Once more camouflage to postpone settlement. General Opposition allege the government

Monday , 10 December 2012

Government is triggering camouflage to once again postpone the political settlement for the racial crisis. This is the reason even after the end of war; the Tamil people are labeled with tiger stamp.

 

Through this, the government is journeying towards the black day was the allegations made by the general opposition parties.

 

Meanwhile if government do not renounce the activities against the Chief Justice, this matter would be taken up to the level of international sector, and we would not hesitate to create a dangerous atmosphere through economy embargo against the country was the warnings given by general opposition parties.

 

Opposition parties made this statement at a media briefing held yesterday at the official bungalow of opposition party leader in Colombo.

 

During the media briefing Democracy People Front Deputy Leader Prof.Kumarakuruparan in his statement said, a tension situation is currently in occurrence in the north. Northern youths, Jaffna University students are labeled as tigers and government is continuing in arresting them.

 

Government arrested them because they remembered their demised relations. It is a misconception issue. International countries are observing these activities of the government.

 

By labeling the northern Tamil youths as tigers, government is advancing activities to go backwards towards the political settlement against the Tamil people’s racial crisis. Once again it is directing the country towards a black day.

 

Government is originating a tension situation once again in north by camouflaging that there is an environment getting originated by the surface of tigers.  Prof.Kumarakuruparan questioned whether Tamils in the north does not have the rights to pay their tribute to their demised relations?

 

Chief Justice, who is holding the highest position in the country is placed in an inconvenience position, and if this is the situation to the Chief Justice, everyone will be aware about the plight of the innocent people, was mentioned by him.

 

New Sihala Urumaya Party Leader Sarath Manmendra while speaking at the conference said, citizen who is holding the fourth position is Chief Justice in the country, and government is processing activities against her. If government does not renounce such activities, the above issue would be taken to the attention of United Nation Council, European Union, Geneva Human Rights Commission sessions and we would originate an atmosphere of introducing economy embargo against the country.

 

Nawasamasamajee party member Lanka Beli while stating said, under the terrorism detention law, government is arresting the youths in north.  Parents do not know where the children are detained.

 

Recently Tamil women were enrolled to the military. But they were not issued appointment letters, hence there is no evidence that they are recruited to the military was mentioned by him. 

SLA conscripted Tamil females admitted at Ki'linochchi hospital in mentally affected state

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 12 December 2012, 11:59 GMT]
21 of around 100 Tamil girls, who were conscripted to Sri Lankan military in Vanni, were admitted in Ki’linochchi hospital in a mentally affected state on Tuesday night around 11:00 p.m. by the SL military from Paarathipuram in Ki'linochchi, parents of the victims told TamilNet. In the meantime, TNA parliamentarian Sritharan was at the hospital struggling to get permission to witness the plight of the victims. But, around 30 SL military personnel guarding the hospital were not allowing him to independently witness the state of the victims, the parliamentarian told TamilNet. 

Tension prevails as the kith and kin of the females are not allowed to meet them and journalists and civil activists are kept in the dark. There is widespread fear of sexual exploitation and harassment inflicted on conscripted Tamil girls in the SL military.

For more than 2 weeks parents were not able to get in touch with their daughters and they were in shock to learn that the victims were admitted to the hospital. 

Official explanation from the medical sources at the hospital was that 13 females were admitted in a “possessed” (Peay adiththu channatham aadiya) state. But, parents and relatives of the victims put the number at minimum 21. 

The victims were protesting against forced conscription to military service. During conscription, the families were promised that their daughters would be given office work and parents could visit them every Sunday. But, when the parents visited last Sunday they were not allowed. They may able to visit once a month, that too can’t be guaranteed, the parents were told.

In order to show that Tamils are joining the almost exclusive Sinhala military, announcements were made last month through loudspeakers and village offices that many privileges would be given to girls joining the ‘civil coordination offices’ the SL military would be opening soon in Vanni. The work promised was related to handling computers in the offices. The SL military visited schools in Vanni to hand-pick and coerce brilliant students there. 

Those who were coerced to join, numbering around 140, were kept at an SL military training camp at Krishnapuram that was earlier an academy for disabled fighters (Navam A’rivuk Koodam) in the LTTE times.

The girls who were taken for the SL military soon found out that they were recruited for uniformed service and soon felt coming out. They told this to visiting parents. There were arguments between parents and the SL military last week.

The girls were not allowed to return home even to prepare for the GCE O’Level exams falling this month.

They were not given with any professional military training either. The SL military told them that they would be taken on a ‘tour’ programme soon.

According to an inmate most of the girls were crying to come out, but they were intimidated by the SL military.

Around 10 of the girls had already managed to flee from the occupying SL military.

Around 8 girls were noticed in a mentally affected state last week itself. They were crying incessantly.

The SL military brought an exorcist to the camp to ‘treat’ the girls on Monday. According to sources close to the occupying military, the shaman priest, who conducted special rituals, told the SL military that 14 more would get possessed and one might lose life as spirits are haunting them.

Informed circles told TamilNet that the affected state of mind of the girls was due to sexual harassment inflicted on them in the night times by the occupying Sinhala soldiers. 

Like the colonial Portuguese and the Dutch creating Burghers to have a faithful community for them in the occupied colony, the Sinhala military is trying to create a community for it, social workers in Vanni said. 

Genocide is becoming official while international abettors never see any genocide taking place in the island, they further said.

Complaints increased to 25.

