When a toddler fell into a zoo enclosure 20 years ago, he was saved — by a gorilla

By Lindsey Bever June 1

Days after a young boy fell into the gorilla exhibit at the Cincinnati zoo — prompting the zoo’s decision to shoot and kill a 17-year-old gorilla — archived video has emerged showing a similar incident 20 years ago, with a very different outcome.

In summer 1996, a rambunctious 3-year-old boy slipped away from his mother and squeezed through a barrier at the Brookfield Zoo in Illinois, plummeting more than 15 feet into a pit holding several gorillas. One of them scooped up the toddler, cradled him, carried him to paramedics — and gained international fame.

WGN-TV posted the footage of the moment Binti Jua, a rare western lowland gorilla who was then 8 years old, picked up the boy after he fell to the concrete floor. Witnesses said Binti Jua mothered him for several minutes while toting her own 17-month-old baby on her back, according to WGN-TV.

“She picked up the boy, kind of cradling him, and walked him around,” zoo spokeswoman Sondra Katzen told the Chicago Tribune back in 1996. Katzen added that the boy was “was alert and crying when the paramedics came and got him.”

The boy, whose name was not released, had a broken hand and minor cuts, but he recovered, WGN-TV reported.

[‘It could have been very bad': Gorilla killed after boy falls into Cincinnati zoo exhibit]

The situation on Saturday started in a similar way: A 3-year-old boy climbed through a barrier to the gorilla exhibit at the Cincinnati Zoo & Botanical Garden and fell into a moat in the enclosure, according to the zoo.

A 3-year-old boy fell into an endangered gorilla's enclosure at the Cincinnati Zoo on May 28, and a witness captured the scene as onlookers shouted for help. The gorilla, a 17-year-old named Harambe, was shot by zoo staff in order for rescuers to reach the boy. (Kimberley O'Connor/ViralHog)

But it progressed differently. Zoo Director Thane Maynard told reporters that a male gorilla named Harambe “went down and got” the boy and started to drag him.

“It seemed very much by our professional team, our dangerous-animal response team, to be a life-threatening situation,” Maynard said over the weekend. “And so the choice was made to put down, or shoot, Harambe.

“And so he’s gone.”

[Grief over gorilla’s death turns to outrage; prosecutors’ office to meet with police]

The incident ignited uproar, with some people criticizing the zoo’s decision to put down the gorilla and others pointing fingers at the boy’s parents for not supervising the child. The Hamilton County prosecutor’s office later announced that it will meet with local authorities following a police investigation into the matter, though it is still unclear whether — or against whom — any criminal charges would be filed.

The child’s family, which has been declining interview requests, released a statement Wednesday morning, saying that the small boy was “doing well” and asking people to remember the gorilla that lost its life.

“We continue to praise God for His grace and mercy, and to be thankful to the Cincinnati Zoo for their actions taken to protect our child,” the family said in the statement to the Cincinnati Enquirer. “We are also very appreciative for the expressions of concern and support that have been sent to us.

“Some have offered money to the family, which we do not want and will not accept,” the statement said. “If anyone wishes to make a gift, we recommend a donation to the Cincinnati Zoo in Harambe’s name.”

The mother of the 3-year-old boy who fell into the gorilla exhibit at the Cincinnati Zoo Saturday frantically called 911 and described the animal dragging her son. (AP)

[Family of boy who fell into gorilla exhibit asks for zoo donations in animal’s memory]

As debate over the incident continued, Ian Redmond, a biologist and conservationist who says he has worked with gorillas for some 40 years, penned an op-ed published in the Guardian on Tuesday, suggesting that the zookeepers may have had other options, such as using tranquilizer darts or distracting the gorilla with a treat.

Killing animals, he said, should always be a last resort.

In the wild, Redmond said, mature male gorillas known as silverbacks do “strut and display their strength,” sometimes by dragging things, including humans, across the forest floor. In a concrete jungle, he said, such a display can be more harmful.

“My immediate response to the news was a deep sense of regret and sadness,” he wrote. “Watching the shaky phone video, it is clear that the child was understandably frightened and the gorilla 

understandably stressed, but in the video shown on the news websites, Harambe did not attack the child. 

He pulled the child through the water of the moat, at one point held his hand — apparently gently, stood him up and examined his clothing.”

Redmond added: “Clearly if a silverback wanted to kill a child, he could do so in an instant. But he didn’t.”

Harambe. (Cincinnati Zoo/Reuters)

However, Redmond said, zookeepers were faced with a tough decision.

“Without knowing what happened in the seconds leading up to the lethal shot, we are not in a position to judge the outcome,” he wrote in the Guardian. “I can imagine the panic of the child’s mother and the fear of the zoo staff. For a man with a gun thinking a child is in danger, it is a tough decision and the zoo is standing firmly behind their use of lethal force.”

Redmond referenced the 1996 incident and another, in 1986, when a 5-year-old boy who fell into an ape pit at Jersey Zoo in the United Kingdom. In both cases, the animals protected the boys.

The video from 1996 shows Binti Jua carrying the limp boy while zookeepers spray water from above to keep the other gorillas in the exhibit from interfering.

“I feared the worst,” Jeff Bruno, a paramedic who ran to the zoo’s primate exhibit, told People magazine at the time. “I didn’t know if she was going to treat him like a doll or a toy.”

Binti Jua had been abandoned and raised by humans, and when it came time for her to be a mother, trainers taught her how to care for a baby gorilla using dolls, a zoo curator told the Chicago Tribune at the time.

