Syria deaths near 100,000, says UN – and 6,000 are children

UN human rights office says it has confirmed the deaths of 92,901 people between March 2011 and end of April 2013

Ian Black, Middle East editor-Thursday 13 June 2013 

A Free Syrian Army fighter works on the grave of a fallen colleague in Deir al-Zor. Photograph: Reuters

Syria's conflict has now claimed nearly 93,000 lives, the UN human rights commission has said, but it warned that the true death toll after 27 months of violence was likely to be higher.

Amid warnings of a new government offensive against rebels in parts of Aleppo, the UN said the figure of 92,901 was reached at the end of April, with an average of over 5,000 people being killed every month since July last year. More killings, however, may be undocumented.

The UN statistics also showed that at least 6,561 minors were among the dead, prompting calls for urgent humanitarian access to prevent further "appalling abuses". Of those, 1,729 were reported to be under the age of 10. The figures were "heartbreaking", said Unicef UK, warning of a "lost generation" in Syria.

"This extremely high rate of killings, month after month, reflects the drastically deteriorating pattern of the conflict over the past year," Navi Pillay, the UN's high commissioner for human rights, said in a statement.

The latest statistics are published against a background of international efforts to convene peace talks between Bashar al-Assad's government and rebels seeking to overthrow him – as well as intensifying discussion in the west about supplying weapons to opposition fighters if negotiations fail. Syria is high on the agenda of the G8 summit in Northern Ireland, which will bring Barack Obama and Vladimir Putin together next week.

The previous UN figure, issued in mid-May, was that 80,000 people had been killed in the conflict, which began with peaceful and initially localised protests against the Assad regime in March 2011 and turned into a countrywide armed rebellion a few months later.

The latest analysis is based on data from eight sources, including the Syrian government and the British-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights (Syria HR). Killings were included only if the name of the victim and the date and location of death were known. "The status of the victims as combatants or noncombatants is unknown for all but a few records," says the report by the Human Rights Data Analysis Group.

"This report finds that when the fully identified records were combined and duplicates identified, the eight databases collected here identified 92,901 unique killings. The enumeration is likely undercounting the true total number of conflict-related killings that have occurred during this time period. This is because an unknown number of conflict-related killings are likely to have occurred without being documented anywhere."

Pillay added: "There are also well-documented cases of individual children being tortured and executed, and entire families, including babies, being massacred – which, along with this devastatingly high death toll, is a terrible reminder of just how vicious this conflict has become."

Save the Children said in a statement: "The appalling abuses of children documented by the United Nations underline the urgent need for a resolution to this conflict and for humanitarian access to those children still trapped in the country. It is a sad indictment of the international community's failure on Syria that children continue to be killed, injured and maimed by artillery and crossfire.

"As the G8 prepares to meet in Northern Ireland, this is a timely reminder of the devastating effect of this conflict on the young. We support the UN view that 1,700 under-ten deaths is likely to be a huge underestimate, as two thirds of all recorded deaths do not include an age."

Pillay also warned of an impending Syrian government offensive against Aleppo following the defeat of rebel forces in Qusair, near Homs, last week.

Activists on Thursday reported rebels gaining control of a key military base in the central Hama province straddling the country's strategic north-south highway leading to the province of Aleppo.

Syria HR said the rebels seized the base after clashes with regime forces. It said the rebels killed six government troops and seized weapons and ammunition. Assad's forces are waging an offensive to drive rebels out of Hama, Homs and Aleppo.

Exposed: Rajapaksa’s Blood Ivory Robbery: Justice Rohini Lies Internationally

June 14, 2013 

Despite Sri Lanka’s obligations under the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species, there has been a surreptitious move by the President Mahinda Rajapaksa to misappropriate an entire stock of blood ivory seized by the Sri Lanka Customs, the Colombo Telegraph can exclusively reveal with the documentary evidence today.

On 19th December 2012, on the orders of the President Rajapaksa, the Director General of Customs was directed by the Presidential Secretariat to hand over the entire stock of blood ivory to the Presidential Secretariat to be utilize them for a ‘magnanimous trust work’ launched by the Presidential Secretariat and the DGC Jagath Wijeweera directed the Additional Director General (Enforceemnt) to ‘attend soon’  to the President’s directive.

Any ivory seized shall be destroyed

Despite an international ban adopted in 1989, the global ivory trade seems flourishing. And according to the statistics published by the National Geographic Magazine, last year alone over 25,000 elephants have been killed mainly in Africa to satisfy the human greed for blood ivory, resulting Africa’s elephant population and range dramatically shrinking. And in 2011 poaching hit the highest levels with the greatest impact in the central Africa region.