Wednesday , 12 December 2012

Regional Coordinating Officer T.Thanagaraj said, until Tuesday yesterday, 25 complaints had been recorded to the Jaffna Human Rights Commission by the relations regarding the arrest of persons by the Terrorism Investigation unit Jaffna.

 

Until now, more than 45 persons are arrested in the peninsula, and Kilinochchi by the Terrorism Investigation unit which are unconfirmed information which is stated. Some who had been called for inquiries had been later released hence the exact figures of the arrest are unknown.

 

The relations of the arrested persons had made complain to the Sri Lanka Human Rights Commission’s Jaffna Regional Branch. Until Monday, 22 complaints were recorded at the Human Rights Commission.

 

Out of this three complaints are received from Kilinochchi area, and another complaint regarding the Jaffna university student was recorded.

 

In this situation, 3 complaints were recorded by the Human Rights Commission from the Achchuweli area. They were arrested on last Sunday was stated.

Of resistance and loss

INDIA'S NATIONAL MAGAZINE
from the publishers of THE HINDU

K. SATCHIDANANDAN

Sri Lankan Tamil writers tried to capture the trauma of the violence that gripped the country from 1983. The songs of the vanquished show how poetry can be a way of coming to terms with the despair of defeat.

Rudramoorthy Cheran, perhaps the most clairvoyant among the poets of the Eelam movement.---M. VEDHAN 

There can be two opinions about the politics and the tactics of the Eelam movement in Sri Lanka, but there cannot be two about the brutal massacre of Sri Lankan Tamils at Mullivaikkal which was the culmination of a series of smaller, indiscriminate attacks on the Tamils —including women and children—that had gone on for years since the beginning of the movement and had taken a bloodier course from the latter half of 2008 to May 18, 2009, when it was officially announced that the war on Eelam Tamils had finally been concluded.

The atrocities have not gone unrecorded, thanks to the meticulously researched 158-page document produced by the Jaffna-based University Teachers for Human Rights (UTHR) titled, “Let Them Speak: The Truth about Sri Lanka’s Victims of War”, based on eyewitness accounts of the brutalities perpetrated on the entire Tamil population in the localities declared as “war zones”. The report exposes the tactics of the state that always came up with false figures about the victims as well as the refugees in the camps. The figures of death between January and March 2009 vary from 3,000, given by some human rights organisations, to 37,000, ascertained by a lady doctor working with the Health Department of the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE). Even after the massacre, the detainees in the camps were subjected to extreme human rights violations in the name of “investigations”. The case bears many similarities to both the Nazi atrocities in the German concentration camps and the quantitatively smaller yet equally brutal treatment meted out to the refugees in the camps in Gujarat—in the wake of the post-Godhra genocide—to which this writer had been an eyewitness. This included sexual exploitation of women and diverse kinds of torture during the interrogation of “suspects”, who could be any Tamil in the area. Even those in the hospitals were not spared and many young inmates were just taken away, and they “disappeared”, if we can trust the testimony given by some of the doctors at Vavuniya hospital.

Hundreds of people were killed in aerial bombings supposedly meant to clear out the people living in Sampur, a place the Sri Lankan government seems to have tactically chosen to set up a thermal power plant helped by India’s NTPC Ltd. It was declared a High Security Zone, and the evicted people were never allowed to go back. The UTHR report is full of testimonies by eyewitnesses from different localities like Killinochchi, Iranapalai, Anandapuram, Valaignarmadam, Pokkanai, Vattuvakal and Mullivaikkal where women and children—not to speak of men—were subjected to indiscriminate shelling and shooting that maimed them, with no place to go to for treatment of any kind. The stories are really chilling and clearly involved the violation of international war conventions and protocols. Even the unarmed soldiers who carried white flags in a gesture of compromise were shot to death, and people who had taken shelter in the bunkers were buried alive using bulldozers.

The Sri Lankan Tamil writers tried to capture the trauma and anguish of this unimaginable violence in their vibrant poetry that declared like Ceslaw Milosz that “the poet remembers”. Right from 1983, the year of the first major ethnic riots in Sri Lanka, the tone and tenor of the Tamil poetry on the island began to change. Magazines like Alai (Wave) and Serinigar became the platforms of the new literature of resistance. Poets like M.A. Nuhman, Sivasekharan, A. Yesurasa, Rudramoorthy Cheran, V.I.S. Jayapalan, Latha, Ravikumar and Vilvaratnam have been voicing their protest against the atrocities on Tamils from the beginning, though their positions vis-a-vis the movement were at times at odds with one another. Sivaramani, a pioneer of Eelam women’s poetry, committed suicide on May 19, 1991, after burning all the copies she had of her poems to mark her protest against the denial of freedom to her and other writers, but not without making a poetic statement before she took her own life: “ You cannot snatch away/my days from me./ I will continue to exist for sure/ like a little star /descending between your fingers/ that cover your eyes.” If she ended her life, many others simply stopped writing and courted the other form of death: silence.

