Referendum Redux?

Two years after deciding to leave the European Union, many Brits want a second vote on Brexit.

Demonstrators take part in the People's Vote march calling for a referendum on a final Brexit deal in central London on Oct. 20. (Nikilas Halle'n/AFP/Getty Images)

BY OWEN MATTHEWS- OCTOBER 22, 2018

Organizers of a rally in London calling on the government to hold a new referendum on Britain’s leaving the European Union had expected 100,000 people. Instead, nearly 700,000 turned up for the People’s Vote march over the weekend, the largest protest in Britain since a 2003 rally opposing the Iraq War. The demonstrators—many of whom had traveled from far-flung corners of Britain—carried placards that ranged from the witty (“What a Load of Brexcrement”) to the obscene (“Buck Frexit!”). But the message sent by the huge numbers of protesters was clear enough. After nearly two years of stalled negotiations between Theresa May’s Conservative government and the EU, support for a second vote has suddenly gained dramatic momentum.

It’s not hard to see why. May is trapped in an impossible paradox. The hard-liners in her own party demand that Britain leave Europe’s customs union and single market. But May herself has also promised Brussels that there will be no post-Brexit border between Northern Ireland (part of the U.K.) and the Republic of Ireland (an EU member). That means that Northern Ireland must remain inside the EU’s rules, effectively forever, regardless of what the rest of the United Kingdom does. May has insisted that there will be no internal customs border inside Britain—which logically means that the rest of the country must stay inside the single market, too. “It is a Customs Union Brexit, or leave the EU without a deal,” wrote Robert Peston, the political editor of Britain’s ITV News. “But a customs-union Brexit deal would see her Brexiter [members of Parliament] become incandescent with fury.”

It’s the looming prospect of Britain crashing out of the EU with no deal in place that has given the People’s Vote movement much of its urgency. Last week, a key meeting with EU leaders long billed as May’s make-or-break moment fizzled when the British prime minister brought no new proposals to the table. May is also looking increasingly like a politically dead woman walking. Over the weekend, the British press was awash with rumors that enough Conservative MPs had registered their opposition to May to trigger a formal leadership challenge. And even if May survives and is able to reach some kind of agreement with Brussels—which, realistically, can only be a Brexit in name only—there are serious doubts that she has enough support from her own terminally fractured Conservatives to get such a deal approved by Parliament.

That leaves three options: a new general election, a no-deal Brexit, or a second referendum. The first is unlikely, as two-thirds of Parliament would have to approve an early election and Conservatives would be reluctant to face an electoral bloodbath. A no-deal Brexit would be economically disastrous, with the government itself warning of serious disruption to food and medicine supplies and severe delays and confusion at hastily set up customs posts between Britain and the EU.

By this logic, a second referendum might seem the most likely way out of the coming parliamentary deadlock. It would certainly if the voters reversed their decision, allowing May an easy way out of her current nightmare with Brussels. Yet most Brexit supporters—including May herself—passionately oppose it. “We have already had a People’s vote. The People voted to Leave,” tweeted Jacob Rees-Mogg, a former banker-turned-Conservative member of Parliament who now leads the European Research Group, a club of hardcore Leavers. “The second referendum campaign is a con promoted by elitist losers who cannot accept democracy unless it goes their way,” read an ad in the Times.

Driving the resistance to a second vote is the concern that Brexit is no longer appealing to a majority of Brits. A study of recent opinion polls by the data analysis group Focaldata in August seemed to bear that out. It showed that on average some 53 percent of voters now wish to remain in the EU. The same study suggested that some 112 parliamentary seats (out of 632 in England, Scotland, and Wales) had swung from Leave to Remain. Members of Britain’s three biggest trade unions now also support a new referendum on Brexit by a margin of more than 2 to 1. Among the most vocal groups calling for a fresh vote are those too young to have participated in the first one. Since the first referendum in 2016, some 650,000 voters have died—almost all of them from a demographic that strongly supported leaving the EU. In their place, a similar number of young people have joined the electorate—and some 75 percent of Britain’s 18- to 24-year-olds oppose Brexit.

The main problem for the People’s Vote campaign is time. “The clock that has been ticking since March 2017 [when May triggered Article 50 of the Treaty on European Union, which regulates countries leaving the EU] is now at one minute to midnight,” wrote Chris Grey, a professor at the University of London, in his blog. “If Brexit is to be averted by means of referendum it is pretty much now or never.”

May has consistently opposed a second vote as not being “in the national interest.” And any new referendum must be approved by Parliament. The Labour opposition, despite strong pressure from its members during its recent conference, has not yet committed to backing a referendum. That’s in part because many working-class Labour heartlands voted Leave and in part because Labour’s leader, Jeremy Corbyn, and his closest ally, shadow Finance Minister John McDonnell, both believe that Brexit will allow them to pursue a more radically socialist agenda if and when they get into power.

But even if Parliament—meaning Labour—backs a referendum, Britain’s Electoral Commission insists on a 10-week campaign period for a national referendum. That timeline comes perilously close to the moment that Britain is formally due to leave the EU: March 29, 2019. Several European leaders, including French President Emmanuel Macron, have indicated that the Article 50 deadline could be extended and that Britain could still change its mind about Brexit. But hard-line Brexiteers “know very well that if the date is postponed by even a day, then it’s all over,” said one senior U.K. government aide who was not authorized to speak on the record. The hard-line Brexit advocates’ “goal is to get us across that line, whatever happens. Then Brexit is done, and they can get on with blaming everyone else for the ensuing disaster.”

The paradox is that even as opposition to Brexit and support for a referendum grows, the path to a second referendum remains for all practical purposes blocked by die-hard Brexit supporters in Parliament and Labour’s deliberate fence-sitting. For the moment, a no-deal Brexit remains the most likely option.