“She was better than we expected,” her keeper, Craig Demitros, told People. “She’s a great mom now.”

Experts were asked why a gorilla might show compassion to a human child: Could her own upbringing have played a role?

“She saw this thing lying there,” Jack Hanna, who was director emeritus of Columbus Zoo, told People, “and she knew from humans taking care of her that they could take care of this problem.”

Still, the gorilla’s reaction to the small boy left some experts in awe.

“I could not believe how gentle she was,” Celeste Lombardi, who helped raised Binti Jua, told the magazine in 1996. “I just had chills. I was very proud.”

Binti Jua still lives at the Brookfield Zoo, where she is among four generations of western lowland gorillas.

This is Your Brain. This is Your Brain as a Weapon.

Jann Scheuermann, who has quadriplegia, brings a chocolate bar to her mouth using a robot arm she is guiding with her thoughts. She later flew an F-35 fighter-jet simulator.

Cutting-edge neural technologies can erase traumatic memories and read people’s thoughts. They could also become the 21st century’s next battleground.

BY TIM REQUARTH-1 June 2016

ILLUSTRATIONS BY JIMMY TURRELL

On an otherwise routine July day, inside a laboratory at Duke University, two rhesus monkeys sat in separate rooms, each watching a computer screen that featured an image of a virtual arm in two-dimensional space. The monkeys' task was to guide the arm from the center of the screen to a target, and when they did so successfully, the researchers rewarded them with sips of juice.

But there was a twist. The monkeys were not provided with joysticks or any other devices that could manipulate the arm. Rather, they were relying on electrodes implanted in portions of their brains that influence movement. The electrodes were able to capture and transmit neural activity through a wired connection to the computers.

Making things even more interesting, the primates shared control over the digital limb. In one experiment, for example, one monkey could direct only horizontal actions, while the other guided just vertical motions. Yet the monkeys began to learn by association that a particular way of thinking resulted in the movement of the limb. After grasping this pattern of cause and effect, they kept up the behavior--joint thinking, essentially--that led the arm to the target and earned them juice.

Neuroscientist Miguel Nicolelis, who led the research, published earlier this year, has a name for this remarkable collaboration: a "brainet." Ultimately, Nicolelis hopes that brain-to-brain cooperation could be used to hasten rehabilitation in people who have neurological damage--more precisely, that a healthy person's brain could work interactively with that of a stroke patient, who would then relearn more quickly how to speak or move a paralyzed body part.

His work is the latest in a long string of recent advances in neurotechnologies: the interfaces applied to neurons, the algorithms used to decode or stimulate those neurons, and brain maps that produce a better overall understanding of the organ's complex circuits governing cognition, emotion and action. From a medical perspective, a great deal stands to be gained from all this, including more dexterous prosthetic limbs that can convey sensation to their wearers, new insights into diseases like Parkinson's, and even treatments for depression and a variety of other psychiatric disorders. That's why, around the world, major research efforts are underway to advance the field.

But there is a potentially dark side to these innovations. Neurotechnologies are “dual-use” tools, which means that in addition to being employed in medical problem-solving, they could also be applied (or misapplied) for military purposes.

The same brain-scanning machines meant to diagnose Alzheimer’s disease or autism could potentially read someone’s private thoughts. Computer systems attached to brain tissue that allow paralyzed patients to control robotic appendages with thought alone could also be used by a state to direct bionic soldiers or pilot aircraft. And devices designed to aid a deteriorating mind could alternatively be used to implant new memories, or to extinguish existing ones, in allies and enemies alike.

Consider Nicolelis’s brainet idea. Taken to its logical extreme, says bioethicist Jonathan Moreno, a professor at the University of Pennsylvania, merging brain signals from two or more people could create the ultimate superwarrior. “What if you could get the intellectual expertise of, say, Henry Kissinger, who knows all about the history of diplomacy and politics, and then you get all the knowledge of somebody that knows about military strategy, and then you get all the knowledge of a DARPA engineer, and so on,” he says, referring to the U.S. Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency. “You could put them all together.” Such a brainet would create near-military omniscience in high-stakes decisions, with political and human ramifications.

To be clear, such ideas are still firmly in the realm of science fiction. But it’s only a matter of time, some experts say, before they could become realities. Neurotechnologies are swiftly progressing, meaning that eventual breakout capabilities and commercialization are inevitable, and governments are already getting in on the action. DARPA, which executes groundbreaking scientific research and development for the U.S. Defense Department, has invested heavily in brain technologies. In 2014, for example, the agency started developing implants that detect and suppress urges. The stated aim is to treat veterans suffering from conditions such as addiction and depression. It’s conceivable, however, that this kind of technology could also be used as a weapon—or that proliferation could allow it to land in the wrong hands. “It’s not a question of if nonstate actors will use some form of neuroscientific techniques or technologies,” says James Giordano, a neuroethicist at Georgetown University Medical Center, “but when, and which ones they’ll use.”

People have long been fascinated, and terrified, by the idea of mind control. It may be too early to fear the worst—that brains will soon be vulnerable to government hacking, for instance—but the dual-use potential of neurotechnologies looms. Some ethicists worry that, absent a legal framework to govern these tools, advances in the lab could enter the real world dangerously unencumbered.

For better or for worse, Giordano says, “the brain is the next battlespace.”

Read More

She Thinks She Has A Blister..But When She Goes To The Doctor? HOLY COW!

