By Devon Haynie . VAVUNIYA, Sri Lanka — At some point during its brutal 26 years, the Sri Lankan civil war brought terror or loss to virtually everyone in the country. For Kasipillai Jeyavanitha, a mother of four, the defining moment of the conflict came in March 2009, just two months before the war ended […]

Image: A grieving mother at today memorial event. Photo credit @vikalpavoices Memorial event organised by the Northern Provincial Council to remember  victims of the  of war was  held at the Mullivaikal today. Leaders of the Tamil National Alliance (TNA) including its leader R. Sampanthan, Mavei Senathirajah, Sritharan took pat in the event. Northern Province Chief Minister C.V. Wigneswaran made the […]

IPS/ Sri Lankan exports, which have been flagging in recent times, gained some much needed relief with the European Union’s (EU) Foreign Affairs Council deciding to grant additional trade preferences to Sri Lanka under its GSP-Plus initiative. By granting this concession, Sri Lanka will now benefit from the full removal of tariffs on Sri Lankan imports […]

Image: Preparations were under way for the Mullivaikkal 18 May stones commemoration. credit @itjpsl Sir Lanka police have obtained a stay order from the Mullaitivu Magistrate’s Court against the memorialisation event organised by the Tamil civil society scheduled to be heal on 18th May. This is the first time Sri Lankan state has banned a memorialisation event after new […]

“Fragile hopes for lasting peace and cooperation across party and ethnic lines are imperilled. To avoid leaders of the corrupt and violent former regime taking back control of the country, President Sirisena’s two-year-old “unity government” should put aside short-term calculations and return to reform.” says new ICG report on Sri Lanka. Executive Summary: Two years […]

Image: Free Trade Zone workers in Sri Lanka: Will GSP plus benefits reach them? Issuing a press release on providing GSP plus trade concessions to Sri Lanka the European Union says that ” it is also a vote of confidence from the European Union that the Sri Lankan Government will maintain the progress it has […]

Photo credit: Newsin.Asia. Rohantha N.A. Athukorala. Over the weekend I was honoured to listen to my teacher from Harvard, Professor Matt Andrew’s lecture to the Masters in tourism students of Colombo University. He voiced that if not for the tourism industry Sri Lanka would have faced a serious financial crisis and he emphasised the importance […]

Image: Lawyers hung a black flag as a sign of protest against the government’s impeachment bid outside the Colombo court complex (January 2013) Commenting on the way Sri Lanka Supreme Court provided immediate relief to parliamentarian Geetha Kumarasisnghe presidential council J.C. Weliamuna  has said that “the credibility of Court is at stake in such instances. She is […]

Image: Armin Laschet, top candidate of Angela Merkel’s Christian Democratic Union celebrates after the North Rhine-Westphalia state elections. Photograph: Kay Nietfeld/AFP/Getty Images. Editorial. Last week France, next month Britain. Yet even by these standards, Sunday’s German regional election in North Rhine-Westphalia (NRW), won – on exit poll projections – in emphatic fashion by Chancellor Angela Merkel’s […]

Image: Resistance to repression in Venezuela. Only the naïve would believe the rosily repeated plea by the European Union (EU) that ‘the implementation of twenty seven international conventions is the only criterion for regaining’ the GSP Plus trade facility for Sri Lanka. Posing infinitely greater harm Repetition does not make what is false, true though this […]

Image: Modi, Sirisena, and Wickremesinghe holding-hands credit @narendramodi P.K.Balachandran. Glorifying the teachings of the Buddha and pointing out their relevance to addressing the problems of the crisis-ridden modern world, Modi said that Vesak day is a day for rejoicing as well as reflection on the “timeless truth of the Dhamma” which the Buddha preached. He was in […]

Image:Yameen Rasheed’s family submit a petition to Maldives Police Services to investigate his murder.  Dying Regime on Flickr. 48 rights groups strongly condemn the brutal murder of popular blogger Yameen Rasheed in what is believed to be an attack motivated by his political and social commentary. Maldivian authorities are urged to hold all perpetrators to […]

Sri Lanka (MNN) — A persecution trend has been quietly taking place in Sri Lanka. People hostile to Christianity have been approaching churches – often in more rural areas – and saying that because of a 2008 circular, if the church is not registered, they have to shut down. The circular in question was issued […]

Image courtesy of  Narendramodi.in. MAYA MIRCHANDANI. This week, Sri Lanka is “Dhammadvipa”, the island of Buddhist philosophy, as it celebrates United Nations Vesak Day to mark the birth, enlightenment and death of Lord Buddha on Friday. There have been fourteen international celebrations, but this is Sri Lanka’s first time as host, even though it was instrumental […]

  Image: This years’ Chief Ministers Summit was held at Habarana and President Maithripala Sirisena participated as the chief guest. A collective call has been made to President Maithripala Sirisena to devolve more power to Provincial Councils and make them meaningful by Chief Ministers of all nine Provinces at the 33rd Convention of Chief Ministers. The Convention […]

