Opposed to erect Buddha statue at the entry of Batticaloa.

Sunday , 26 May 2013

Permission is granted to erect the Buddha statue at the entry of the high way leading to north of Batticaloa town, and most of the city people has expressed their grief.

Information reveals that the Highways Development Department has sanctioned for the erection of a Buddha statue, to the request made by the Batticaloa town Mangalaramaya Chapter.

Buddha statue kept in the area where Buddhist people are not residing is not in any manner reasonable and the people living in that area mainly to the Hindu community, this activity may hurt their feelings was said by the town people.

A welcome decorative  structure is erected at the curve of the north main entry, and there are no identities focused for any religion, the people pointed out.

Tamil National Alliance district parliament member concerning this issue expressed his objection and oppose after holding discussion concerning this issue.

Parliament member Seenithambi Yogeswaran, has forwarded an urgent letter to Prime Minister T.M.Jayaratne in charge of religious affairs, requesting to stop this venture.

He pointed in his letter that Kothukulam Muthumariamman temple is located in that area and such activities amidst people is an act creating controversies amidst religions communities, was mentioned in his letter.

Buddha statue kept in the area where Buddhist people are not residing is not in any manner reasonable and the people living in that area mainly to the Hindu community, this activity may hurt their feelings was said by the town people.

Sunday , 26 May 2013

JHU wants to mobilize masses

By a Staff Reporter Jathika Hela Urumaya (JHU) Parliamentarian, Athuraliye Rathana Thera said, yesterday the government must be compelled to change its stand on the 13th Amendment to the Constitution through public mobilization. Referring to the announcement made by Cabinet Spokesperson, Minister Anura Priyadarshana Yapa, who confirmed on Wednesday (22) that the government would not be abolishing the 13th Amendment, and the strongly expressed views of the JHU calling for the abolishment of the same, Rathana Thera said, "We must mobilize the public to push the government toward changing their stand on the matter." JHU National Organizer, Nishantha Sri Warnasinghe, responding to the inquiries pertaining to his party's alliance with the government, considering the current differences of opinion regarding the 13th Amendment, said, "What Minister Yapa expressed was the stand of the government. It is our view the amendment should be abolished. This isn't a government-JHU problem." Commenting further on the government's decision to go ahead with the Northern Provincial Council (NPC) Polls in September, he said, "The government so far has not discussed any of these matters with our party." Minister Yapa at the Cabinet briefing pointed out that only the Parliamentary Select Committee (PSC) can take a decision on the 13th Amendment, echoing President Mahinda Rajapaksa's sentiments. Warnasinghe, when asked whether the JHU has planned to discuss the matter at the PSC, said, "Even though a PSC has been appointed, it has never been convened, with the United National Party (UNP) and the Tamil National Alliance (TNA) studiously avoiding it. If it is convened, then the problems of the North can be discussed. The reality is that it is never convened." The National Freedom Front (NFF), headed by Minister Wimal Weerawansa is another government party which has expressed the need to abolish the 13th Amendment. NFF Member Piyasiri Wijenayake told Ceylon Today, "We have no qualms about the NPC polls, as long as the powers granted to Provincial Councils by the 13th Amendment are removed first."

Kuragala Lessons: Fighting With Honour For A Stake In A Layered Heritage

By Darshanie Ratnawalli -May 26, 2013 

Darshanie Ratnawalli

In Archaeology there is a novel concept called “Public Participatory Interactive multi cultural Museum and Site Presentation” applicable to sites with multiple heritages[i]. This involves being inclusive of all available heritage components in presenting the identity of a site[ii].

Kuragala presents the typical layered heritage pattern. Season 1- It is a pre-historic habitat of Homo sapiens balangodensis[iii]. Season 2- In 2/3^rdcentury BC Lanka, adherents of a new religion make it a raging fashion to dedicate caves right and left to the cave dwelling Sangha (inscribing the donor names on the cave wall) and Kuragala does not escape[iv]. Season 3- Kuragala becomes an Islamic shrine and a retreat.

Nowadays, Kuragala is a very useful site. Trying to assess how much its presentation in Media measures up to the multiple stakeholders concept is a sure way to identify the less obvious faces of intolerance and chauvinism. (As we already know the obvious face, the BBS, the flavor of the season in villainy).