June 1, 2016
Carelle Mowatt, who works as a country singer, recently noticed that a blister had appeared on her leg. Thinking it might be a case of ringworm, she did not make a doctor’s appointment. As the blister continued to grow, Mowatt became more concerned and after it burst, revealing a nasty wound underneath, she finally had it checked out. She then got the shock of her life.

Learn QiGong in 3 Easy Lessons Get Your Free QiGong Video Course Mowatt was told the blister formed because she had been bitten by a poisonous recluse spider. She was put on antibiotics and carefully changed the bandage on her leg each day. After 14 days, Mowatt was in such terrible pain, she went to the hospital where she was treated with a stronger set of antibiotics and given morphine to manage the pain. Despite the aggressive treatment, her condition continued to deteriorate over several months until the wound turned into a hole in her leg that was progressing toward gangrene.The dead tissue was removed so new tissue could grow in its place. Mowatt endured such intense pain during the procedure, she had to be held down by several people. In the end, the infection was cured and Mowatt’s leg finally healed. She uses her story to warn people not to ignore any medical symptom, no matter how small.

‘Never again’

Survivors who have suffered untold pain and loss, must frame the current debate on transitional justice. To what extent the Government, legal drafters and reconciliation agencies understand that behind the academic debate lies the suffering of real people, and how far the Government can convince people on both sides of the ethnic divide to acknowledge each other’s pain, will ultimately determine the success or failure of its search for truth and justice – AFP Photo

Thursday, 2 June 2016

The Government’s ambitious truth and justice project is only as successful as its recognition of the real victims transitional justice mechanisms are supposed to serve and its ability to convince the entire country of the desperate need to acknowledge pain on both sides of the ethnic divide in order to reconcile

On a rain-washed evening in Kilinochchi about three weeks ago, Saraswathi Ramasamy related a story, her words tumbling out in a rush as her expert hands deftly sliced a green mango plucked from a tree in the garden. She hands a piece to each visitor, speaking earnestly, quietly all the while. The day had been long and the unfolding twilight was distracting in the wild and sprawling property her family owns in the tiny village of Ambalpuram. It took a few minutes before the gravity of Saraswathi’s story began to sink in.

She spoke of a family trapped in a shrinking battlefield, over several months pushed and pushed to the very edges of the Wanni. They had tried to stay together and find a way to escape the fighting by crossing into ‘cleared areas’ the war-time term for territory held by Government forces. As they ran, the family had to keep taking cover from the shells raining down on the area from far-off artillery positions.

One day, the family was on the run again when the shells started falling. For Saraswathi’s youngest daughter, only 12 at the time, death came instantaneously, her mother says. Alongside the child, lay four other members of the Ramasamy’s extended family, Saraswathi’s brother-in-law, his wife and two children – all killed by the single wayward shell.

“There was nothing we could do. We had to keep running. We dug a hole and buried all five inside. Then we had to go,” she explains. Throughout Saraswathi’s tale, she never once apportions blame. There is only weary resignation. And tremendous, still-lingering, pain.

The tale was chillingly familiar, mirrored in multiple UN documents and media reports. But it was the fact that we had just stumbled upon her randomly and the nature of her retelling that was so haunting. But it wasn’t random. In Kilinochchi, the heart of the Tigers’ de facto administration for so many years, nearly every resident will tell similar stories; speak of similar terror, of similar loss.

Moving forward

Seven years later, even in this district at the heart of the conflict between the LTTE and the Sri Lankan Government, much of the time the war seems so far away. New roads, buildings sparkling in the sun and ambitious livelihood programmes are altering the landscape in the most battle-worn towns. But Saraswathi’s story of how her family had been touched by those much-written about final battles a few miles from where we were sitting, watching the darkness fall, brought the legacy of the conflict back with disturbing suddenness.

The Ramasamy family embodies the determination and resilience of a community intent on moving forward – a new house to replace the shell-shattered one still standing in the compound, a tractor to rent out in ploughing season and a fresh-faced young girl whose job at an apparel factory is altering her family’s fortunes. Saraswathi beams with pride about her daughter’s success that we have visited to chronicle. But the pain of loss is never far away either.

As her daughter speaks cheerfully during an interview of her future plans – to find a husband, to build another house for themselves in the same property – Saraswathi wrings her hands and whispers the rest of her tale to anyone willing to listen. Her eyes full of a million unshed tears, she speaks again about the little daughter she buried on that blood-soaked strip of beach deep inside the Mullaitivu District.

“She was only 12 years old. This is what I can’t bear.” 

Transitional justice

Survivors like Saraswathi, people who have suffered untold pain and loss, must frame the current debate on transitional justice. To what extent the Government, legal drafters and reconciliation agencies understand that behind the academic debate lies the suffering of real people, and how far the Government can convince people on both sides of the ethnic divide to acknowledge each other’s pain, will ultimately determine the success or failure of its search for truth and justice.

Seven years to the month after the war ended, the Government announced its intent to establish the first ‘pillar’ of a four-pillar transitional justice mechanism it committed to at the UN Human Rights Council in Geneva last September. Draft legislation to set up a Permanent Office of Missing People (OMP) was presented to Cabinet by Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe last week, eight months after the pledge in Geneva.

Concerns have been raised by civil society and human rights groups about the failure to consult victim families before the mechanism was designed. But over a relatively short period of consultations with disappearances activists, civil society and other stakeholders, including the Tamil National Alliance, the Government has managed to draft legislation to deal with an acute problem that even activists grudgingly admit addresses major areas of concern with regard to disappearances.

