Showing posts with label wanted. Show all posts
Showing posts with label wanted. Show all posts
Saturday, December 17, 2011
Saturday, October 22, 2011
TV channel in Sri Lanka to popularise the Chinese language
China is hoping to establish Confucius Centres and a TV channel in Sri Lanka to popularise the Chinese language and telecast educational programmes, train teachers and school principals, an Education Ministry spokesman said yesterday.
The move comes after Education Minister Bandula Gunawardene had several rounds of talks with his Chinese counterpart Yuan Guiren and Deputy Minster Hao Ping during Mr. Gunawardene’s recent visit to China.
He pledged to increase the number of scholarships offered to Sri Lankan students by the Chinese government.
The move comes after Education Minister Bandula Gunawardene had several rounds of talks with his Chinese counterpart Yuan Guiren and Deputy Minster Hao Ping during Mr. Gunawardene’s recent visit to China.
He pledged to increase the number of scholarships offered to Sri Lankan students by the Chinese government.
Thursday, October 20, 2011
Channel 4 had to face an organized campaign against it originating from the Sri Lankan ministry
Speaking to the Lords communications committee on the impact of PR companies on television current affairs, Ms. Byrne said that this was something "not just us but the whole of society needs to be aware of," The Guardian reported Wednesday.
The Lords committee was holding an inquiry into the future of investigative journalism.
Commenting, Tamil diaspora activists in London said that what was known on the international operations of Sri Lanka’s State terrorism is only a tip of the iceberg.
“We have friends,” Mahinda Rajapaksa said when the UN panel report on Sri Lanka’s war crimes advocated international investigations.
What is the ultimate source of funds and strength for Sri Lanka to unashamedly uphold genocide as a justifiable international paradigm to answer a national question and unabatedly continue structural genocide after the war, has to be investigated and brought to light by international media seeking justice to human civilisation, the diaspora activists said.
On the question of Eezham Tamils, the international media for long failed to differentiate and justify the spontaneous voice of the people long suffering State genocide from the deceptive campaign orchestrated by not only Genocidal Sri Lanka but also by a group of over 30 abetting Establishments.
The international media now needs a focussed political and ideological orientation to compensate and to eliminate the Frankenstein Monster, the diaspora activists further said.
An interesting but dangerous reality revealed through the testimonies of Channel 4’s Byrne and Panorama’s John Ware to the Lords committee was that countering the malicious and orchestrated campaigns were costlier to investigative journalism than researching on truth or even choosing not to tell the truth.
According to John Ware, the cost of dealing with a concerted campaign of complaints about a recent edition of BBC1's Panorama was more than it cost to make the programme itself.
"A recent Panorama was cleared in almost every respect save for some minor matters. I'm pretty sure the bill for that was significantly more than the actual transmission itself," he said, adding:
"That's fine – it's a public service broadcaster – but what I'm saying is there aren't the funds, the resources, to deal with the aftercare and the aftercare is getting greater because of the lobby groups."
"I hope we are still pretty rigorous in facing it off where it needs to be faced off. But there is an increasing amount of spin, PR, and people who are very clever at … stopping us putting material out," John ware revealed the realities.
Talking on the point, Byrne said: "If we are doing a really big investigation that could take six months to a year … We have to be ready that we could be living with an investigation for a year after it has gone out.”
"Stories have appeared, for example, about our Sri Lankan investigation all over the world in a highly organised way," she told the committee.
"They appear to be normal stories and they are not – they are obviously coming from somewhere. Demonstrations have taken place in the street – there was one outside Channel 4 – and this demonstration had been organised by the Sri Lankan ministry of defence," she further said.
BBC or any other international media were neither moved by genuine and spontaneous demonstrations of the affected people nor were put into ‘cost’ concerns when they were silent on the genocide while it was taking place.
But now, when they choose to reveal a little of the genocidal phenomenon in the island the cost of facing Establishment’s orchestrated opposition is higher than researching and telling the truth. This is the real danger journalism face today.