Britain’s 2016 vote to leave the EU exposed many fault lines in British society—a revolt of left-behind provinces against the capital, of anti-immigrant, white working-class voters against the liberal values of a metropolitan elite. But most glaring of all was the split between the young and the old. One slogan carried by many of the youngest demonstrators in London over the weekend told the most profound story: “Brexit stole my future.” But with both the British government and opposition reluctant to consult the people once more, the protesters are likely to be ignored. Much the same way the anti-war protesters were ignored 15 years ago.

Australia strikes Burmese generals with sanctions over Rohingya crisis

Burmese military chief Senior General Min Aung Hlaing inspects a major bridge near capital Naypyidaw along Yangon to Mandalay highway damaged by rampaging flood waters from Swar Chaung dam on Aug 29, 2018.

23rd October 2018

AUSTRALIA has imposed sanctions and travel bans on five Burmese (Myanmar) generals said to be responsible for atrocities committed during the country’s crackdown on insurgents from the Rohingya Muslim minority last year.

On Tuesday, Foreign Minister Marise Payne issued a statement on the sanctions following Australia’s announcement that it would likely take action on the matter last month.

“I have now imposed targeted financial sanctions and travel bans against five Myanmar military officers responsible for human rights violations committed by units under their command,” she said, as quoted by ABC.

The sanctions against the generals are the latest in wake of the crisis that prompted 700,000 people from the marginalised Rohingya group to flee for refugee camps in neighbouring Bangladesh and several other Southeast Asian countries.

SEE ALSO: Burma president intervenes in case of three jailed journalists 

Previously, the European Union, and the United Kingdom and the United States had imposed similar sanctions and travel bans on the generals implicated in the ‘atrocities’ committed against the minority group.

However, two of those blacklisted by Australia are no longer serving in the military.

Members of Burma’s military take part in a parade to mark the 73rd Armed Forces Day in the capital Naypyitaw, Burma March 27, 2018. Source: Reuters/Stringer

Bureau of Special Operations commander, Maung Maung Soe, was removed from his post in after the EU imposed the sanctions while the head of Western Command, Aung Kyaw Zaw, resigned in May.

The remaining three, Aung Aung, Than Oo and Khin Maung Soe, are still serving the military, also known as the Tatmadaw.

SEE ALSO: Malaysia wants Burma’s commanders probed for ‘atrocities’ against Rohingya 

Australia’s announcement did not include Commander-in-Chief Min Aung Hlaing, but Facebook had taken down his official page in August following a UN report that accused the military of carrying out a systematic campaign that saw mass rapes and enforced disappearances.

While the sanctions against the generals was a welcome move for human rights campaigners, Diana Sayed, of Amnesty International Australia also called on Canberra to withdraw financial support for the Burmese military and impose similar sanctions on other individuals.

Last year, Australia allocated US$400,000 in military training budget for Burma, which Sayed says has put the country “out of step” with the rest of the world.

“We can’t be announcing sanctions and by the same token be engaging with the military through our defence department,” she was quoted as saying.

New research measures impacts of China’s elephant ivory trade ban

 

 by Mongabay.com on 23 October 2018

 

• Research released last month by WWF and TRAFFIC, the wildlife monitoring network, found that there has been a substantial decline in the number of Chinese consumers buying ivory since the ivory trade ban went into effect on December 31, 2017. But there is still work to be done to diminish both the supply and demand for elephant ivory in China.
• Of 2,000 Chinese consumers surveyed, 14 percent claimed to have bought ivory in the past year — significantly fewer than the 31 percent of respondents who said they’d recently purchased ivory during a pre-ban survey conducted in 2017. Some ivory sales have simply gone international, however: 18 percent of regular travelers reported buying ivory products while abroad, particularly in Thailand and Hong Kong.
• TRAFFIC reports that all of the formerly accredited (i.e. legal) ivory shops the group’s investigators visited in 2018 have stopped selling ivory. But the illegal ivory trade has not been so thoroughly shut down. TRAFFIC investigators also visited 157 markets in 23 cities and found 2,812 ivory products on offer in 345 separate stores.

When China banned all commercial trade in elephant ivory and shuttered its domestic ivory markets at the end of 2017, conservationists applauded the measure. But they also warned that if China’s neighbors didn’t take similar action, the ivory trade would simply shift to those countries.

New research finds that those concerns were absolutely justified, though China’s ivory ban has had some decidedly positive impacts all the same.

Research released last month by WWF and TRAFFIC, the wildlife monitoring network, found that there has been a substantial decline in the number of Chinese consumers buying ivory since the ivory trade ban went into effect on December 31, 2017. Of the 2,000 Chinese consumers surveyed for a study titled China Ivory Consumption Research Post-Ban 2018, 14 percent claimed to have bought ivory in the past year — significantly fewer than the 31 percent of respondents who said they’d recently purchased ivory during a pre-ban survey conducted in 2017.

Chinese consumers overwhelmingly view the ban favorably, according to the survey, which found that 9 out of 10 respondents support it. Or at least, 9 out of 10 respondents said they supported the ban once they were made aware of it. Just 8 percent of respondents knew about the ban without having to be prompted, but that is twice the amount of awareness that existed pre-ban. These results suggest that, while word is slowly spreading, China needs to do more to increase public awareness around the ivory trade ban.

That’s especially true of the Chinese consumers who travel internationally, as the study found that 18 percent of regular travelers reported buying ivory products while abroad, particularly in Thailand and Hong Kong.

“We are seeing some positive trends in post ivory ban China that indicate the new legislative changes may be yielding positive results,” Margaret Kinnaird, Wildlife Practice Leader for WWF, said in a statement. “But persisting demand and a lack of awareness among consumers in some parts of the country as well as weak spots with insufficient regulation and enforcement means we need to redouble efforts in strengthening these areas.”