The legislation empowers the Office, comprising 14 commissioners appointed by the Constitutional Council to investigate and trace missing people and relay information to victim families. A controversial clause under discussion during the consultations was a proposed ‘firewall’ between the OMP and other transitional justice structures the Government is proposing – specifically the prevention of testimony provided to the OMP being shared with a future prosecutor or investigator on the Special Court that was also proposed as part of the four pillar system to prosecute perpetrators of war-time atrocities. This provision was subsequently excluded, even while the OMP will have no power to prosecute.

The OMP Bill was approved by the Cabinet of Ministers and has just been gazetted. It is likely to be tabled in Parliament during the UNHRC June Session which begins in two weeks. Interestingly, the remit of the OMP includes an open timeframe, allowing the Commissioners to hear testimony and trace disappearances which occurred outside and beyond the civil war. If it becomes a credible, working mechanism, the OMP could potentially help families who have been searching for loved ones since the JVP insurrections of 1971 and the 1980s to finally get some answers.

For the Government, the OMP is what it likes to refer to as ‘low-hanging fruit’. That is, the parts of the transitional justice structure that can be established quickly are widely acknowledged by all parties as crucial to national healing and will result in the least political stumbling blocks. But while the OMP is largely uncontroversial, it’s also a crucial place to start the justice-seeking process.

In Sri Lanka and countless other countries in transition from conflict or authoritarianism, transitional justice processes have been driven by disappearances activists. The most powerful of these is the Madres de Plaza de Mayo in Argentina, where some 30,000 people were disappeared between 1976 and 1983 by a series of military juntas. Powerful and unrelenting agitation by disappearances activists in Argentina paved the way for criminal charges to be filed against 800 accused, with 200 sentenced following trials in domestic courts. Last week, an Argentine court convicted 18 former military officers – including Argentina’s last dictator Reynaldo Bignone, 88 – on charges including kidnapping, torture and forced disappearances during a brutal multi-nation operation to eliminate left-wing activists across South America. Families of the disappeared are patently visible victims and become powerful symbols in campaigns to end impunity.

This holds true for Sri Lanka, where thousands of families searching for loved ones missing since the war have become the faces of the clamour for justice and accountability for crimes committed in the final months of the war; while victims of indiscriminate shelling, for instance, have remained mostly invisible. As has become apparent during the LLRC and Paranagama Commission processes, the testimony of these families will continue to point to major rights violations and potential violations of international humanitarian law that governs conflict situations. There is, in fact, no better place to start the truth-seeking process.

Key reforms

Ahead of the June session of the Human Rights Council, the Government will also try to begin the process to reform the Prevention of Terrorism Act (PTA) with a new bill that seeks to bring the country’s anti-terror laws within the framework of international law and best practice. Agitation for reform of the draconian PTA has been long-standing and forms an important aspect of the Government’s international human rights commitments.

Ahead of the UNHRC session in March 2017, when a full report on the Sri Lankan Government’s implementation of the resolution it co-sponsored in September 2015 comes due, the Government will try to complete the next least controversial step in its four-pillar proposal for transitional justice: the truth and reconciliation commission.

By this time, the Government also hopes the constitution-making process will also be well underway, with power-sharing proposals for the Tamil-dominated Northern and Eastern Provinces on the table that will help to demonstrate its commitment to preventing a recurrence of ethnic strife. It is also hopeful that perceptions about justice seeking will change within the country by this time, as the reconciliation drive gains momentum and nationalist hysteria whipped up by the former administration dies down. To this end, the Government will take its time over the establishment of the special court to try alleged war crimes.

In the same week that the Government unveiled the OMP, it also doubled down on its insistence about the exclusion of foreign judges from the special court. Senior Ministers speaking on condition of anonymity told Daily FT that the Government had decided foreign judges were “off the table,” but that they were also hoping international participation in the special court could be accommodated in other ways, such as the inclusion of foreign investigators, experts and forensic analysts in the prosecutorial process.

There are other complications with regard to the establishment of the court, even one that comprises only local jurists. For one thing, Sri Lanka currently has no laws to prosecute violations of international humanitarian law – war crimes and crimes against humanity. These are not crimes, legal analysts say, that can or should be tried under the category of ‘murder’ or ‘abduction’ because of the systemic nature and enormity of the crimes. A prerequisite for prosecutions in the proposed special court therefore would be the enactment of retroactive legislation, or ex post facto law.

Sri Lanka already has precedent for introducing statutes in this way, specifically during the Sepala Ekanayake hijacking case in 1982. Ekanayake hijacked and diverted an Alitalia aircraft in order to be reunited with his Italian wife and their son and demand a $ 300,000 ransom from the Italian Government. Rather than submit to Italy’s demand for Ekanayake’s extradition after his return to Sri Lanka, the Government introduced retroactive legislation to prosecute the hijacker domestically.

By 1982, Sri Lanka had ratified all three major international conventions on air piracy but had failed to pass enabling legislation to make Ekanayake’s actions criminal in the country. Three weeks after the hijacking, the Sri Lankan Parliament passed the Offences Against Aircraft Act of 1982, which was importantly, decreed to be law retroactively from 1978, making Ekanayake’s crime retroactively illegal under Sri Lankan law. Under the 1978 Constitution, ex post facto criminal law can only be enacted if the law is based on general principles of international law. In the case of the proposed Special Court, the enactment of ex post facto law will be possible since International Humanitarian Law (IHL) now falls within the ambit of customary international law as accepted by UN member states.

