 For over two decades, there has been savage conflict in Sri Lanka between a minority group of Tamils who claim traditional rights for land in the north-east and the majority, Sinhalese, government in Colombo. The conflict has consumed tens of thousands of lives, displaced hundreds of thousands, sown agricultural land with mines, laid waste plantations, and stunted a generation of children. It could be argued that the only rule of warfare is the respect each side has for the capacity of the other to terrorise: the desire for self-preservation has tended to restrict the number of civilians being bombed. |
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 New Minister of Foreign Affairs Hon Stephen Smith MP, fired former ambassador to Sri Lanka Dr Greg French and appointed Ms Kathy Klugman as Australia's new High Commissioner to the Democratic Socialist Republic of Sri Lanka. Dr Greg French took a soft stand on Sri Lankan Government sponsored human rights violatons and took a more pro US approach to Tamil ethnic conflict and hardly ever condemed Sri Lankan Goverenemts Human Rights violations.The Rudd Government has ratified the Kyoto protocol, started talks with the United States on withdrawal of Australian combat troops from Iraq, and is now risking diplomatic damage with Japan by confronting it over whaling. Stephen also stressed, "Ms Klugman’s appointment comes at a time of increasing conflict in Sri Lanka. Australia’s view is that only a negotiated and just political settlement can achieve durable peace for all Sri Lankans." and which is not a good news for war loving Mahinda Rajapaksa brothers in Sri Lanka. |
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 ".. Your government has repeatedly expressed the view that it considers human rights as the most core issue in the Sri Lankan scene. Therefore isn’t the ‘Defense of Human Rights Defenders’ a challenge to your government as it is to Sri Lankan Human Rights defenders?
I request for your government’s constructive involvement..." |
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 Sri Lankan Defence Secretary Gothapaya Rajapaksa's, Sri Lankan Military Paramilitary Ring Leader Karuna to face War crimes inquiry in UK. Full Text of Report
War crimes inquiry into Tamil rebel living in UK
By David Brown
A Sri Lankan guerrilla leader living in London is being investigated for possible war crimes charges, The Times has learnt. Karuna Amman, who has been implicated in atrocities over two decades, entered Britain on a diplomatic passport. The Crown Prosecution Service is looking into whether there is sufficient evidence to bring him to trial under international laws on war crimes, torture and hostage-taking. |
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 The Protection of Women and Children during Armed Conflict: Whose Responsibility?
UN Special Rep to give Chancellor’s Human Rights Lecture on protection of women and children in armed conflict
"..In Sri Lanka, there were 237 reported cases of children abducted between
November 2005 and October 2006.." |
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The latest article that appeared in the Washington Times on 11 December 2007, provided by the current Ambassador of Sri Lanka Ambassador Bernard Goonetilleke to the United States of America. It can be considered as a common view of many Singhalese politicians who are at the first place to blame for the current strife between the two major ethnic communities on the island namely the Sinhalese and Tamils. |
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 Full text of the media release:
Government is setting stage for my elimination by first publishing lies and then withdrawing security
Government has withdrawn since 8 PM of 18th December the additional security provided to me aftermath of the killing of my co-founder of Civil Monitoring Commission Nadaraja Raviraj almost a year ago in Colombo's high security zone. Government's latest move is amidst my request for enhancement of my security due to the increased threats to my life. Eight out of the team of ten MSD security personnel have been called back with their weapons and security back-up vehicle. |
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Tamil residents in Jaffna are reportedly being forced to carry a special document of identification issued by security forces, in addition to the national identity card provided by the Emigration and Immigration Department. In other words, these Tamils have been ignominiously reduced, in the eyes of government authorities, to the status of non-nationals of their own country.Not only that, in order to get this security clearance, as reported in a weekend newspaper, one is obliged to disclose his/her political affiliations too. |
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Jaffna - The Head of Sri Lanka Red Cross (SLRC) of Point Pedro, Mr. Sooriyakaanthi Thavarasa’s lifeless body was found in the road side.He was a father of five children and he had been receiving death threats from paramilitary group and forced to go into hiding due the intent of threats and fear from these groups and complained made to the Jaffna Human Rights Commission (JHRC), according to his relatives. |
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Value attached to different lives
The UDHR (Universal Declaration of Human Rights) in 1948 was momentous, for it - for the first time in the history of human race - declared that all people of the human race are equal. It did make a definite shift in the manner in which humans perceived the value of human life. Yet, the value attached to a loss of life undoubtedly varies at all levels of the human group. |
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Around 25 Tamil journalists have fled Sri Lanka over the past three years, the Free Media Movement (FMM) claimed yesterday. FMM Convener Sunanda Deshapriya told The Nation that the journalists had fled the country as their lives were in danger. The Nation learns that one of the most recent reporters to flee the country was Thinakkural Defence Correspondent K. P. Mohan, who was subjected to severe harassment by security forces on several occasions. |
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Belying expectations, Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (DMK) president and Tamil Nadu chief minister M Karunanidhi on Sunday night avoided a direct response to the succession issue saying the time had not yet come for him to declare his son M K Stalin as his political heir but an announcement would be made shortly. |
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Kshenuka Senewiratne
Lankan HC dodges British summons
~ London Foreign Office wants to lodge official protest over Karuna’s ‘fake’ passport
Sri Lanka’s High Commissioner in the United Kingdom, Kshenuka Senewiratne, was summoned to the British Foreign and Commonwealth Office for a meeting on Tuesday over issues relating to renegade Tiger guerrilla leader Vinayagamoorthy Muralitharan alias Karuna entering Britain with official backing from the Government of Sri Lanka. |
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 Ex- envoy insists RAW tried to kill him
Former Pakistan High Commissioner Bashir Wali Mohmand reiterated at a dinner given in honour of a group of visiting Sri Lankan journalists on Tuesday night when he openly accused India’s external spy agency of staging the bomb blast in Colombo targeting his motorcade on August 14, 2006. Mr. Mohmand who was one of the invitees at this dinner hosted by Mushahid Hussain Sayed, the Chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee kept everyone entertained with these revelations. The former High Commissioner who is now serving as Sri Lanka’s consul in his home region of the North West Frontier Province - one of the most volatile areas in Pakistan - said, to his surprise, the news of the blast had reached New Delhi before anywhere else. |
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News
In a surprising move the Government of Sri Lanka has appointed spin doctoring guru and regular contributor to the pro-government Asian Tribune web news paper Walter Jayawardena an official Minister/Counsellor (Information) at the Sri Lankan High Commission in the UK. The Asian Tribune editor K T Rajasingam came under media scrutiny over his involvement with the President Rajapakse to implement a government run massive project costing over million US dollars to carryout campaign work against the anti-government forces and the LTTE. 
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