Tuesday, July 23, 2013

Archbishop of Canterbury: Attacks on Muslims are 'unacceptable' and 'inexcusable'

By: Benjamin Russel-July 22, 2013

THE ARCHBISHOP OF CANTERBURY has condemned recent attacks on Muslims following the murder of Fusilier Lee Rigby as "unacceptable" and " inexcusable ".

The Archbishop of Canterbury was speaking at a

Diversity is a gift, not a threat, it is a hope, not a danger

The Archbishop of Canterbury

Addressing an inter-faith audience gathered at Featherstone High School in Southall, west London, the Most Rev Justin Welby said he did not want to live in a "monocultural" society.

He said: "The attacks on minority ethnic groups across the country that there have been over the last few weeks are inexecusable, unacceptable and a scandal to a tradition of hospitality in this country of which we should be deeply proud and which has contributed far more to us than it has taken from us.

"I want, as I have already done, to acknowledge the pressure that our Muslim friends and colleagues have faced over the last few weeks.

"There have been terrible attacks, I know that the vast majority of those in this country and especially people of faith would join me in condemning utterly any act of violence against anyone because of their faith.

"We want you to know that we stand with you, we will do so privately and publicly. We will do so persistently and I pray in the grace of God, persuasively.

"We will do all we can to support the security forces, the police, in bringing to justice those who seek to spread hate and cause division in our community."

The Most Rev Welby told his audience that diversity was a "gift not a threat" and he "rejoiced" in the example of inter faith cooperation and community work he had witnessed in Southall.

"The kind of country I want to live in has as one of its best examples what goes on in this area. I don't want to live in something that is monocultural,” he said.

The Archbishop of Canterbury, the Most Reverend Justin Welby

The Archbishop of Canterbury speaking after the attack on Lee Rigby

The Most Rev Welby was speaking after visiting St John's Church, the Shree Ram Mandir Hindu Temple and the Sikh Gurdwara Sri Guru Singh Sabha, where 20,000 free meals are served every week in Southall.

The Archbishop also met Muslim leaders, currently observing the Ramadan fast, at the Central Jamia Masjid Mosque in Southall.

The Most Rev Welby said the work done by different faiths he had witnessed in Southall were an example of the "kind of country that I am proud to be in."

He said: "It is hard to say that religion is a spent force when you come to Southall, this is something that people need to see and hear, it is hard to argue against diversity in a place like this.”

During his visit the Archbishop announced a £25,000 grant from a discretionary fund for a new centre hosted by Christians in Southall but providing a range of services including debt counselling to all groups.

Rajapaksa’s Olcott Buddhist Card

By Gamini -July 23, 2013

The world before it being discovered, the individual societies across the globe lived a life, free of aggression and occupation by others. Every society that lived had it’s Rulers either Monarchies or Tribal Leaders to fend and protect their subjects. Once the world was discovered there started Trade and Colonization of the weaker by the stronger. Wars have been waged between countries for supremacy, dominance or Religious reasons. Thereafter the Monarchies have been replaced by elected bodies to govern with the birth of Democracy, while some countries opted for systems of Communism and Socialism as opposed to the former.

Colonel Henry Steel Olcott

The present day America is one country that have been plundered from it’s original inhabitants by all those invaders who Colonized countries across the globe then and their progeny that constitute the majority of it’s citizenry. Hence modern America, boasts of a History of a little over two hundred years, while today the US has become the major supper power after the collapse of the USSR. The US today acts as the self appointed Guardian and Policeman to foster a form of Democracy they believe is right to suit their agendas, ably assisted by their allies with no other country standing up to it openly. The US virtually dominates the whole world. Although the US professes to safe guard Human Rights, Democratic Freedoms including Media freedom in all countries especially of those under the UN charter, they are absolutely silent when these very basic norms are violated by their brief carriers whom they have helped to elect to govern, as ours. On the one hand they allow Journalists and those who dissent to be killed by their brief carriers and offer Asylum to others to show how magnanimous they are and their Democracy is.