In another study, China’s Ivory Market after the Ivory Trade Ban in 2018, TRAFFIC reports that all of the formerly accredited (i.e. legal) ivory shops the group’s investigators visited in 2018 have stopped selling ivory. But the illegal ivory trade has not been so thoroughly shut down. TRAFFIC investigators also visited 157 markets in 23 cities and found 2,812 ivory products on offer in 345 separate stores. That’s 30 percent less ivory for sale than was found in a similar 2017 survey, but still a high level of trade considering that the sale and purchase of ivory is illegal.

Ivory trafficking hotspots identified by the WWF and TRAFFIC include a handful of provincial cities like Chengdu, Chongqing, Hangzhou, and Pingxiang, as well as the city of Dongxing, which sits on China’s border with Vietnam. In fact, according to the research, those five cities were the site of more than half of all the ivory products TRAFFIC found for sale.

Sales of illegal ivory online also have yet to be eradicated, though they do appear to be in decline as well. According to the study, the average number of new ivory advertisements have decreased by nearly 27 percent on websites and close to 11 percent on social media platforms since the ban went into effect.

“We are encouraged by the decline in both trade and consumer demand since the ban went into effect, but there’s still work needed to address the persistent demand and lack of awareness among consumers in some parts of the country,” Jan Vertefeuille, who oversees WWF’s ivory work, said in a statement. “And particularly concerning is the finding that people who regularly trav
el outside mainland China have actually shown an increase in intent to buy ivory this year.”

Xu Ling, who coordinated WWF’s and TRAFFIC’s research efforts in China, said that the findings support the call for China’s neighbors to take steps to outlaw the ivory trade in order to safeguard a future for elephants.

“Closure of the legal ivory market is a critical tool for Chinese government efforts and sets a benchmark for other countries and regions where domestic ivory markets remain active,” Xu Ling said in a statement. “Only a united global effort will achieve the goal of stamping out ivory trafficking for the benefit of elephant conservation.”

African elephants in Kruger National Park, South Africa. Faced with the worst elephant poaching crisis in three decades, countries and territories with major ivory markets such as China, Hong Kong SAR, and the US have introduced plans that are being implemented at different stages to phase out domestic ivory trade; while other countries like the UK are proposing stricter measures to curtail domestic illegal ivory trade. Photo by Rhett A. Butler.

Article published by Mike Gaworecki

Famine in Yemen could become one of worst in living memory, UN says

Country is in ‘clear and present danger’ of mass deaths from starvation, top aid official says


A mother holds her six-year-old son at a hospital in the Red Sea port city of Hodeida. Photograph: Abduljabbar Zeyad/Reuters

Emma Graham-Harrison-Thu 25 Oct 2018

Yemen is sliding fast toward what could become one of the worst famines in living memory, the UN’s top emergency relief official has warned.

The country is in “clear and present danger” of mass deaths from starvation, and as many as 14 million people – half the population – could soon be entirely dependent on aid to survive, the under-secretary general for humanitarian affairs, Mark Lowcock, said.

Fighting is blocking shipments from getting into the country, let alone to those who need it. Even after expanding relief operations to help an estimated 8 million people, it is not possible to reach all those in need. The looming disaster could be “much bigger than anything any professional in this field has seen during their working lives,” he said.

Food prices have also nearly doubled in the country, Save the Children said in a new report.
Yemen has been at civil war for three years after Houthi rebels backed by Iran seized much of the country, including the capital, Sana’a. Saudi Arabia and allies including the United Arab Emirates joined the war in 2015.

Thousands of civilians have been caught in the middle by airstrikes and mortar bombardments. Trapped also by minefields, huge numbers are hungry and vulnerable to infectious diseases. The country’s cholera outbreakhas become the worst in history.

People queue to collect drinking water from a standpipe in Sana’’a. Photograph: Yahya Arhab/EPA
At least 10,000 civilians have been killed and millions displaced in what has become an urgent
humanitarian catastrophe.

Lowcock said intense fighting around the rebel-held port city of Hodeida, once the entry point for much of the country’s food, posed a particular threat. He called for a halt to fighting around ports, and protection for relief convoys across the country.

Both aid and commercial shipments of vital food and fuel are unloaded at Hodeida, but fighting has blocked roads east and damaged infrastructure. Enough aid to feed 3.7 million people for a month is trapped in one warehouse.

Hours after Lowcock addressed the UN, however, Yemeni officials said they were bracing for a fresh wave of attacks after the Saudi-led coalition – which backs the internationally recognised government of Yemen – sent reinforcements to the coast near the port. They include tanks and armoured vehicles provided by the UAE, the Associated Press reported.

Each wave of fighting causes further damage to the port and its infrastructure, as well as adding to the death toll. At least 65 people have been killed and hundreds injured in the last 48 hours across Yemen, official sources said.

The direct impact of the violence has been compounded by the slow collapse of the national economy. Many public sector salaries haven’t been paid for months or even years,. With up to a third of Yemenis employed in the civil service, millions have been left without any income.

Even for those who still getting paid, feeding themselves and their families is a challenge. The Yemeni riyal is now worth barely a third of 2015 levels, and the weakness of the currency and supply shortages caused by the war have combined to push food prices up.

“The economic collapse is Yemen’s silent killer. Many Yemenis are struggling just to survive. Parents tell our staff how they’re skipping meals or are going up to two days without food to give what little they have to their children,” said Tamer Kirolos, Save the Children’s country director for Yemen.

The parents separated from their children at the US border 

Guillermo Galdos-23 Oct 2018Latin America Correspondent

What’s happened to the families who got caught up in President Trump’s zero tolerance policy at the border? The hundreds of parents who were separated from their children and deported without them? In the second of his special reports, we revisited one Guatemalan mother who was sent home without her family.

