Bribery and corruption petition filed against Bribery Commissioner for first time in SL history..!

(Lanka-e-News-03.Jan.2014, 11.00PM) On the first day of the New year 2014 , a bribery and corruption petition against the very Commissioner of the commission into Bribery and corruption was filed . This is the first time in Sri Lanka’s history bribery and corruption charges have been filed against the very Commissioner who is expected to investigate and discourage bribery and corruption in the country. This necessity arose because the corrupt Rajapakse regime itself is following the policy of setting a thief to catch a thief when making appointments to high positions in the government. Consequently , most top government positions are now manned by thieves and corrupt officials.

The petition against the Bribery Commissioner , Jagath Balapatabendi ,a former supreme court (SC) judge was handed over to the Commission inquiring into bribery and corruption this noon by JVP member Sunil Handunneti JVP M.P., Sunil Watagala (CMC member) and a group.

Handunetti addressing the media after handing over the petition said , the petition was handed over today , the first day of the new year because it is hoped that at least the beginning of the year 2014 , will mark the beginning of the end of the most corrupt regime . It is very unfortunate that this petition against the Bribery commissioner cannot be handed over to any other Institution for inquiry than the Bribery commission itself ,the chief of which is the accused himself, Handunetti pinpointed. 

After handing over the petition to the Bribery commission secretary , Handunetti stated , if the Commissioner of bribery and corruption Commission has any respect for his lofty post and personal honor , he should resign of his own accord in keeping with the sublime traditions and professional ethics before bringing more disgrace upon himself.

When the present bribery and corruption commissioner Balapatabendi against whom the bribery and corruption petition is now filed , was a supreme court judge , he gave an irregular verdict permitting the leasing of 145 vehicles .One such vehicle was gifted to Balapatabendi by the importer as a reciprocal gesture. Balapatabendi had registered this vehicle and used it wrongfully while having the revenue license and other documents registered in another person’s name . 

In his court verdict he had said , the vehicles should be used in the name of ‘Emperor’ but he had himself used it in the name of ‘Toyota corolla’. In other words after giving a judicial order , he had himself transgressed that order brazenly and blatantly by using the vehicle in the name of ‘Toyota corolla’.

Moreover while he was using this vehicle , he had transferred it to another person by backdating the transaction after preparing documents fraudulently to facilitate the irregular transaction. 

‘We have handed over all the documents relating to these irregularities and illegalities along with our petition,’ Handunetti revealed. 

It is the President who appoints individuals to these government positions . All this evidence and other exposures only bear testimony to the monumental support the President is extending to corruption and its encouragement in the state departments , Handunetti added with concern.

The copy of the full petition is appended.

Bribery Chief should step down 

   January 3, 2014 

Bribery and corruption are as old as civilization itself. The propensity for deceit, duplicity and fraud that exists in the ordinary mind has endured, despite the scriptures and teachings of religious leaders about the value of honesty, integrity and ethical conduct in the long journey of the human race.
 
Yet, we come across, every now and then, some rare individuals who, despite the almost irresistible pressures and temptations, withstand the tentacles of corruption in its various forms in the conduct of their day to day affairs. One would expect the Chairman of the Commission to Investigate Allegations of Bribery or Corruption (CIABOC) to be one such individual,
several notches above the common man with his weakness and his flaws.
 
One could argue that the Bribery Chief is not a celestial being, but a human, susceptible to temptation like everyone else. And that 'every man has a price.' But when allegations of corruption are levelled against a Bribery Chief who also happens to be a former Supreme Court Judge, demands are made for his removal, and petitions are submitted detailing the corruption charges, no argument about human fallibility can hold water, for the issue is not human fallibility, but the credibility of an institution tasked with wiping out corruption and it accompanying evils. This is why one expects the head of the institution to be honourable, scrupulous, and above all, honest in his dealings, with not even a whiff of scandal following in his wake.
 