Fear And The Predicament Facing Muslims

By Ahilan Kadirgamar -July 23, 2013

Ahilan Kadirgamar

A Muslim lecturer friend some time ago described a troubling moment. The incident took place when he pulled into the parking lot of a supermarket with his wife few weeks ago. As they got out of the car, a group of men standing by first stared at his wife, who was wearing a headscarf, and then looked intently at him. In a split second, his day was disturbed; he reflected on this moment for quite some time. Was this a harmless gaze or did it reflect a change in attitude towards Muslims? My friend described his own reaction to that momentary stare as one that brought on fear. What did he fear? And why?

The Muslim community is in a state of fear in Sri Lanka. That is what many Muslim intellectuals, activists and community leaders have been saying in recent months at various forums. Do they fear the fringe groups mobilising Sinhala Buddhist nationalism against the Muslim community? Or is it the reception of anti-Muslim rhetoric by broader sections of the Sinhala community? Or is this fear rooted in the support given to such extreme forces by the ruling regime? Or is it fear of the Sri Lankan state itself, responsible for the security of its Muslim citizenry? Indeed, fear is characteristic of modern state and society. But the form that fear takes differs at different historical moments and in different societies and communities.

A few months ago, I wrote an article titled “The Political Economy of Anti-Muslim Attacks”. There, I discussed the broad reception of the anti-Muslim hate campaign within the Sinhala community and its relationship to the economic changes taking place in Sri Lanka. I concluded by mentioning the need to rethink concepts such as the state, religion and politics, as well as the importance of reflecting on questions of fear and insecurity facing communities and their implications for relations between communities. In response to my article, at a conference, a Marxist feminist critiqued what she felt was a reductive analysis of social disaffection on my part. She argued that such political economic analysis of social disaffection also makes claims about people’s affection towards both the economy and the state. She went on to argue, that classes are not just formed, but also formulated through narratives which are predicated on the nation and produced in part by the state. Acknowledging her critique and building on it, I find questions about fear to be inextricably linked to analysis of the state. In this article, I will engage the politics of fear in the Muslim community and articulate the need to build bridges between communities through dialogue and dissent. Read More

Reliving Black July 1983

Tamil Guardian 23 July 2013

As Eelam Tamils around the world mark thirty years from the horrors of the anti-Tamil pogrom of 1983, we remember the events of that infamous month of 'Black July' via a collection of excerpts from international newspapers published at the time... As well as news stories from the last two years...

21 Jul 1983 - The Times:

"The Government yesterday imposed local and foreign press censorship on all news about national security, law and order, essential supplies, and incitement to mutiny, riot or civil commotion."

[more]

A point of departure

Dushiyanthini Kanagasabapathipillai-23 Jul, 2013

Keep the memories alive

July 1983 was a turning point for many Sri Lankan Tamils to leave the motherland, and seek refuge in various countries including India, Australia, United Kingdom, Canada, United States of America, France, Switzerland, Denmark, Germany, New Zealand, and so on. Tamils who have either lost their family members or properties during the 1983 July pogrom, were forced to leave the land with endless haunting memories. Many of my beloved and blood relatives (brothers, paternal aunts and uncles, maternal aunts and uncles, and cousins) too have decided to leave Sri Lanka after suffering losses (of lives, identities and properties), displacement and trauma. One such relative has agreed to share his unforgettable memories of Black July with me, although he lives in a western country, he misses his home, going through never ending nostalgia, and haunting memories which don’t allow him to return to what he still calls a “home”.

“I remember the month of July 1983 every year and its horror in Sri Lanka 30 years ago. We as Tamils lived peacefully in Bambalapitty, Colombo since 1950. On a peaceful day on 23rd of July 1983, we got up early morning to our phone ringing, and warning us of a mob attack of Tamil shops and homes in Borella that night after the ceremonial funeral of 13 army soldiers who were killed in Thirunelvely, Jaffna. Although road blocks were set up, and curfew was imposed, killing and burning alive of Tamils in the heart of Colombo, looting of Tamil houses and shops continued unchecked. Some Sinhala Catholics and Muslims extended their helping hands towards the targeted Tamil community, but a larger portion of people from other communities remained silent!