I am going to highlight two recent journalistic presentations that attempted through misinformation (which even a routine veracity check could have shown up), to obliterate one heritage component of Kuragala and up the stakes of another. These presentations were by Latheef Farook and Dharisha Bastians.

Let’s compare these with the presentation of Kuragala (in 1932) by Charles Collins, the British Civil Servant and GA for Ratnapura at the time. Collins’ presentation, “The Archaeology of Sabaragamuwa, Bintenna” (Journal R.A.S (Ceylon) Vol. XXXII, No 85 of 1932) is currently available in the RAS library, Sri Lanka. In the public interest, I have uploaded my scanned copy at http://ratnawalli.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/05/The-Archaeology-of-the-Sabaragamuwa-Bintenna..pdf.

Collins’ paper is an attempt to give an account of the antiquities of the Ratnapura District which “is generally considered archeological barren”. “The few early Ruins and Inscriptions which are to be found in the District” are practically “in one small corner”. Traversing this ‘small corner’ to get up close and personal with these ruins and inscriptions takes Collins to seven places (Budu-gala, Kura-gala, Diyainna, Handa-giriya, Kottimbul-wala, Sankha-pala Vihare in Pallebedda and Galpaya).

“Kura-gala, the next place that claims our attention…the interest centres not at the foot of the hills, but high up …The archeological interest is confined to two sets of high and rocky cliffs, with a deep cleft between them. In the first set…there are several caves and two inscriptions. The latter are found on a high rock known as Hituwan-gala. The first record (A) is cut in a single line at the South end of one of the caves in this rock”.

Collins then describes the first record (A). “The inscription is cut in Brahmi characters of about the second century B.C.” This “inscription is worn and very difficult to reach, but from a “squeeze” and an “eye-copy” it appears to be as follows…”

Describing Inscription B, as being “on the same rock as A, but inscribed in two lines, about 30 feet or more above a second cave” and “in an almost inaccessible position” Collins gives us its transcript nevertheless. As per these transcripts, these are records of cave dedications by elite donors.

Return to 2013 and witness the obliterative intent in Latheef Farook’s presentation. He transforms the Buddhist layer of the site into a mere claim by “vested interests”, dating from 1961, for which “no proof can be adduced”. The only evidence that the site was a Buddhist monastery of the 2^nd century BC, Farook informs us confidently, is “a board placed by the Archaeological Department in 1972”. As we struggle between two explanations for Farook; ignorance or deception, we notice another strange thing.

Far from being ignorant of the writings on the Hituwangala rock he is very much aware of them. The following sentence makes this clear; “For example when Mr. Godakumbura was asked to record and decipher the Arabic writings at Dafther Jailany Mosque especially on the Hittuwangala Rock, his answer was that it was of no relevance…”  It is this sentence which ultimately points us away from ignorance and towards deception as the real explanation. Notice the plural ‘Arabic writings’. Also notice the annexation of ‘writings on the Hituwangala Rock’ under ‘Arabic Writings’.

The only writing on the Hituwangala rock as Collins makes clear is in the Brahmi script and by no stretch of the imagination does Brahmi look like Arabic as Collins’ ‘eye copy’ also makes clear[v]. Nor is there a plurality of Arabic writing in Kuragala. There is only one open claim of an Arabic inscription. It’s written on a tombstone allegedly discovered in 1922. (This discovery is unknown to Collins and his local guides). This tombstone is the only Arabic writing Farook’s article mentions upfront. “Among the proofs of Qutub Muhiyuddin’s links with Kuragala was the tombstone discovered in 1922 when excavating to build a mosque about ten feet below a mound of earth with the words stating “Disciple of Mohyiuddin” dated 1322 AD.” It is the photograph of this Arabic writing, which is uploaded and circulated widely as the legitimating evidence. There are no upfront references in Media to Arabic inscriptions on the Hituwangala rock[vi] or any rock in the vicinity (Crucial geology tip- a tombstone is not a rock). Nor photographs. Nor translations.

Instead there are covert acts of annexation and multiplication. Consider the following sentence from Dharisha Bastians’; “Kuragala is home to an ancient Sufi shrine, sacred to Muslims because Arabic rock inscriptions, tombstones and other historical evidence point to a greatly revered Islamic saint having meditated in the rock caves”.