If one is to go by the media reports, the Bribery Chief is alleged to have not only received a vehicle released through a judgment in a bench he presided over, but is also accused of suppressing and covering up charges of bribery and corruption against government politicians and their stooges. A UNP Parliamentarian, during the Third Reading of the 2014 Budget, is reported to have pointed out how the Bribery Chief had allegedly aided and abetted in the arrest of a former director of Sri Lanka Customs as a personal favour to one of his friends. The allegations are indeed serious, and if proved to be true, could have a seriously adverse impact on the reputation and credibility of the Commission.
 
Acting on these allegations, the JVP on Wednesday, handed over a petition to the Bribery Commission and called for the suspension of the Bribery Chief so that an independent investigation could be carried out.
We have not had any serious probe into alleged practices of corruption and bribery by such a high level public official, politicians or ministers since the Thalgodapitiya Commission on Bribery and Corruption in 1959. Consequent upon the findings in the Commission Report, three high-ranking government politicians were found guilty and punished, and their attempts at re-entry into politics were tarnished by the punishment that was meted out to them.
 
Certainly, allegations of corruption and bribery against very high-ranking politicians and government officials are many. But the usual practise has been to circumvent the whole issue by punishing some nondescript MPs, Provincial Councillors, other so-called people's representatives or low-level public officials. That kind of mass-hoodwinking could only be described as a wilful perpetuation of a corrupt system that will sustain the 'sharks' at the expense of the 'sprats.'
 
Transparency and accountability must start at the very top. And if there are allegations against the Chief of the Commission to Investigate into Allegations of Bribery or Corruption, the Commission certainly needs to investigate its Head. But an impartial probe will not be possible unless the Commission is given the liberty to conduct a free and fair investigation without any interference from any quarter. That is why the onus is on the Commissioner to step down, for his own sake and for the sake of the investigations, which will prove his guilt or innocence. The other option would be for the President, in whom the powers to appoint the Chairman is vested, to make the decision, which would not add any points in favour of the beleaguered Bribery Boss.

SUB-INSPECTOR ARRESTED ON BRIBERY CHARGE

January 4, 2014

A Sub-Inspector (SI) of the Payagala Police Station has been arrested by the Commission to Investigate Allegation of Bribery or Corruption today on charges of soliciting a bribe of Rs 10,000. 

The Sub-Inspector was arrested this afternoon while accepting the bribe of Rs 10,000 in exchange for releasing a three-wheeler involved in an accident, before it was released by court, the Police Spokesman said. 

Government reduces official inflation figures

 Saturday, 04 January 2014 

The government has reportedly surreptitiously reduced the official inflation figures of the country calculated by the Census and Statistics Department in 2013.

JVP parliamentarian Anura Kumara Dissanayake charged during a debate in parliament last month that the government was doctoring data and statistics in the country and called for an independent commission to be appointed to probe the matter.

He accused the government of pushing the Census and Statistics Department to change the official growth and inflation statistics.
It is learnt that while the inflation rate according to the Colombo Consumers Price Index (CCPI) was 8.1 last January, the real inflation rate for the month was 13.9.

The prices and wages division of the Census and Statistics Department has recorded the inflation rate to be 13.9 in January 2013 until it was later changed to 8.1 due to political pressure.

A similar situation was recorded in March last year when the inflation rate recorded at 8.8 was reduced to 6.9 in the reports published in December.

The inflation rate reflects on the cost of living.

Heroin busts increased in 2013 


by Gihan Nicholas-  January 4, 2014

The number of drug traffickers, as well as the quantities of heroin seized, saw a marked increase in 2013, compared to 2012.

According to statistics, a total of 296 Kg of heroin was confiscated in 2013, representing a sharp spike, as opposed to the 15 Kgs seized in 2012. A total of 76 direct drug peddlers were apprehended in 2013, compared to the 33 arrested in 2012, according to the statistics provided by the Police Narcotics Bureau. Five foreign nationals were arrested for direct peddling in 2013, while 23 were arrested the year before. The total number of direct female peddlers had seen a decrease by one digit, falling from seven in 2012 to six in 2013.