I have lost two of my closest friends including a shop owner. Despite fear and risk, I have decided to go and help the fellow Tamils who have sought refuge at a few camps set up in Hindu temples and halls in Colombo. I was the last to leave from Colombo to Jaffna by ship, because I was nursing a Tamil woman who was brutally attacked and injured. Her father was killed, and her house was razed to the ground by fire and mob attack. She was physically and psychologically unfit due to unexpected loss of her beloved father. I tried to console her, but it was far beyond even trying. I managed to accompany her to Jaffna by ship on a long journey. After having handed her to relatives, I went to my house and I lived in Jaffna for awhile. But, continued discrimination and suspicion towards the Tamils in Sri Lanka, and not equally respecting my identity as a “Tamil” made me feel as a stranger in the same land! I have decided to leave Sri Lanka, and settle in a foreign land for safety, security, equality, respect, and mutual understanding and respect for my own identity”

It’s noteworthy that many Tamils who have left the land or remained in Sri Lanka are reluctant to recall their memories of horror. These ghostly memories are beyond imagination!

Anatomy of an Anti-Tamil Pogrom: Thirtieth Anniversary of “Black July” 1983.

dbsjeyaraj.com

by-

D.B.S. Jeyaraj-22 July 2013, 9:25 pm-Saumiyamoorthy Thondaman-

“Shops, Banks, Offices and Restaurants in the Capital’s crowded City Centre and Main Streets being burnt while the Police look on. Thousands of houses ransacked and burnt, sometimes with women and children inside. Goon squads battering passengers to death in trains and on station platforms and, without hindrance, publicly burning men and women to death on the streets! Remand prisoners and political detainees in the country’s top prison being massacred.

The armed forces joining in and sometimes organizing this pogrom against members of Sri Lanka’s two Sri Lankan minority communities. The nation’s President and top ranking cabinet members publicly justifying the pogrom!”t is clear therefore that in spite of the attempts to rationalise the July 1983 anti-Tamil violence as a “Sinhala backlash to 13 Soldiers being killed by Tamil Tigers” evidence uncovered during the past years have proved conclusively that “Black July” 1983 was a definite Pogrom and not a spontaneous reaction of the Sinhalese.

. Full Story>>>

On Black July, I was 3 years old

Natalie Soysa-23 Jul, 2013Thirty years ago today, on Black July, I was 3 years old.

I doubt I even knew what the difference between Sinhalese or Tamil or Muslim meant at the time. I am angered that the 30 years since has taught me otherwise.

I’ve spent the last 6 weeks, working with Sachini Perera who invited me to be a part of the ’30 Years Ago’ initiative that Groundviews had commissioned her for. Our specific project covers the stories of over 40 women we have been photographing and interviewing together. The experience has been a process of growth and insight for us both. Towards the last lap of our journey, we interviewed a mother of two young children. One point of her conversation has continued to resonate with me since; her young daughter had asked her recently what a bomb was.

When I was her age, I didn’t need to ask.

Yes, we are at apparent peace now. The cost however, has been too dear, the aftershocks still echoing beyond the annals of history, reminding us that we’re too stubborn a species to enjoy something as simple as peace.

Today I am a parent and it has completely changed my outlook in many senses. I am neither proud nor ashamed of my race, instead I’ve come to a place where I don’t care what terms I use to identify myself at all. I want to bring my son up in an environment where each individual is held accountable for their actions and not an entire collective for the actions of a few.

For now, my son is growing up in a country with no apparent violence. He isn’t exposed to daily checkpoints and guns, the constant possibility of being in the wrong place at the wrong time, watching bombs explode and scatter human limbs in front of his eyes; big, obvious signs of violence. Things happen at a far subtler level now. How do you protect your child from something that is less tangible to the naked eye?

I’ve often wondered how many instigators of violence are themselves parents. I feel we’re responsible for raising the next generation and we seem to often forget this when we go about with our lives. I am equally guilty.

