“The Rajapaksas want more power. Again, according to Basil Rajapaksa, “In other countries who are successful, they were successful because immediately one person he takes the decisions. In Sri Lanka, the main problem is that that is not there, more decisions have to be centralized” (ibid). Wade through the grammatical-mire and the meaning is as […]

A series of photos supposed to provide an insight into Prince William’s time in the RAF revealed something a little more, when several images were shown to contain sensitive information, including login details to a military website.
When the PR folk got together and said “let’s do a day-in-the-life of Prince William in the Royal Air […]

Resources on and trainers for promoting awareness on LLRC

23 November 2012, Colombo, Sri Lanka: The Lessons Learnt and Reconciliation Committee presented their much awaited report on Dec 16 2011. Following a war which lasted almost 30
years, and resulted in death, destruction and devastation, this report is the result, after 18 months, of a presidential commission of inquiry […]

Washington – Nov. 23, 2012– Freedom House denounces Egyptian President Mohamed
Morsi’s decision to claim sweeping new powers for himself through a constitutional declaration that expands his presidential power significantly beyond that of his predecessors, including those of Hosni Mubarak. This action poses a serious threat to the democratic transition in Egypt, and Freedom House urges […]

My last conversation with Prof Peter Schalk was in the faculty dining room at Georgetown University in the fall of 2005, when I was a visiting professor at the School of Advanced International Studies of Johns Hopkins University in Washington DC. We were speaking at seminar on conflict in the Asian region hosted by the […]

The Preamble to the 1978 Constitution sets out the Mandate given by the Sovereign People to assure to all peoples FREEDOM, EQUALITY, JUSTICE, FUNDAMENTAL HUMAN RIGHTS and THE INDEPENDENCE OF THE JUDICIARY, as the intangible heritage that guarantees the dignity and well being of succeeding generations of the Peoples of Sri Lanka. Significantly “Justice” and […]

Passing judgement
The process of impeaching Chief Justice Shirani Bandaranayake has commenced in earnest. The Parliamentary Select Committee to investigate and pass judgment on her has been appointed with a 7-4 government majority and consists of very senior government and opposition members. It has been very prompt in serving the charges against her. The Chief Justice […]

“As I said on the floor of this house last week, during the adjournment debate on KP Pathmanathan there are reasonable grounds to believe that part of the black money which has flooded into the stock market in Colombo as well as some of the FDI in Colombo is LTTE blood money. In fact, it […]

Getting away with murder
THERE is little doubt that in 2009 the government of Sri Lanka pulled off one of the nastiest episodes of mass killing since the Rwandan genocide – and got away with it. Tens of thousands of civilians were massacred, with barely a trickle of Syria-like imagery emerging from the battle zone.
In a […]

(Tamilnet)
Sri Lanka’s ambassador in France, Dayan Jayatilleke, calling for “autonomy within a unitary structure,” at a seminar in Paris earlier this month was a political-populist statement, responded Professor Emeritus Peter Schalk, who participated the seminar arranged by Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (CNRS). A unitary structure excludes autonomy. A social scientist would not have […]