The larger problem, from the Government’s perspective, will be getting this law through Parliament with a Mahinda Rajapaksa-led Joint Opposition likely to oppose tooth and nail any mechanism to try soldiers for crimes committed during the war or apportion blame for alleged atrocities on a command structure which at the time included key members of the Rajapaksa family.

The Special Court will remain the Government’s last priority, therefore, until it is confident it can carry the southern constituency along in the accountability process and prevent a political backlash from the nationalist fringe.

Danger in delay

The danger, civil society activists say, is that prolonging the implementation of the promised structures will destroy momentum and delay justice for victims – perhaps indefinitely if the current administration is unseated or the political will for delivering transitional justice proves fleeting. So far, the Government is yet to take meaningful steps to change attitudes in the south with regard to the accountability process. It is certainly not sowing mistrust between communities about this process, but it has also failed to take an offensive path and really ‘own’ its truth and reconciliation initiatives.

Foreign Minister Mangala Samaraweera is an exception to this rule. Samaraweera is confident that the southern constituency has the capacity for compassion, if and when the truth about what happened during the final months of the war is finally revealed. Minister Samaraweera believes that the people of south have been influenced by a six-year propaganda operation executed by the Rajapaksa administration, to believe that justice for atrocities committed in war time was tantamount to a betrayal of the security forces and a repudiation of the ‘righteousness’ of the war against the LTTE.

The Foreign Minister, who has the heart of an activist still after a year in Government, speaks openly about how he showed several members of his Matara constituency the Channel 4 footage from the final weeks of the war, which laid bare unspeakable atrocities in the battlefields of the Wanni. At the end of it, Samaraweera says, grown men watching the footage had been in tears. “The Sinhalese people are a pretty compassionate bunch,” he says.

Samaraweera’s assertions may not necessarily be wrong. Observers of the LLRC process speak of how they watched the personal transformations of the Commissioners on the Rajapaksa appointed panel as the proceedings progressed.

Victim testimony is a powerful force. The faces and voices behind the technical narrative of events that unfolded during the final days of the war humanise the truth-seeking process and give it life and meaning. Perhaps that explains why the LLRC report, against all odds, became a largely-credible document that has been used ever since by the international community as a blueprint for reconciliation in Sri Lanka.

A credible Truth and Reconciliation Commission, with public sittings that are broadcast live across the country, could be the best case the Government could ever make for the establishment of a special court to try major cases of rights violations during the war. For that reason, the Government’s plan to begin with the least controversial aspects as it sets up the Transitional Justice structure could still work.

Justice and accountability

Saraswathi Ramasamy returned to Mullivaikal only once after the war ended. She went back to collect her daughter’s death certificate. She remembers where they dug the rough hole that would serve as a single grave for five people. “I went back and I looked at that spot. Small trees had started to sprout over the grave. I decided to let it be. I don’t want to go back there again.”

In the grand picture of justice and accountability in Sri Lanka, Saraswathi Ramasamy is one of the invisible victims. During the war, even while living in the Tiger stronghold, the Ramasamy family stayed out of the fight, hiding their children during LTTE recruitment drives and staying out of trouble and under the radar. Post-conflict, she is neither activist nor agitator. She and her family have chosen to move on; to rebuild. But victims like her must be seen. They must be acknowledged. From the battlefields of Mullivaikal to the mass burial site recently uncovered in Matale, there are countless victims and tragic stories behind the push for justice and accountability.

The ongoing process of reconciliation and transitional justice is far from perfect. It is not fast enough, it is not consultative enough, and it is fraught with political danger for a Government that is still finding its feet. But in spite of the imperfections, this process, combined with the promise of a new Constitution to guarantee the rights of all Sri Lankans and a Government that is still displaying a degree of political will, could be the country’s last best hope to bring about a sustainable, lasting peace. True peace will elude Sri Lanka until the north and the south can find a way to acknowledge each other’s pain and loss, the murder and exploitation of fellow citizens and resolve that it must never happen again.

The struggle for transitional justice is not an abstract; it involves real victims, real crimes and a real clamour for justice that must be grappled with, to end the cyclical violence and bloodletting that has marked every decade since independence. For too long, truth and justice seeking for crimes committed in war-time has been viewed as an international prescription upon a smaller, weaker state. It is not a ‘Geneva issue’ or a ‘foreign policy debacle’. Respect for human rights is at the heart of the re-democratisation project that began on 8 January 2015; and the truth is that the search for answers and answerability is a battle to regain Sri Lanka’s soul.

TIME FOR DEMOCRATISATION OF THE STATE AND NATIONAL RECONCILIATION – PRC REPORT

( Senior lawyer Lal Wijenayke chaired  the committee)

01/06/2016

The finalized Public Representations Committee report on public submissions to the Constitution submitted to the Prime Minister on 31st May 2016. The report is comprehensive and has 222 pages. It has been released to public in all three offcial languages of Sri Lanka.The full report is attached at the end of this news item.

“”We have done our best to reach a wide section of the people within the given time frame. We have gone out of the way to get the views of religious leaders, leaders of political parties, independent commissions, professional organizations, etc. within the
available time frame.

Our sittings were held in public and all those who appeared before us were allowed to express their views freely and openly. On a study of the representations made by the people it is seen that a considerable representation of people throughout Sri Lanka are for:

1. Democratisation of the State, by establishing the Rule of Law, broadening Fundamental Human Rights through a comprehensive Bill of Rights and strengthening independent commissions.