Caught between extremes

Cheran is perhaps the most articulate and the most clairvoyant among the poets of the Eelam movement. Even an early poem of his like Apocalypse reveals his far-sightedness. (“ In our own time we have seen the Apocalypse….We have all gone away;/ there is no one to tell our story./ Now there is left/ only a great land/ wounded./ No bird may fly over it/ until our return.”) Cheran’s name as a poet has become synonymous with the vicissitudes of the Eelam liberation movement in Sri Lanka though he himself has never been a member of the LTTE nor a votary of violence. He had to leave his country having spoken against the violence of the Sri Lankan army that culminated in the infamous genocide as also against the violence of the Tamil Tigers when it turned against the innocent Sinhalese civilians of Sri Lanka. (I recall how this moral consistency mistaken for political ambivalence was criticised by an angry Indian Tamil after a reading of his poems at Thiruvananthapuram—where I read my Malayalam versions of his poems.) Caught between the two extremes—that remind us of the state of the people in our own Kashmir or Manipur—he was forced to move out to Canada, where he is presently teaching at the University of Windsor. In between, he survived a helicopter crash and a tsunami, both of which gave him poems, testifying to James Joyce’s belief that writers yield their best in times of crisis: “Squeeze us, we are olives.”

Cheran’s poetry—a selection of which, A Second Sunrise—is available in English ably translated by Lakshmi Holmstrom and Sascha Ebeling (Navayana, Delhi, 2012)—grew with the conflicts in Sri Lanka, which were not necessarily always ethnic; they had to do as much with economic inequalities, cultural identities, different ideas about the nation, questions of class and caste and region. Cheran’s poems and plays tried to address all these dimensions. The disturbances had begun far back, with the ethnic conflict in 1958; the brutally suppressed insurgency of the People’s Liberation Front (JVP) in 1971; and the burning of the Jaffna Public Library by the police in 1981: all these helped shape the aesthetics of Cheran’s poetry. Having matured in the 70s and the 80s of the last century in Sri Lankan history, his consciousness, imagination and idiom came to be moulded to a great extent by politics and violence, though his style did undergo changes, especially after the genocide when he found he could no more employ his old forms for the new poetry of the vanquished, the poetry of erasure rather than of witnessing. Cheran had been influenced in his early poetry by his father, “Mahakavi”, known for creating a people’s idiom that had some elements of the tradition as different from the esoteric modern Indian Tamil poetry. Marxism was another early influence.

It is difficult to categorise Cheran’s poetry as “revolutionary”, “modern” or “postmodern”; it is deeply human, direct and moving without being sentimental; it is political without being loud and hoarse. The poet is not dogmatic, making his range wide, his idiom flexible. His approach to issues and events too is open and uninhibited. The trauma of loss, exile and defeat has not turned his poetry cynical; it has retained to this day its tenderness and concern for the suffering. Cheran uses everyday language, his rhythms coming from the spoken idiom. Lyricism and irony have been his hallmarks.

 
 V.I.S. Jayapalan, one of the poets who voiced their protest against the violence on Tamils from the beginning.

R. RAVINDRAN

The sea is a major presence in Cheran’s poetry; he says the sea that surrounded his native village defined his imagination when he was growing up. His first poem was titled “The Sea” ( Kadal), and one of his latest collections carries the name “To the Sea Again” ( Meendum kadalukku). The sea symbolises vastness and security while it can also turn into their opposites: isolation and vulnerability. Water is the primary element here: his poems abound in references to wells, ponds, rivers, rain and tears. His images are mostly taken from nature, a quality he must have inherited from the tradition of ancient Tamil poetry. The heron practising austerities, the flowering ironwood, water lilies and jasmine vines, coconut fronds swaying in the wind, the many blues of the Lankan sky, the fire breaking out in the bamboo grove, the deep-rooted forest trees: simple things assume symbolic significance in his poetry.

The poet chronicles the terror and violence in Sri Lankan life in sober, matter-of-fact tones. An example: “ A body by the sea,/ head split open./ In the straight glance of the eyes/ that refuse to close even in death/ there float: resistance, surprise,/ distress, struggle, agony, despair/ and an endless dream” (“Body”). He sees the bridge burdened by a thousand tales collapse within a single tear (“Chemmani”). A coffin moves by itself to the cremation ground, followed by a multitude of legs without faces or bodies (“The Trace of a Dream”). Looking at the face of a hoarse-voiced Tamil migrant girl in a street demonstration, he comments: “ The trail of tears has erased/ her countenance, but I see/ her other faces unfolding” (“Generations”). He advises a mother whose husband was shot dead the moment their baby had been handed over to her, spilling blood on her taali lying in the dust: “ Tell him the story of the spreading blood/ tell him to wage war/ to end these cruelties (“Amma, Don’t Weep”). A torn American flag flutters above a sleeping god (“Journey to a Volcano”). He can be epigrammatic at times : “ The sea is without water/ Tamil is without land/ Kinship is without name” (Untitled). “She heads for the shore; I am still amidst the waves” (“The Seashore: Three Notes”). His final advice is: “Fling away the footprints, the voice./ Only sow words.”

Another poet, Jayapalan, sums up the experience of the struggle in a long poem like “The Song of the Defeated”. The songs of the victors after the “battle” seem to spit on the face of the vanquished; but “like the shoots of grass/ growing from the ashes/ of burnt pastures, we too/ have our songs”. (This and the following translations are from Waking is Another Dream, Poems on the Genocide in Eelam, translated by Meena Kandaswamy and Ravishankar, with inputs from Sascha Ebeling, edited by Ravikumar and published by Navayana, Delhi, 2010.) Injustice, he says, is a pestilence and having robbed the Tamils of whatever they had and eaten them, now they will start eating one another. “The anger of our raped women/ will be reborn as fiery goddesses.” The forest is charred, but the roots remain: “Our songs will continue/ As a dirge for the dead/ A call for the lost/ A reclaiming of home.” The Tamils are the lost children of The Pied Piper of Hamelin and the Lilliputians in Gulliver’s Travels: they will again rise to conquer. “Let justice descend like the fire of apocalypse.” He calls himself “yesterday’s poet singing of today” and asks the poets of tomorrow whether they will yield to despondency or continue to dream of liberation. He assures the motherland, the “imprisoned mother”, that they are not running away: “hall always be the magic lamps in your hand”. Yesurasa finds his dreams full of the smoke from cluster bombs, artillery missiles and Kfir jets. His bitterness born of impotent rage however soon gives way to a feeble smile (“Face”). He wants the present situation to be reversed: “You submit first. I will, then.”

