Committee to Protect Journalists
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Eknelygoda, a political reporter and cartoonist for Lanka eNews, disappeared on the night of January 24, two days before the presidential elections that gave the incumbent president a sweeping victory that will keep him power for six more years.
“The media under Rajapaksa have been under tremendous pressure,” said Bob Dietz, CPJ’s Asia program coordinator. “The government’s silence over Prageeth Eknelygoda’s disappearance represents the continuation of policies that have allowed journalists killers’ to go unprosecuted, and driven scores of others into exile. The government must offer Sandhya Eknelygoda all its support in finding her husband.”
Sandhya Eknelygoda told CPJ she last saw her husband when he left for work around 7:30 a.m. on the morning of January 24. Since then, repeated visits to police stations, appeals to members of parliament, and personal requests to Rajapaksa and other members of his government have been met with silence.
With no answers forthcoming from the government, Sandhya Eknelygoda says she will start organizing prayer vigils at temples across the country. The first will be at the Kaali Amma Kovil Hindu temple in Colombo at 5 p.m. Saturday.
In a report released in May, In Sri Lanka, no peace dividend for press, CPJ highlighted Eknelygoda’s case, noting that even with the end of Sri Lanka’s war with Tamil rebels, repression of independent media has not eased, and journalists still face violence, harassment, and detention.
CPJ reported extensively on attacks on journalists in its special report Sri Lanka: Failure to Investigate and recently ranked Sri Lanka as the fourth-worst country in the world for impunity in attacks on journalists. Twelve journalists have been killed and scores of others attacked since the Rajapaksa government came to power in 2004, with no convictions in any of the cases.
CPJ’s Journalists Assistance program counts more than 40 Sri Lankan journalists living outside of the country who left out of fear for their safety.
© Committee to Protect Journalists
Saturday, July 24, 2010
Sri Lankan journalist’s disappearance remains unexplained
Saturday, July 24, 2010
Ban Ki-moon's UN Called Secret on Corruption, Silent on Torture from Sri Lanka to Sudan
By Matthew Russell Lee | Inner City Press
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Ban's “senior UN official,” when asked by Inner City Press why under Ban moves toward a UN Freedom of Information Act were curtailed, replied, “ask the member states, let them legislate, then we'll do it.” He paused. “If the member states insist, our way of decision making would have to be modified” for “this kind of perfect transparency.”
But back on May 3, Ban intoned that “I welcome the global trend towards new laws which recognize the universal right to publicly held information. Unfortunately, these new laws do not always translate into action. Requests for official information are often refused, or delayed, sometimes for years... Too often, this happens because of a culture of secrecy and a lack of accountability” Ya don't say.
Inner City Press asked Ban's senior UN official to explain what if anything he has done about the military dictatorship and impending scam election in Myanmar, a country where Ban's administration allowed and covered by the theft of over 20% of UN aid funds by the Than Shwe regime using foreign exchange requirement the UN never complained about until exposed by this publication.
The official declined to give any specifics, but said
“If you are leading on several fronts, you are not leading on any. Things take time; some things take time. Effort for us is a great thing. The kind of effort you make on particular issues is important. There is a definition of bureaucratic action: it is like elephants mating. There’s a lot of noise, and it take years to see the result.”
But Ban has had more than three years, and in the next six months on elections in not only Myanmar but also South Sudan, leadership is sorely lacking. Inner City Press asked Ban's spokesman Martin Nesirky this week why the UN has said nothing about reported torture of South Sudan referendum supporters. Nesirky said, it's “not our job to police the police.”
The senior UN official on Thursday, speaking more general of Ban, said that
“He has called himself a carpenter, not an architect. The way he handled climate change was to take on the larger role. But on other issues – DRC, Sudan – he’s taken the nuts and bolts role. He has generally had a predisposition to look to practical aspects; he has taken a practical approach. That is part of his training.”
Apparently, “practical” means staying silent in the face of torture. Ban's training was as South Korea's minister of trade and foreign affairs. In this role, he praised a joint Daewoo and Indian pipeline across Myanmar as a “win - win.”
