China raises ‘combat readiness’ as US warships enter disputed waters

Satellite imagery shows what the CSIS Asia Maritime Transparency Initiative describes as the deployment of several new weapons systems, including a J-11 combat aircraft, at China’s base on Woody Island in the Paracels, South China Sea May 12, 2018. Source: Reuters

28th May 2018

CHINA’S Defense Ministry says it will increase its “combat readiness” on Sunday after two US navy warships entered the disputed waters of the South China Sea on a freedom of navigation operation (FONOP).

The ministry said the Chinese military issued warnings to guided-missile cruiser USS Antietam and the USS Higgins to leave the waters after they “arbitrarily entered” the contested Paracel Islands in the waterway “without permission of the Chinese government”.

In a statement, ministry spokesman Wu Qian said Chinese navy vessels were deployed “to conduct legal identification and verification of the US warships and warn them off.”

SEE ALSO: Philippines takes ‘diplomatic action’ after China lands bombers on islands

“The US has seriously violated China’s sovereignty, undermined strategic mutual trust, and undermined peace and security in the South China Sea,” Wu said, as quoted by the Japan Times.

The US did not confirm whether or not the operations took place.

“US forces operate in the Asia-Pacific region on a daily basis, including in the South China Sea,” Pentagon spokesman Lt. Col. Christopher Logan said.

China’s aircraft carrier Liaoning takes part in a military drill of Chinese People’s Liberation Army (PLA) Navy in the western Pacific Ocean, April 18, 2018. Source: Reuters

“All operations are conducted in accordance with international law and demonstrate that the United States will fly, sail and operate wherever international law allows.”

Several US officials who declined to be named said the two US warships came within 12 nautical miles of the Paracel Islands, maneuvering near Tree, Lincoln, Triton and Woody islands in the operations.

The operation was the latest attempt to counter what Washington sees as Beijing’s efforts to limit freedom of navigation in the strategic waters.

While this operation had been planned months in advance, and similar operations have become routine, it comes at a particularly sensitive time and just days after the Pentagon uninvited China from a major US-hosted naval drill.

SEE ALSO: Aussie warships had ‘robust’ encounter with Chinese military in South China Sea

China claims almost the entire South China Sea, a strategic waterway through which about US$3 trillion worth of sea-borne goods passes every year. Brunei, Malaysia, the Philippines, Taiwan and Vietnam also have conflicting claims in the area.

Last week, Chinese bombers landed on islands and reefs claimed by the Philippines, prompting Manila to take “appropriate diplomatic action” on the matter.

China has built seven artificial islands in the Spratlys group in the South China Sea and turned them into military outposts with airfields, radars, and missile defences.

Beijing says its military facilities in the Spratlys are purely defensive and that it can do what it likes on its own territory.

Russian journalist and Kremlin critic Arkady Babchenko shot dead in Kiev

Murder thought related to prominent journalist’s work, following threats that caused him to leave Russia in 2017

 Arkady Babchenko died after being shot in Kiev on Tuesday.

Andrew Roth in Moscow-Tue 29 May 2018 23.34 BST

A dissident Russian journalist has been shot at his apartment in Kiev in a high-profile murder that police said may have been tied to his reporting.

Arkady Babchenko, a veteran Russian war correspondent, was shot three times in the back as he left his apartment to buy bread. He was found bleeding by his wife. Babchenko, 41, died in the ambulance to the hospital, a government official said.

The killing appeared to be targeted. The gunman had apparently lain in wait for him outside his apartment. The head of Ukraine’s police force said that two motives were being considered: his “professional work and civil position”. Police on Wednesday evening had not named a suspect, but did post a sketch of a bearded man in a baseball hat.

Babchenko had grown highly critical of the Russian government in recent years. He criticised Vladimir Putin’s annexation of Crimea and his support for the separatists of south-east Ukraine. He left Russia in February 2017, writing that it was “a country I no longer feel safe in”.