Notice the transmogrification of tombstone into tombstones and Brahmi rock inscriptions into Arabic[vii]. There is a strikingly similar sentence in Farook’s, strongly suggestive of both journalists having dipped into the same source.

“Rock carvings, Arabic inscriptions, writings, tombstones and legends lead us to believe that Qutub Muhyiuddin had spent a part of his meditation at Jailany-Kuragala.”

To be continued.

*The writer can be found at http://ratnawalli.blogspot.co.uk/

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[i] This is how the Jetavana site has been presented to the public. According to Sudarshan Seneviratne; “Though this is primarily a religious site, the rationale of the site presentation is to situate Jetavana within a socio-cultural context representing its international dimension to the visitor as well”. He is all for stressing “the multi religious and multi cultural character of this site”. Because “This site, which is primarily a Mahayana Buddhist site, has yielded several statues of Hindu deities. A Mahayana statue carries a 10^th Century AC Tamil inscription recording an endowment by a mercantile guild in south India. The discovery of West Asian ceramics and large quantities of imported ceramics and raw material for beads only speak of the multi cultural and multi religious character of this site. The 6^th Century AC Nestorian cross (now located at the Anuradhapura archaeological museum) was discovered in the elite Citadel complex adjacent to the Jetavana site.”

[ii] Some others caution against being too heavy handed with the multi-religious -multi cultural approach to the extent of distorting the true ethos of a site. See A look at an Insider’s Challenge to History Brown Sahibs and Cultural definitions by Bandu de Silva. Part I http://www.island.lk/2007/10/10/midweek4.html and Part II http://www.island.lk/2007/10/11/features5.html .

[iii] It appears now that Kuragala is the largest prehistoric settlement ever to be unearthed in Sri Lanka. It’s a success story where a bold decision led unexpectedly to spectacular results. http://www.ceylontoday.lk/59-32242-news-detail-kuragala-back-in-the-limelight.html

[iv] Note that Caves all over Sri Lanka are inscribed in one language(Sinhalese Prakrit) and one script (the variation called Sinhalese Brahmi), even when the donors described are from varying cultural/ethnic contexts. This uniformity across a broad geographic canvass helps to place it within a single genre. For this reason even when the word ‘sangha’ does not occur in the inscription people generally do not make embarrassing gaffes. For example, it would be a rare simpleton who would interpret “The cave of the merchants who are the citizens of Dīghavāpī, of the sons of ….and of the wife Tissā, the Tamil” as a record of a 200 BC X rated cave epic. You don’t have to have the whole nine yards as in “Princess (Abi)Allurādhī, daughter of king Nāga and wife of king Uttiya, and king Uitiya, caused this cave to be established, for the Saṅgha of the four quarters, as comfortable abode of all that are come, and for the welfare and happiness of beings in the boundless universe”. The context identifies the purpose.

[v] The only thing that would exonerate Farook from ‘deception’ is if Arabic writing had appeared on the Hituwangala rock face after 1932 when Collins failed to witness any. But then he would be open to ‘gullibility of the most simpleton kind’. If I were a journalist I would prefer the charge of ‘deception’ to gullibility. I could at least preen myself on being a wily fox.

[vi] There is one though. But I am saving it for next week. Too juicy.

[vii] Again if Arabic witting and a tombstone had materialized after Collins’ visit, this would exonerate Dharisha Bastians from ‘deception’ and transform her merely into a ‘bridge buyer’, but is such deliverance worth it?