Sunday, September 4, 2011
West’s criticism of Lankan human rights record concerned India
In what might prove to be a political embarrassment for Congress in Tamil Nadu, a Wikileaks cable has revealed that India viewed Western criticism of Sri Lanka’s human rights record with concern as it felt shunning the island nation would drive it towards China. An Indian official in the external affairs ministry told US diplomats that the West - by shunning a victorious Sri Lanka (after its defeat of the LTTE) over human rights issues - “pushed Sri Lanka into China’s arms”, and opened the region to the influence of both China and Iran.
In the January, 2010, interaction, joint secretary T S Tirumurthi said the elections in Sri Lanka should be welcomed and they would mark a new phase in resolving the Tamil question democratically. India was confident that if the vote is closely divided it would motivate the victor to consider the views of the other camp.
“The pattern of Chinese assistance to the needy northern areas of Sri Lanka would not uphold democratic ideals and human rights. Indian security, defence, and ethnicity-related interests are directly affected by Sri Lankan actions. In this regard, India welcomed U S engagement and saw the U S abstention on the IMF vote as a signal of a pragmatic approach,” the cable says of the Indian position.
While Indian did not perceive the Chinese role as ill-intentioned, nor wish to counter it, Tirumurthi highlighted that India last December extended a $425 million line of credit to Sri Lanka that had however got no attention.
A Sri Lankan first secretary in the embassy at New Delhi told US diplomats that “that some of the rail projects were funded in part by the Chinese, so it would be “very embarrassing” if the Indians did not complete their section.”
The cable also stated that Tirumurthi’s comment that India was not trying to counter Chinese influence in Sri Lanka should be taken with a grain of salt. “Our contact at the Sri Lankan High Commission hit the bull’s eye with his comment that India might be embarrassed if they could not match Chinese contributions to reconstruction.”
Thursday, August 11, 2011
Tamils still suffer 2 years after Sri Lanka war By Krishna Francis for AFP
The roadblocks have been dismantled, the sandbags removed, and Sri Lanka is again a palm-fringed tourist paradise, the government says. But for ethnic Tamils living in the former war zone, it is still a hell of haunted memories, military occupation and missing loved ones.Tamils still suffer 2 years after Sri Lanka war By Krishna Francis for Afb
Hundreds of thousands remain homeless, and no effort has been made to reunite families separated two years ago during the final bloody months of the war between the now-defeated Tamil separatists and the ethnic Sinhalese-dominated government.
A power-sharing program that President Mahinda Rajapaksa promised to enact after the quarter-century war has gone nowhere.
The International Crisis Group castigated the government in a July report that said "the country is yet to see any semblance of compromise or inclusiveness."
In the meantime, the government has worked hard to project an image of peace and redemption to the world. It insists Tamils have embraced its plan to rebuild homes and shattered lives. It is playing up the Indian Ocean island's reputation as a tourist destination, building airports, seaports and new roads. It's even ordered an army headquarters to be converted into a luxury beachside hotel.
But in the ethnic Tamil heartland in the north, resentment has been building.
From the school where he sleeps at night, principal Asirvatham Soosainathar watches the troops who are still living in his house in the village of Murikandy. On weekends, he visits his family in the home they have rented 50 miles (80 kilometers) away.
More than 100 families in the village were displaced by troops and the government has promised to soon return their homes. But in two years, Soosainathar said he's seen no evidence of it.
"I have 106 coconut trees on my land, but nowadays I have to pay for my coconut," Soosainathar, 44, said in a telephone interview. "The army has been telling me for two years that it will leave my house, but they are still cultivating my land."
Visvalingam Komathy has also been ousted by the army from her home in the former rebel stronghold of Kilinochchi, where she lived off the chicken and cattle she raised. She has pawned her jewelry for living expenses and legal fees in trying to free her son detained on charges of helping the rebels.
"We only want the house that is rightfully ours," said Komathy, 52.
Many Tamils fear that the soldiers in their homes are the vanguard of a government plan to send majority Sinhalese settlers into their area to dilute Tamil power and prevent any new push for a separate homeland for the minority. Tamil lawmakers say the military is seizing land that was in private hands before the war.