The killing was the most recent murder of a high-profile dissident in Kiev, a city that has become a refuge for some of Moscow’s most vehement critics, as well as the scene of targeted assassinations that have remained unsolved for years. In 2016, the investigative journalist Pavel Sheremet was killed in a car bombing outside his apartment. Some journalists have claimed that Ukraine’s powerful intelligence agency has sought to stifle the investigation.

Babchenko’s murder quickly attracted international attention. Harlem Désir, the media freedom representative at the Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe, said he was horrified by Babchenko’s death. “I call on Ukraine authorities to conduct immediate & full investigation,” he tweeted.

Ukrainian and Russian officials immediately traded finger-pointing over his death. Anton Gerashchenko, a Ukrainian lawmaker who serves as an adviser to the interior minister, said on Facebook that investigators would be looking at “Russian spy agencies’ efforts to get rid of those who are trying to tell the truth about what is going on in Russia and Ukraine”.

“Ukraine is becoming the most dangerous country for reporters,” Russian lawmaker Yevgeny Revenko said in remarks carried by the state RIA Novosti news agency. “The Ukrainian government can’t guarantee basic freedoms.”

Babchenko served as a soldier in both wars in Chechnya before turning his bleak experience into the acclaimed memoir One Soldier’s War. He served as a war correspondent for more than a decade, writing about the war in Georgia and later in southeast Ukraine.

He fled Russia in 2017 after provoking a scandal in a Facebook post that expressed indifference over the deaths of a military choir and other passengers aboard a Russian plane that crashed en route to Syria. In the backlash, his home address was published and he received personal threats. Some people called for Babchenko to be stripped of his Russian citizenship.

He moved first to the Czech Republic and then to Israel, before settling in Kiev, where he worked for the Crimean broadcaster ATR. “All the elements of the propaganda machine were engaged,” he wrote in the Guardian last year, calling the experience “so personal, so scary, that I was forced to flee”.

A number of other critics of Russia have been killed in Kiev in recent years. An ethnic Chechen fighter named Amina Okuyeva was killed outside Kiev in a car bomb in October. In March 2017, renegade Russian lawmaker Denis Voronenkov was shot and killed at the entrance of a hotel in Kiev. Ukrainian prosecutors alleged that Voronenkov, who had toed the Kremlin line while serving as a Russian lawmaker but became a critic of the Kremlin after his 2016 move to Ukraine, was killed on orders from a Russian crime lord.

As a reporter, Babchenko staked out a position as an opponent of war. His memoirs were the opposite of triumphant, describing the dangerous, banal daily life of a soldier on the frontlines of the conflict in Chechnya. Asked what he wanted to say in the memoirs, he told the Guardian in 2007: “I exist. I was in this war. And this is what I saw.”

The day of his death, he wrote online about an incident in which a Ukrainian general denied him permission to travel on a helicopter during the beginning of the war in 2014. The helicopter was later shot down. “Fourteen people were killed,” Babchenko wrote. “I was lucky. It turns out to have been the second day of my birth.”

No Warning: Witnesses describe how police shot and killed smelter protesters in Thoothukudi

Government officials seal a copper smelter controlled by London-listed Vedanta Resources in Thoothukudi in the southern state of Tamil Nadu, India, May 28, 2018. REUTERS/Sudarshan Varadhan

Sudarshan Varadhan-MAY 29, 2018

THOOTHUKUDI, India (Reuters) - Police in the port city of Thoothukudi in Tamil Nadu gave no warning last Tuesday before firing with live ammunition on protesters seeking the closure of a copper smelter owned by London-listed Vedanta Resources Plc, according to 16 witnesses interviewed by Reuters.

The police also appear to have ignored Indian police rules on the use of force to quell protests by, in some cases, firing at the heads of protesters rather than their legs. Friends and relatives of two people who died said they had been shot in the face.

Warning protesters before firing is stipulated in the current federal manual for crowd control, and it is also outlined in Section 129 of India’s criminal procedure code, according to a home ministry official in New Delhi, who declined to be identified. “It is mandatory,” the official stressed.

Vappala Balachandran, a former deputy police commissioner in Mumbai, added that the manual gives detailed instructions about how force should be used. “First baton charge, then tear gas and when everything fails, firing. The constables have to squat on the ground placing one knee on the floor, take aim on the legs to incapacitate the rioters and fire,” he said.