2. Democratisation of the polity by strengthening institutions for people’s active participation in governance and political life by devolving power to the provincial and local government level and by incorporating citizens’ political activity at the village or town level into the State structure.

3. National reconciliation as an urgent task. There were divergent views as to how it could be achieved. Among these, one view was that constitutional reform should focus on meaningful devolution of power as a means of resolving the longstanding political issue of the minorities.

4. The establishment of a public service that is closer to the people, fair, nonpolitical, independent, professional and dedicated to serve the people.

It was also a common view of the people who came before us, that the time is opportune for democratisation of the State and national reconciliation that it should be done immediately and if it fails at this moment, the country will not get such an opportunity again.”

Read the full report as a PDF: PRC Report English Final 
Sinhala and in Tamil.     

PRC-Report-English-Final.pdf by Thavam Ratna

Batticaloa Tamil Journalists Association protest for justice

01 June 2016

The Batticaloa District Tamil Journalists Association staged a protest on Wednesday demanding justice for the demanded justice for the murder of journalist Ayuthurai Nadesan who was killed in Batticaloa twelve years ago.

Photograph:Tamil Guardian

Journalists and members of local civil society gathered in Kandhi Park to demand the new Sirisena government to reopen the case of Nadesan’s murder.

A petition calling on government authorities to reopen the murder case and investigate other past killings and abductions of Tamil journalists was handed over to the Deputy Inspector General (DIG) in Batticaloa.

Murdered Tamil journalist Aiyathurai Nadesan remembered in Batticaloa (30 May 2016)

Conviction of Chad leader for Crimes against Humanity - Will Sri Lanka reverse the trend? TGTE

Jun 01, 2016

As the world celebrate the historic conviction of the former Chad leader Mr. Hissene Habre for committing Crimes Against Humanity, there are concerns that this positive trend may get reversed by the developments in Sri Lanka, unless the UN Human Rights Council take urgent steps to address the back sliding of commitments given to the UN body by the Sri Lankan Government, said Mr. Visuvanathan Rudrakumaran, Prime Minister of Transnational Government of Tamil Eelam (TGTE).

Extraordinary African Chambers convicted former Chadian leader Hissene Habre of crimes against humanity and sentenced him to life in prison.

Several world lenders applauded the sentence and expect this positive trend to continue and will deter other leaders from committing war crimes, crimes against humanity and genocide.

But few notice the developments in Sri Lanka, where the Sri Lankan Government gave commitments to the UN Human Rights Council to take concrete steps, including involvement of foreign judges, to hold those responsible for the killing of 70,000 Tamils in six months in 2009 and rape of hundreds of Tamil women by the Sri Lankan security forces (Source: UN Internal Review Report on Sri Lanka).

But so far the Sri Lankan Government not only failed to take any meaningful steps as promised to the UN body, but it is taking steps to evade or damage any credible judicial mechanism to hold those responsible for the mass killing of Tamils.

Here are some of the examples:

1) Both the President and the Prime Minister have rejected any international involvement in the judicial process, as they have promised to the UN Human Rights Council.

2) The Prime Minister has announced that thousands of Tamils who disappeared are now dead. He refused to give details on the manner they were killed, who is responsible for the killings, and the whereabouts of the remains.

3) The Army Commander during these killings was not only promoted to the highest military rank but was made a Cabinet Member (Minister).

4) The current President Sirisena was the acting defense minister during the final weeks of the war, when large number of Tamils were killed, thus call into question conflict of interest and neutrality in holding an investigation under his Government.

5) Even seven years after the war, security forces are still stationed in large numbers in Tamil areas as during the war (one soldier for every five civilians – believed to be the highest ratio in the world). These soldiers are still committing abuses like abductions and rape.

The list goes on and on.

"Unless the UN Human Rights Council take concrete steps to address Sri Lankan Government’s evasive steps to fulfill its commitments it gave to the UN Human Rights Council, the whole euphoria about the conviction of Chad’s leader will be short lived and several leaders who committed war crimes, crimes against humanity and genocide will breathe a sigh of relive" said Rudrakumaran.

"To reverse this UN Human Rights Council should take a firm stand in its upcoming June Session, when Sri Lanka is coming up for review and when the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights is to submit a report on Sri Lanka".

RETURNING TO ORIGINAL PLACES VERY IMPORTANT FOR IDPS – NORWEGIAN DEPUTY FM

(The Opposition Leader and the Leader Of Tamil National Alliance Hon. R . Sampanthan met with  visiting Norwegian Deputy Foreign Minister Tore Hattrem on 31st May)

01/06/2016

Visiting Norway’s deputy foreign minister Tore Hattrem visited Norwegian funded UNDP programme in Jaffna on 1st June and discussed the issues related to resettlement of IDPs. In his speech he said that “It is very important for people to return to their original places and re- established their lives. Therefore, the Norwegian Government has decided to financially support people to re-start the livelihood activities and promote the resettlement process.”

Here is the  the text of a speech he delivered in Jaffna.

“Dear Government Agent, dear UNDO-representative, dear representatives from the local community,

Thank you very much for the warm welcome. I am very happy to be back in your lovely country. Sri Lanka means something special to me and I often think of all the good memories that I have from my term as Ambassador of Norway in Sri Lanka 7 years ago.

I am pleased to be here at this occasion with my colleagues from the Embassy of Norway and the members from the UN country Team in the newly released Valalai area in the Jaffna District today.