Blood ivory seized by the Customs

Exposed Rajapaksa’s Blood Ivory Robbery Justice Rohini Lies Internationally by nelvely

Sri Lanka and the culture of impunity: human rights challenges in a post-war and post-conflict environment

Page Contents >

• The speakers 
• Coming to the event

• Thursday 20 June 2013, 6.30-8pm 
• Wolfson Theatre, New Academic Building, LSE
• Speakers: Dr Paikiasothy Saravanamuttu; Asanga Welikala; Uvindu Kurukulasuriya
• Chair: Professor Chetan Bhatt

Sri Lanka’s civil war, which spanned more than a quarter of a century, ended in 2009. With more than 100,000 war casualties and one million refugees, it represented one of Asia’s most violent, destructive and intractable conflicts. Four years since active military hostilities ended, there has been no progress towards constitutional and political reforms addressing the problems of pluralism and democracy that lay at the heart of the conflict, nor a legitimate process of truth and accountability for war-time abuses. Instead, Sri Lanka is steadily moving in the direction of becoming an authoritarian state, with the rule of law and governance under attack, the ascendance of majoritarian ethno-religious intolerance, and an overall decline in democratic and human rights standards. This event will explore the pervasive culture of impunity in Sri Lanka, both with regard to past abuses as well as post-war governance. The broader challenge of transition from a post-war to a post-conflict situation will be discussed in relation to ongoing efforts regarding peace and good governance.

The speakers

Dr Paikiasothy Saravanamuttu has been the Executive Director of the Centre for Policy Alternatives (CPA) since its exception in 1996. He is a Convenor of the Centre for Monitoring Election Violence (CMEV) and is a founder Board member of the Sri Lanka Chapter of Transparency International. Currently he is on the Board of the Berghof Foundation for Peace Support and a Member of the Transparency Advisory Group on The Right to Information in South Asia. In June 2003 he made the Civil Society Presentation at the Tokyo Donor Conference on Sri Lanka at the invitation of the Government of Japan and in March 2009, he served as a Member of the External Review Panel of the World Bank’s Post-Conflict Performance Indicators. In 2010, he was awarded the inaugural Citizens Peace Award by the National Peace Council of Sri Lanka. He has been quoted widely in the international and local print and electronic media and presented papers at a number of international conferences on the situation in Sri Lanka, on governance and security issues.

Asanga Welikala is a doctoral candidate and ESRC Teaching Fellow in Public Law in the School of Law, University of Edinburgh. He is also a Senior Researcher in the Legal & Constitutional Unit of the Centre for Policy Alternatives (CPA), Sri Lanka. His most recent publication is the edited collection, A. Welikala (Ed.) (2012) The Sri Lankan Republic at 40: Reflections on Constitutional History, Theory and Practice (Colombo: CPA)

Uvindu Kurukulasuriya is a Visiting Fellow in the Department of Media and Communications at LSE. He has been a journalist for more than two decades and also the co-editor of Media Monitor. He is a freedom of expression activist, researcher and artist. At the time he was forced to leave the country he was the Convenor of the Free Media Movement and a Director of the Sri Lanka Press Institute and Press Complaints Commission of Sri Lanka. He was a Council member and executive committee member of International Freedom of Expression Exchange (IFEX) and Co-Convener of the Centre for Monitoring Elections Violence. He is co-author of Reporting on Human Rights in Sri Lanka: A Handbook for Media Professionals (Colombo: Centre for Policy Alternatives and International Federation of Journalists, 2008)

Coming to the event

This event is free and open to all with no ticket or pre-registration required. Entry is on a first come first served basis. We suggest arriving 15-20 minutes in advance of the start time. General information about coming to an event at LSE. 

No Fire Zone: The Killing Fields of Sri Lanka

Screening

14 Jun 19:45

ITV Town Hall Reception Rooms

No Fire Zone: The Killing Fields of Sri Lanka

• Director(s):

  Callum Macrae

  Producer(s):

  Zoe Sale

• • United Kingdom
   
  • 2013

No Fire Zone is the definitive story of the final awful months of the 26 year long Sri Lankan civil war told by the people who lived through it. A chilling expose of some of the worst war crimes and crimes against humanity of recent time.