DISPUTE OVER LAST RITES OF INDRARATHANA THERA Members of the ‘Sinhala Ravaya’ Buddhist group attempt to storm into the funeral parlour in Borella, where the remains of Ven. Bowatte Indrarathana Thera were placed. Pic by - Sanjeewa Lasantha-May 26, 2013  A conflict of opinion between two Buddhist monk groups resulted in a heated exchange of words near a private funeral parlour in Borella today with the announcement that the remains of Ven. Bowatte Indrarathana Thera, who committed self-immolation, is to be taken to Kahawatta in Ratnapura. Western Province Senior DIG Anura Senanayake had also arrived at the location and attempted to intervene and resolve the situation, which developed at around 10.45 a.m. today. However, he was unsuccessful as the argument between the two groups of Buddhist monks continues to rage on, Ada Derana reporter said. The remains of Indrarathana Thera, who succumbed to injuries at the Colombo National Hospital last night, was taken to the Colombo Medical College for postmortem examination.  It has been reported that certain Buddhist nationalist organizations prefer the last rites of the Thera to be performed in Colombo.  Indrarathana Thera was a resident monk at the Porabe Viharaya in Kahawatta. He doused himself with a flammable liquid and set himself ablaze near the main entrance at the Dalada Maligawa in Kandy on Friday (24) to protest against the slaughter of cattle among other issues. Policemen and devotees near the temple doused the flames and rushed the monk to the Kandy Hospital. He was later airlifted and transferred to the Colombo National Hospital, where he succumbed to injuries last night. Video: At Borella Members of the Sihala Ravaya are seen having a heated argument with the law enforcement authorities in front of the Jayaratne Florists, Borella against sending the body of the monk, Ven. BowatteIndraratna Thera, who died by self-immolation to Ratnapura. Pix by Pradeep Dilrukshana Video: by - Pradeep Dilrukshana and Darshana Sanjeewa

BBS wants Gota to man Buddha Sasana Ministry

The Bodu Bala Sena (BBS) today said the Buddha Sasana Ministry should be brought under the purview of Defence Secretary Gotabaya Rajapaksa to protect Buddhism.

BBS General Secretary Galagoda Aththe Gnanasara thero told a news conference that the Buddha Sasana Ministry was currently performing a poor service in protecting the Buddha Sasanaya and observed that the time had come to take a decision in this regard.

Gnanasara Thera said it could be recommended that the Defence Secretary should be given the responsibility of the Buddha Sasana since he was a person the BBS trusted.

Addressing a joint press conference organised by the BBS and Sihala Rawaya organisation regarding the self-immolation of Bowatte Indrarathana Thera, the BBS General Secretary further said Sinhala Buddhists should awake and be committed to fulfil the aspirations of the Buddhist monk who sacrificed his life for the nation. He further said within a period of one week, the BSS would take a decision regarding the Ministry of Buddha Sasana which is currently performing a poor service to Buddhists and the Buddha Sasanaya.

“We cannot expect an effective service from the Ministry of Buddha Sasana in protecting Buddhism. It has come to the status of a multi-religious Ministry that ignores the real issues of Sinhala Buddhists,” he said.

 Meanwhile, the BBS called upon President Mahinda Rajapaksa to convene a discussion with all Ministers to discuss the issues relating to the Sinhala Buddhists. (Lakmal Sooriyagoda)

State Media Knew Of Monk’s Self-Immolation Plan In Advance And Filmed It – Secretary Media Ministry

May 26, 2013 

The incident of the Buddhist monk Bohowatte Indararatna thero’s self-immolation has sparked a journalistic ethics issue Media Ministry Secretary Charitha Herath told the Sunday Times.

Charitha Herath

According to the Sunday Times, investigations by Media Ministry has revealed that the monk had, before setting himself on fire told the local correspondent of a State media institution of his plans to do so. The correspondent had videoed the entire event. The material had been aired both in State run and private television networks.

“We have to ask the media to draw the line when it comes to such issues. As a result of the correspondent in question keeping the incident a secret until he videoed it, the life of a monk is now in danger,” he told Sundya Times. Media Ministry Secretary said his Ministry was going into the ethical issues in this regard. “We don’t want to be restrictive but the media, both State run and private, must know their limits in cases like this,” he said.

Related stories;

End Cattle Slaughter: Monk Who Set Himself On Fire Passes Away

End Cattle Slaughter: Sri Lanka’s First Attempt At Self-Immolation By A Buddhist Monk

Court orders Kelaniya PS Chairman’s arrest SUNDAY, 26 MAY 2013  Mahara Magistrate Darshika Wimalasiri ordered the Kiribathgoda police to arrest the Chairman of the Kelaniya Pradeshiya Sabha Prasanna Ranaweera and produce him in court, in connection with the alleged assault on the businessman of the area and a supporter of Minister Mervyn Silva. Police investigating the complaint of Kaduruketiya, Kelaniya resident Christie Roy Perera, submitted a report to court. Meanwhile the Pradeshiya Sabha Chairman had made a complaint that Perera assaulted him. The magistrate who considered the police report ordered the arrest of Roy Perera as well. Police told court that an altercation between the two parties, when Perera was erecting a cut-out at Roseville place in praise of a prominent minister’s wife, had resulted in the assault. (Ganidu Rochana Samaratunga)