Wipro sees challenges in U.S healthcare amid Obamacare uncertainties

The logo of Wipro is seen inside the company's headquarters in Bengaluru, India, January 19, 2018. REUTERS/Abhishek N. Chinnappa

Krishna V Kurup, Sankalp Phartiyal-OCTOBER 24, 2018

BENGALURU/MUMBAI (Reuters) - Indian software services exporter Wipro Ltd on Wednesday called out its healthcare services business in the United States as a challenge as uncertainties over Obamacare meant insurers are holding off on big technology expenditure.

The healthcare market accounts for nearly 13 percent of Wipro’s IT sales and reform of the sector in the United States, its biggest market, remains in prospect given the hostility of President Donald Trump and many Republicans to the Affordable Care Act, commonly known as Obamacare, despite a failed 2017 push to repeal it.

Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell said last week Republicans could try again to repeal Obamacare if they win enough seats in U.S. elections next month.

Bengaluru-headquartered Wipro has previously said uncertainty around Obamacare has pushed healthcare insurance clients to defer major investments.

The company, which posted a 13.8 percent fall in quarterly profit after taking a hefty one-off charge, will get more clarity around the business of HealthPlan Services (HPS), its unit proving technology solutions to insurance firms, as people in the United States enrol for insurance towards year-end, Chief Executive Abidali Z. Neemuchwala said.

“In the health segment, we continue to see a challenge, primarily driven by uncertainty of the HPS business due to the Affordable Care Act,” Neemuchwala told a news conference, adding that the company was also looking at other opportunities in the healthcare sector.

However he did not give any details on the scale of the impact of these uncertainties.

STEADY PERFORMANCES

All other main vertical markets of Wipro, including banking, financial services and insurance (BFSI), the company’s biggest revenue stream, were showing steady performances, Chief Financial Officer Jatin Dalal told Reuters.

For the quarter to end-September, Wipro posted a net profit of 18.89 billion rupees ($258 million) after taking a one-time charge due to the settlement of a legal dispute, compared with 21.92 billion a year earlier.

That was below analysts’ average estimate of 21 billion rupees, according to Refinitiv Eikon data.
Wipro had warned in August that its September-quarter profit was likely to be affected by a $75 million settlement with National Grid US over a legal dispute.

Wipro also said on Wednesday that from the December quarter it would not count sales from its unit providing services to Indian government and state-run firms in its key IT services revenue, as part of a business reorganisation.

After accounting for that exclusion, Wipro said it expected its IT services revenue for the December quarter to be in the range of $2.03 billion to $2.07 billion.

It posted IT services revenue of $2 billion in three months to September.

Shares in Wipro closed marginally lower ahead of the results in a broader Mumbai market that finished 0.8 percent higher.

($1 = 73.1250 Indian rupees)

Reporting by Krishna V Kurup and Sankalp Phartiyal; Additional reporting by Tanvi Mehta; Editing by Alexandra Hudson and David Holmes

The terror of counter-terror laws

 BY RUKI FERNANDO-21 October, 2018

http://www.sundayobserver.lk/2018/10/21/opinion/terror-counter-terror-lawsWith the second reading of the Counter Terrorism Bill scheduled for Tuesday (23), rights activists are still raising grave concerns about the proposed legislation.

For about 40 years, the Prevention of Terrorism Act (PTA) served as a license for torture, sexual violence, enforced disappearances, and prolonged detention. Three years have passed since the governmental commitment to repeal it, and it must be done now.

There are also many problematic clauses in the draft of the proposed new counter terror law,which has been tabled in parliament, with the original Sinhalese name, and a new English name – “Counter Terrorism”. Crimes must be prevented and responded to, including serious ones termed as “terrorism” and we already have a plethora of laws to do this. It is also possible to amend existing laws to include any new types of crimes that are not included. Therefore there is no need for a new counter terror law.

We have been living in a state of almost continuous emergency for about 40 years from1971 to 2011. Emergency regulations were reintroduced in March 2018 for a short period when there was violence against Muslims around Kandy. Under the Public Security Ordinance (PSO), the President has absolute discretion, without judicial scrutiny, to declare a state of emergency and ‘emergency regulations’ that can override all laws except the Constitution. Parliament can extend such emergency laws beyond 14 days. Emergency regulations can take away procedural protections on arrests, detention, and trials, which are guaranteed under criminal law, and they can be used for entry, search, seizure of assets and properties, providing powers of arrest to the armed forces, and accepting confessions made to the police. 1

Emergency regulations have also introduced definitions of terrorism. Our Constitution also provides for restrictions of rights2 in the name of national security, without them even being required to be ‘proportionate’. In addition to the PSO and emergency regulations, Sri Lanka has about 15 other laws,3 which can deal with offences that are listed under the proposed counter-terrorism law.
The Bill contains vague and broadly worded definitions of the intention required for the offence of terrorism:4 The defined actions include ones that can infringe on dissent and fundamental rights guaranteed under the constitution.5 Even the exception clause to the above – the exercising of a fundamental right - is subject to that of being done in “good faith”.

There is no compulsion to protect an arrested person from physical harm. Conveying information about the arrest to the arrestee in her or his own language is not compulsory and where it cannot be given immediately, there is no specified time frame to do so. Even if family members are present at the time of arrest, there is a 24 hour period provided, to notify the family of the arrest details. If family members are not present at the time of arrest, serving acknowledgement of arrest is not compulsory. It is not compulsory for female suspects to be questioned by female officers or have a female officer present.

The time frame for a detainee to be produced before a Magistrate is doubled to 48 hours from the 24 hours limit allowed under ordinary laws, increasing the possibility of abuse. A person could be remanded for upto one year without charges and without bail.