Latha in her untitled long poem recollects the struggle sunk in the past like mapping a lost country. Suddenly, the land had turned alien, every landmark gone. Even the ancient wind, drained of its hues, speaks a new language: “ The uniformed guide/ standing on the first step/ delves deep into the month of May/ and rambles on about/ artillery guns and landmines/ hand-grenades rifles/ blood tears fear./ As it comes to a grinding halt,/ he speaks of the time when/ Tamil Eelam Welcomed You/ here. Face flushed by the harsh sun;/ I shade it with a scarf/ The check-post lies worn out./ Tamil lies under Sinhala/ all along the way.” She finds her unrelenting vengeance buried in the silence of the Buddha raging in the karthikai flower adorning his hair. Even the headless palm trees that showed the way are gone. “ The hero stones have been bundled away for interrogation.” Houses have been blown to bits “in weird shapes like an art fair”. People have learnt to pose for long clutching the barbed wire without getting pricked. “ The swords of the victors and/ the eyes of the vanquished have been buried.” They say all are back to normal, “ Yet/ when I say/ that Eelam is where I was born/ they growl more than ever.” In another poem (“Kurukshetra”), Latha compares the deserted battlefield to Kurukshetra: Karna and his soldiers are languishing in prison, and the gods, having listened to the Gita, have begun to raid the villages. In “Celebrating Remembrance”, she shows how the end of a race is celebrated with speeches, photos, conferences, essays, fables, poems, music and web links. “ The only bit of worry is/ whether the barbed wire fence/ will be wrenched out.” She can look at the whole episode in ironic detachment: “ You became wrathful/ and set fire to my house./ Fine./ I am sending you my sparrow/ untouched by the fire till now./ May your cell/ be suffused with light.” Time does not heal, and no one can stop the dead coming alive in one’s dreams (“Forgetting Death”).

Ravikumar’s untitled long poem is like an ironic stocktaking of all that had happened during those turbulent years. With a heart heavy with guilt, the poet speaks for all those who were indifferent to what was happening. They were dining and smoking and drinking in the safety of their homes or were eager to see their faces on the TV screen when the war raged outside. It was just hearsay. “ When the child/ with bandages/ in place of hands,/ looks at us with smiling eyes,/ why do we turn our faces away?” he poignantly asks. There are no diaries; poets and artists have failed to record the misery; the dead in the mortuary have a grinding stone in place of the heart; the man without legs, the woman with cotton wool for eyes and the old man with ripped cheek are silent. “ I have become a cannibal./ There is no scarcity where I live/ But I am now used to eating people…. The home sparkles/ When the floors are washed/ With blood./ It is even better if it is/ The blood of children.” The end of the poem is also intensely ironic: “ Chant the names of God/ So that those howls escape your ears./ It is even good for them/ To listen to the name of God/ At the time of their death.” These songs of the vanquished, full of irony and anguish, demonstrate how poetry can be a way of coming to terms with the disgrace and despair of defeat.

E-mail: satchida@gmail.com

Grenade attack targets TNA's youth politician from Jaffna islet

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 11 December 2012, 22:13 GMT]
A motorbike squad, allegedly operated by the SL military intelligence, on Monday, lobbed a grenade on the house of Tamil National Alliance (TNA) youth wing coordinator of Jaffna islets Mr Nishanthan. The attack took place around 9:00 p.m. targeting Nishanthan's house situated on Vyman Road, near Nalloor Kanthasaami temple in Jaffna. The attack on Nishanthan comes after the occupying SL navy entered the house of TNA politician Anaimukan, accusing him for tolling bells on the Heroes Day coinciding with the Kaarthikai festival in the temples of Kaarainakar. 

The youth politician said that he narrowly escaped the attack, as the grenade had hit a tree and exploded outside the house. 

Nishanthan had earlier defected the EDPD after exposing fraud in the administration of the EPDP controlled municipal council of Jaffna where he had been an elected member. 

Opposing the EPDP, the young politician from Veala'nai islet worked briefly with the SLFP's Ankajan group and later started to work with the TNA, taking a lead role in mobilising the youth of the islets sector. Nishanthan is now the coordinator of the youth wing of the TNA in the islets off the Jaffna peninsula.

The EPDP, which is controlling the islets with an iron fist, has a grudge on him. One of his associates has reportedly gone missing recently.

Legendary Sitarist, Composer Ravi Shankar Dead At 92

December 12, 2012 

Sitarist and composer Ravi Shankar, who helped introduce the sitar to the Western world through his collaborations with The Beatles, died in Southern California on Tuesday, his family said. He was 92.

