Monthly Archives: August 2013

Sri Lankan government heading towards dictatorship says HR chief Navi Pillay after fact finding visit

Opening remarks by UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Navi Pillay at a press conference during her mission to Sri Lanka
Colombo, 31 August 2013
Good morning, and thank you for coming.
As is customary at the end of official missions such as this, I would like to make some observations concerning the human rights situation in the […]

By | Published on August 31, 2013 at 9:58 pm

Asinine sexist response to UN official by Mervyn Silva: Married Minister willing to commit bigamy and marry Navi Pillay

Daily Mirror, TUESDAY, 27 AUGUST: The country’s maverick Public Relations and Public Affairs Minister
Mervyn Silva said he was willing to marry visiting UNHRC Commissioner Navaneetham Pillay.
“I urge her to join me to go on a trip around the country. I would teach her the history of Sri Lanka, I would tell her
about Maha Ravana. It was […]

By Daily Mirror | Published on August 28, 2013 at 9:51 am

Sri Lanka: A new Ministry of Law and Order in a lawless Land

“In our world there will be no emotions except fear, rage, triumph and self-abasement…. Always, at every moment, there will be the thrill of victory, the sensation of trampling on an enemy who is helpless.”
Orwell (Nineteen Eighty-Four)
Just 24 hours after the new Ministry of Law and Order came into existence, an armed gang invaded the […]

By Tisaranee Gunasekara | Published on August 25, 2013 at 11:10 pm

Navi Pillay is a Human Rights Fundamentalist says Dayan

This week will be a crucial week for Sri Lanka, or more precisely for the Government, as the woman seen as the
“iron lady” dealing with human rights issues makes her visit to Sri Lanka to get a firsthand account of what happened during and after the war.
During her weeklong stay in Sri Lanka, UN High […]

By The Sunday Leader | Published on August 25, 2013 at 10:59 pm

Ghosts of 1994 hovering over Gamini’s son: Attempt on Mayantha’s ’s life

“Life is a grindstone. Whether it grinds us down or polishes us up depends on us.”
~Thomas L. Holdcroft
Gamini Dissanayake, one of the patriarchs of Sri Lanka’s modern day politics was a victim of a brutal attack by the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Ealam (LTTE). On October 24, 1994, while he was bidding adieu to a […]

By Vishnuguptha | Published on August 25, 2013 at 10:48 pm

Poignant lament of a nation’s soul: The regime’s insensitivity to the melancholy of the ordinary

“My grief lies all within, and these external manners of lament are merely shadows to the unseen grief that swells with silence in the tortured soul”
~William Shakespeare
Mending roofs
Darmasena wakes up to the haunting melody of the cuckoo’s morning call. Bare- bodied and in his only pair of shorts ragged with wear he gets off the […]

By Vishnuguptha | Published on August 23, 2013 at 10:28 pm

Planned introduction of religious censorship yet another measure of divide and rule, Rajapaksa-style

“Lies are believed amongst every race;
And was any race ever the sole possessor of Truth?”
Abdallah al-Mar’arri (973-1057)
Religious bigotry
When Martin Wickremesinghe’s Bhavatharanaya was first published, some Sinhala-Buddhists (lay and ordained) wanted it banned for ‘insulting’ the Buddha.
There are American Evangelicals who think that Harry Potter books should be prohibited for promoting anti-
Christian values.
The BJP student union […]

By Tisaranee Gunasekara | Published on August 22, 2013 at 11:37 pm

Reflections on “Long War, Cold Peace”

“Sri Lanka faces a crisis of transition and transformation… Sri Lanka has been unable to make the transition from war to sustainable peace; from what I believe was fundamentally a just war to a just peace.
The crisis is at least in part a crisis of the post war discourse. … The discourse has not been […]

By Dr Godfrey Gunatilleke | Published on August 22, 2013 at 1:37 pm

The TNA the TGTE and the UNP

While it is by no means the place of a uniformed officer, however highly placed, decorated or both, to comment on the peaceful political conduct of members of parliament and/or of academics, the story told by the new Chief of Defence Staff, to the effect that Mr Sampanthan and Mr Sumanthiran attended an event of […]

By Dr. Dayan Jayatilleka | Published on August 22, 2013 at 3:00 am

The Lies They Tell Us

“The most alarming aspect of the video to me was the seemingly delightful bloodlust they appeared to have. They….seemed not to value human life…”
Bradley Manning (Statement at the Trial – referring to an American attack on Iraqi civilians)
The ‘Rajapaksa Model’ of warfare had eight fundamentals, Indian journalist VK Shashikumar wrote in the Indian
Defence Review . […]

By Tisaranee Gunasekara | Published on August 22, 2013 at 2:56 am