Through Detention Orders (DOs) a police officer can tell the judiciary (a Magistrate) what to do, and the Magistrate must obey, in terms of detaining a person, granting bail or discharging an arrestee. These DOs can last up to two weeks at a time and with approval of a Magistrate, can be then extended for eight weeks. Detention is in places and conditions decided by a Minister. Appeals against DOs are to be made to a“Board of Review”, comprising the Minister the Ministry’s Secretary, and two others appointed by the Minister. A detained suspect’s lawyer and family can only access her or him with the prior permission of the Officer in Charge (OIC) of the detention facility or prison.

Lawyers cannot be present during interview and taking of statements. Police are given 72 hours to notify the Human Rights Commission of Sri Lanka (HRCSL) of a detention under a DO, but no time frame is given for the HRCSL to be given a copy of the DO. The Bill gives power to an OIC to do a medical examination of a detainee to check for visible injuries, and if there are visible injuries, the OIC only has to produce a suspect before a Judicial Medical Officer(JMO)and obtain a report.
If a Magistrate or the HRCSL thinks a place of detention/remand does not conform to the requirements of humane treatment (after a visit), they are to notify the Inspector General of Police/Superintendent of Prisons. However, neither of them are obliged to provide ‘whatever is necessary for humane treatment’.

Under the PTA, only police officers can make arrests, enter premises, conduct searches, and seize material, but the new Bill also grants sweeping powers to the armed forces and the coast guard. Police can seek an order from a magistrate to stop a gathering, a meeting, rally or activity, without a chance for an affected party to be heard. A Minister can proscribe an organization and declare any public place or any other location as a prohibited place indefinitely- without prior possibility for the affected to challenge this- powers that even the PTA doesn’t provide for. Additional powers that the Bill provides but the PTA does not have, are for the President to declare a curfew and call out armed forces so as to maintain public order.

The PTA only allowed seizure and forfeiture of properties of a convicted person, but the new draft law expands this to include those acquitted by courts or anyone else.

The Bill also legitimizes acceptance of a penalty such as a public apology, or reparation to victims of the offence- such as undergoing rehabilitation or engaging in community service. In the context of decades long court cases and high legal costs, the threat of fresh charges with high penalties may compel individuals to admit guilt rather than establish their innocence in a Court of law. The Bill also allows the Attorney General, the prosecutor, to play a judicial role by imposing penalties when withdrawing charges.

The new draft Bill improves on some of the draconian provisions of the PTA, but also goes on to provide the Minister, President, armed forces more powers than the PTA. We must not lower our standards to use a much abused draconian law like the PTA as a benchmark for any new law.
Extraordinary powers should always be an exception for limited purposes, limited periods and a limited geographical area, but the new law is a permanent all island law. It introduces offences that are vague and could criminalize exercise of human rights and dissent. It reduces checks and balances to safeguard life, liberty and wellbeing, reduces judicial discretion and grants extraordinary powers to a Minister, police, army and coastguard on top of the wide powers they could exercise even now through proclamation of emergency by the President. These are powers that have been heavily abused in the past and the new bill can facilitate continuation of such abuses. It can permanently militarize civil life, based more on security obsessed authoritarianism than democracy and rule of law. This must be opposed.

(The writer is a rights activist. A significant part of his work in the last few years has been about those detained under the PTA and those released. He has also been detained under the PTA, has a pending investigation for four and half years, and a court order restricting his freedom of expression)
[1]In the past, this has even included bypassing inquests required under ordinary laws for death of persons caused by the police or the army, or the death of persons while in their custody, and made it mandatory for all media organizations to submit their reports to the ‘Competent Authority’ prior to publication or broadcast.

[2]Such as right to be presumed innocent until proven guilty, freedoms of expression, assembly, association, and movement, equality before the law and non-discrimination.

[3] For example, Penal Code, Code of Criminal Procedure, Offences Against Aircraft Act No. 24 Of 1982, Suppression Of Unlawful Acts Of Violence At Airports Serving International Civil Aviation No. 31 Of 1996, Suppression Of Unlawful Acts Against The Safety Of Maritime Navigation No. 42 Of 2000, Prevention Of Hostage Taking No. 41 Of 2000, Prevention And Punishment Of Crimes Against Internationally Protected Persons No. 15 Of 1991, Suppression Of Terrorist Bombings Act, No. 11 Of 1999, Chemical Weapons Convention No.58 Of 2007,, Convention On The Suppression Of Terrorist Financing Act No. 25 Of 2005, Financial Transactions Reporting Act No. 6 Of 2006, Prevention of Money Laundering Act No. 05 of 2006 (as amended), Proscribing of Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam and Other Similar Organizations Law No. 16 of 1978, SAARC Regional Convention On Suppression Of Terrorism Act No. 70 Of 1988, United Nations Act No 45 of 1968 and regulations made under that to deal with terrorist financing and money laundering and which has led to listing of persons and organizations.

[4] Such as “intimidate a population”, “wrongfully or unlawfully compelling the government of Sri Lanka, or any other government, or an international organization, to do or to abstain from doing any act”, “prevent any such government from functioning” or “causing harm to the territorial integrity or sovereignty of Sri Lanka or any other sovereign country”.

[5]obstruction to essential services, obstruction, interference to any electronic or automated system and causing serious risk to safety of a section of a public.

Two Tamil students killed by police remembered two years on

Two Tamil university students shot and killed by Sri Lankan police two years ago were remembered by their peers at the University of Jaffna on Saturday.

21Oct 2018

Media faculty students Nadarajah Kajan and Vijayakumar Sulaxan were shot dead by Jaffna police officers in Kokkuvil on October 20, 2016, sparking protests across the North-East, further around the island and internationally.

The officers accused of their killing have been on bail since September last year.