Read more

DOCUMENT - SRI LANKA: FURTHER INFORMATION: CRACKDOWN ON STUDENTS SPREADS FURTHER

PLEASE SEND APPEALS BEFORE 22 JANUARY 2013 TO:

Further information on UA: 347/12 Index: ASA 37/015/2012 Sri Lanka Date: 11 December 2012 Date: 14 January 2011

URGENT ACTION

CRACKDOWN ON STUDENTS SPREADS FURTHER

One student is believed to have been released on bail, but many more have been arrested. Several are held incommunicado, putting them at much greater risk of torture.

One of the four detained students, Kaneshamurthy Sudarsan, has been released on bail, according to local press. P. Tharshananth, Sanmugam Solaman and K.Jenemajeyamenan are still in Terrorist Investigation Division (TID) custody. They are not known to have been produced before either the Vavuniya or Jaffna Magistrate and their families have been given no written notification of their detention or the charges against them. Officials at the TID Office in Vavuniya refused to allow Sanmugam Solaman's parents to visit him, and told them that the students had been transferred to a “Rehabilitation” centre in Welikanda, a long way from Jaffna.

Local press quoted police as saying the students had been arrested in connection with their alleged involvement in a petrol bomb attack on the office of a local political organisation, as well as their involvement in organising demonstrations. However, faculty members with the Jaffna University Science Teachers’ Association said in a letter to President Mahinda Rajapaksa on 7 December that the petrol bomb was only a pretext to detain and harass student leaders and that the students “had nothing to do with bomb throwing.” They expressed opposition to the use of the Prevention of Terrorism Act against non-violent political activities and opinion.

On the morning of 6 December, a man claiming to be with the TID presented the University of Jaffna administration with a list of 10 students the university should hand over to the Jaffna Police Station, without giving any reason. The Dean of the medical faculty handed over five students to the authorities that day. A sixth student from the Management Faculty was handed over by his father; all six were interrogated, and released on 10 December. Three others surrendered to the Human Rights Commission on 7 December and later to the TID were also interrogated for several days and released. Student Union President V. Bhavananadan surrendered to the Human Rights Commission in Jaffna on 7 December and later turned himself in to the TID. His whereabouts are unknown.

Please write immediately in English or your own language:

Calling on the authorities to release the students or charge them with a recognizably criminal offence and to try them promptly in accordance with internationally recognized safeguards;

Urging them to ensure that the detainees are treated in accordance with international standards, especially that they are not tortured and are given full access to their lawyers, families and any medical attention they may require;

Calling on them to end restrictions on freedom of expression, association and peaceful assembly, including religious gatherings and other commemorative activities, and bring to justice those who attack such gatherings.

PLEASE SEND APPEALS BEFORE 22 JANUARY 2013 TO:

�

Inspector General of Police

N K Illangakoon

New Secretariat, Colombo 1

Sri Lanka

Fax: +94 11 244 0440

Email: igp@police.lk

Salutation: Dear Inspector General

Defence Secretary

Gotabhaya Rajapaksa

Ministry Of Defence and Urban

Development

15/5, Baladaksha Mawatha,

Colombo 03, Sri Lanka

Fax: +94 11 254 1529      

Email: secdef@sltnet.lk

Salutation: Dear Defence Secretary

And copies to:

Secretary, Sri Lanka Human Rights Commission

No. 108 Barnes Place, Colombo 07,

Sri Lanka

Fax: +94 11 268 9558

Email: sechrc@sltnet.lk

�

Also send copies to diplomatic representatives accredited to your country.

Please check with your section office if sending appeals after the above date. This is the first update of UA 347/12. Further information: http://amnesty.org/en/library/info/ASA37/014/2012/en

URGENT ACTION

CRACKDOWN ON STUDENTS SPREADS FURTHER

ADDITIONAL INFORMATION

The arrests came after several days of student protests following efforts by the security forces to suppress peaceful commemorations of Maaveerar Naal (Heroes Day), a day of remembrance established by the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE). On 27 November security forces broke up a lamp lighting ceremony at the women’s hostel at Jaffna University, reportedly breaking lamps, threatening students and pointing weapons at them. The following day students responded with a silent protest and short march and held placards denouncing the restrictions on freedom of expression. At least 20 undergraduates were injured and beaten by riot police and officers in civilian dress, including Sanmugam Solaman. Security forces allege that the students had thrown stones at them, prompting them to react; university staff told local media that the event was peaceful until the authorities attacked the marchers.

There have been a series of previous violent attacks on student activists in Jaffna, as well as efforts to prevent students from organizing. In October 2011 Subramaniam Thavapalasingham, President of the Jaffna University Students’ Union was attacked by unidentified assailants wielding iron bars who accused him of supporting Tamil separatism; he blamed Sri Lankan military intelligence for the attack. In May 2012, P. Tharshananth was attacked in a similar way and was very badly beaten shortly before he was to address a remembrance event commemorating victims of the armed conflict that ended three years earlier.

Since the armed conflict between the Sri Lankan armed forces and the LTTE ended in May 2009, the Sri Lankan authorities have placed tight restrictions on events and religious observances held to commemorate and mourn war victims, particularly those held around 27 November, the LTTE’s ‘Heroes Day’ which had been established to commemorate cadres killed during Sri Lanka’s armed conflict and which falls on the day after late LTTE leader Velupillai Prabhakaran’s birthday. 27 November 2012 also coincided with the Hindu festival Karthikai Deepam, which involves the lighting of oil lamps, and the army reportedly prevented many Jaffna residents from lighting lamps to celebrate the festival.