This morning, as I held my son in my arms, I was reminded of what his presence in my life has been doing for me, since his first flutter of a movement in utero; he has made me want to be a better person. All these grandiose notions of wanting to change the world I’ve had since childhood have boiled down to a simple fact; I can’t change the world, I can only change me.

If you are a parent I ask one thing of you today. Go home and hold your child. If you are not with them, pick up the phone and make a call. Make contact and remind yourself of why you are here.

It could make all the difference to the next 30 years to come.

(Words by Natalie Soysa, Photograph by Sachini Perera)

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Editors note: Both Natalie and Sachini are part of a project, curated by Groundviews, that brings together leading documentary filmmakers, photographers, activists, theorists and designers, in Sri Lanka and abroad, to focus on just how deeply the anti-Tamil pogrom in 1983 has shaped our imagination, lives, society and polity.

The resulting content, featuring voices never captured before, marrying rich photography, video, audio and visual design with constitutional theory, story-telling and memorialising, has no historical precedent.

The project is an attempt to use digital media and compelling design to remember the inconvenient, and in no small way, acts of daring, courage and resistance during and after Black July.

Tamil Canadians Remember and Reflect on 30 Years since anti-Tamil riots

Tamil Canadians Remember and Reflect on 30 Years since anti-Tamil riots

The Canadian Tamil Congress somberly commemorates the 30th year anniversary of the 1983 anti-Tamil riots that sparked an armed conflict between the Tamil peoples and the Government of Sri Lanka in their homeland. Between July 24 and 29 of that year, Tamils were systematically targeted with violence in Colombo and many other parts of the island. During this period, an estimated 3000 Tamils were killed and thousands of Tamil homes and businesses were destroyed. More than one million Tamils have fled Sri Lanka since July 1983 fearing for their safety, while over a million more Tamils have been internally displaced within the island.

“Black July is a poignant anniversary for Tamil Canadians to remember,” said David Poopalapillai, National Spokesperson for the Canadian Tamil Congress. “There is not one single Tamil family living in Canada that hasn’t been affected somehow by the 1983 anti-Tamil riots and its aftermath.” Although four years have passed since the end of armed conflict, Tamils in the NorthEast of Sri Lanka are still suffering immense hardship.

“As we remember the events of the past 30 years, it’s also equally important to recognize that not much has really changed for Tamils currently living in the NorthEast of Sri Lanka,” said Poopalapillai. “While the bombs have stopped dropping and the guns may be silenced, the Tamil people are still living under a militarized occupation in the North and East, continue to fear for their safety and are subjected to persecution because of their ethnicity.” The Canadian Tamil Congress strongly encourages Tamil Canadians to share their stories, experiences and feelings about Black July by making submissions to http://www.blackjuly83.com/SubmitStory.htm and using social media platforms such as Facebook and Twitter using hashtag #30YearsBlackJuly.

The Canadian Tamil Congress is also showcasing an exhibit to reflect upon the 30th year anniversary of Black July featuring testimonials of Black July survivors. We encourage you to join us – may we always remember.

Date: Thursday July 25th, 2013

Time: 6:00 pm

Venue: Scarborough Civic Centre Rotunda

150 Borough Drive, Toronto, Ontraio M1P 4N7

For more information please contact: David Poopalapillai at (416) 240-0078

Published on: 07/22/13 08:35

School closed early today…

Groundviews

Dilrukshi Fonseka-23 Jul, 2013

Image from Asianews.it

School closed early today. Amma was looking very jumpy when she came to pick me up, but she wouldn’t tell me why. When we went to get Loku and Chuti, Chuti was nowhere to be seen. We walked all over school looking for him and finally found him running around with a chair in his hand looking to ‘hit someone’. Amma gave him a good scolding. Serves him right.

On the way home we saw a group of aiyas dancing around an uncle whose hands were tied to the lamp-post. They were pouring bottles of talcum powder on him, and he was starting to look like a ghost. They were laughing. He was looking sad. I think he was the uncle who worked in the Pharmacy we sometimes bought our Multi-Sanastol from. Amma said it was better if we looked straight.