Related Articles: 

21 October 2017 : 1 year on, Jaffna University remembers two students killed by police

06 October 2017 : Two Jaffna Uni students killed by police remembered in Ponnalai

14 September 2017 : Police officers suspected of shooting Jaffna Uni students granted bail

22 August 2017 : Sri Lankan soldiers lay foundation for new home for family of Tamil student killed by police

Dealing successfully with the past needs a public and truthful process

Among those who came to the OMP to make their representations at the public consultation was Sandya , wife of Prageeth Ekneligoda

Jehan Perera-October 22, 2018, 9:25 pm 

For reconciliation to become a reality in Sri Lanka, no section of society should feel it is being marginalized or ignored. In a recognition of the need for all of society to be engaged, the Office of Missing Persons (OMP) is about to commence a campaign to generate empathy for victims. The value of public processes in giving a place to those whose sorrows have been long ignored to speak their truth was seen at the public consultation organised by the OMP in Colombo last week. This consultation was meant for people from the Western Province. The problem of missing persons is not limited to the North and East nor to the Tamil people. In the past three months since it was constituted, and commissioners appointed, the OMP has been holding consultations in different parts of the country.

The significance of the OMP’s consultation in Colombo is that it highlights that its constituency is not limited to only the disappearances that took place during the course of the war with the LTTE. The OMP has no time bar and therefore covers earlier periods as well. The OMP’s mandate includes the disappearances that took place in the southern parts of the country during the JVP insurrections as well. At the public consultation in Colombo most of those who made public representations were those who lost their loved ones in the course of the JVP insurrection that took place during the period 1988-89. Although these events took place three decades ago, the memories still remain and hope still remains in the hearts of those who come for redress. The OMP is meant to locate the whereabouts of those who went missing or find out what happened to them.

One of those present at the OMP consultation was Shantha Pathirana. He said that his brother had been abducted in 1989. He had been working at a government hospital when his brother was abducted and never seen again. Their mother now wanted to block out the past, but Shantha wanted to pursue the past. I asked him why. He said he wanted to know why his brother was made to disappear. His brother was a trade union member. Therefore the hospital authorities may have wanted him out of the way. Shantha wanted to know whether the hospital authorities had been involved. He wanted the law to take its course and those who made his brother disappear to be brought to justice. He awaits the setting up of a judicial process that would ensure accountability for severe violations of human rights. This shows that the promise of the government in Geneva in October 2015 to set up a special judicial mechanism to ensure accountability is as much a need for the people of the South as it is for those in the North and East.

POLITICAL STRATEGY

Amongst the others who came to make their representations was Sandhya Ekneligoda who had lost her journalist husband in 2008 in Colombo when he was abducted and never returned. Her public lament to the OMP was that some of the suspects from the security forces who were involved in her husband’s disappearance were now in remand custody. But the security establishment was not cooperating in providing information. Despite orders by the courts of law the information has been slow in coming and she appealed to the OMP to step into the breach and get the necessary information so that the case in court could proceed. The OMP is constituted of members who have the will and determination to fulfil its mandate. But they need to have political backing or else their efforts and the work of the OMP and the larger reform process itself can meander.

However, the political strategy of the government in dealing with controversial issues appears to be to work on them outside the public eye and get it passed into law and then let events take their own course. This is a ticking the box approach. But this is not enough. There also needs to be political accompaniment by political champions. The newly legislated Office for Reparations is an example. The legislation was passed in parliament by a slim majority, with most of the parliamentarians not participating in the voting at all. The legislation was prepared out of the public eye. It was not shared with either the parliamentarians or the general public prior to emerging as draft legislation. But this has enabled the opposition to take the upper hand in the public debate that has opened up after the legislation was passed in parliament.

The public untruths about what this legislation is meant to achieve is an example of what can happen when there is insufficient public discussion. This highlights the need for the truth commission that the government promised in Geneva in October 2015 as part of its package of four special mechanisms. Whether in Sri Lanka or internationally, the passage of legislation that is meant to look after those who were victims of past violence is an achievement that ought to be appreciated by the people. Dealing with the violence of the past whether in a personal or public setting is not easy to do. Dealing with the past especially when it involved a war, terrorism, and severe human rights violations that lasted for nearly three decades, necessarily requires dealing with a divided past. There is a need for the truth to emerge, as it can through the workings of the OMP and Office for Reparations and by the still to be established truth commission.

FALSE PROPAGANDA

The new government institutions that have been established are now functioning in a variety of areas related to good governance. These would include the Office for Reparations, the Right to Information Commission and the Office of Missing Persons. But the extent to which the general public knows about them and their objectives is limited. Therefore they start off on a negative note in the minds of most people. Whether it is university students, business persons or grassroots community leaders, these new institutions that are meant to assist Sri Lanka in its democratic transition from war to peace are seen in a negative light as being detrimental to the country’s national interest.

The false propaganda about the Office for Reparations is an example of what can happen when there is insufficient information about a new mechanism that is meant to deal with a divided past. Unless the government takes the people along with it in the formulation of the new mechanism, the door is left open for the opposition to create fear and suspicion about it. The opposition has been claiming that the Office for Reparations is meant to compensate the LTTE for its losses at the behest of the international community. This was the view expressed by students of Wayamba University at a discussion on the transitional justice process last week that I attended. But when it was explained that what will be compensated is the loss of human rights due to a human being and to a citizen, and not the label, they understood and appreciated.

Ironically, the JVP which failed to vote for the Office for Reparations when it was being legislated in parliament has now come forward to be its main political champion in the public sphere. The JVP leadership has pointed out that racist elements had dubbed the Office for Reparation Bill as a move to help former LTTE members as they wanted to instigate communal disharmony. JVP Propaganda Secretary and MP Vijitha Herath said that the Office for Reparation Bill had been given various interpretations. But as he said the objective of the new mechanism is to compensate those who have been affected by political and civil conflicts irrespective of their ethnic or religious background.