Monk attempts suicide on Wesak day at Dalada Maligawa entrance emulating Prabhakaran not Lord Buddha

(Lanka-e-News-25.May.2013-11.30PM) An extremist Buddhist monk had attempted to commit suicide in front of the entrance to the Dalada Maligawa , Kandy on the Wesak day (24) , the day considered as most sacred by Buddhists and when religious activities should be engaged in and not in sinister activities like suicide or in the manner villainous Prabhakaran and his clan acted.

The name of this fanatical monk is B .Indraratne , and is from the Ratnapura Kahawatte Viharaya . Fortunately those who were around had succeeded in dousing the fire , and admitting the pro Prabhakaran style suicide attempting monk to the Kandy general hospital . It is very unfortunate that on this sacred day when monks in SL must demonstrate qualities of Lord Buddha they are trying to emulate villain Prabhakaran monk. They must learn to realize that Lord Buddha did not encourage suicide like Prabhakaran. Besides he never said cattle are more important than humans. He had always preached the uniqueness of human life and its supreme value.

While SL currently has become notorious within and without of it for ruthless human slaughter and human rights violations , this extremist monk had tried to commit suicide over the slaughtering of cattle in SL , based on his statement made a few moments prior to his suicide attempt , according to the police .

According to hospital sources , the monk is in a critical condition. As his condition was critical he had been transported by plane to the Colombo general hospital.

Subsequent inquiries have revealed that this monk, Indraratne of Bowatte who engaged in this anti religious act was a JHU member of the Pelmadulla local body ,and his membership was revoked because of his neglect of duties towards the public after being elected as their representative , that is he had been keeping away from attending the local body meetings. The JHU had earlier intimated by letter to the local body chairman that he had been sacked from the party.

later reports says The monk succumbed to his injuries at the National Hospital a short while ago, hospital sources confirmed.

Photo : R.M .R .Ratnayake

EU probes ally of Kosovo PM, ambassador for war crimes

By Fatos Bytyci

PRISTINA | Thu May 23, 2013 

(Reuters) - European Union police said on Thursday they had arrested five people, including a wartime ally of Kosovo’s prime minister, and were investigating the ambassador to Albania on suspicion of war crimes during Kosovo’s 1998-99 conflict.

The EU police and justice mission in Kosovo, EULEX, did not release the names of the five in detention, but a lawyer for Sami Lushtaku, mayor of the town of Skenderaj, said his client was among them and would appear in court on Friday.

Lushtaku has been regarded as close to Prime Minister Hashim Thaci since before the war, which saw NATO intervene with air strikes in 1999 to halt the killing and expulsion of ethnic Albanians by Serbian forces trying to crush an Albanian insurgency.

Lushtaku and Thaci were both senior commanders of the guerrilla Kosovo Liberation Army (KLA) from the hardline Drenica region. Lushtaku is now a member of Thaci’s Democratic Party of Kosovo.

Without giving details, EULEX said in a statement the five had been investigated “for war crimes against the civilian population in the form of violation of bodily integrity and health of civilians held in a KLA detention centre located in Likovc, Skenderaj municipality”.

“One of the individuals is investigated also for war crimes in the form of killing of one civilian,” it said.

The mission is also investigating Kosovo’s ambassador to Albania Sylejman Selimi, a former KLA commander, his lawyer said.

“I was informed that my client is one of the suspects and there are allegations against him that he is involved in a case of keeping civilians in a detention centre in Likovc,” Tome Gashi told Reuters.

Gashi said his client would appear in court on Friday.

Sylejman Selimi was the commander of the Kosovo Security Force (KSF), which is trained by NATO. He left the force in 2011 to become ambassador to Albania.

Kosovo expects to transform the KSF into its own armed forces in the future but no dates have been set. Kosovo has no proper army but some 6,000 troops under NATO command patrol the new country.

The EU mission, established after Kosovo declared independence from Serbia in 2008, handles sensitive war crimes cases, in a country where the former guerrillas are revered as heroes and clan loyalties run deep.