The number of total arrests, meanwhile, made in relation to drug offences in 2013 was 462, indicating a slight dip against the 544 arrests in 2012. The number of Court cases filed in 2013, however, decreased to 399, while the figure stood at 523 in 2012.

Meanwhile, among the variants of drugs seized, 5,147 Kgs of cannabis was seized in 2012, whereas only 166 Kgs was seized in 2013, showing a major decline.

Seizures of hashish and methamphetamines, however, had indicated borderline increments and declines respectively.

Death row prisoners protest on Sri Lankan jail rooftop 

   January 4, 2014

A group of death row prisoners at a Sri Lankan jail are staging a protest on its rooftop demanding their release, officials said on Saturday.

“There are 27 inmates on rooftop. They demand they be freed,” Bogambara prison spokesman Gamini Kulatunga said, adding that all of them protesting at the jail in Kandy are death row convicts.

“18 of them are those who had been condemned for execution while six more of them are those who have appealed against (their) death sentence,” he said.

Executions do not take place in Sri Lanka even though death penalty is legal. No executions have taken place since June 23, 1976.

Successive Sri Lankan presidents since 1978 have declined to use hanging warrants for personal reasons. The death sentence therefore is commuted to life imprisonment.

Prisoners who have to suffer 20-year jail term instead of hanging seek remission at 10 years of their term, officials said.

However, at present no remission would be applicable until 20 years of sentence is completed. (PTI)

Edward Snowden, Whistle-Blower

By THE EDITORIAL BOARD-January 1, 2014

Seven months ago, the world began to learn the vast scope of the National Security Agency’s reach into the lives of hundreds of millions of people in the United States and around the globe, as it collects information about their phone calls, their email messages, their friends and contacts, how they spend their days and where they spend their nights. The public learned in great detail how the agency has exceeded its mandate and abused its authority, prompting outrage at kitchen tables and at the desks of Congress, which may finally begin to limit these practices.

Snowden Lied About China Contacts

Snowden lied about his contacts with China. Should he get clemency?

Yesterday, the New York Times urged the Obama administration to offer Edward Snowden “a plea bargain or some form of clemency.” The paper called the former NSA contractor “a whistle-blower” for his exposure of “the vast scope” of the NSA’s “reach into the lives of hundreds of millions of people in the United States and around the globe.”
Edward Snowden, Whistle-Blower by nelvely

Putin Gambles In A Tortured World: Is Russia’s Star Rising From The Ashes?

By Kumar David -January 5, 2014 

Prof Kumar David

From the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991, no from the latter part of Gorbochev’s cock-up, Russia has been sick, a wounded creature crawling on its belly. The state-owned economy was ripped and robbed by squadrons of oligarchs capitalising on the neoliberal Washington Consensus of the IMF, World Bank, and US Treasury, and dyed-in-the-wool dogma of American academia’s MIT economics department. At its nadir, poverty exceeded 50%, starvation and malnutrition spread, and alcoholism was up by 60%. Population declined sharply due to deprivation, not natural aging. Soviet rump Russia was a spent force, an impotent flop, bereft of military and economic clout. In this decade and a half long lean years NATO humiliated the rump, pushing its unwashed posterior right up the prostrate bear’s nose.

Nevertheless, strategically, Russia is custodian of the world’s largest and possibly dirtiest nuclear arsenal, though the efficacy of its delivery systems is suspect against high-tech American defences. But enough of a first salvo will get through to destroy metropolitan conurbations. As a global power, Russia will raise its head at a pace depending on opportunity and leadership. The question is whether this has already commenced. Putin scored a good six months in the second half of 2013 and successfully projected his national and international visibility. What next?