As it enters its final year in office the government has many promises to keep. The most important of these is with regard to the constitutional reform process. Here again there is uncertainty in the minds of the people regarding what the government’s intentions are with regard to constitutional reform. There is uncertainty whether the government wants to keep the unitary state or depart from it. There is uncertainty whether the government will continue to give the foremost place to Buddhism in the constitution or will move away from it. Explaining the truth of the situation can win trust. The success of the reconciliation process will depend on the extent to which the people trust the government, the government speaks the truth to the people and still succeeds in taking them along.

Learning from Sisyphus?

That history is now forgotten. And democracy’s failure of memory has resulted in an attitude to economics which is so dogmatic it seems almost religious. The post-war nexus between individual freedom and social justice lies sundered.

by Tisaranee Gunasekara- Oct 21, 2018

“The painful secret of gods and kings is that men are free.” ~ Sartre (The Flies)

( October 21, 2018, Colombo, Sri Lanka Guardian) The ‘journalist who fell foul of his country’s ruling dynasty’ – that was the title of The Guardian obituary of Jamal Khashoggi. In his last column for The Washington Post

Mr. Khashoggi’s murder holds up a mirror, giving us a clear view of the emerging times. Had anyone other than Donald Trump occupied the Oval Office, the Saudis might not have murdered Mr. Khashoggi the way they did, where they did (Turkey is not a Saudi ally). But with Mr. Trump in the White House, insane minds could prevail in Riyadh. After all, Mr. Trump has made no secret of his hatred of free expression and independent media. The Wall Street Journal reports that the Saudi crown prince called Jared Kushner and wanted to know what the fuss was about.[i]

The murder of Mr. Khashoggi, like the triumph of Mr. Trump, is not an isolated event. It is a mark of the times we are living in, a period in history when battles considered won must be refought, and issues considered settled must be reengaged with.

When Cardinal Malcolm Ranjith of Sri Lanka, took a stance in clear opposition to Pope Francis, and publicly questioned the need for human rights, he was doing what many politicians, thinkers and clerics are doing all over the world. As the new wave of national-populism sweeps across the globe, influential voices are arguing that people and countries need to make a choice between freedom and security, between basic rights and economic prosperity. Fear is being used to push voters into voluntarily abandon basic rights, and transform themselves from free citizens to obedient subjects.

Democracy’s boast is that it is government for the people. But when economics, instead of delivering a liveable life causes in-your-face inequalities, democracy acquires the image of government not for people but against people. That is the hour of the strong leader, the one who promises to shake the foundations, drain the swamp and make countries great, always pointing to a utopian past as lodestar.

The world’s safest countries, countries which have succeeded in ensuring for their people the best possible lives are not autocracies, run by strong leaders or families.[ii] They are democracies where basic rights are accepted, basic freedoms flourish and the rule of law prevails. But a blasé disregard for facts is another hallmark of the new wave of national populism.

This month, the UN Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change issued a landmark report, putting the world on notice. If global warming can be limited 1.5 Celsius above preindustrial levels, the world has a future. If not, especially if the rate exceeds 2 Celsius, a natural Armageddon awaits us. Asked about the report, President Trump said that he has seen reports with antithetical conclusions and that he believes a ‘glorious future’ awaits the world (he also boasted about his natural instinct for science).

According to the report, the world can save itself with drastic remedial measures. Not if Donald Trump continues to occupy White House and fellow climate-science denier, Brazil’s Jair Bolsonaro (who defends the country’s past military dictatorships) wins the presidency and implements his promise to super-exploit the Brazilian Amazon in the name of development. What Italy’s Five Star Movement has achieved with its anti-vaccination campaign – a sharp spike in measles as vaccination rates drop – is a warning of what awaits not just individual countries but the entire world, if the current wave of national-populism, with its practice of making a false equivalence between proven facts and personal beliefs, continues its global sweep.

Democracy’s Failure of Memory

When Cardinal Malcolm Ranjith made his retrogressive remarks about individual rights, the only politician who bothered to counter him was Mangala Samaraweera. The Joint Opposition then came swinging in the Cardinal defence (just as it did when a senior Buddhist monk asked Gotabhaya Rajapaksa to ‘become even a Hitler to develop the country’). Mahinda Rajapaksa lamented ‘the attacks on religions’. In his weekly Lankadeepa column, Gotabhaya Rajapaksa railed against modernity’s disregard for religious traditions.

Mr. Samaraweera is a political liberal; but like most political liberals of today, he doesn’t seem to understand the nexus between democracy and social justice. Mr. Samaraweera speaks out against religious and cultural extremism while showing a lamentable inability to remember that historically there has been a clear interdependence between economic fairness and political tolerance. Had Mr. Samaraweera not been the minister of finance, this inability might not have been of consequence. Since he is, his position, his failure to comprehend the political consequences of austerity is turning to be a key factor in the imminent Rajapaksa resurgence.

The last time a national-populist wave swept across the world was in the 1920’s and 1930’s. That first wave of national-populism was born of the First World War and gave birth to the Second World War. A key characteristic of the interwar years was economic dysfunction, the Great Depression of 1929 and the not quite so famous depression of 1921-23. Economic pain and hopelessness drove individuals and nations to the edge of insanity and, often, beyond. Those countries with strong institutions averted disaster, and used the crisis as an opportunity to prune the system of some of its more egregious aspects – the American New Deal being the most outstanding case in point. Other countries, lacking in strong institutions, tried to fill the vacuum with strong leaders, opening the gates to the likes of Adolf Hitler.