(Reporting by Fatos Bytyci; Editing by Matt Robinson and Andrew Roche)

Two child limit imposed on Myanmar's Rohingya

New measure, which applies to Muslim Rohingya families in western Rakhine state, does not affect Buddhists in the area.

Last Modified: 25 May 2013

Sectarian violence first flared nearly a year ago between the region's Rakhine Buddhists and Muslim Rohingya [EPA]
Authorities in Myanmar's western Rakhine state have imposed a two-child limit for Muslim Rohingya families, a policy that does not apply to Buddhists in the area, and comes amid accusations of ethnic cleansing in the aftermath of sectarian violence.
Local officials said on Saturday that the new measure would be applied to two Rakhine townships that border Bangladesh and have the highest Muslim populations in the state.
The townships, Buthidaung and Maundaw, are about 95 percent Muslim.
The unusual order makes Myanmar perhaps the only country in the world to impose such a restriction on a religious group, and is likely to fuel further criticism that Muslims are being discriminated against in the Buddhist-majority country.
China has a one-child policy, but it is not based on religion and exceptions apply to minority ethnic groups.
India briefly practised forced sterilisation of men in a bid to control the population in the mid-1970s when civil liberties were suspended during a period of emergency rule, but a nationwide outcry quickly shut down the programme.
'Overpopulation causes tension'
Rakhine state spokesman Win Myaing said the new programme was meant to stem rapid population growth in the Muslim community, which a government-appointed commission identified as one of the causes of the sectarian violence.
Although Muslims are the majority in the two townships in which the new policy applies, they account for only about 4 percent of Myanmar's roughly 60 million people.
The measure was enacted a week ago after the commission recommended family planning programs to stem population growth among Muslims, Win Myaing said.
The commission also recommended doubling the number of security forces in the volatile region.
"The population growth of Rohingya Muslims is 10 times higher than that of the Rakhine (Buddhists)," Win Myaing said. "Overpopulation is one of the causes of tension."
Sectarian violence in Myanmar first flared nearly a year ago in Rakhine state between the region's Rakhine Buddhists and Muslim Rohingya.
Mobs of Buddhists armed with machetes razed thousands of Muslim homes, leaving hundreds of people dead and forcing 125,000 to flee, mostly Muslims.
Witnesses and human rights groups said riot police stood by as crowds attacked Muslims and burned their villages.
New York-based Human Rights Watch has accused authorities in Rakhine of fomenting an organised
campaign of "ethnic cleansing" against the Rohingya.

Buddhism never allowed for Buddhist extremists says Rajapaksa


25 May 2013

Pictures Of The Kuragala Islam Holy Site Demolition

The Barbarians Within

Sri Lankan president Mahinda Rajapaksa exalted the values of Buddhist teachings, asserting that Buddhism had never allowed Buddhists to become extremists.

Addressing devotees on Wednesday, Rajapaksa said that the Mahasangha 'should be more concerned and well-informed about a situation being plotted to rouse communal tensions and create a crisis situation among religions and sects of the same religion to breach the religious harmony in the country'.

A government website quoted him as saying:

'It is evident that certain NGOs are drafting agendas to dislodge the place given to Buddhism in the constitution. But the government will never allow these forces to achieve their sinister targets'

'The government has been the protector of Buddhism as per the provisions of the constitution. It should foster and nourish Buddhism and should give the foremost place to Buddhism'

'The ulterior motive of these conspirators is to create a conflict among religions and create divisions among the religious sects as in certain other countries where there are conflicts taking place on the basis of their religions and sects.'

"In the best interest of the media"

Press freedom in Bangladesh-May 25th 2013

THE Indian media is sometimes said to provide the reader with more than 100% of the facts. In neighbouring Bangladesh, readers are used to having to make do with less.

The worry is that things have been getting worse of late. This week Bangladesh’s newspaper editors demanded in joint that the government free Mahmudur Rahman, the editor of the country’s biggest-circulation pro-opposition paper. The government shut down the paper on April 11th and has had him locked up ever since. The minister of information, Hasanul Haq Inu, rebuffed the editors, telling them that their appeal was“not in the best interest of the media”.

The government also rejected the editors’ demand that Amar Desh, Mr Rahman’s paper, be allowed to resume printing and that two Islamic TV stations be allowed back on the air. The television stations were shut down after they broadcast live images of the security forces’ attacks against hardline Islamist demonstrators, which left dozens dead.