You can’t keep a resource rich country with superior research and education, a skilled labour-force and a classy cultural ethos down in the mud forever. If English is supreme in poesy (a multitude led by Shakespeare) Russian literature can claim a comparable status in prose (Gogol, Tolstoy, Dostoevsky and Chekhov for starters); and so it goes in music and ballet, architecture and in the sciences. On the grand scale the Russian chronicle sweeps through Peter the Great, the rituals of Orthodoxy, and a hundred year revolutionary tradition from Herzen to Bakunin to Lenin.

Russia in numbers                                                         Read More  

The Future Of Wellbeing

 by Victor Cherubim

( January 4, 2014 – London –Sri Lanka Guardian) Cambridge researcher Aubrey de Grey argues that “ageing is merely a disease – and a curable one at that”. Humans age in seven basic ways, he says all of which can be averted. While others maintain that the longer we can live, the more we value our lives and the more precious life becomes. Yet others state there are an infinite number of things one would like to do and see, but only so many one can find time and resources to achieve.

What is living longer mean?

Ordinarily for ordinary people it is living fuller for longer. It is not trying to eliminate old age but trying to get more out of the one life one has and that you need more years in that life to reach optimal fulfilment.

Medical advances in the post genomic age confront us in modern healthcare. Exploring the impact and the potential of rapidly developing technologies as applied to health and medicine, is a study by itself. With so many innovations, cybernomics ,bionics, nano technology, etc., medical knowledge is fast changing.

Medicine is evolving daily, monthly; yearly. To some extent medicine or rather therapeutic medicine is not evolving, but revolutionising itself. Genetic testing is starting to offer the chance of far more precise targeted treatment based on new knowledge of who is likely to benefit. From providing a platform for expert commentary and analysis, to tailoring the drug therapy at a dosage that is most appropriate for an individual patient, to increasing the potential benefits of the efficacy and safety regime of medication, healthcare is now powered by tools, tests and even apps, that bring diagnostic information right to the patient’s bedside, a new dawn at the least, in treatment.

The other day I was told by a friend that when he visited his GP for a check up he was prescribed a drug called “Nitrofurantoin” capsule as an antibiotic. But having been warned of immunisation to antibiotics, he visited the Emergency Department at his nearest hospital where the Consultant prescribed him a specific type of bacteria drug called “Ciprofloxacin”.

The reasoning was that “personalised medicine” was more important in treatment. The point at issue is that generally doctors have had recourse to treat patients with “broad spectrum” antibiotics, whereas hospitals are now very particular in prescribing, “specific and Personalised Medicine”.

What is happening today from random controlled trials, personalised medicine is assisting to shape the future of medicine. No two cancers are the same so even patients with tumours in the same part of the body, may respond differently to treatment.

We are noticing perhaps due to many factors including cost, population explosion, life expectancy and digital medicine, which “it has to be the right drug, to the right person at the right time”. Gone are the days of anything but the right treatment, for the wellbeing of patients.

We are learning that most diseases are caused by a complex interplay of genetic and other factors such age, lifestyles, hormones, medications, environment and other contributors. It is

no longer an acceptable practice or is ethical to prescribe any drug, to any patient.

In the first instance, the medical profession is slowly by surely recognising that impersonal, wide spectrum drugs are in many cases too expensive to say the least, the wrong treatment, to the wrong patient. This takes into account recent genomic, genetic and other data explosion in a clinical context.

With so many other advances in health care, of course quality of life is becoming an important consideration. But the sanctity of life and the duty of care in my opinion is paramount.

What then is life?

The battle over life and death, of even the most recent medical ethics case to catch the public’s attention is for serious consideration. Promoting good and avoiding harm are serious ethical questions of medicine. It is of course a difficult balance. We, in this instance are asked, both as individuals involved and our society in general, to make moral judgments about the appropriateness either to maintain or withdraw life sustaining treatment.

If we take the easy route of taking refuge in the so called “concept of suffering” involved, we naturally run into buffers. Many do not have the breath of understanding about the different types of brain injury. Coma, brain death, vegetative state, minimally conscious state are all separate and distinct conditions which a patient may pass through, but it is my firm belief that we as a civilised society should work with what we have and try to make it better.