Strands

Best of British

Official Website:

www.nofirezone.org/

Festivals:

Geneva Human Rights Film Festival 2013, Movies that Matter Film Festival 2013, Addis International Film Festival 2013

Credits

Cinematographer:

Vaughan Matthews 

Editor:

Michael Nollet 

Executive Producer:

Sandra Whipham, Dorothy Byrne, Chris Shaw 

Impact Producer:

Joanna Natasegara 

Original Score by:

Wayne Roberts 

Sound Designer:

Bob Jackson 

Director Filmography

• 2012, Channel 4. Dispatches: Secrets of Poundland
• 2012, June 2012 Channel 4. Dispatches: Let Our Dad Die
• 2012, Channel 4 Sri Lanka’s Killing Fields: War Crimes Unpunished
• 2011, Al Jazeera English, Sudan: War and independence
• 2011, Channel 4. Sri Lanka’s Killing Fields

Contact

Zoe Sale

Producer

Outsider Films

sale.zoe@gmail.com

www.nofirezone.org/

Three Things I’ve Learned From Warren Buffett

Bill Gates-LinkedIn

Co-chair, Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation

I’m looking forward to sharing posts from time to time about things I’ve learned in my career atMicrosoft and the Gates Foundation. (I also post frequently on my blog.)

Last month, I went to Omaha for the annual Berkshire Hathaway shareholders meeting. It’s always a lot of fun, and not just because of the ping-pong matches and the newspaper-throwing contest I have with Warren Buffett. It’s also fun because I get to learn from Warren and gain insight into how he thinks.

Here are three things I’ve learned from Warren over the years:

1. It’s not just about investing.

The first thing people learn from Warren, of course, is how to think about investing. That’s natural, given his amazing track record. Unfortunately, that’s where a lot of people stop, and they miss out on the fact that he has a whole framework for business thinking that is very powerful. For example, he talks about looking for a company’s moat—its competitive advantage—and whether the moat is shrinking or growing. He says a shareholder has to act as if he owns the entire business, looking at the future profit stream and deciding what it’s worth. And you have to be willing to ignore the market rather than follow it, because you want to take advantage of the market’s mistakes—the companies that have been underpriced.

I have to admit, when I first met Warren, the fact that he had this framework was a real surprise to me. I met him at a dinner my mother had put together. On my way there, I thought, “Why would I want to meet this guy who picks stocks?” I thought he just used various market-related things—like volume, or how the price had changed over time—to make his decisions. But when we started talking that day, he didn’t ask me about any of those things. Instead he started asking big questions about the fundamentals of our business. “Why can’t IBM do what Microsoft does? Why has Microsoft been so profitable?” That’s when I realized he thought about business in a much more profound way than I’d given him credit for.

2. Use your platform.

A lot of business leaders write letters to their shareholders, but Warren is justly famous for his. Partly that’s because his natural good humor shines through. Partly it’s because people think it will help them invest better (and they’re right). But it’s also because he’s been willing to speak frankly and criticize things like stock options and financial derivatives. He’s not afraid to take positions, like his stand on raising taxes on the rich, that run counter to his self-interest. Warren inspired me to start writing my own annual letter about the foundation’s work. I still have a ways to go before mine is as good as Warren’s, but it’s been helpful to sit down once a year and explain the results we’re seeing, both good and bad.

3. Know how valuable your time is.

No matter how much money you have, you can’t buy more time. There are only 24 hours in everyone’s day. Warren has a keen sense of this. He doesn’t let his calendar get filled up with useless meetings. On the other hand, he’s very generous with his time for the people he trusts. He gives his close advisers at Berkshire his phone number, and they can just call him up and he’ll answer the phone.

Although Warren makes a point of meeting with dozens of university classes every year, not many people get to ask him for advice on a regular basis. I feel very lucky in that regard: The dialogue has been invaluable to me, and not only at Microsoft. When Melinda and I started our foundation, I turned to him for advice. We talked a lot about the idea that philanthropy could be just as impactful in its own way as software had been. It turns out that Warren’s brilliant way of looking at the world is just as useful in attacking poverty and disease as it is in building a business. He’s one of a kind.

Photo: Bill Gates

Sri Lanka: Using Google Earth as a storytelling tool

Sri Lanka's citizen journalism website Groundviews also archives tweets as a 'public record'

Posted: 13 June 2013 By: Sarah Marshall

The old adage says that a 'picture tells a thousand words'. And by using just two satellite images from Google Earth, taken two months apart, a citizen journalist has been able to tell the story of the end of Sri Lanka's 25-year civil war.

Back in November 2012, Sanjana Hattotuwa, founding editor of Groundviews, a site dedicated to 'journalism for citizens', realised that by using the Google Earth time slider, a tool which shows satellite imagery taken on different dates, he could see the presence and subsequent disappearance of refugee camps. The images show a littoral sliver of land between the sea and a lagoon in the north-east of Sri Lanka where displaced people were living in camps.

re four occasions where the war ending is catalogued". (The audio interview with Hattotuwa is here.)