Image: Despite the military harassment civil society is working on Mullivaikkaal commemoration, inscribing names of the disappeared on stones. Credit: Tamil Guardian  As families of the disappeared pass the two-month mark of their roadside protests demanding answers to the whereabouts of their disappeared loved ones, and over eights months after the Sri Lankan government passed […]

Image: Aerial view of the Joint Oppositions May Day- ally at the Galle Face Green;Imag Mahinda Rajapaksas official Facebook page. It was some half a century ago that we marched crying the slogan “We are going to – Galle Face; Come with us to – Galle Face.” My elder brother and I had two red shirts […]

Image: Ambassador Tung-Lai Margue. European Union Ambassador to Sri Lanka  Tung-Lai Margue’s  has reaffirmed the reinstatement of GSP Plus to Sri Lanka in his message for Europe Day. The excerpt of his message says that ” two years ago, after the election of a government with a commitment and vision to make fundamental reforms, Sri Lanka and the European Union […]

Image: Sri Lanka police known for its brutality.  by Anurangi Singh. Senior academics, human rights activists, and judicial experts are strongly critical of the proposed policy and legal framework on the proposed CTA, a draft of which had been submitted before the Cabinet last week. Prof. Nihal Jayawickrama, former Secretary to the Ministry of Justice, […]

Image: Emmanuel Macron: new French president. Photograph: Denis Charlet/AFP/Getty Images. Any other result would have been a European catastrophe and, for once, thank goodness, the opinion polls got it right. Emmanuel Macron has swept Marine Le Pen aside to become France’s next president. Mr Macron won by an even wider margin than the polls have consistently […]

By Avani Dias.  Women and girls whose male relatives were killed in Sri Lanka’s brutal civil war are now helping the country recover, taking on roles formerly reserved for men and heading to schools and universities to complete their education. The so-called “Border Girls” mostly come from towns and villages which formed a human buffer […]

    Image: Udayanga Weeratunga with former President Mahinda Rajapaksa. Speaking at the parliament on 05th May  Minister Mangala Samaraweera  said  that Rs 1 billion had been transferred to the account of  a close relative of former President Rajapaksa, when he was the Ambassador to the Ukraine. ” To date,14 accounts in the Commercial Bank and […]

Image: Shiranthi Rajapaksa in Paris. Sri Lanka’s former first lady, Shiranthi Rajapaksa, spent 25 million rupees to watch Vesak, the biggest Buddhist festival in Paris while packing in a pilgrimage to Lourdes, a beloved shrine of the Catholics. She was representing Sri Lanka at the 2014 Vesak celebrations organised by the UNESCO in France and stayed […]

Jaffna Press Club marked the World Press Freedom Day 2017 by organising  a priest march, remembrance of murdered journalists in Sri Lanka and  issuing a statement calling for accountability for  all crimes against journalists and media workers committed during the previous regime. It said that ” there must be investigations into all the murders, abductions and disappearances […]

Issuing a statement Tamil National Alliance says it is shocked by the extent to which the draft framework curtails civil liberties, erodes judicial control over the state security apparatus and the staggering potential for abuse and torture. We are unequivocally committed to supporting a legal framework that would prevent and punish acts of terrorism in […]

Image form Sri Lanka president’s media division shows the symbol of hammer and sickle as back ground to his may day message.  Meera Srinivasan.  One would have thought that political parties here would use this year’s May Day platform to reach out to agitating contractual workers or government doctors. But Tuesday’s rallies turned out be almost […]

On Monday, May 8, 2017, activists, journalists and members of Sri Lankan civil society will gather outside the Maldivian High Commission (25, Melbourne Avenue, Colombo 4,) at 3.30 p.m., to protest against the recent murder of Maldivian blogger Yameen Rasheed. Yameen ran a satirical blog called The Daily Panic and was a vocal critic of […]

Image: May day 2017 in Kilinochchi, Sri Lanka, Credit: Garikaalan. As EU Parliament Considers Preferential Trade Status to Sri Lanka, Ensuring Human Rights Compliance Is Key. By Shreen Abdul Saroor You see a shirt. The price is right: you buy it. “Made in Sri Lanka,” it says. What you probably don’t think about is the real […]

Image: One of the legislation is pushed ahead by Ranga Kalansooriya, DG government information department and former Asia head of International  Media Support. Issuing a statement on the world press freedom day Transparency International Sri Lanka says that ” as we celebrate World Press Freedom Day here in Sri Lanka, processes have been initiated to […]

Image: ”Edward Selyn was displaced in 1996 with her family. Eight years after the war ended and months after her return, she still feels displaced.” Ms. Selyn with her grandchildren at the protest site. | Photo Credit: Meera Srinivasan Meera Srinivasan. It is time for the Sri Lankan government to get its act together on the […]