Ten people were killed on the day of the shootings, and a further three have died since, making this one of the most deadly environmental protests in India since at least 14 were killed by the police in Nandigram in West Bengal in 2007 in a demonstration against plans for a chemicals hub.

Several state and district officials declined to comment on what happened that day, citing a pending investigation. Sandeep Nanduri, who was installed as the new district chief for Thoothukudi after the protest, told Reuters the sequence of events leading up to the firing has not yet been established.

India’s home ministry has asked the Tamil Nadu government to submit a report on the police firing, a ministry spokesman said. He said the ministry wouldn’t say anything else at this stage.

India’s government funded National Human Rights Commission said on Tuesday it will send a team of investigators to Thoothukudi to carry out its own probe.

Vedanta’s Sterlite Copper smelter is one of only two major copper smelters in India and it had announced plans to double its capacity. The Tamil Nadu state government ordered that the plant be shut permanently on environmental grounds on Monday, and officials physically sealed the smelter, saying it was listening to residents’ complaints.

Vedanta, in which Indian-born resources magnate Anil Agarwal has a controlling stake, has been accused by local residents and environmentalists of polluting the city’s air and ground water. The state pollution control board in April rejected the company’s request to renew its license to operate, saying it had not complied with environmental laws on five counts.

The company has denied it is in breach of any environmental laws. Agarwal in a video on Twitter last Thursday expressed sadness about the protesters’ deaths, saying “it was absolutely unfortunate” and his full sympathy is with the families of those killed. He said he is committed to the local community and the environment, and to abiding by the law.

In response to the state shuttering the plant, Vedanta said on Monday that it will study the order and decide on its next course of action.

STORMED GOVERNMENT OFFICES

On May 22, the protest quickly got unruly and out of police control as the demonstrators reached the district offices.

 

The protesters had been given permission to rally in a playground in the city but not to gather outside the district government offices, police said.

The playground could hold only 2,000 and the protesters said numbers swelled to at least 50,000 on the 100th day of their campaign against the smelter - a campaign that began when the company announced plans for the expansion.

Police and protesters threw stones at each other, seven witnesses said, and protesters stormed the offices and threatened to get into an apartment building where Vedanta employees live, police and a Vedanta official added.

Four police officials and two people working at the district headquarters said police fired only after protesters threw stones at the office building.

Most of the 16 witnesses said police moved straight from using tear gas and sticks to live ammunition to try to control protesters. Police and other officials haven’t challenged this.

Reuters was unable to determine what or who prompted the police to fire on protesters, why live ammunition and not rubber bullets was deployed, and why some people were shot in the head.

One police officer speaking on condition of anonymity said police had to act to restore order. “Do you expect us to take it lying down and die in a riot situation? Of course we will hit back,” he said.
Initially, local police and state officials defended the use of live ammunition. The state’s chief minister, Edappadi K. Palaniswami, told reporters on the day of the protest that the police had been forced to act after it turned violent. And on the same day, state Fisheries Minister D. Jayakumar said it had been “unavoidable” for police to fire on protesters.

In the past few days, though, Tamil Nadu state officials have declined to respond to detailed questions posed by Reuters about the police actions on that day, including deputy chief minister O. Paneerselvam during and after a news conference on Monday.

FIRED FROM TERRACE

Six of the witnesses – a mixture of protesters and bystanders – said in separate conversations that they saw gunmen shooting from behind trees. Two other witnesses said they saw a man shooting down on the crowd from the terrace of the district authority offices.

Some of the gunmen, who carried pistols and rifles, were in police uniform, while others were in plainclothes, the witnesses said.

One man, who said he lost a relative in the shootings, described seeing someone firing from the top of a van. “They were shooting from the top of a van, police were not even wearing uniforms and they gave no warning,” said the 43-year-old man who gave his name as Gopal but was afraid to give his full name, citing fear of the authorities.

Television channels have also shown a man, armed with an assault rifle, lying on the roof of a police bus in a marksman’s position.