"The intention was not actually to ascertain culpability," Hattotuwa said in the interview. "It is impossible to ascertain who shot what and when, but it is very clear from the imagery that it's a scorched earth policy, you can see pock marks all over the place."


Image: Google Earth

Hattotuwa addded: "It is an interesting use case of Google Earth to flesh out inconvenient truths about a country's recent past."

Sri Lanka Using Google Earth as a Storytelling Tool by nelvely

Justice Sripavan Advises DSG How To Grab Lands Correctly: Right Of Reply By A Lawyer Present In Court And By Our Court Reporter

June 13, 2013 

Regarding the story published in Colombo Telegraph titled ‘Jaffna Tamils Land Grab FR cases: Justice Sripavan Advices DSG how to Grab Lands Correctly’, a lawyer present in court clarifies as follows: 

• There were only three typographical errors and not ‘lots of mistakes’ as your article claims that have to be corrected in the petition. The errors were first pointed out by Justice Sripavan and the counsel for the petitioners who was well aware of the errors conceded very early on in the proceedings and moved that he be allowed to make the necessary amendments. Such typographical errors are commonplace and corrections by way of amendments take place as a matter of routine. Further Mr. Shavindra Fernando, DSG appearing for the AG said he needed more time to peruse documents handed over to him by the Sri Lanka Army only that morning. Accordingly the case was fixed for support on the 15^th of July.

Justice Sripavan Advises DSG How to Grab Lands Correctly Right of Reply by a Lawyer Present in Court and by... by nelvely

Scrapping PCs:JHU discusses its proposal 

with UNP

June 12, 2013, 9:57 pm 

by Dasun Edirisinghe

UNP and Opposition Leader Ranil Wickremesinghe discusses his party’s draft proposal for a new constitution with the leaders of the JHU. UNP General Secretary Tissa Attanayake, Ven. Omaple Sobhitha Thera, Ven. Aturaliye Ratana Thera, Minister Patali Champika Ranawaka, Western Provincial Council Minister Udaya Gammanpila are also in the picture. 

The Jathika Hela Urumaya (JHU) yesterday met the United National Party (UNP) at the latter’s headquarters, Sirikotha, to get its support for scrapping provincial councils, which were established under the 13th Amendment to the Constitution in 1987, with India’s intervention.

JHU spokesman Nishantha Sri Warnasinghe told The Island his party had had discussions with UNL leader Ranil Wickremesinghe flanked by UNP Chairman Gamini Jayawickrema Perera, UNP General Secretary Tissa Attanayake and UNP MPs Ravi Karunanayake and Wijedasa Rajapakshe.

JHU MP Athuraliye Rathana Thera presented a private member’s motion, in Parliament two weeks ago, seeking to scrap the provincial council system.

Warnasinghe said that his party had explained to the UNP delegation the JHU’s private member motion and discussed its five major points. "We explained to the UNP delegation, the danger of providing police and land powers to a provincial council under any government," he said, adding that the UNP had agreed to study the JHU proposal. Their meeting lasted for two hours.

Warnasinghe said that they asked for the support of UNP members or to allow their members to vote freely when the proposal was taken up in parliament.

UNP Leader, Ranil Wickremesinghe had appointed MP Wijedasa Rajapakshe to study the JHU draft proposal and to brief him on it, Warnasinghe said.

The JHU spokesman said that his party had got a copy of the UNP’s proposed draft Constitution and both parties had agreed to exchange their views on the two proposals at a future meeting.

According to Warnasinghe so far, the JHU had discussed its proposal with President Mahinda Rajapaksa, the UNP and the Ceylon Workers’ Congress (CWC).

The JHU was planning to discuss it with other parties shortly, he said.

JHU leader Ven. Omalpe Sobitha Thera, General Secretary and Minister of Technology and Research Patali Champika Ranawaka, Western Provincial Minister Udaya Gammanpila, Attorney– at–Law M. C. Jayarathna and JHU Media Secretary Nishantha Sri Warnasinghe attended the discussion.

UNP MP Wijedasa Rajapakshe said that they would inform the JHU of the UNP’s views on their proposal, at a future meeting, after studying their proposal.

Anesthetising The People

By Tisaranee Gunasekara -June 13, 2013 

“That is a slave’s lot – not to be able to speak one’s mind”. - Euripides (Ion)

In Turkey, an attempt to uproot a public park and build a shopping mall ignited a tidal-wave of protests which is yet to abate.

In Saudi Arabia, innumerable Islamic sites are being annihilated in the name of ‘development’, with nary a protest. “No one has the balls to stand up and condemn this cultural vandalism” laments Dr. Irfan Al Alawi, Executive Director of the Islamic Heritage Foundation; “we have already lost 400-500 sites”[i].