This to me is the meaning of living.

January 3-5, 2014 -- NSA has capability to zap cell phone users with RF energy

Jan 3, 2014                                                                                                                                                  

January 3-5, 2014 -- NSA has capability to zap cell phone users with RF energy

According to a set of documents from the National Security Agency's ANT division, which likely stands for Access or Advanced Network Technology, the NSA has fielded special units which drive up the RF output of cell phones. According to medical experts, the increased radiation can cause brain cancer, skin burns, and eye cataracts.

The NSA unit is code named WATERWITCH.

WMR's editor discovered this technology the hard way when he received a second degree burn while talking on a Samsung cell phone in January 2011.

On January 10, 2011, WMR reported that this editor was under increased NSA surveillance because of a number of recent exposés of NSA:

"WMR has learned from an NSA source that this editor continues to remain a top priority for NSA electronic surveillance, including phone tapping and e-mail interception. NSA is also monitoring all those who are in communications with this editor via electronic means. WMR has previously reported on this web site's sources and contacts being major targets for NSA surveillance. Just as the latest report of NSA surveillance was received, this editor experienced a second-degree burn with blistering on the right neck and shoulder, usually where my cell phone is placed during conversations. The latest warning about NSA eavesdropping was received on January 8. The burn, that began as what can be described as a bad sunburn, began on the evening of January 6. The contour of the burn mark is oddly similar to the two equal halves of my flip-top telephone, with a white stripe in the middle where the hinge is located."

Second degree burns on Wayne Madsen's right shoulder and neck after January 2011 warning of increased NSA phone surveillance.

It now appears that the editor was subjected to a blast from WATERWITCH targeting and "finishing" signal boosting unit that works with the TYPHON equipment interrogator. The NSA document on WATERWITCH states the unit "emits tone and gives signal strength of target handset" from within a mile of the target.

North Korean Dictator Teaches Us A Few Handy Lessons

By Shyamon Jayasinghe -January 4, 2014 |

Shyamon Jayasinghe

On December 13^th in the year that has just passed North Korean Leader ( Dictator) self-styled as “Dear Leader,” Kim-Jong-Un, had his uncle Jong Song Thaek executed in public for “treachery.” The uncle’s aides were also executed along with him. An extract of a news story published in the Straits Times is given below. This gives a brief snapshot about the execution. I thought of presenting this story along with a few comments for the benefit of Colombo Telegraph readers as this incident throws light on the character and operational path of all dictators. Kim-Jong-Un’s uncle had helped to establish this young brute as successor when his father died. However, they soon fell out and the fall-out climaxed with the public execution.

”AFTER North Korean dictator Kim Jong-Un declared his uncle to be “despicable human scum, he got the latter executed in public.

The details were disclosed in a report, where unlike previous executions of political prisoners which were carried out by firing squads with machine guns, Jang Song Thaek was stripped naked and thrown into a cage, along with his five closest aides, the Straits Times reports.

“Then 120 hounds, starved for three days, were allowed to prey on them until they were completely eaten up. This is called “quan jue”, or execution by dogs.”

North Korean leader Kim Jong Un (left) with Jang Song Thaek, who was the vice-chairman of the National Defence Commission, at a cemetery for Korean War veterans in Pyongyang in July. Photo courtesy AP

The report also said the entire process lasted for an hour, with Jong-Un, watching it along with 300 senior officials.”

It is instructive for us to note the following lessons from this harrowing event and the narrative leading to it:

(1)  How dictators get swallowed up by a consuming passion to bring anything and everything under control. Kim has achieved this in great speed. All obstructions on the path are mercilessly destroyed. He saw his uncle and aides as a check on his ambition. The nature of this execution shows the vindictiveness and hate that dictators develop against their “enemies.”