“They started shooting at us without any warning. They came with an intent to kill as if we were terrorists,” said 47-year old K. Selvam, a labourer who joined the protest and was shot in the leg.
None of the witnesses said the police used loudspeakers or other methods to give directions to the protesters. Such warnings are typical when police engage in crowd control in India.

The public uproar that has resulted from the killings last Tuesday prompted the state government of Tamil Nadu to replace both Thoothukudi’s police superintendent and the district’s top administrative official. It provided no reason for the removals.

The officials who had been replaced did not answer repeated calls seeking comment.

The closure of the smelter means India will have to get more copper from overseas, said Goutam Chakraborty, a securities analyst with Indian broker Emkay Global, boosting its import bill. The metal is essential for a country developing rapidly as it is used in everything from housing to autos.

HORRIFIC INJURIES

Among those who died on Tuesday was a 17-year-old girl, J. Snowlin, who was shot in her face, according to her mother J. Vanitha. She died while trying to flee from the firing at the district offices, according to her mother and a school friend who was with her during the protest.

A 43-year old fisherman said his friend Tamilarasan was mowed down in what appeared to be “blind shooting” by the police.

“He was standing behind me, I heard a shot and I turned around, he had dropped to the ground. He had been shot in his face” the fisherman said. He requested anonymity, citing fear of retribution by the police. The state government confirmed to Reuters that a man called Tamilarasan, aged 42, died in Tuesday’s violence.

It is still unclear how many died from gunshot wounds, or where they died. Some people were beaten with sticks and iron rods and may have died as a result.

Officials said the cause of death for the 13 would be known only after autopsies were completed. Not everyone died around the district offices - there were reports of deaths in at least two other parts of the city. Doctors at the city’s main hospital, Thoothukudi Medical College, said they dealt with some horrific injuries that day.

There were people shot in the head, in the groin, and in the legs. People with broken spines, fractured arms and limbs and ribcage damage were also being treated in the hospital.

Police stand gurad outside a copper smelter controlled by London-listed Vedanta Resources in Thoothukudi in the southern state of Tamil Nadu, India, May 28, 2018. REUTERS/Sudarshan Varadhan

 

Altogether there at least 102 injured in addition to the dead, with 19 of them in critical condition, the state government said.

Harvard study estimates thousands died in Puerto Rico because of Hurricane Maria

Hurricane Maria caused widespread damage to Puerto Rico. Drone footage captured the scene in San Juan and Canóvanas on Sept. 21. (Hector Santos Guia/The Washington Post)

By Arelis R. Hernández and Laurie McGinleyMay 29 at 3:15 PM

CAGUAS, PUERTO RICO — Miliana Montanez cradled her mother’s head as she lay dying on the floor of her bedroom here, gasping for air and pleading for help.

There was nothing her family could do. It took 20 minutes to find cellular reception to make a 911 call. Inoperative traffic signals slowed down the ambulance struggling to reach their neighborhood through crippling congestion.

Ivette Leon’s eyes bulged in terror as she described to her daughter the tiny points of light that appeared before her. She took one last desperate gulp of air just as paramedics arrived. Far too late.

More than eight months after Hurricane Maria devastated Puerto Rico, the island’s slow recovery has been marked by a persistent lack of water, a faltering power grid and a lack of essential services — all imperiling the lives of many residents, especially the infirm and those in remote areas hardest hit in September.

A new Harvard study published Tuesday in the New England Journal of Medicine estimates that at least 4,645 deaths can be linked to the hurricane and its immediate aftermath, making the storm far deadlier than previously thought. Official estimates have placed the number of dead at 64, a count that has drawn sharp criticism from experts and local residents and spurred the government to order an independent review that has yet to be completed.

[In Puerto Rico’s ‘last mile,’ power is still elusive as next hurricane season looms]

The Harvard findings indicate that health-care disruption for the elderly and the loss of basic utility services for the chronically ill had significant impacts, and the study criticized Puerto Rico’s methods for counting the dead — and its lack of transparency in sharing information — as detrimental to planning for future natural disasters. The authors called for patients, communities and doctors to develop contingency plans for such disasters.

