner at the death inquest. Before he gave evidence, a police officer from the Gampaha Police Station threatened him, warning him not to reveal what he had witnessed. However, he reiterated that he would testify to what he witnessed throughout the whole process, from his friend’s arrest until his death.

Anuja and Sunanda’s family members state that he was illegally arrested, detained, severely tortured and finally extra-judicially killed—all to cover up evidence of torture by the police. They seek justice for him.

IT IS THEREFORE REQUESTED THAT THE HONOURABLE MINISTER OF JUSTICE AND THE HONOURABLE MINISTER OF LAW AND ORDER & SOUTHERN DEVELOPMENT:

1. Assign the task of investigating deaths at police stations to a Special Unit of Inquiry of the Criminal Investigation Division;

2. Hold the ASP who has jurisdiction over the particular police station where the an extra-judicial killing has taken place responsible for their failure to control the police station in the manner required by Departmental Orders, and similarly hold the Officer in Charge of the police station responsible for letting such a killing happen (enforcing command responsibility); and

3. Make sure statements are taken from all police officers at a particular station about all events surrounding such murders.

– Letter sent to Ms. Agnes Callamard, The UN Special Rapporteur on extrajudicial, summary or arbitrary executions by Bijo Francis, Executive Director, Asian Human Rights Commission, Hong Kong.

My SAITM Story

By Ammar Jawfer –March 18, 2017

Ammar Jawfer

Why London Syllabus?

I am a proud product of Gateway College, Colombo. We were abroad as my father was working in the Sri Lankan Embassy, Riyadh, KSA. Therefore, I had already started my education at the Sri Lankan International School, Riyadh, in the Edexcel syllabus and therefore had to follow it when we returned to Mother Sri Lanka. One ought to bear in mind, that getting entry into international schools are not as easy as they perceive. There are waiting lists almost similar to getting into state schools and they also have placement tests for to sit for to get entry. Just walk into any international school in Colombo and you will understand what I am talking about. The false ideology where if you have money, you can enter into any international school is completely baseless.

I believe that I was blessed to have received my education at Gateway College, the brain child of late Mr. Alles, who was our chairman. He nurtured us to be great individuals and he repeatedly stressed the importance of giving back to this country as he has done so by example. He also encouraged us to become all round students, not just sticking to studies alone or sports alone but to be able to do both, to balance it and to then strive and achieve further. We followed in none other than that pathway and were able to reap various benefits as time went on.

I sat for ordinary level examination, 2 months after having continuously trained and participated in our Annual Inter-International Athletics Championship and managed to walk away with an Edexcel High Achiever Award. I believe that I was able to do this with the backing and guidance of our dear chairman, Mr.Alles and my teachers to whom I am ever so indebted. It wasn’t easy.

Why SAITM?

In 2011, for my Advanced levels, apart from the 4 subjects in the bio-science stream, I did 2 additional subjects, which were per my interest in them. I managed to get good results in that too and it was hard. With prefect ship duties, sports and other activities at school, time was the ultimate factor.

During this period, I was contemplating on my final studies. I had already decided to do medicine. I wanted to become a doctor and I had various reasons for that, which were mainly three. The first was the ability to serve people and not just people, but the people of this country. Another reason was my mother who is sick and suffering from a chronic disease. She has supported me in every juncture and I believe that I owe her as well as my father a lot for everything that I have achieved in my life as they are the 2 pillars of my life which I was blessed with from God Almighty. So I wanted to try and see if I can find out a way to find a cure for the people suffering from this disease as well.

The final reason is a personal quote and motto of mine,

“To make someone smile is something…

But.. to make someone smile and know that you are a part of the reason for that smile, is something words cannot explain”

I wanted to do medicine in Sri Lanka, so I checked out the state universities and there was no way that I could join them. I looked in to Sri Jayawardenapura University because if you had studied abroad you could enter through the foreign quota but I wasn’t eligible because I should have done my exams abroad for that. So although my batch mates who remained back at Riyadh, were able to get in to the Sri Jayawardenapura University having studied the same syllabus that I did, I wasn’t able to. I then looked in the Kotelawala Defence University but at that time, yet again, there was no entry method for a student who had studied the Edexcel Syllabus. The only option I had was to go abroad for to do medicine. We checked various places and the total cost inclusive of the tuition fee, travelling cost, food and other daily expenditure at a relatively good SLMC recognized university was roughly at a minimum of around 7 million Sri Lankan rupees. This was with the additional difficulty of having to learn the language of that country, to be dependent on translators, to be able to cope and live in different conditions as well. Having learnt from my friends and seniors that this wasn’t relatively easy and a simply fairy tale as some people describe it to be, I still wanted more options. And not to mention the fact that having studied and finished medicine abroad, one has to come back here and sit for the Act 16 exam at which there was a pass rate of 13%! What kind of a mental block is that with regard to spending so much money and coming back and not being able to pass this test and practice as a doctor in mother Lanka?