Ban also befriended Sri Lankan strongman Mahinda Rajapaksa, such that he remained sickeningly silent as Rajapaksa's forces killed tens of thousands of Tamil civilians in 2009, and imprisoned hundreds of thousands more, using UN funds.
Ban visited the prison camps and smiled as Tamil children as gunpoint sang his name. That's not nuts and bolts, one wag said: that's just nuts.
But who will tell him? The senior UN official continued:
“He has a wide spectrum of senior managers; not all yes-men as such. In every management team you have ones who prefer the subrosa approach, and ones who prefer the public approach. There is a necessity for the SG to insist on a certain modicum of discipline. That’s not very different than what would happen in any governmental or private sector management team.”
Not all yes-man as such. No, it is a multi-cultural and multi-lingual Organization, so there are also the men and women of Si and Oui and iwa. Ban himself should have, and some say soon will have to, deliver his own defense.
© Inner City Press
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Saturday, July 24, 2010
Sri Lanka: Five senior journalists to be recognized
By Rifthi Ali | Daily Mirror
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Among those being recognized for their brave efforts to defend press freedom would be slain Sunday Leader Editor Lasantha Wickramathunga who will be given this award posthumously. Others receiving awards on this day would be former Suder Oli Editor N.Vidyatharan, Sri Lanka Working Journalists Association General Secretary Poddala Jayantha, former Rivira Editor Upali Thennakoon and former Outreach Magazine Editor J.S Tissainayagam, who will receive Merit Awards.
© Daily Mirror
Saturday, July 24, 2010
Sri Lanka Army personnel to be settled on uprooted civilians’ land in Ki’linochchi district
Tamil Net
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The above prefabricated houses bought with international funds donated for resettlement in Vanni are being transported to Ki’linochchi in heavy vehicles and are assembled on cement foundation and flooring on selected places, NGO circles said.
Sri Lanka government, with its scheme to construct 12,000 prefabricated houses in the above area intends to settle the SLA personnel with their families permanently.
In the first stage of this scheme of Sinhalicization, 5,000 houses are to be settled with SLA personnel and their families in the first weeks of August.
No one except SLA personnel and labourers is allowed into this housing scheme that is being constructed in haste.
Sinhalese building masons are working along with SLA personnel in constructing the houses, sources in Ki'linochchi who had taken the snaps of the houses said.
© Tamil Net
Saturday, July 24, 2010
Remembering “Black July” to encourage Sri Lankan reconciliation
By Melani Manel Perera | Asia News
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After Tamil Tiger fighters ambushed and killed 13 Sri Lankan soldiers on that tragic day, 27 years ago, ethnic Sinhalese attacked ethnic Tamils. Up to 3,000 Tamils are thought to have died in the violence, 18,000 Tamil homes and 5,000 shops were destroyed, whilst more than 100,000 Tamils fled to India, setting off a civil war that ended only last year with the defeat of the Tamil Tigers.
“Eyewitnesses and victims reported that on the streets cars were stopped by gangs and the people inside were asked whether they were Sinhalese or Tamil,” wrote Patricia Hyndman, senior lecturer in Law at the University of New South Wales, in Democracy in peril : Sri Lanka : a country in crisis : report to the LAWASIA Human Rights Standing Committee (1985).
“Some Sinhalese words are extremely difficult for people who do not speak the language fluently to pronounce,” she explained. Hence, “people were tested by being made to pronounce these words. The mobs were also demanding to see identity cards to establish whether or not people were Tamils . . . . People identified as Tamils as a result of the questioning were told to get out of their cars and their cars were set alight . . . . In cases where any resistance was offered, killings were likely to take place.”
AsiaNews has spoken to people, including ordinary people as well as Sinhalese Buddhist monks, who are involved in Colombo in activities designed to encourage national reconciliation.
“Tragic events like those of Black July can be an opportunity for genuine national reconciliation,” said Rukshan Fernando, head of the Lawyers and Society Trust. “Sadly, Sri Lankan society seems far from” that goal. “Not only July but every month of the year continues to be black for thousands of people who have had family members killed, missing or detained without charges . . . . Instead of recognizing wrongs, the authorities seem eager to deny and cover them up.”