Researchers in the mainland United States and Puerto Rico, led by scientists at the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health and Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center, calculated the number of deaths by surveying almost 3,300 randomly chosen households across the island and comparing the estimated post-hurricane death rate to the mortality rate for the year before. Their surveys indicated that the mortality rate was 14.3 deaths per 1,000 residents from Sept. 20 through Dec. 31, 2017, a 62 percent increase in the mortality rate compared with 2016, or 4,645 “excess deaths.”

“Our results indicate that the official death count of 64 is a substantial underestimate of the true burden of mortality after Hurricane Maria,” the authors wrote.

Carlos R. Mercader, executive director of the Puerto Rico Federal Affairs Administration, said in a statement Tuesday that the territorial government welcomes the new Harvard survey and looks forward to analyzing it.

“As the world knows, the magnitude of this tragic disaster caused by Hurricane Maria resulted in many fatalities,” Mercader said. “We have always expected the number to be higher than what was previously reported.”

He said such studies — including a forthcoming George Washington University probe into hurricane fatalities — will help Puerto Rico better prepare for disasters and prevent the loss of life.

Maria, which caused $90 billion in damage, was the third-costliest tropical cyclone in the United States since 1900, the Harvard researchers said.

They also said that timely and accurate estimates of death tolls are critical to understanding the severity of disasters and targeting recovery efforts. And knowing the extent of the impact “has additional importance for families because it provides emotional closure, qualifies them for disaster-related aid and promotes resiliency,” they said.

The researchers noted that the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention says that deaths can be directly attributed to storms such as Maria if they are caused by forces related to the event, whether it is flying debris or loss of medical services.

Miliana Montanez, 29, in Caguas, Puerto Rico, in late March, with a memorial book for her mother. (Erika P. Rodríguez for The Washington Post)

“The worst part was knowing I could do nothing to help her,” said Leon’s daughter, Montanez, a 29-year-old mother of two. “Knowing she didn’t die peacefully means I will never have closure.”

In the aftermath of Hurricane Maria, doctors and parents struggle to provide for some of Puerto Rico’s most vulnerable babies. (Whitney Leaming/The Washington Post)

The uncounted

Puerto Rico’s government faced immediate scrutiny after initially reporting that 16 people had died as a result of the storm, which strafed much of the island Sept. 20. That number more than doubled after President Trump visited in October, when he specifically noted the low death toll. The number kept rising until early December, when authorities said 64 had died.

The official toll included a variety of people from across Puerto Rico, such as those who suffered injuries, were swept away in floodwaters or were unable to reach hospitals while facing severe medical conditions. One was a person from the city of Carolina who was bleeding from the mouth but could not reach a hospital in the days after the storm. After arriving, the patient was diagnosed with pneumonia and died of kidney failure. Another, from Juncos suffered from respiratory ailments and went to the hospital — only to be released because of the coming storm. That person later returned, dead.

[Sin luz: Life without power in Puerto Rico]

The new study indicates there probably were thousands more, like Leon, who died in the weeks and months that followed the storm but were not counted. Their deaths have long raised questions about the manner and integrity of the Puerto Rico government’s protocols for certifying hurricane-related deaths.

Gov. Ricardo Rosselló’s administration did not immediately release mortality data, nor did officials provide much information publicly about the process officials were using to count the dead. But officials and physicians acknowledged privately that there were probably many, many more deaths, and bodies piling up in morgues, across the island.

[Exodus from Puerto Rico grows as island struggles to rebound from Hurricane Maria]

After pressure from Congress and statistical analyses from news organizations that put the death toll at higher than 1,000, Rosselló enlisted the help of George Washington University experts to review the government’s death certification process. He promised that “regardless of what the death certificate says,” each death would be inspected closely to ensure a correct tally.

“This is about more than numbers,” Rosselló said at a news conference in late February. “These are lives — real people, leaving behind loved ones and families.”