As a Norwegian, the fishery sector is close to my heart because the fishery industry is very important to the Norwegian economy with its contribution to export, income and employment generation in Norway.

Norway has a longstanding development co-operation with Sri Lanka. Some of you may remember that Norway has assisted the fisheries sector in the North decades ago and that cooperation was commonly known as “CEYNOR” which was a joint venture between Sri Lanka then known as (Ceylon) and Norway.

With assistance from Norway, several projects to improve the fishing industry were undertaken throughout the coastal areas of the island. The CEYNOR funded factory was built in Karainagar and Kurunagar to build boats and to manufacture fishing nets.

And earlier this year, Norway accepted a request from the Ministry of Fishery to assist further within the fishery sector.

In recent years, our assistance mainly focused on supporting vulnerable communities in the Northern Province. A major part of the support has been extended through the UN Organisations and civil society organisations to enhance the livelihood opportunities of the affected communities.

It is very important for people to return to their original places and re- established their lives. Therefore, the Norwegian Government has decided to financially support people to re-start the livelihood activities and promote the resettlement process.

Here in Valalai and adjoining villages, we support livelihood opportunities for targeted communities in fisheries, agriculture, livestock and alternative income-generating activities. We know you are among the first to return and that many of you have been displaced for a very long time. We understand that you face challenges when you are coming back to your own land. That you have moved back is an important symbol for the new Sri Lanka.

I am happy to be present at this occasion when boats, engines, fishing gears, and some agriculture equipment is distributed for you to start your livelihoods. I sincerely hope that you will be able to re-establish your lives in your areas of origin. We hope you will contribute with hard work, and are able to rebuild your community and lives on your own land.”

Thank you for your attention.

Norway's state secretary meets with Wigneswaran

01 June 2016
Norway's State Secretary, Tore Hattrem, held discussions in Jaffna with the Northern province's chief minister, C V Wigneswaran on Wednesday. 

"Reconciliation between the victims and those who inflicted the harm will only be possible in a country when the affected people's requests, appeals and point of view is understood and acknowledged," Mr Wigneswaran said during the meeting.

"Instead of this, the Colombo government is making claims that is is doing this or that for reconciliation [but] these efforts will be futile," he added. 

Norway's five member delegation from the ministry of foreign affairs, undertook a two day visit to the island, focusing on reconciliation efforts. The delegation met with the government on arrival in Colombo. 

Multi Billion Tax Revenue Fraud By Yahapālana Group Exposed

By Nagananda Kodituwakku –June 1, 2016 

Nagananda Kodituwakku

Wickremesinghe administration when keep on increasing tax in various forms, urged people to bare it, claiming that the new administration cannot run the government business without adequate funds in the treasury blaming MR regime. Since then people were burdened with more and more tax charged on every commodity, including hospital bill payments.

Yet, it has been revealed that the new government that promised clean corrupt free administration dubbed ‘Yahapalana’ is committing worse crime than Rajapaksa regime, keeping the people in total dark.

All 225 MP elected to the parliament in the General Election held in August last year, including those who were rejected by the people yet nominated as MPs through the National list, have been issued with a tax free permit by yahapalana administration to import a vehicle (petrol or diesel) upto the value of US$ 62,500.00. These permits have been issued with no limitation on the engine capacity and there is no restriction whatsoever on the transfer of vehicles imported on these permits to any.

Read More

Return Of Saffron Violence?

Featured image courtesy the Star

HILMY AHAMED on 06/01/2016

Ven. Ampitiye Sumanaratne Thero of Mangalaramaya temple in Ampara walks in to the residence of the Chief Minister of the Eastern Province, Nazeer Ahamed and threatens him over the despicable incident at the Sampur school funct

Later, the venerable Thero leads a protest in Ampara, shouting Islamophobic slurs.

The Editor of Sunday (Irida) Divaina in his editorial on 29th May 2016 calls for the slaying of Chief Minister, Eastern Province, Nazeer Ahamed, to be carried out by the father of the child who was accidentally hit, and for his head to be offered to the Governor of the Eastern Province – Austin Fernando.

 Where is Sri Lanka heading as a nation? Has the saffron brigade been revived? President Maithripala Sirisena and Prime Minister Ranil Wickramasinghe, the architects of Yahapalanaya need to awaken from their slumber. Many risked their lives for regime change, and people do not want the same wine in a different glass. Do we need more violence than what we have seen during 30 years of ethnic strife? The international community and Sri Lanka’s vibrant civil society that has been hitherto supporting the reconciliation process along with the Northern Tamil population is silent on the attack on the Muslim community.  Aluthgama/Beruwela is a forgotten story.

The Yahapalanaya revolution in January 2015 that brought the opposition’s common candidate Maithripala Sirisena to power as President was celebrated as the end of the racist campaign of the Rajapaksa regime which nurtured extremist Buddhist monks to unleash violence with impunity against Muslims and evangelical Christians. A large number of moderate Sinhala Buddhists and almost the entirety of minority communities voted against the regime of Mahinda Rajapaksa. President Mahinda Rajapaksa had the illusion that he could win elections by pandering to Buddhist extremism and alienated the minorities. He without a doubt was considered the savior of the nation by almost all Sri Lankans (including the Muslims) and was reelected for his second term with an unprecedented majority against another hero of the war against terror, Sarath Fonseka. He learned his bitter lesson and miserably failed in his third attempt in January 9^th 2015, due to his racist and dictatorial attitude towards the nation.