P. Tharshananth is Secretary of the Jaffna University Students' Union; Sanmugam Solaman is a Science Faculty Student Union member; Kanesamoorthy Sutharsan is a medical student, and K. Jenemajeyamenan is President of the Arts Faculty Student Union; and V. Bhavananadan is Jaffna University Student Union President.

Names: P. Tharshananth; Sanmugam Solaman; Kanesamoorthy Sutharsan; K. Jenemajeyamenan; V. Bhavananadan.

Gender m/f: m

Further information on UA: 347/12 Index: ASA 37/015/2012 Issue Date: 11 December 2012

It’s An Evil World And We Need Strict Rules!

By Uvindu Kurukulasuriya -December 12, 2012

Uvindu Kurukulasuriya

Have you ever been subjected to ‘stop and search’ by the British police? Here is a conversation which took place in a ‘police stop and search’ exercise.

How are you sir?

I’m fine, thanks and how are you?

We are good, where are you from sir?

I’m from Wood Green.

What are you doing here, sir?

I’m just visiting.

Any identification sir?

(Checking the identification)

Don’t lie sir, you are from Sri Lanka.

I’m not lying. Yes, I was born in Sri Lanka, but I live in Wood Green. I’m visiting  Hammersmith.

How did you come to this country? By plane? Lorry? Ship? Train? By boat or swimming?

This is the conversation two police officers had with me in front of Hammersmith Broadway underground. I was waiting for a friend in front of the Broadway underground. Two white police officers approached me and checked my identity with the above conversation. After the conversation or the so-called search was completed, they gave me a receipt with all my biological details. Interestingly, there is reason for checking. It says “Gentleman was standing outside Broadway underground; welfare-check conducted”.  Is it a reason for a police check? Is standing in front of a railway station a crime?

Section 60 of the 1994 Public Order Act was originally brought in to tackle people going to illegal raves. It gave police the power, if they feared violence or disorder, to stop and search suspects at a specific time and place. Stops carried out under Section 44 of the Terrorism Act 2000 have already been dropped after the European court of human rights struck them down.

On and off, I have been living in London for nearly 6 years, though that was the only time I was subjected to a police stop and search operation. I’m still angry over this incident. Look at the questions they asked. This is clearly racism. The police treated me in a humiliating and degrading way when I was searched. The police verbally insulted me. I wonder what it’d be like if it happened every day? This story is an example of the xenophobic attitude of elements of the British police towards immigrants, refugees and asylum seekers. It is racial profiling. It’s as fundamental as that. It is based on sight, suspicion and fear. It’s a systematic pattern. I have seen this in Sri Lanka against ethnic minorities.

A couple of months after I was harassed by the police, in March 2010, the Equality and Human Rights Commission (EHRC) released its report on the police stop and search operation with shocking data. It starts as:  “if you are a black person, you are at least six times as likely to be stopped and searched by the police in England and Wales as a white person. If you are Asian, you are around twice as likely to be stopped and searched as a white person.”

The report found a rise in the percentage of ethnic minorities among those stopped under Section 60 between 2008 and 2011, from 51 to 64%. The EHRC said that through Section 60 alone, ethnic minorities underwent more than 100,000 excessive searches over the 2008-2011 period. Simon Woolley, a Commissioner at the EHRC, said; “Our research shows black youths are still being disproportionately targeted, and without a clear explanation as to why, many in the community will see this as racial profiling.”

In June 2010, in another report, the justice ministry’s publication Race and the Criminal Justice says; “the number of black and Asian people stopped and searched by the police has increased by more than 70% over the past five years”

Various explanations have been put forward as to why the police use the stop and search powers so disproportionately against certain groups. Even taken together, however, they provide no justification for the extent and persistence of the problem, the report said.

The Commission questioned one common explanation, that is; black people are generally more often involved in crime is not supported by robust evidence. In any case, stops and searches should be carried out on the basis of ‘reasonable suspicion’. It is unlawful for the police to base their suspicions on generalised beliefs about particular groups.

In its recommendation the EHRC says; “For those forces who have demonstrated the most significant and persistent disproportionalities and excesses, we intend to take more immediate action. Following publication, we will be contacting several forces who have demonstrated the most significant and persistent disproportionalities and excesses, with a view to taking enforcement action under the Race Equality Duty, if necessary.”

The EHRC report concludes: “The evidence points to racial discrimination being a significant reason why black and Asian people are more likely to be stopped and searched than white people. It implies that stop and search powers are being used in a discriminatory and unlawful way.” It finds little merit in arguments advanced to justify excessive use of stop- and search operations against ethnic minority Britons and questions how frequently some forces use the power.

Despite years of debate and several initiatives aimed at tackling the problem, these ratios have stayed stubbornly high. Why is that?

The role of the media is crucial to the further strengthening of an anti-racist society in UK, where cultural diversity is valued and respected. As a journalist I would like to examine briefly the role of the media and its contributions to establish the stereotype -Immigrants/Refugees/Asylum seekers/Blacks/Asians/non-whites are criminals.