Lots of Aiyas. Lots of police uncles too.

Amma stopped to buy groceries. We asked for Icy-Chocs.

Later in the afternoon we found our neighbour’s servant boy standing in our garden holding a siri-siri bag with his clothes in it. He was crying. Amma was angry, but she wouldn’t tell me why. Sena, hoisted the boy over the wall back into our neighbour’s garden. Chuti thought we should have kept him on our side, because he could have been a fielder.

We weren’t allowed to play cricket that day.

Thaththa came home with uncle Gnana, that aunty and their son. They were also looking sad. Thaththa was looking worried but he wouldn’t tell me why. I had to give up my room for them. I wasn’t happy. Seela was asked to make more string hoppers for dinner. She wasn’t happy either.

We were allowed to stand at the gate for a bit. But I was not to tell anyone I had given up my room. I am not sure why.

I saw an Aiya removing a piece of glass from his foot. It was bleeding. There was a lot of blood. It must have hurt him alot. One of the police uncles gave him a ride in their jeep. That was nice of him.

Sena kept asking us to repeat the words ‘Baldiya’ for fun.

I am hoping we won’t have school tomorrow.

(July 1983. Unlearn. Relearn. Teach. Remember.)

Home

This is the view from my home.-Tehani Ariyaratne-23 Jul, 2013

30 years ago, I was not even alive but if I had stood in this same place, looking in this same direction, I would have seen the black smoke choking the air, perhaps seen flames rising from building and cars; I would have heard the screams of the tortured and the victorious cheers of the mob; my nose would perhaps have filled with the acrid smell of burning rubber and wood, and I would stepped indoors, into the safety my ethnicity afforded me.

For the last two months now I have been immersed in 1983; that week of mayhem and bloodshed and misery, and I have looked upon this view with a renewed sense of home. I have met an old lady whose eyes filled with tears as she spoke of lost wedding photographs; a young man who talked of his father patrolling their street to keep everyone safe; a woman who longed for home after she fled to India; a son who spoke of broken parents and a daughter who remembered midnight feasts with her friends who came to hide.

The reality of Black July is a horror I cannot imagine, and yet have, vividly, through the stories I’ve heard. I have tried to imagine what it must be like to stand in a burnt garden, staring at the charred rubble of what was once my home; to find bits and pieces of my belongings scattered in the winds. I have tried to envision moving on from that and cannot.

Some people made new homes. Some rebuilt, some relocated, some preserved, some forgot. And some never regained. For some, home is still an elusive idea, a faded memory of safety and belonging. For that, for taking away someone’s home, their heart, their sanctuary, we must never forget.

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Editors note: The author is part of a project, curated by Groundviews, that brings together leading documentary filmmakers, photographers, activists, theorists and designers, in Sri Lanka and abroad, to focus on just how deeply the anti-Tamil pogrom in 1983 has shaped our imagination, lives, society and polity.

The project is an attempt to use digital media and compelling design to remember the inconvenient, and in no small way, acts of daring, courage and resistance during and after Black July.

Remembering Sri Lanka's Black July

22 July 2013

Thirty years ago, Tamil separatists stepping up militant attacks in northern Sri Lanka killed 13 soldiers who reported for duty only a day earlier. Over the next few days, mobs of the Sinhalese majority took revenge, killing between 400 and 3,000 Tamils around the country and triggering a civil war that lasted 26 years and sent hundreds of thousands of Tamils into exile. The BBC's Charles Haviland reports on the legacy of what came to be known as Black July.

An abandoned burnt out automobile and street filled with rubble, Colombo, July 30 1983

The mob violence that erupted after an attack on 13 soldiers triggered a 26-year civil war

Merchants return to their burned out businesses in the Pettha area of downtown Colombo, Sri Lanka, 1 Aug 1983

In the stillness of a Colombo afternoon, as a clock chimes three, an elderly woman looks back 30 years and remembers.

"There was a first mob of about 80-odd young guys with iron rods and things. They were in a frenzy, obviously under the influence of alcohol - they smashed up and then came the next lot to loot."