Fr Sarath Iddamalgoda, a human rights activist, has also not seen any steps towards reconciliation. “Black July was one of the greatest mistakes committed by Sinhalese fanatics,” he said. “Even now, that the war is over, Sinhalese leaders do not seem interested in power sharing. What they want is to control Tamil areas. Genuine reconciliation will only occur by seeking a shared political solution.”
© Asia News
Saturday, July 24, 2010
Sri Lanka: returning home to nothing
By Olav A. Saltbones | Norwegian Red Cross
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Ouvurasa Anuba, 32, is the mother of two young children. She lost her husband in the final weeks of the war between the army and the ‘Tamil Tigers’ (LTTE). She also lost her mother and father-in-law during the conflict. Her youngest child, Varmina, is two and a half – old enough to have memories of the war, but too young to understand it. At five, her older brother, Thanashi, understands that he lost his father to the
war.
The conflict saw hundreds of thousands of Tamils flee the country – many of them to Norway – but a similar number fled to other parts of Sri Lanka. Now, they are returning home to rebuild what the war destroyed.
Ouvurasa and the children returned to their home in February this year. Her husband used to earn a living by selling goods at the local market. Now she doesn’t know what the family will live on as she is worried she won’t be able to find a job. For now, she is focusing on rebuilding the family home.
“My house was destroyed and there is only one wall left. I want to keep the one wall that is still standing, and use it as a part of the new house,” she says.
Ouvurasa is receiving support from the Red Cross to build the new house on the plot of the old house.
Loss of livelihood
On the other side of town, another family is also rebuilding their house.
S. Ranganathan and his family have so far rebuilt the foundation wall. Whilst the construction is ongoing, they are living in a makeshift shelter with a corrugated iron roof.
Ranganathan was badly injured in a bomb attack. He received first aid from the Red Cross, and fortunately they managed to save both his foot and his life. Sadly, he lost six members of his family in a bomb attack as he was fleeing to safety with his family. Some of his other relatives live in the house across the road where they have put up a memorial altar with a picture of the six dead family members.
His injuries prevent him from doing physical labour. He shows the scar that runs up his thigh.
“I am a farmer, but now I need help to till the land. I hope we never have to experience war again. I hope for peace and harmony around the world,” he says.
New homes desperately needed
The Red Cross estimates that more than a 100,000 new homes are needed in northern Sri Lanka, but there are not enough resources. It is expected that only a few hundred homes will be completed before the monsoon season starts in October.
“The internally displaced people, who are returning to their villages, are coming home to nothing. More than 300,000 people are in a desperate humanitarian situation,” says Børge Brende, Secretary General of the Norwegian Red Cross.
“When they come back to their villages, they must prove ownership of the house or land, and not everyone can do that. So they are given sheets of corrugated iron and they use whatever they can find – sticks, planks and bricks to try to build a house. In the meantime, they live in school buildings, public buildings or under tents and tarpaulins next to their destroyed houses,” explains Brende.
Working with the The Sri Lanka Red Cross Society and IFRC, the German Red Cross is also working to build new homes and repair damage to others.
“The need is huge. As many as perhaps over 100,000 homes must be built for those who are returning from other parts of Sri Lanka and from abroad. This is not a task either we or others can ignore,” says Brende.
“The Norwegian Red Cross made a major effort in Sri Lanka after the tsunami. We are about to complete that operation now, but we cannot leave Sri Lanka with the challenges the country still faces in the northern areas,” says Brende.
In recent months, several thousand people have been forced to flee again, either back to host families in other parts of the country, or to camps for internally displaced people.
“In the largest of them, Mannik Farm, where more than 280,000 people stayed at the peak, more than 40,000 people remain. Some of these have been forced back there because they have nothing to return to or rebuild in their original villages. Some have lost all their papers and documents of ownership. Some had nothing before they fled and they have nothing now. So we must help these people”, says Brende.