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Govt. in a mess over Basil’s Malwana property 

Mar 18, 2017

The Attorney General’s Department is trying to prevent the auctioning of the 16-acre property with a palatial house at Malwana said to belong to Basil Rajapaksa, reports say. Legal experts say the AG’s Department and the FCID will have to share the blame if this attempt, being made at the instigation of certain government politicians, succeeds.

The Pugoda magistrate has ordered the auctioning of the property. The state has valued the property at Rs. 208 million. But, AG’s Department officials were due to ask the magistrate to halt the auction. This is insanity. In the legal process, Basil was the first to be asked about the ownership of the property. He said he was not the owner. Then, Tiru Nadesan, husband of Nirupama Rajapaksa was asked and he answered that he had sold it. Furthermore, the notorious architect Muditha Jayakody, who had been given state contracts without tender-calling, said the property did not belong to him. Therefore, the magistrate ordered the public auctioning of the property without an owner.

The main distortion in this matter was the Rajapaksa darling Muditha Jayakody being made a state witness. Gotabhaya had given him contracts without calling for tenders, and without stopping there, he had paid him in excess. When obtaining the tenders, Muditha had given false information to the relevant institutions.

All these have been revealed, but Muditha has written to the commissioner of Inland Revenue saying that the valuation reports submitted when he had been dealing with the Malwana property were wrong and asking that he be reimbursed the tax money paid. When shameless thieves are given leniency, what they do is taking the entire judicial process as a joke. That is the result of having made a state witness out of a thief who should be sent behind bars for many years.

The government cannot halt the auction ordered by the magistrate. If it wants, it can buy the property at the auction. However, the government is influencing the AG’s Department to halt the auction. When this attempt, being made due to the wants of certain government politicians, is foiled, the blame will go to the AG’s Department and the FCID. Then, the ‘Yahapaalana’ politicians who influenced them will not be caught. Basil will not be caught. Muditha will not be caught. In the end, there will be no one to accept the blame.

The spectre of populism: The Dutch escape; Modi’s magic and menace; Trump in checkmate

Voting at the recent Dutch Election

by Rajan Philips-March 18, 2017, 8:13 pm 

The Dutch people have warded off the spectre of xenophobic populism that is haunting Europe. With 85% voters turning out, the Dutch have spurned the darker angels inherent to every polity and stayed true to their ‘consociational tradition’, electing for government an alliance of parties that spans from the centre all the way to the green-left. After Brexit, Europe was bracing for a possible ‘Nexit.’ Netherlands has resoundingly voted to remain in, and not emulate the fragmented British vote to exit the European Union. It is Brexit that is now in trouble, tormented by buyers’ remorse among the English, and threatened by a new Scottish referendum (what would they call it, Sexit?) to exit not the EU but the UK.

Populism is not only in Europe. Nearer home, Indian Prime Minister Modi has confounded both followers and haters by leading the BJP to a phenomenal victory in the Uttar Pradesh state election. Away in the Western Hemisphere, President Trump is proving himself to be more a lying blusterer than a governing leader, and is turning America from being a superpower into a super circus.

The term and its significations have been around for a long time in Europe and the Americas. In its current release, populism stands for nativism and anti-elitism, and against immigrants and their ‘politically-correct’ sponsors and defenders. Populism is the west’s internal reactions against globalization and free trade that western establishments imposed on the world. As far as I know, populism was never identified as a political phenomenon in Sri Lanka or South Asia, although the term has been used in its literal, or pejorative, sense. Rajni Kothari, for example, saw the reaction to globalization in the global south – not in populism but in the waxing politics of ethnicity, which has since waned quite considerably.

Yet, there is a tendency to view populism as a new law of political gravity everywhere. There are seemingly common threads in the manifestations of populism in Netherlands, US, Britain, and even in India. But there are also significant differences in the contextual causes and the responses to political questions in every country. The point of political understanding is to provide a political response; and not like in religious theology, where - ‘to understand is to believe and to believe is to understand’. And the metrics of measuring political responses have not changed. They should remain the same everywhere: fairness, equality, justice, tolerance, decency and respect for diversity.

Neither inevitable nor permanent

Alongside the tendency to view populism as a new organizing political principle, there is also the tendency to overestimate the strength of its constituency and its consequences. The opposite error is to underestimate them and fail to use effective electoral tactics to deal with them. The Hillary Clinton campaign was guilty of the latter error despite its formidable resources and handsomely compensated professional managers. The American voters did not let her down. At 65 million votes, she holds the record for white American presidential candidates. The only person who surpassed her is Barak Obama, the African American President. He polled a whopping 69 million votes in 2008 and 65 million in 2012.