(2)  The judge who tried the uncle was obviously Kim’s appointee and he gave the verdict that the Dictator wanted. This points to the danger of having a dependent judiciary. A judiciary in any country is supposed to be the last resort for those seeking relief and protection from the abuse of executives.

(3)  Kim has been lying and making bogus threats all along. Dictators tend to cut corners, truth being one of the easiest to trim.

(4)  Dictators tend to present to the public and the world a show of prosperity, pomp and glory. We all know that North Koreans are mostly struggling in the margins to survive. Yet Kim and his father before him concentrated on diverting resources to building a nuclear base. One of the poorest nations of the world has thus become a nuclear power.

Did North Korea's Kim Jong-un really kill his uncle with 120 starving dogs?

By Tim Stanley World Last updated: January 3rd, 2014

The thing about North Korea is that it's so mad, so gruesome that it's difficult not to believe whatever tall story you hear about it. Kim Jong-un ate a baby? The army uses kittens for taget practice? Kim Jong-il's reanimated corpse stalks the countryside scaring children? It all seems possible.

Which is why this story is so tempting. The Singaporean Straits Times reports that Chinese Media reports that Kim's recently slaughtered uncle was executed not by a firing squad but by a pack of hungry dogs. Look away if you have a weak stomach:

According to the report, unlike previous executions of political prisoners which were carried out by firing squads with machine guns, Jang was stripped naked and thrown into a cage, along with his five closest aides. Then 120 hounds, starved for three days, were allowed to prey on them until they were completely eaten up. This is called "quan jue", or execution by dogs.

The report said the entire process lasted for an hour, with Mr Kim Jong Un, the supreme leader in North Korea, supervising it along with 300 senior officials.

How did Kim "supervise" it exactly? By handing out popcorn?

Western news outlets are slowly picking up the story but I'd urge caution. North Korean media has made no reference to starved dogs, including in Kim's New Year's message – even though the chubby prince did describe his uncle as "filth" (and a Happy New Year to you, too, comrade!). Moreover, why were 120 hounds used when half a dozen would do? And why the audience of 300? It's all a bit James Bond, a bit shark-tank-in-an-underground-bunker.

The source is questionable, too. If the Chinese knew about how Kim's uncle died, why didn't they talk about it sooner and why did the story only leak out through a Hong Kong news outlet? The incident was first reported by the Wen Wei Po newspaper on December 12, yet it's only now that The Straits Times has commented upon it – and only now that the Western media has started to take notice. The Straits Times is a respectable and widely read publication, but it's often been accused of being the mouthpiece of Singapore's ruling party and is staunchly anti-communist – so political bias is possible. Finally, we can't dismiss the possibility that China itself has fabricated or at least encouraged the story to send a message to Pyongyang. Kim's uncle was the architect of closer economic ties between the China and North Korea and there is thought to be a lot of anger about his death.

My caution comes from bitter experience. A few months ago, I was one of many writers who fell for the claim that North Korean propaganda told its people that hungry Americans eat snow to survive. That turned out to be a fraud. But the problem with Kim's crazy "paradise" is that it's so thoroughly evil that it seems capable of any act of inhumanity. Including even this.

Heading towards a ‘third warning’ from Geneva 

By Manekshaw-December 28, 2013 


The Tamil National Alliance (TNA) has officially rebuked the call made by President Mahinda Rajapaksa in Parliament last week to participate at the Parliamentary Select Committee (PSC) to deal with the Tamil question. 
The President extended the invitation to participate at the PSC to the TNA’s two key figures, the leader of the Alliance, R. Sampanthan, and Northern Provincial Council Chief Minister, C.V. Wigneswaran.