© International Federation of Red Cross Red Crescent Societies
Friday, July 23, 2010
Sri Lanka: University student dies after Police assault
Colombo Today
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Bandara succumbed to his injuries last night after an assault by the police during a protest demonstration on June 18.
Convener of the Inter University Students Federation, Udul Premaratne said that the Minister has said in a recent television programme that the students who jeered will be sent to jail and this posed a threat to these students.
The protest was held as a mark of protest against the minister's remark, he added.
He further said that the Minister, who is boasting to privatize education, is evading a challenge by the IUSF for a debate on privatizing education.
Meanwhile, the class boycott at Sabaragamuwa University, which prevailed for over a fortnight, ended today.
The boycott was held as a mark of protest against the suspension of four students.
The boycott ended after Vice Chancellor of the university, Prof. S. Rupasinghe forgave the suspended students.
© Colombo Today
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Friday, July 23, 2010
Sri Lanka: Journalist assaulted in Mannar
Daily Mirror Online
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Speaking to Daily Mirror online from his hospital bed this morning, Anthony Mark said that he was assaulted by men wearing face masks while he was on his way to the Temple last night.
The senior correspondent who is also physically feeble owing to his old age, said that one man had approached him and attempted to take him to a parked van. After refusing to do so the journalist was physically assaulted and an attempt was then made to take him by force.
However on seeing another vehicle approaching them, the gang fled the area in the van together with a diary, some books and other material which were in the possession of the correspondent.
Anthony Mark claimed that some groups who had opposed his writing on the plight of Internally Displaced People (IDP) in Mannar had often branded him an LTTE supporter and at time leveled threats against him and feels those groups maybe behind the assault.
© Daily Mirror Online
Friday, July 23, 2010
Murali: A genuine sporting king in a world of unworthy princes
By Martin Kettle | Guardian
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Would the guileful Sri Lankan bowler – the greatest Asian sportsman of all time, perhaps – cap his final game by dismissing an unprecedented, still almost unbelievable, 800th test match victim? For the many who neither know nor care about such things but who are sufficiently motivated to read on, it may be helpful to understand that only two other bowlers in addition to Muralitharan has ever dismissed more than 600 batsmen in his career and that in nearly a century and a half of trying no Englishman has ever exceeded 383. That's how much in his own league Murali is. In mid-morning came the inevitable confirmation that he had done it.
Murali is simply the best. But don't take my word for it. Take the word of someone who played against him many times without ever fully mastering Murali's array of skills. Batting against him, wrote Steve Waugh, the combative former Australian captain, was the ultimate challenge, "enticing then withdrawing, probing before striking, each delivery a mini-battle". Murali possesses a very even temperament, Waugh says, but like all great artists in any field "he is also focused and driven, always looking to extend his repertoire". In the end, Waugh concludes, "one can only marvel at his unsurpassed record".
There is, however, something beyond the record. Put aside, for a moment, the poignantly appropriate fact that Murali completed his career yesterday on the cricket field at Galle that was swamped by the 2004 tsunami for whose victims he has worked so tirelessly ever since. Put aside, too, the remarkable truth that in a nation, and in a national team, dominated by the majority Sinhalese population during a period of brutal ethnic civil war, this nonpareil player is from the minority Tamil population. Put aside, for that matter, the fact that not one of Mr Murdoch's many TV channels, happy to carry any amount of live darts and minor league football, could be bothered to broadcast yesterday's milestone moment live.
Instead consider this. Amid the overpaid egos and pampered brats who populate so much of contemporary sport, Muralitharan seems to stand almost completely apart, the proverbial good deed in what often feels like an ever naughtier sporting world of drugs, bribes and cheating. With achievements like his on the cricket field, and amid the apparently unconditional adulation of his divided nation, Muralitharan could so easily have become the worst kind of petulant sporting diva. There are many precedents. Nor, after suffering so many insults to, and insinuations about, his bowling action for so long, would it have been any surprise if he had evolved into one of sport's most self-pitying, embittered crazy guys.