The Committee to Protect Journalists says it is deeply concerned by the deteriorating climate for the press in Bangladesh. Human Rights organisations say there is only one place in South Asia that treats the idea of press freedom with lesser regard: Sri Lanka.

To be sure, Bangladesh still has some way to slide before reaching rock-bottom. It has in some respects a thriving media landscape, including an array of popular late-night political talk shows. But if recent months are anything to go by, the government’s selective approach to press freedom will grow only more overbearing.

In April 2013, the authorities appeared to be complying with the demand of a tiny, hardline Islamic fundamentalist group when it had four “atheist bloggers” arrested. The government also vowed to punish those who make derogatory comments against Islam. In the same month the telecoms regulator issued an international tender to procure a technical solution to provide it greater control over the internet (“to keep Bangladesh safe from harmful internet content and material that threaten national unity and solidarity, and are derogatory to religious beliefs, or are obscene”).

Like the rest of the country’s institutions, most of the media are aligned with or the other of Bangladesh’s two squabbling political dynasties. With elections due at the end of the year, the battle lines are hardening.

Mr Rahman is a former businessman and was chairman of the Board of Investment from 2001 to 2006, while the opposition Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP) was in power. His paper was selling like hotcakes; in the months before the government shut it down, the circulation had jumped six-fold, to 200,000 copies daily.

He was detained on charges of sedition, stemming from the publication last December of a series of Skype conversations between the chairman of Bangladesh’s war-crimes tribunal and a Brussels-based lawyer. The conversations showed collusion between government officials, judges, prosecutors and people who had no affiliation to the court. Taken as a whole they raised profound questions about the integrity of the trial. (The presiding judgeresigned as chairman of the tribunal after questions put to him by The Economist and the publication in Bangladesh of various private e-mails.) Mr Rahman says he was tortured in custody, which the government denies.

Politicians close to the ruling Awami League (AL) revile him. Some of them ascribe to him near-supernatural powers of persuasion. They suppose he must have the ability to convince the masses of just about anything—in particular, that the BNP’s most recent government was a relatively clean one. It was a period that many people, and especially those with AL sympathies, associate with robbery on an unrivalled scale. For five years in a row, Bangladesh was left at the very bottom of international corruption league tables.

And then Mr Rahman has been accused of inciting religious hatred, too. His paper reprinted offensive material from the anti-secular blogosphere. His critics say he did so in a bid to label peaceful mass demonstrations, which demanded the death penalty for nearly the entire leadership of the Islamist Jamaat-e-Islami for crimes committed in 1971, as un-Islamic. So he stands accused of having encouraged last month’s “long march” of hundreds of thousands of Islamists from the port city of Chittagong to Dhaka, where they demanded the execution of atheist bloggers, on the ground that they were defaming Islam.

Mr Rahman was arrested a full four months after the main offence for which he was charged. The real reason for his detention might lay elsewhere.

The day before he was picked up Amar Desh had advertised an upcoming series of damning American embassy cables on Sheikh Mujibur Rahman, Bangladesh’s founding president and the father of the current prime minister, Sheikh Hasina. The website of Amar Desh announced the forthcoming series, which was to be translated into Bengali from the WikiLeaks trove, with the headline: “Mujib: The New Mughal”. This was a clear reference to the absolute powers that “Chairman Mujib” assumed upon decreeing one-party rule in February 1975.

Another cable notes that Sheikh Mujib “began to suffer the classic paranoia of the despot”, speaks of his “failure to meet their (the Bengalees’) aspirations” and “his apparent desire to hold power largely for personal aggrandisement and dynastic reasons”.

The content of the cables and the timing of Mr Rahman’s imprisonment makes it seem that the government’s desire to control the media has a lot to do with its imperative to defend its own version of the country’s history. The press would hardly be the first Bangladeshi institution to fall crumble under such pressure.

(Picture credit: Free Mahmudur Rahman)

Guantanamo Bay: Why are so many inmates from Yemen?

By Jasmine Coleman-24 May 2013 

More than half of the detainees at Guantanamo come from Yemen

US President Barack Obama has lifted a moratorium on the transfer of Yemeni prisoners held at Guantanamo Bay as part of a renewed push to close the detention camp.