Heading towards a ‘third warning’ from Geneva by nelvely

Sri Lanka One Island Two Nations

History of Sri Lanka part 1 .(Tamil)

Published on Dec 29, 2013

History of Sri Lanka part 2 .(Tamil)

Tamil Nation Awaiting Justice In Sri Lanka

By G K Nathan -January 3, 2014

Dr. G K Nathan

Open Letter to Members of United Nation Human Right Council –Tamil Nation Awaiting Justice in Sri Lanka   

Ancient Sea-Routes to East and West from the
Ports of South India

Open Letter to Members of United Nation Human Right Council –Tamil Nation Awaiting Justice in Sri Lanka   

Sri Lanka an Island is presently inhabited by multilingual (Sinhala, Tamil and English) multireligious (Buddhists, Hindus, Muslims and Christians) and multiethnic (Sinhala, Tamil, Arab and European descendents) 

Ancient Indian ocean-going ship arriving at Java, from a frieze of the Borobodur stupa (Indonesia).

 peoples. Brief history of Sinhala and Tamil Nations gives evidence of antiquity of Tamil Nation and both Nations have lived in the Island for a few millennia. Each of the two Nations meets the legal definition of a Nation: “A distinct group or race of people that share history, traditions and culture” for obvious reasons the language has been left out in the legal definition as many ancient Nations in Asia, Australia, Americas etc speak variety of languages or dialects. In Sri Lanka, both Nations speak two different languages which further reinforce the concept and differences between the two Nations, recognition and acceptance is a prerequisite for reconciliation to occur. Tamils are a sea-faring Nation as known from ancient literature; further reinforced in A Survey of Indian History by Sardar Kavalam Madhava Panikkar which says “From the first century CE we witness the strange fact of Hindu or Hindu (influenced) kingdoms in Annam, Cochin-China and the islands of the Pacific. The Ramayana knew of Java and Sumatra. Communication by sea between the ports of South India and the islands of the Pacific was well established many centuries before the Christian era.” Beside that majority of Tamil population live in South India across the Palk straight from time immemorial and they were the first settlers in Sri Lanka, as seen by the archeological evidence before others came to the Island. Further evidence can be found from the website “A Tribute to Hinduism” the extracted evidence given below shows: the major sea-route linking South India to South East Asia and to the West, and a frieze of ocean going ship’s arrival from South India at Borobudur in Java.        Read More

Cat Burglar Caught Pronto

killers of scribes and activists roam free

| by Pearl Thevanayagam

(January 03, 2014 - London - Sri Lanka Guardian) The burglar who robbed Mangala Samaraweera of his laptop and foreign liquor was soon apprehended by the police. But killers of human rights lawyer Kumar Ponnambalam and Sunday Leader editor Lasantha Wickrematunge whose death anniversaries fall on January 05 and January 08 respectively are roaming scot-free.

Kumar received a telephone call on January 05, 2000 to come to Wellawatte to meet someone and he chose to drive his car himself and was shot point-blank in broad daylight. Lasantha was brutally murdered on his way to work in a high security zone on January 08, 2009 by several armede men who used revolvers and truncheons to bash down the car windows in broad daylight when he drove the car himself instead of his driver as was his custom.

Prageeth Ekneliyagoda, the cartoonist who disappeared in January 2010, is still missing and feared dead although CJ Mohan Peiris let it rip to the international media he had sought refuge in a European country on the flimsy evidence from a lowly government MP who heard it from someone who said he had seen him in France. Neither can pinpoint where he is.

Killers of Richard de Soysa, the first journalist to be murdered by the government in 1990, were apprehended and subsequently released. His ‘crime’ was sending video-tapes of Black Cats (notorious and brutal killer squads led by DIG Udugampola who roamed the length and breadth of Southern Sri Lanka in the dead of the night) under President Premadasa abducting and murdering JVP youth to DPA, an international News Agency. They were men in army fatique.

K.Sivaram alias Taraki, Aiyathurai Nadesan, Relangi Selvarajah, Ketheeswaran Loganathan, BBC’s Nimalarajan , Puniyamoorthi and Isaipriya among other journalists sacrificed their lives in the call of duty at the hands of killer squads and to date not a single killer had been arrested or charged.