On the contrary, as far as one can see, Murali has managed to combine being one of the handful of genuine sporting legends with a calm demeanour, a warm personality and an ability to see his achievements in a healthy perspective. Yesterday, having completed his amazing feat, Murali told interviewers that he was more concerned to be remembered as a nice person than as an often unplayable spin bowler. It is impossible not to contrast both Murali's goodness and his sustained success – he had to capture eight wickets, no mean challenge, in his final game to reach 800 – with the record and demeanour of England's over-hyped footballers with their six-figure weekly wages and lack of basic skills and success.
Murali is a lesson to others too. Last weekend at St Andrews, Tiger Woods battled his way around the Open championship golf course in the wind and rain, playing neither particularly well nor badly, but looking more miserable than a multimillionaire sports star has any right to look. Over the years, I have seen Woods play several times, and I daresay I would never have gone to watch golf in the first place if it hadn't been for his all-round appeal. I once even wrote – confession time – an article about Tiger as the perfect American, a man who embodied with almost laboratory precision the combination of ability, hard work, ethnic mix, glamour and success that make a lot of Americans feel good about themselves. Oh what a fall was there.
Do not forget, though, that before he self-destructed, Woods had an on-course allure that only a handful of sports stars, or stars of any kind, could command. When you saw him approaching down the fairway, it was thrilling, like waiting for Domingo to sing. The aesthetic of his play and his demeanour were mesmerising. His ability to do something truly brilliant was unrivalled.
Over the years, Woods honed all these talents into the most gloriously intimidating aura that the sports world could offer, certainly unprecedented in golf. In modern times, only Federer's command of tennis stands comparison. At St Andrews, however, it was obvious that Woods has lost it. The aura is gone. He is just another fine player, struggling to keep up, a bit like Lance Armstrong in this year's Tour de France, although unlike Armstrong it is possible that Woods may manage to put most of it back together again one day.
The sports world will always crave faster, stronger and higher. Sporting heroes, though, are transient at best and have feet of clay at worst – in sport as in other things, certainly politics. Even Federer has begun to lose, and even Muhammad Ali lost too. And anyone who has put their faith in sporting princes over the years knows how regularly they turn out to be unworthy of the worship that we lavish on them. The day Fred Trueman told the Yorkshire Evening Post he always voted Tory was a particularly hard one for me. Perhaps, as Enoch Powell said of political careers, all sporting careers end in failure too.
But if that is true, then how to explain the amazing Murali? His career ends in triumph not failure, in acclaim not disdain, as a legend not as a loser. Unhappy the land that needs heroes, says Brecht sternly. But perhaps his preceding line – unhappy the land that lacks heroes – is actually truer after all. Idols do not have to fall, like Woods. They can also be worthy, like Murali. Or perhaps I have fallen for the, er, spin.
© Guardian
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Friday, July 23, 2010
Sri Lanka to miss 2010 FDI goal, set up new policy
By Shihar Aneez | Reuters
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The $42 billion economy had aimed to attract a record $1 billion FDI mainly in tourism and outsourcing after a 25-year war ended in May last year.
Jayampathy Bandaranayeka, the chairman and director general of the country's state-run Board of Investment (BOI) said the aim was ambitious.
"We are unlikely to move beyond $1 billion and investments would be more in line with what was achieved last year," Bandaranayeka said in an interview.
"The real take off will be following the budget in November. We expect 2011 to be much higher than $1 billion," he said.
Foreign direct investment hit a record $889 million in 2008, but fell in 2009 to $602 million due to the global downturn.
The end of the war, since when the stock market had surged over 152 percent, boosted Sri Lanka's growth prospects.
The new FDI policies, expected in 2011 budget, will aim to draw investments into agriculture, fisheries, business outsourcing, education, shipping, aviation, infrastructure and tourism, Bandaranayeka said.
The new policies also will rationalise tax concessions, which were given to attract foreigners due to the prolonged war.
"The government will be looking forward to a different regime of incentives that take into account the special needs of the country. The expectation is both to attract FDIs to increase investments and also to ensure the future tax base of the country is protected," he said.
Future FDI projects would be available for investors across the world in all the selected sectors and the BOI hopes to minimise all bureaucracy for foreigners.
© Reuters
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