The wars around the world have created a wave of refugees. Some have crossed the borders and live in terrible conditions in other countries, others are internally displaced persons who simply no longer have homes and no independent lives of their own. In many places, long-time residents who are themselves struggling to adjust to life under often harsh conditions have not welcomed their presence. Politicians often seek to bolster their popularity by promoting resentment against them among the local population (Media Diversity Institute 2002). Politicians’ remarks on asylum seekers and immigrants are both selective and power-serving. While the actual demographic and economic effects of immigration on the UK are rarely discussed, the causes of immigration – global inequality, conflict and human rights abuses – are ignored. Irrespective of party, leading politicians repeatedly highlight issues of exclusion – fears of ‘invasion’, alleged ‘threats’ and actual prejudices – ensuring a very negative image of immigrants. Concerns over crime, disease, terrorism, detention and surveillance are consistently pushed well to the fore. This lack of balance can be attributed to a number of factors, including the existence of a covert racist ideology and the political expediency of ‘the race card’ – factors that repeatedly compromise the welfare of refugees and immigrants. Honest consideration of asylum and immigration issues should involve a far more diverse range of topics, reflecting the complexity of contemporary national and global relations. These include issues of nationalism, sovereignty, racism, demography, human rights, arms sales, war, refugee health, economic policy and moral responsibility. But does this happen?

We all know the case of the Rochdale sex crime gang. , The gang was a group of men who preyed on under-age teenage girls in Rochdale, Greater Manchester, England. They were convicted of sex trafficking on 8 May 2012; other offences included rape, trafficking girls for sex and conspiracy to engage in sexual activity with a child.  47 girls were identified as victims of child sexual exploitation during the police investigation. The men were all British Pakistanis (except for one from Afghanistan, an asylum seeker) and the girls were white; this has led to national discussion of whether the crimes were racially motivated, or, conversely, whether the early failure to investigate them was linked to the authorities’ fear of being accused of racism (Wikipedia). Almost all mainstream media covered the story and debated on white victims – non-white criminals issue. Now even the Rochdale sex crime gang has a Wikipedia page!

Two months later in Derby, England on 13 July 2012, eight men were convicted of plying “vulnerable” teenage girls with alcohol, drugs and gifts before paying them for sex. Fifteen girls aged 13 to 15, many of them in care, were preyed on by the men. And though they were not working as a gang, their methods were similar to those of the Rochdale sex crime gang  – often targeting children in care and luring them with, among other things, cuddly toys. In this case, of the eight predators, seven were white, not Asian. And the story made barely a ripple in the national media. Of the daily papers, only The Guardian and The Times reported it. There was no commentary anywhere on how these crimes throw a light on British culture, or how middle-aged white men have to confront the deep flaws in their religious and ethnic identity. ( Guardian July 23, 2012)Yet that’s exactly what was played out following the conviction in May of the “Asian sex gang” in Rochdale, which made the front page of every national newspaper. Though analysis of the case focused on how big a factor was race, religion and culture, the unreported story is of how politicians and the media have created a new racial scapegoat. In fact, if anyone wants to study how racism begins, and creeps into the consciousness of an entire nation, they need look no further.

One story is reported and the other is not. Is it the media’s job to take sides? Or to take on a tone of outrage and offence then encourage its readers, listeners and viewers to join in an orchestrated campaign of hate against non-white people? The media is one of the many agencies for policing organisational life, although with a much wider mandate and field than most other agencies. When such an agency works unprofessionally and establishes stereotypes such as ‘Asian criminals’, there’s a moral message for the nation to take on board: “It’s an evil world and we need strict rules”.

When the law requires reasonable suspicion of involvement in crime, black and Asian people are more likely to be stopped and searched than white people. So, the police are checking the ‘evils’!

*Uvindu Kurukulasuriya is a Sri Lankan journalist living in exile. He is also a visiting fellow at the London School of Economics and Political Science and an academic consultant to the Silent University. This essay, which was first published by the Tate, was based on a lecture given by him at Tate Modern in December 2012.

Top misled EU to err on Tamils: Srinivasan tells Oslo Club session on Nobel peace award

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 11 December 2012, 18:31 GMT]
The European Union listening to wrong advice from the top and proscribing the Tamil movement was a serious mistake that disrupted peace, said Srinivasa Rao Thangavelu, a grassroot peace ambassador touring world, speaking at a brief session held at Café Nobel in Hotel Opera, by Oslo International Club together with Brussels Alumni, right before the torchlight march honouring Nobel Peace Prize award on Monday. The session was on “Creating lasting peace: top-down and bottom-up.” This time’s Nobel Peace Prize was awarded to European Union. According to EU Commission President, the EU brings lasting peace among former enemies who fought, among others, two world wars. Usually Norwegians conduct a torchlight parade to honour the Peace Prize winners. But this time there were two: one on Sunday opposing the award going to the EU and the other on Monday honouring the EU. 

Speaking at the Oslo International Club meet, Mr Srinivasan said that the EU decision misled from the top to proscribe the Tamil movement was taken at restaurant discussions outside the EU offices, despite repeated requests by the Nordic peace monitors, not to disrupt the peace mission.

The Eezham Tamils living in Europe, living in Norway, are disappointed with their governments and the supranational entities like the EU and the UN, Srinivasan said.

He also criticised the Norway government and the then minister facilitating peace for their failures on Tamils, but said that there are experts in Norway who stand on moral high ground.

“I was watching ‘One on One’ television discussion show by Riz Khan on Al Jazeera a few months ago. Kahn was interviewing a great academic and activist, Johan Galtung, who is described as the father of peace studies. He is a Norwegian. Khan was asking, what Dr Galtung regretted the most in the field of peace making and his first response was the case of Tamils of the island in Sri Lanka,” Srinivasan cited. 