Anesthetising the People by nelvely

Central Committee and politburo of the Frontline Socialist Party dissolved

Thursday, 13 June 2013 

The Central Committee and politburo of the Frontline Socialist Party (FSP) have been dissolved due to an ideological clash among party leaders and the party’s organization work is currently being carried out by a national operations committee.

It is learnt that several members of the party’s Central Committee and politburo have given up politics. A former politburo member of the JVP, Kularatne has now left the FSP and traveled to London.

His wife holds a senior post in the Sri Lankan administrative service and the Kularatne family has left for London to enable her to pursue further studies.

It is learnt that the various ideological clashes that existed among the FSP leader when forming the party after breaking away from the JVP have now intensified.

A head of the party’s students organization, Nuwan Jayaweera had informed the party that he be assigned to carry out work on international relations since he wanted to travel to London with his lawyer wife Dharani who has received a scholarship. Pubudu Jagoda had made a proposal to the Central Committee to assign Jayaweera to party’s international wing and to provide him with Rs. 700,000 to travel to London. However, Central Committee members Waruna Rajapakse and Ashoka have opposed this proposal. The reason was that Pubudu Jagoda and Kumar Gunaratnam had rejected a proposal made by Waruna Rajapakse and Ashoka to assign the party’s Puttalam District Leader Eraj Krishantha Alwis to manage international relations and to provide him financial assistance to carry out the work.

Waruna and Ashoka have stopped communicating with Kumar Gunaratnam via skype and telephone following this clash. One of the main reasons for the clash in the FSP is the document prepared by Kumar Gunaratnam on the party’s stance on the national issue. The clash had occurred since it was similar to the stance of the JVP on the subject.

The Central Committee has questioned if a new party was formed after moving out of the JVP in order to carry out the policies of the latter.

Comrade Chameera Koswatte was faced with unpleasant situations when he had tried to explain the current crisis in the party to its activists in the Gampaha District. It is learnt that the Gampaha District activists had even pushed Chameera to a room and physically attacked him. Chameera was attacked in this manner by Waruna Rajapakse’s supporters. Waruna has now moved out of the FSP and politics.

The clash within the FSP has even moved towards its office staff. The party’s women’s wing head Dimuthu Attygalle had not participated in the Central Committee meetings for a few months and when the office staff had questioned about it from Opatha, he had informed it to Dimuthu.

Angered by the inquiry, Dimuthu had visited the party office and shouted at the staff. The staff had then walked out of the office in protest.

Party sources also say that FSP’s Polonnaruwa organizer, S.K. Subasinghe is also disgruntled with the current situation. He has said that the situation has got worse due to Kumar’s usual actions.

Several attempts were made to contact Kumar Gunaratnam and Pubudu Jagoda via skype and the telephone. However, they could not be contacted to inquire about the current issues faced by the party. In the event the FSP provides us with the party’s response to the story, we would be glad to publish it in our website.

SAJIN GAVE HELICOPTER FOR MEDIA COVERAGE AND NOT TO SAVE FISHERMEN - WIJEDASA

June 13, 2013 

The death of dozens of fishermen who lost their lives during adverse weather conditions that prevailed over the island a few days ago is a ‘national tragedy’, UNP MP Wijedasa Rajapakshe stated.

He explained that this was reason why he along with Opposition Leader Ranil Wickremasinghe and UNP General Secretary Tissa Attanayake decided to attend some of the funerals of the fallen fishermen in Balapitiya.

Speaking at a press conference held today (June 13), the MP said that they had heard that UPFA MP Sajin Vass Gunawardena along with some others had been under the influence of alcohol at one such funeral.

Bringing to memory the incident that unraveled in Balapitiya, MP Rajapakshe said that the unruly group had attempted to drag the UNP members out of their vehicles and assault them but the situation was soon brought under control by the Ambalangoda and Ahungalla police.

He reminded the media that Sajin Vass Gunawardena was unable to help the very people who voted for him when they requested him to secure the services of a helicopter to find their loved-ones who were lost at sea. However, the MP pointed out that Gunawardena had given a media organization a helicopter at Rs.65,000 per hour to film the tragedy.

Rajapakshe expressed his regret for the leaders who brought people like this to the parliament stating that MP Gunawardena attends many international human rights conferences including in Geneva bringing the country to further disrepute.

He added that the UPFA MP was trying to teach the media lessons in ethics while not having any ethical idea about his own speech.

Finally, the UNP MP warned that if stern action is not taken regarding this incident, steps will be taken to take the incident to Geneva as well as informing the Commonwealth.