Nearly 800 detainees have passed through the centre since it was set up under the Bush administration in 2002 to hold "enemy combatants" from the war in Afghanistan - and 166 are still being held there.

More than half of these inmates - 89 men - come from Yemen.

They were largely picked up around in Afghanistan or border areas 11 years ago on suspicion of involvement with al-Qaeda.

But of the 86 men in Guantanamo who have been cleared for transfer or release, 56 are Yemeni. They are no longer considered enemy combatants or a threat to US security.

I think the hunger strike has made the Obama administration move Guantanamo up its priority list”

Martha RaynerClinical Associate Professor of Law, Fordham University

Many of other nationalities - including Europeans, Saudi Arabians and Afghans - have been moved on due to agreements with their home countries. But the Yemenis have been going nowhere.

'Too risky'

"The Europeans went home first, as did others whose home countries did quite a bit of advocacy on their behalf," said Martha Rayner, Clinical Associate Professor of Law at Fordham University in New York, who has represented some of Guantanamo's Yemeni inmates.

"The Yemenis had the misfortune of coming from a country that had had a dictator for many years - Ali Abdullah Saleh - and that didn't do enough to advocate for its nationals.

"So the Yemenis languished, even though many were approved for release by the Bush administration."

In January 2009, President Obama ordered the closure of Guantanamo within a year.

But on Christmas Day of that year, Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab - a Nigerian trained in Yemen - attempted to set off a bomb hidden in his underwear on a Detroit-bound jet.

And the following January, President Obama issued a moratorium against the release of any Yemeni detainees. Combined with restrictions imposed by Congress, it brought releases and transfers to a virtual halt.

"I think it was a practical response," said Ms Rayner.

"It was a year since Obama had come into power and his critics were already galvanising themselves to challenge him on the issue of Guantanamo and connecting it to national security."

Matthew Waxman, professor at Columbia Law School and former Department of Defense adviser on detention issues, sees it as a more international issue.

"During that time, the view was that violent instability in Yemen made returning detainees too risky," he said.

"There was little confidence that the Yemeni government would be able to mitigate any continuing threat that the returned Guantanamo detainees would pose."

President Obama says Yemenis who have been cleared will be transferred "to the greatest extent possible"

Rehabilitation

Al-Qaeda gained territory during the Yemen revolution in 2011, taking control of towns predominantly in the Abyan region in the south west of the country.

Yemen's new President, Abd Rabbuh Mansur Hadi, led a US-backed military offensive against them in the summer of 2012, pushing the insurgents out of Abyan.

But their presence continued - their numbers rose from hundreds estimated in 2009-2010 to several thousands believed to be operating in the country in 2013.

Suicide bombings and assassinations of military and security personnel became common. A growing anti-American sentiment has also been fuelled by a popular Shia Houthi rebellion and hated US military drone strikes.

This instability, combined with a lack of infrastructure and rehabilitation services in Yemen, means that Guantanamo's Yemeni detainees may not be going back just yet.

Former prisoner Said Ali al-Shihri, who was returned to Saudi Arabia, went on to become a leading member of al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP), now seen as the country's greatest threat.

US officials fear other former inmates - radicalised in the detention centre if not before - will go straight to fight for al-Qaeda once released.

Nevertheless, President Obama said on Thursday: "I am lifting the moratorium on detainee transfers to Yemen so we can review them on a case-by-case basis.

"To the greatest extent possible, we will transfer detainees who have been cleared to go to other countries."

President Obama vowed to close Guantanamo Bay in January 2009

Ms Rayner believes the move is connected to a hunger strike, which is being staged by around 100 detainees and has attracted worldwide attention.

"I think the hunger strike has made the Obama administration move Guantanamo up its priority list."

But Wells C Bennett, an expert in national security law at the Brookings Institution, said it was a sign of increased US confidence in the Yemeni government.

"It may mean that the administration is beginning to feel more positively about security," he said.

Analysts agree, however, that a number of hurdles remain, such as strict requirements imposed by Congress that mean that Guantanamo's Yemeni detainees may not be transferred or released imminently.

Much depends on how much energy the Obama administration is willing to expend.

"I am hopeful that a few Yemenis will go home," Ms Rayner said, "but I think it will be a small number."

Posted by Thavam