During the session, Dr Gerhard Sabathil, who has been the Ambassador of the European Commission for Norway and Iceland since 2000 and a former director of Foreign Policy Strategy and Coordination of the European Commission in Brussels, Mr Eivinn Berg, former Norwegian Ambassador to EU and Ms Isabelle Benoliel, the president of Association Jean Monnet and a former director in the European Commission, talked on “Top-down: Peace in our time: The EU as a worthy recipient of the Nobel peace prize.” 

Srinivasa Rao Thangavelu [left] and Gnansekaran Rajasekaran

Srinivasan, who as a grassroot ambassador carried the message of nuclear disarmament, world peace and protection of environment to 120 countries, three UN Secretary Generals and other world leaders, spoke on the side of “Bottom-up” at the session. Mr. R. Gnanasekaran, who is on the mission with Mr Srinivasan for the past 26-years, was also present at the session.

Saying that this was their 8th touring mission, Srinivasan told the audience that during their recent travels and staying with Eezham Tamils, they were able to witness the sufferings of a people affected by genocide in their homeland.

Eivin Berg, former Norway Ambassador to EU [Right] together with Srinivasan and Gnanasekaran and Jørn Lein Mathisen, who chaired the session, jointly organised by OIC and Brussels Alumni

Later, speaking to TamilNet and elucidating on his views, Srinivasan said that geopolitical interests of powers cannot be allowed to result in the genocide of the people of a nation and that’s why they had taken up the question for their mission in their recent travels.

All the Establishments of the world provided direct and indirect support to the regime in Sri Lanka to accomplish the first genocide of this century, Srinivasan said, citing the contrasts as well as invariability of powers: Pakistan and India, Israel and Iran, China and the USA, Britain as well as Russia. 

In the 21st century, if this can happen for geopolitics and end up in genocide, then it is the prime question to be taken up on world peace, Srinivasan said.

He recollected his experience of witnessing the International Community of Establishments being at war with the People in Africa, West Asia and elsewhere. 

There is also a tendency to imagine ‘peace’ through military action, he said.

“During our interactions we find more and more Eezham Tamils in the diaspora feeling that their struggle for justice is not merely with the Sinhala Nation, but increasingly with the International Community of Establishments,” Srinivasan said.

Leaders at the top must act with statesmanship and the EU deserves the award only when it admits the failures and course-corrects itself essentially to provide justice to the victims. Not delivering justice, but saying that learning lessons here will help future cases, will not make anyone as peacemakers, Srinivasan further said.

* * * On Sunday, hundreds of protestors were seen marching in Oslo against Nobel Peace Prize going to the European Union.

Peace and human rights campaigners as well as members of political groups, including Norway’s Socialist Left Party in the government, were among the protestors.

The torchlight protestors marched past the hotel where the Nobel Peace Prize recipients were staying.

According to the protestors, EU is undemocratic, one of the biggest weapon producers of the world and maintains a large military even when its people economically suffer.

Past prize winners, Desmond Tutu, Adolfo Perez Esquivel and Mairead Maguire have also said the EU does not deserve the award and that it contradicts the values associated with the prize because it relies on military force to ensure security, reported MailOnline.

However, the focal argument – EU’s bandwagon participation in the ‘clash of civilization’ war with the Islamic World– was largely missing in the Western media that is usually obsessed only with the Islamic World in perceiving war or peace on entire humanity.

The torchlight protest was a democratic occasion for Eezham Tamils in Norway to register their protest with international attention against the EU that is still at war with the liberation polity of genocide-affected Eezham Tamils. But the political creativity of effectively using the opportunity was missing in the Orientalism-influenced mindset of never questioning imperialism, but meekly looking upon it for solutions, commented a diaspora member of another nation without state, who is researching on the comparative capacity of elite among the various diaspora in Norway.

Sri Lankan Parables: 3. The Greatest Product Of Our Own Political Laboratory

By Basil Fernando -December 12, 2012 

Basil Fernando

Mr. Thinking Citizen asked the ruler, “Why don’t you make a law against forced disappearances? It is such a terrible and ugly thing.”

The ruler replied, “You Mr. Thinking Citizen, you make me laugh. You cannot understand what a great political laboratory our Sri Lanka has been and you try to undermine the greatest achievement that has come out of that laboratory?”

Mr. Thinking Citizen asked, “What is that achievement?”

The ruler replied, “It’s our own utopia. Not the one you are educated about. In your utopia, reason is the king or queen. But what we have demonstrated to world is that there is a better way to rule. When every mother or father knows in their hearts that their child is not immune to be counted among the disappeared, we have the key to control the young. When we control the young, we can rule forever. See how we control insurgencies since 1972. Who else has been so successful? We have a lesson for the whole world.”

“What is that lesson?” asked Mr. Thinking Citizen.

“It is that the body is all that there is. No soul, no sprit. See this UN and other pundits come and demand inquiries, prosecutions. When there is nothing to found by way of exhumation, what comes of their demands?” The ruler laughed. “There are no souls to come and tell tales. Only the body tells tales. That is the lesson, you fool, that we have found from the experiments in our own laboratory. Fellows like you do not know how to be proud of our own great achievements.”

Pointing his finger at Mr. Thinking Citizen, the ruler said, “I want to be alive so that I can illustrate the contrast between your utopia and mine. So few of you are around. Others have been  dispatched or fled to other worlds… Do not worry, I will let you live, so long as I need you… But don’t take too much liberty, my guarantees are conditional.”

Two previous parables can be found here