To date almost 40 media personnel have been killed by successive governments and their sins were exposing bribery and corruption, human rights violations, nepotism among other irregularities by government agents and top and not so important politicians all cocooned and feathered by the governments in power.

Iqbal Athas, a well respected journalist who wrote the defence report for Sunday Times and CNN correspondent was hounded out through intimidation, attack and threats on his life and those of his wife and daughter.

The exodus of journalists intensified after Mahinda Rajapakse and his family ascended the throne of parliament.

This is not happening in Communist North Korea, China or Russia where such crimes are the prerogative of the ruling powers; this is happening in the Democratic Socialist Republic of Sri Lanka once known as Serendib meaning peaceful isle.

As we mark the eighth anniversary of university students who were brutally murdered while relaxing on a beach in Trincomalee and question the impunity with which the government sends out is agents to kill at will as they did with the French aid workers in Batticaloa we can only stand aside and keep mum for fear of being bumped off.

Media in Sri Lanka be it state or otherwise is under the total control of the state as long as the reporting is from within the country.

The islanders are known for their bon-homie and hospitality but lurking under this façade is a nation tainted by mass graves of dissenters, murky underworld killer squads (consisting of government security forces and paramilitary groups supporting the regime) directly under the supervision of the governments who would kill for a few lakhs of rupees and corruption at all levels of governance only matched if not being superceded by its neighbouring India.

There is much work for international investigators of Sri Lanka’s notorious history of mass murders, war crimes and media suppression and we have less than three months before all the evidence is presented prior to the UNHRC sessions in March. Could 2014 bring relief to the victims of the violent regime? Only if we act fast and furiously.

(The writer has been a journalist for 24 years and worked in national newspapers as sub-editor, news reporter and news editor. She was Colombo Correspondent for Times of India and has contributed to Wall Street Journal where she was on work experience from The Graduate School of Journalism, UC Berkeley, California. Currently residing in UK she is also co-founder of EJN (Exiled Journalists Network) UK in 2005 the membership of which is 200 from 40 countries. She can be reached at pearltheva@hotmail.com)

Early 1988: Conspiracies Galore

By Rajan Hoole -January 3, 2014

Rajan Hoole

The Year 1988: The Red Moon Over Sri Lanka And The Dawn Of New Wisdom – Part 2

In the absence of constraining loyalties or principles, particularly within the UNP, politics by early 1988 had become very volatile. India had enforced the Accord after recently threatening the Sri Lankan Government with logistical support for its erstwhile protege, the LTTE, with which she was now (in 1988) locked in conflict. Assignment Colombo (AC), the book written by J.N. Dixit, who was then Indian High Commissioner, while whitewashing India’s record during that period, gives us valuable insights into the political atmosphere in the South. At the time the Accord was signed, it would have been quite logical for Premadasa and Athulathmudali to encourage the JVP and other extremist elements to launch violent demonstrations against it for their own ends. But Dixit’s charge that Athulathmudali supplied arms to the JVP (AC, p.209), has so far not been supported by evidence.

Way back in mid-July 1985 Mrs. Bandaranaike had warned Dixit that Jayewardene was not serious about coming to terms with the Tamils and about the negative approach of Premadasa and Athulathmudali. Judging by her own actions in 1987, it seems that they were all in the race for the high ground of Sinhalese chauvinism. Privately, Athulathmudali confided to Dixit that the Bandaranaike-Chelvanayakam pact of 1957 if implemented would have solved the problem. When India was pressing for further concessions to the Tamils in the run up to the Accord, Athulathmudali had asked Dixit whether he could have confidential discussions with Rajiv Gandhi. By so doing Athulathmudali hoped to steal a march on his rival Gamini Dissanayake who, along with N. Ram of the Hindu and Dixit, was a key player behind the Accord. This was not encouraged (p.126).

To be continued..

*From Rajan Hoole‘s “Sri Lanka: Arrogance of Power  - Myth, Decadence and Murder”. Thanks to Rajan for giving us permission to republish. To read earlier parts click here

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