Kishali Pinto Jayawaradene

Kishali Pinto Jayewardena. (Sunday Times/03.3.19) Verbal gymnastics indulged in by Sri Lankan politicians in respect of the draft Counter Terrorism Act (CTA), now before Parliament awaiting amendments from the sectoral oversight committee, are vastly entertaining in truth. The ‘political hot potato’ Unlikely champions of constitutional rights are emerging from the Rajapaksa-led opposition. This week, the […]

Returning from Malaysia this week, correspondence with a now retired and respected diplomat focused on the ravages that the Malaysian people has had to go through including the gruesome instance of a Malaysian deputy public prosecutor whose body was discovered in a cement-filled oil drum dumped in a river. He had apparently been investigating corruption […]

(08 July 2018/Sunday Times) When mad dogs bark at the moon, the wise would probably advocate just a shrug and a sigh. However in a country where those who have lost their senses to all intents and purposes capture the public space so belligerently, shrugging and sighing may not suffice. The tide of insanity is […]

In retrospect, one of the greatest missed opportunities of the now doomed Sirisena-Wickremesinghe Unity Government was its failure to grab Sri Lanka’s legal system by its ears (metaphorically speaking), cleanse the Bench of corrupt and politically compromised judges against whom files were stacked up aplenty and demonstrate the power of criminal justice reforms for human […]

Image: Rajapaksa  is waiting to capture the power to establish autocratic family rule in Sri Lanka. Kishali Pinto Jayawaradene. Those who are bewildered by the results of Sri Lanka’s local government elections a week ago need a harsh reality check if not a resounding knock to the head.. Massive public discomfiture For it must be […]

Image: This year, the mood of the visiting European delegation is certainly more irritable. ( photo credit: FT) There appears to be a brisk uptick in the tone of visiting European lawmakers to Sri Lanka this week as compared to their sojourns last year. Has realism dawned, too little, too late? In November 2016, the delegation […]

However much they may genuflect to the concept of free speech, Sri Lanka’s politicians are quite unable to shake off a constitutional dislike of that theory in abrasive practice. Remarkably clever traits of politicians ‘Yahapalanaya’ Ministers appear not to be different to their predecessors in office in that sense, excepting of course the Mahinda Rajapaksa […]

Image: White flag being hoisted on the top on the Meetotamulla Garbage dump after the tragedy in April 2017. Kishali Pinto Jayawaradene. It is a typical incongruity of these times that constitutional reforms promising protection of civil liberties are discussed in tight-lipped seriousness in Colombo even while the police seem unable to arrest the hate […]

Kishali Pinto Jayawaradene. The perception that Sri Lanka’s proposed Counter-Terror Act (CTA) will affect only those of one community or another engaging in ‘terrorist’ activities and is therefore, of incidental concern to the citizenry at large is a misapprehension that is most unfortunate. CTA poses dangers beyond the PTA and the PSO Let us be […]

Kishali Pinto Jayawaradene. The Government’s proposed draft on a new counter-terror law for Sri Lanka is rather like a thoroughly unpleasant case discovery. Each time that one revisits afresh, new horrors are unearthed. Several other fiendish offences Drawn reluctantly back to this document following representations from several quarters, it may be said that absorbing its […]

By Kishali Pinto Jayawaradene. Governments may come and go in Sri Lanka but the anti-reform and anti-liberties mindset seems firmly entrenched. This is now proven beyond all shadow of a doubt. The only difference therein is that of gradation. So the gullible may gladly murmur ‘this is better than what was there before.’ That, in […]

(Anti PTA protest in Sri Lanka) By Kishali Pinto Jayawaradene. A draft policy and legal framework aimed at a new law on counter-terrorism to replace Sri Lanka’s Prevention of Terrorism Act (PTA) may well be a classic case of the cure being far worse than the disease. A bare reading of the draft immediately gives […]

( Disappeared in Sri Lanka; Image courtesy Amnesty International) Even from a fairly prosaic standpoint, the Unity Government’s proposed Office of Missing Persons (OMP) Bill has all the explosive potential of a double edged sword. This is the first prong of the Government’s promised package of transitional justice reforms originating from the 2015 United Nations […]