The Dutch people and their myriad of political parties have been smarter. The voters were also conscious of their responsibility and their duty. 84% of them turned out to vote, a significantly higher response than the usual 70%. Contrast this to the smug Londoners who had better things to do on Brexit day, or the starry eyed American millennials who either stayed home in protest or voted in protest for third party candidates. One would have thought that with all their education in American history and politics they knew what to do in a close presidential election.

Not to make too much of a value-comparison of electoral systems, it would seem that the system of proportional representation and the political culture of consociationalism in the Netherlands is far more suited to absorb and channel competing political forces in a non-destructive way than the American electoral college system that forces multiple political contentions into a binary contest. Rather than dividing themselves into an Either/OR fallacy, the Dutch voters have been able to elect representatives from the far-left, encompassing political socialism and environmental sustainability, to the far-right that stands for closing not only the Dutch borders but also the Mosques inside. In between are 26 other parties of varying sizes, significance and messages. It is far better to give representation to extremists of every hue and let them vent in public, in parliament, than to shut them off to make mischief in the fringes.

The incumbent Dutch Prime Minister, Mark Rutte, will continue in office but with a new coalition of parties. His Liberal Party lost 10 seats in the election from 41 to 31 – still the top seat count, but his former coalition partner the Labour Party (here’s a parallel to Britain) lost massively 30 seats in all and will have no effective say in the new government or parliament. The predicted winner, the anti-immigration Freedom Party led by Geert Wilder, the Dutch clone of Donald Trump and his ilk in Britain and France, came up terribly short. At twenty seats, the Freedom Party gained five more from its current total, but its vote dial stayed at 15% as it has been for the last few years. Two other pro-European parties performed much better capturing 19 seats each. The cynosural winner is the Green Left Party that quadrupled its strength from four to sixteen seats.

The Green-Left’s charismatic leader, Jesse Klaver, is the son of a Moroccan father and a Dutch-Indonesian mother. The old Empire really strikes back in beautiful ways. Mr. Klaver has been compared to Canadian Prime Minister, Justin Trudeau, for their looks and youthfulness. There are other aspects as well. Mr. Trudeau, quite different from his rigorously exacting father, has managed to find a cordial working relationship with the new Trump Administration in Washington. The Canadian Prime Minister’s ministerial signals are tellingly revelatory: the Minister of External Affairs is a Canadian of Ukrainian roots and Canada’s new Minister of Immigration arrived in the country as a young refugee from Somalia.

The kind of populism that triumphed in the US, and in Brexit, however freakishly, has been pushed back in the Netherlands. But the socioeconomic reasons and deprived experiences of people that generate populist anger and resentment should not be lost sight of even as simplistic political leaders who exploit the situation should be called out. That is the lesson from the electoral success of populism in Britain and the US, and its setback in Netherlands. Narendra Modi is one leader who articulates both the magic and the menace of populism. He is more moderate in his rhetoric than Donald Trump, and he is also more respectful of the institutions of government than Trump is. He took India by storm as a political outsider, but unlike Trump he did not parachute from outside politics.

On the other hand, Indian commentators see parallels between Trump and Modi in creating divisive electoral coalitions and exploiting the ‘post-modern’ social medium of communication. He is the latest consummate beneficiary of the good old (and British) first-past-the-post electoral system, winning 312 seats for the BJP (and 13 for its allies) in the 403-seat Uttar Pradesh state assembly. He has masterfully managed to divide and conquer the grand non-Hinduthva constituency that has hitherto thwarted BJP attempts to win power in India’s most populous state. He has divided the Backward Classes along caste lines, the Dalits along class lines, and everyone against the Muslims. The redeeming aspect of Modi is his discipline against corruption and his willingness to play by the rules of the Indian Constitution. That is a key difference with the Trump presidency.

No one has accused Trump of corruption, but the co-mingling of Trump’s business and government is a new experience for everyone. As well, the unfolding Trump Administration is a clear illustration of the resilience of the checks-and-balances in the American constitutional order that has evolved through two centuries of experience. Not surprisingly, Mr. Trump is finding out that governing is a little too complicated for his liking. In fact, it is a lot more complicated than deal making in real estate business and bulldozing in construction.

The American judiciary is having a field day in checkmating its President as he and his team of neophytes struggle to find a legal way to implement his most outlandish electoral undertaking: to ban Muslims from entering America. The waggish footnote is that Muslims have been arriving in America from the time of its modern founding by Columbus, and long before Trump’s paternal grandfather went there from Germany in 1885. His newly proposed budget, mercilessly slashing funding for foreign aid and environmental protection agencies, has already been rejected even by Republican Senators – as "dead on arrival." All in all, Trump’s power is not unlimited and its effects will not be permanent.