The Riveras have run a successful business for decades in Yabucoa, Puerto Rico but after Hurricane Maria keeping it going without power is a new challenge. (Whitney Leaming/The Washington Post)

Lynn Goldman, dean of GWU’s Milken Institute School of Public Health, expects an initial report to be released in coming weeks. The school’s findings will include the first government-sponsored attempt by researchers and epidemiologists to quantify Hurricane Maria’s deadliness. Experts are assessing statistical mortality data and planned to dive into medical records and to interview family members of those who have died.

Some cases are obviously storm-related, Goldman said, such as someone dying after a tree branch falls on his head while clearing debris, or someone who suffers a heart attack during the storm and is unable to get help. But death certificates bearing the phrase “natural causes” will require further investigation.

[Sluggish recovery from Maria reignites calls for Puerto Rico’s statehood, independence]

The Center for Investigative Journalism in Puerto Rico has gone to court in an effort to seek the island’s mortality data for the months since November, the last month the government of Puerto Rico shared mortality data publicly. The Puerto Rico Institute of Statistics also announced in recent weeks that it would perform an independent death count and use subpoena powers to retrieve the data.

Spokesman Eric Perlloni Alayon said in a statement that the government is still trying to verify the death toll and does not plan to release any new data.

The Harvard researchers reported that there are several reasons the death toll in Puerto Rico has been drastically underestimated. Every disaster-related death, they said, must be confirmed by the government’s Forensic Sciences Institute, which requires that bodies go to San Juan or that a medical examiner travel to the local municipality.

“As the United States prepares for its next hurricane season, it will be critical to review how disaster-related deaths will be counted, in order to mobilize an appropriate response operation and account for the fate of those affected,” the authors wrote.

'Natural causes'

Many families here are awaiting clarity on what happened to their loved ones when “natural causes” became the only explanation. That is what was written on Leon’s death certificate. The Puerto Rico Department of Justice’s Yamil Juarbe said in a statement that it is customary for local officials in these cases to review bodies for any signs of trauma and talk to relatives to learn about the deceased’s medical history. That information is collected and sent to the central office of the Forensic Sciences Institute.

Leon’s family said that her name was misspelled on the death certificate and that her death was incorrectly attributed to diabetes; they say she did not have any known chronic diseases. Officials later corrected the documents.

After falling ill while delivering donations to people who lost their homes in a nearby city, Leon sought treatment at Auxilio Mutuo, a private hospital in San Juan. The hospital never lost water service or electricity, said hospital spokeswoman Sofia Luqui, and the 600-bed facility experienced higher-than-usual patient volume after several other hospitals were forced to close.

Leon was diagnosed with diverticulitis and was sent home with prescription drugs, but she did not improve. Montanez said that at 7 a.m. the following morning, her father summoned her to the family home because Leon was short of breath. She died not long after.

Montanez tried for days to have an autopsy performed, but she said no government agency or private medical organization had the capacity to conduct one. Per her wishes, Leon was cremated a few days later in a rushed ceremony because the funeral home was damaged by the storm and was facing an influx of bodies.

Montanez stays awake many nights replaying her mother’s last days. She tries to remember the woman who loved to make wry jokes, who gave each of her neighbors a whistle to call for help in an emergency during the prolonged blackouts, who organized trick-or-treating by lantern light for the children in the barrio after the hurricane.

But mostly Montanez thinks about the storm. The darkness. The lack of services.

“Everything failed. From Day One, everything was failing,” Montanez said. “There are many stories like ours.”

A view in Caguas, Puerto Rico, in March, six months after Hurricane Maria. (Erika P. Rodríguez for The Washington Post)

McGinley reported from Washington.

Inside Syria’s largest Palestinian refugee camp

Alex Thomson

Chief Correspondent-29 May 2018

“You have turned it into a death Camp” – the United Nations verdict on the Syrian government. For five years Syrian, Russian and Iranian forces besieged and bombarded Yarmouk, the largest Palestinian camp in Syria. The assault was designed to drive out militant Islamic State fighters holding onto what was to become the last anti-government zone in Damascus.

Yarmouk lies on the southern fringes of the Syrian capital. It’s a densely packed area of streets just five miles from the city centre.

Our Chief Correspondent Alex Thomson was the first western journalist to enter Yarmouk since the Syrian army seized it from Islamic State fighters in recent days. He joins us live now from Damascus.