The Bodu Bala Sena (BBS), which was the creation of the Rajapaksa hegemony, went underground immediately after the elections because they lost the immunity that was offered by the Rajapaksa regime. The multiple court cases against Ven. Gnanasara Thero and BBS have kept them busy attending to their legal battles. Their attempt to regroup has failed miserably, especially after their contempt of court charges filed by the bold Homagama magistrate.

This has given rise to a new group of saffron robed extremist monks, who are attempting to come in to the limelight through propagating a racist agenda. The desperate common opposition led by the Rajapaksa faction in parliament has started playing the racist card once more, provoking Buddhist extremism. They are using multiple fronts to attack minorities, especially the Tamils and Muslims after their dismal performance at the May Day rally in Kirulapone, in the hope that they can harness the vote bank of the Buddhists.

These forces have now been unleashed to create hate and target the Muslims and evangelical Christians with the hope that the international community and, especially the Organization of Islamic Countries (OIC) would notice it and impose sanctions on Sri Lanka that would lead to the collapse of our economy.  A ban on the import of Sri Lankan labour to the Middle East would drive the majority of our population to the streets – literally begging for their next meal. The income from foreign remittances is estimated to be around 6-7 billion US Dollars per annum.

The Buddhist extremists are forgetting that a number of Muslim nations came forward to support the Rajapaksa regime in their fight against the Liberation Tigers Thamil Eelam (LTTE). Libya, Pakistan and Iran played a major role in providing military hardware. It was even suspected that Pakistani pilots were flying sorties to destroy the LTTE arsenal.  Many other Arab Muslim nations provided financial support. 

The only friends Sri Lanka had at the UNHCR in Geneva at the time were Muslim nations. Today, Sinhala Buddhist extremists have forgotten the Muslim contribution to the government’s war efforts and branded them as aliens to the nation. Many Muslim intelligence officers sacrificed their lives throughout the war. Only the security forces know their contributions, because most of them were intelligence operatives who could not be exposed to the public.

A few incidents involving Muslim citizens of Sri Lanka are being highlighted as crimes committed by the entire Muslim community. The irresponsible behavior of the Chief Minister of the Eastern Province, Nazeer Ahamed, which was totally condemned by the Muslim community, is being presented as a Muslim person insulting Sinhalese forces of the Sinhala nation, implying that the Muslim citizens do not belong to Sri Lanka. A forgotten fact is the behavior of the army goon squad of Mahinda Rajapaksa on Sarath Fonseka and violence against public servants and forces by Mervyn Silva, Wimal Weerawansa and Nishantha Muthuhettigamage (amongst many others). Their insults of the police and armed forces have never been branded as Sinhala Buddhist excesses. Only Chief Minister Nazeer Ahamed’s action is being branded as an act of treachery by a Muslim.

There have been numerous incidents of conflict and violence at parents teachers meetings in hundreds of schools, but a simple incident at Madawala Muslim Maha Vidyalaya, where a Sinhala teacher who had sided with the Muslim principal was “screamed at” by a Muslim person. This had nothing to do with religion or race but today some news and social media platforms have twisted it as a racial attack on a Buddhist.

Muslim miscreants, who were drunk after a Perahara in Mahiyangana had damaged a Buddhist flag in their drunken stupor. This incident too is twisted as a racially motivated attack on Buddhism. It was the Muslims who caught these youths and handed them over to the police. They have been remanded for two weeks and yet extremist Buddhists are branding it as a crime against Buddhism by the entire Muslim community.

Some Buddhist monks, who are going around intimidating Muslims, have formed themselves in to vigilante groups. One such group is demanding the cessation of the renovation of a mosque down Bhatiya Mawatha, Dehiwela. The building plans and the renovation has been approved by the local authority, the Dehiwela Mount Lavinia municipal council.  Some local politicians along with these monks have marched in to the mosque under police protection and intimated the trustees of the mosque to stop the construction. The Police who are supposed to protect and maintain law and order are providing protection to this vigilante group. The complaint of trespassing in to private property has not been entertained.

Law and order in the country has been deteriorating during the decade long rule of Mahinda Rajapaksa. The majority of the Sri Lankans of all races expected the war winning President, Mahinda Rajapaksa to pave the way for a reconciled Sri Lanka in 2009. Regretfully, he pampered Buddhist extremism due to his greediness for continued political office. Racism has now been rooted out amongst a fair number of Sinhala Buddhists, who fear dominance of the minority community. The Muslims are even accused of strategically increasing their population to make Sri Lanka a Muslim state. The population ratio of Muslims has remained the same since 1891. There is no doubt that the majority of the Buddhists are peace-loving citizens, but they have no voice in the presence of these extremists. The behavior of some of these thugs is a disgrace to the noble teachings of Lord Buddha.

There is a need for the government to take the bull by the horns. No vigilante group should be allowed to intimidate anyone. Law and order needs to be maintained. Their failure will force the country to be a divided nation that would have serious repercussions on the envisaged development and progress that all Sri Lankans hope for.

Religion should be a private affair and remain so. An elected government should not favour one religion above another.  We, the people of Sri Lanka need to come forward as one Sri Lankan nation, devoid of differences in religion, race, caste or creed. This responsibility is not with the government alone but with every individual, religious and political leader. This is easily attainable if every citizen commits to this noble goal.

The new constitution making process needs to ensure that all communities in Sri Lanka have the same rights and religious freedom to practice the religion of their choice.