Priya Balachandran - the BBC has changed her name as she prefers anonymity - recalls the time Colombo and much of southern Sri Lanka seemed gripped by madness. Mob violence was wrought on people, most of whom had little idea what was happening in the north. Full Story>>>

Recognizing And Regretting The Excesses Of July 1983

By Rajiva Wijesinha -July 23, 2013

Prof. Rajiva Wijesinha MP

Perhaps the clearest test of a pluralistic outlook amongst Sri Lankans, to say nothing of basic decency too, is their response to the events of July 1983. Anyone fit to pass the test sees it as an aberration in Sri Lankan history, an outrage in which defenceless Tamils were systematically persecuted.

Those who offer excuses or play down the event seem to me morally repugnant. That is why, despite his comparative efficiency and honesty, I think Ranil Wickremesinghe would not be a suitable leader for Sri Lanka. His comments soon after the riots, when he played down their impact, and claimed that far worse things had happened to the Sinhalese because of theBandaranaike policy of nationalization of businesses, were disgusting.

Since he also claimed that that policy had not affected businesses in the hands of minorities, he was in a sense parroting the Cyril Mathew line that was one of the reasons behind the attacks on Tamil businesses in Colombo, namely greed and the use of emotive racism to suppress competition. I can only hope that those politicians and decision makers now in government who are encouraging the Bodhu Bala Sena, and the shadowy forces behind it that are trying to knock out successful Muslim commercial enterprises, realize that they are repeating history and behaving just as a more callow Ranil Wickremesinghe did in his youth.

But while that sort of indulgence to the racists of 1983 was appalling, equally negative are those Tamil nationalists who play down the exceptional nature of what happened thirty years ago, and present it as simply something in a continuum of Sinhala persecution of Tamils. That is nonsense, parallel to the nonsense of those who do not recognize the exceptional nature of the LTTE, and use it to attack all Tamil politicians. We should not allow such obfuscation of the difference between Tamil political agitation and the terrorism of the LTTE.

Sachini Perera-23 Jul, 2013

I took this photo 4 years ago, on the 18th of May 2009. On a day when I was out of words and could just about manage to write on my blog, much left to untangle yet. On a day when I had reached a boiling point at a home whose politics were not my politics. On a day I felt disconnected from the jubilation pervading the country.

I’m reposting it today, on the 23rd of July 2013. It has been 30 years since Black July.

Black July | කලු ජූලිය

Familiar words though I was born 3 years after the 1983 pogrom. Words that sparked off occasional discussions, words that came up in some of the books I read and most of all, stark images, some of which are permanently etched in my memory. And through it all, a refrain.

Never Again

A few months ago, I was commissioned by Groundviews to be a part of “30 Years Ago”. Together with Natalie Soysa, I began for the first time in my life, to consciously evaluate the past 30 years. To carefully consider the impact the 1983 pogrom has made on my life, if any. To talk to people, mostly women, about 3 decades during which our country has changed so much and yet not changed.

And today, I have come back to this photo. The refrain of “never again” is growing fainter amidst nationalistic rhetoric, amidst a mindset of winners versus losers, amidst a climate of fear and censorship.

Much left to untangle yet

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The project is an attempt to use digital media and compelling design to remember the inconvenient, and in no small way, acts of daring, courage and resistance during and after Black July.

Home

Ameena Hussein-23 Jul, 2013

Photo by Nazly Ahmed (@nazly)

I walk at Independence Square a couple of evenings a week. A friend who walks with me, asked why the Buddhist Flag was hoisted on the flag pole. To tell you the truth, I had not noticed the large rectangle of blue, yellow, red, white and orange fluttering in the wind. On my walks at the newly landscaped area, I admire the root balled trees, appreciate the lights that come on automatically at 6pm, and in the fading light, take care not to trip on the granite paving squares that define the walkers’ route. With my floppy hat jammed on my head, I do not get the chance to look at the sky often. So, while I knew there was a flag flying I believed it was the national flag and did not give it too much thought, after all we were at Independence Square, what other flag would be there?