One million French smokers quit in a year amid anti-smoking measures

AFP-Times have changed since the smoky days of the 1970s, when music legend Serge Gainsbourg was seldom seen without a Gitanes

France has seen a sharp fall in the number of people smoking daily, with one million fewer lighting up from 2016-2017, a survey suggests.

28 May 2018

Such a drop has not been seen in a decade, according to Public Health France, which carried out the study.

There has also been a decline in smoking among teenagers and those on low incomes.

The study pointed to the slew of anti-smoking measures introduced to France as a likely reason for the decline.

Recent years have seen neutral packaging, reimbursements for people using tobacco substitutes, higher cigarette pricing and campaigns like the national tobacco-free month.

• Smoking 'causes one in ten deaths'
• How Australia is stubbing out

According the survey, in 2017 26.9% of 18- to 75-year-olds smoked every day, compared with 29.4% a year earlier. This amounts to a drop from 13.2 million smokers to 12.2 million over the period.

France's Health Minister Agnès Buzyn in particular welcomed the decline in smoking among those on low incomes, saying that "tobacco is a trajectory of inequality, it weighs particularly on the most disadvantaged and it gets worse".

What's the global story?

A study last year found that despite decades of tobacco control policies, population growth had meant there was an increased number of smokers.

Worldwide, smoking causes one in 10 deaths, half of them in just four countries - China, India, the US and Russia, according to the Lancet.

A country-by-country analysis warns that "the smoking epidemic is being exported from the rich world to low-income and middle-income countries".

The World Health Organisation says picture warnings in particular are proven to help people quit, and says that 78 countries making up almost half the world's population currently meet best practices.

Jaffna Uni students condemn shooting of Tuticorin protesters

28May 2018

Students at the University of Jaffna held a demonstration in fron of the university today condemning the shooting of Tamil Nadu protesters in Tuticorin last week. 

Nine people were killed and 65 injured on May 22 after police opened fire at protesters, who had been seeking a ban on Sterlite Industries' copper plant. 

The protesters, who launched their protest many months ago, accuse Sterlite Industries of releasing pollutants from its plants and have been demanding the plant be closed. 

Related Articles: 

27 May 2018 : Further demonstrations in Jaffna as Tamils condemn violence against Tuticorin protesters

26 May 2018 : Tamils demonstrate in Jaffna in solidarity with Tuticorin protesters

24 May 2018 : Tamil Nadu government halts data services in reaction to Tuticorin protests

22 May 2018 : Tamil Nadu police shoot protesters, 9 dead

HNB Saga – When Racism & Discrimination Are The Social Standard

By V. Kanthaiya –MAY 28, 2018

People have to pretend you are a bad person so they don’t feel guilty about the things they did to you – Charles Bukowski.

During the wartime, the Sinhala language based media would reiterate only one theme. The government and the security forces are fighting to liberate the Tamil people from the LTTE. Sri Lanka is one country and we all are Sri Lankans. LTTE does not represent the Tamil community. It is a terrorist element and is a threat to the unity of all the ethnic groups and should be handled by the security forces. 

The LTTE was completely annihilated in May 2009. So theoretically the country should be in peace right after that and ethnic harmony should prevail. But is it the reality?

Once the LTTE is eliminated, instead of focusing on building up the ‘Sri Lankan’ identity and one Sri Lanka for all communities, the country started sporadic violence towards Christian and Muslim minorities. Over the time period these sporadic incidents formed a pattern. In regards to Christians, there will be a rumor or an incident saying the Christian missionaries are in the act of converting Sinhala Buddhists into Christianity and some militant monks would be in action to safeguard Buddhism and the age-old culture of this country. The church or the house of prayer would be attacked by a violent mob. The police would be at the scene after the melee to record the statement and provide protection to the already damaged house of prayer.  