The socialist challenge and the enormous popularity of the Soviet example were what made the victors of 1945 behave in a radically different way from the way they did in 1918. Capitalism was fortunate to have a set of leaders who understood that survival meant change, including borrowing liberally from the socio-economic arsenal of socialism. The statement, that “there is no choice between being a communist on 1500 calories a day and a believer in democracy on a thousand,” attributed to such as ace Cold Warrior and anti-communist as General Lucius Clay, is indicative of Western leaders’ willingness to think outside the box, even to break the mould where necessary. It was this attitudinal transformation which made possible the game-changing Marshall Plan. Marshall Plan’s “effectiveness was rooted in the freedom that it gave post-war European governments, torn between structural rebuilding and investing directly in their citizens, to avoid austerity measures and cutbacks that would have increased political instability and lowered the quality of daily life.”[iii]

So the welfare state became the capitalist norm in the first world. Political leaders used economic measures to transform ordinary people from outsiders into stakeholders of the system, with something to lose. Western European welfare states succeeded in ensuring higher living and working conditions to their own working classes than what prevailed in the Eastern Bloc. As Eric Hobsbawm pointed out, “It is one of the ironies of this strange century that the most lasting result of the October revolution, whose object was the global overthrow of capitalism, was to save its antagonist both in war and in peace – that is to say by providing it with the incentive, fear, to reform itself after the Second World War…”[iv]

That history is now forgotten. And democracy’s failure of memory has resulted in an attitude to economics which is so dogmatic it seems almost religious. The post-war nexus between individual freedom and social justice lies sundered. In 2009, a second great depression was avoided, but the means used to save entire economies from collapsing had a disastrous impact on millions of individual lives. Livelihoods and homes were lost; the fact that those who contributed most to the crisis, banks, insurance companies, hedge funds and other outposts of financial capital, got away scot-free provided kindling to the fire of popular discontent.

Brazil’s transition from democratic success story to deadly failure holds important lessons to other embattled democracies, including right here at home. Had the Workers Party not gained a reputation for rampant corruption, had it focused on improving the lives of ordinary people instead of wasting enormous resources on showy projects (such as the Rio Olympics), Brazil’s trajectory might not have taken the turn it has. When democratic leaders renege on their core promises and turn their backs on their indispensable constituencies, they sow the seeds of authoritarianism.

The Baby and the Bathwater – An Old Adage for New Times

Soon after Hitler came to power, a group European cultural leaders held a conference under the guidance of Andre Gide to analyse what went wrong and how best to resist Nazism. Klaus Mann in his remarks suggested that leftist intellectuals – like himself – were partly to blame for the disaster. Their critique of the Weimer Republic had been too absolute, because they had seen nothing worth defending in the corrupt, decadent and unjust democratic order, until Nazis took power and taught them the value of basic rights. “We have defamed the original, indestructible, and noble desire of European peoples for freedom because in many cases liberalism has been degraded to a worthless phrase and an alibi for high profits.”[v]

If refighting old battles is to be our fate, it must be done without repeating old mistakes. As a second wave of national-populism gains traction across the world, that lesson from the first wave needs to be remembered. Contempt for representative democracy was a European staple during the interwar years; democratic politicians were often venal and ineffective then, as they are now. Another issue common to both times was corruption. As the gulf between the promises of democracy and the reality (especially Weimer Germany) grew, democracy’s defenders sunk into disillusionment and apathy. The value of the freedoms that still remained under the corrupt, idiotically inept and repressive governments was understood only after they were totally lost under Nazi rule.

Most of human history, humans lived without basic rights and freedoms; and their lives were poor, short and brutish. Sans of a voice and rights, they received subhuman treatment at the hands of kings, generals, magnates or religious leaders. The rights we take for granted today, and are so willing to barter for illusions of security and prosperity, are the results of centuries of hard fought battles. A cursory look at history, for instance, would show how and with what tenacity vested interests resisted the idea of universal franchise.

Historically, democracy was not a rich man’s whim but a poor man’s necessity. The absence of basic rights helps not the ordinary law abiding citizen, but power-wielders (political, religious and economic). Such an environment is not conducive even to combat crime. In the absence of due process and free expression, when a crime happens, the police don’t have to spend time and effort conducting a proper investigation. All they have to do is to catch a ‘likely suspect’ who will either commit suicide or be killed while trying to escape.

In Sri Lanka, the Rajapaksa opposition and their supports (which could include up to 45% of the voting electorate) regard extra-judicial killings and involuntary disappearances as a public good. The banishment of the exhibition Unframed (organised by the Vikalpa Magazine) from the Peradeniya University proves the danger of societal intolerance and authoritarians. The decision by the organisers of a recent film festival in Jaffna not to show the documentary, ‘Demons in Paradise’ demonstrates that the habit of self-censorship is alive and well, even in the absence of official censorship. Add to this toxic brew the growing economic pain of the masses – and there can be little doubt that the necessary ingredients for the re-triumph of autocracy are present in Sri Lanka.

There is nothing glorious about starting from zero again and again, in fighting battles which had been won. But if that is to be our fate, then there cannot be a better model for the coming times than Sisyphus, of Albert Camus. Camus reminds all those whose task is to labour in seeming futile conditions that to despair is to cede victory to the rock. “The struggle towards the heights is enough to fill a man’s heart,”[vi] he says in conclusion. Perhaps we are about to find out.

[i] https://www.wsj.com/articles/scandal-over-dead-journalist-jolts-heir-to-saudi-throne-1540076164

[ii] http://visionofhumanity.org/app/uploads/2018/06/Global-Peace-Index-2018-2.pdf

http://hdr.undp.org/sites/default/files/2018_human_development_statistical_update.pdf

[iii] Winning the Peace – The Marshall Plan and America’s coming of age as a superpower – Nicolaus Mills

[iv] The Age of Extremes

[v] Quoted in The Intellectual Resistance in Europe – James D Wilkinson

[vi] The Myth of Sisyphus