In the case of the violence against Muslims, the reasons vary a high degree. It may start with the proposed construction of a mosque or prayer house in the Buddhist holy land (Dambulla and rest of Sri Lanka ) or cattle slaughter or even a rumor of contraceptive pills ( which are yet to be invented) being mixed in Muslim food outlets with a view to reduce the Sinhala Buddhist population. The reasons may be ridiculous to a person with common sense. But in Sri Lanka, a lie becomes the truth, wrong becomes the right and evil is considered to be good, just because it is accepted by the majority of the majoritarian community. 

I would also like to take the honor of explaining the ‘real Sri Lankan’ democracy explained by the renowned political scientist of the country Dr.Dayan Jayatillake. The democracy in simple terms means the collective decision by the majority. The Sri Lankan democracy is a collective decision by the majority of the majoritarian community, thus the present ‘Yahapalanaya’ government which is elected by the majority of the minority communities and the minority of the majoritarian Sinhala Buddhist community is illegitimate. 

I have to discuss all these strange phenomena of Sri Lanka to explain the current public outrage in the southern part of the country regarding the Mullivaikal Remembrance Day.  The event in which the Tamils mourn and remember the death of their loved ones in the final phase of the war is portrayed in the south as an event commemorating the dead terrorists like the way the south commemorate the soldiers killed in the war. Dr. Rajitha Seneratne, the only politician who justified that Tamils, as the citizens of the country, do have the right to mourn for the death is subsequently branded as a terrorist sympathizer by the smart patriots and their media. 

It is understandable why no one else would dare to assert the rights of the Tamils and explain it to the majoritarian populace. Every moderate in the Sri Lankan politics who dare to be sensible regarding the ethnic issue have been successfully branded as a ‘Ponnaya’. 

So far this outright racism by the smart patriots has been a political issue and did not directly affect the day to day life of the Tamil people in the North & East.  But remember when you don’t raise your voice against an individual’s racism, convincing yourself that it is his/her opinion, it will grow into a collective opinion. Then it will become the political opinion and the policy of a political party. Once racism becomes the policy of a political party, it becomes the policy of all political parties competing for the same vote base. Once the party wins, the racial discrimination will be mandated and becomes the state policy. 

The present development is that even corporates have started to adopt racism as a key policy. The incident where two HNB staff were taken disciplinary action and suspended from work for holding an event to remember those killed in the war. The moderates, again can justify this saying the bank has the right to take disciplinary action against the staff who violate the rules and regulations of the entity. That is completely acceptable.  But the incident unfolded in a different way. This event, which included five or six staff lighting a lamp in their office and held a moment of silence for those killed was one of the hundreds held in the North & East on that day. One of the staff shared it on the social media. This was noted by a Sinhala Buddhist right-wing group and they started a pressure campaign to force the bank to take action against the staff otherwise, they would brand the bank as a terror supporter.

In response to this the bank officially apologized and released the following statement.

“HNB takes very seriously any sentiment or act that is in violation of, or poses a threat to the morale of citizens of Sri Lanka. As a Bank that stands for all Sri Lankans, our goals, interests and initiatives are all aligned to the vision and greater good of our Country

We regret an unauthorized incident that took place recently in one of our branches, which does not reflect the values of the Bank. The matter has been investigated and necessary action taken”. 

The statement was released only on English and Sinhala languages. The intriguing phenomena are that the bank says that it considers any activity to remember the loved ones killed in the war by the people in North & East is against the greater good of the country. The event did not have any link to the LTTE. It was just a few people lighting an oil lamp paying their respect for the dead. The bank should have explained how this is a threat to the morale of the citizens of Sri Lanka. 

The Rajapaksa clan and the Sinhala Buddhist nationalists are hell-bent on denying the mass atrocities committed to the Tamil civilians. The denial that a genocide ever happened is the last part of a genocide, as per the 8 stages of genocide model presented by Prof. Gregory Stanton. It is not surprising that an extremist group adopting that agenda. But in Sri Lanka, the Sinhala Buddhist moderates are reluctant to accept the atrocities committed to the Tamils, and they are forced to accept that any event to pay respect to those killed in the war is an attempt to revive terrorism. Now that belief has become a formal policy and a corporate entity which depends on the Tamils for its existence and growth has deliberately denied a fundamental right of its two Tamil Staff purely due to their ethnicity. 

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