"The army is doing everything to be there permanently," said lawmaker Suresh Premachandran, of the Tamil National Alliance. "They are putting up permanent camps, cantonments and of course they are very much part of the entire administrative system in the northern province."
Electricity has been restored and roads repaired. Supermarkets, banks and Internet cafes have opened outlets in areas closed to business during the war.
But many people whose homes were destroyed continue to live under tents or in small huts covered only by tin sheets. Many families who lost their belongings and breadwinners remain in extreme poverty.
On the other hand, military camps have mushroomed and grand monuments have been erected to honor the fallen soldiers. The army also runs roadside restaurants catering to Sinhalese tourists who have flocked to see areas recaptured from the rebels.
Ahead of local elections in the north last month, the government painted the polls as a referendum on its development-oriented reconciliation efforts. But the ruling coalition was crushed, and Tamil politicians in favor of self-determination won 20 of 25 seats on local councils. Officials have since played down the results, and the local positions are unlikely to change the government's policy.
The government insists it is pursuing reconciliation and taking care of the victims.
"Rapid resettlement and economic empowerment is taking place ... though obviously much more needs to be done," said Rajiva Wijesinha, a lawmaker and adviser to Rajapaksa.
He denied that the military was taking over private land, and said it would pay compensation for any land it acquires.
Ananthi, a mother of three who goes by only one name, is still searching for her husband, Sinnathurai Sasitharan, a political leader for the Tamil Tigers whom she last saw being escorted away by the military after surrendering on May 18, 2009.
"He was not going to surrender. He wanted to send me off and commit suicide by swallowing cyanide," she said, recounting the final moments of the war. "But I cried and begged him to surrender so that he could live the rest of his life for his family."
The whereabouts of her husband, known by the nom de guerre Elilan, and scores of other rebels who mounted the last stand against the government forces, as well as a Catholic priest who mediated their surrender, are still unknown, she said.
Ananthi says she appealed to the government, the Red Cross, the national Human Rights Commission and the United Nations to no avail.
Though the government announced that it had rehabilitated many of the 11,000 former rebels it captured at the end of the war, the relatives of many rebel fighters last seen accompanied by soldiers say they have never been told the whereabouts of their loved ones. Families have searched in hospitals, camps and detention centers.
Sandana Murugaiah, a father of seven, is awaiting news about a son and daughter forcibly conscripted by the Tamil Tigers and not heard from since the war ended.
"I do not know if they survived the fighting," Murugaiah said.
The Tamil Tigers, long seen as one of the world's most effective and brutal insurgent groups, had fought to create an independent state for ethnic minority Tamils after decades of marginalization by governments controlled by the Sinhalese majority.
The militants, who ran a de facto state in the north, sent suicide bombers into crowded train stations, while the military was accused of shelling civilians and hospitals in the war zone. Footage allegedly taken by front-line soldiers and aired on Britain's Channel 4 television appeared to show blindfolded prisoners being shot at close range.
A U.N. expert panel report in April accused both sides of potential war crimes and recommended an independent international inquiry.
The government has denied the accusations, though it did acknowledge for the first time last week that some civilians were killed in the final offensive in 2009. The U.N. panel has said tens of thousands of civilians were killed in that offensive.
Jehan Perera, an analyst with activist group National Peace Council says true reconciliation requires a "heart and mind strategy" after a brutal war. Entrenching the military will not serve the purpose, he said.
"A great deal of transparency is required in terms of who is held in custody and what happens to them." Despite promises to Tamil lawmakers to give such a list, the government has not done so, Perera said.
Hundreds of thousands remain homeless, and no effort has been made to reunite families separated two years ago during the final bloody months of the war between the now-defeated Tamil separatists and the ethnic Sinhalese-dominated government.
A power-sharing program that President Mahinda Rajapaksa promised to enact after the quarter-century war has gone nowhere.
The International Crisis Group castigated the government in a July report that said "the country is yet to see any semblance of compromise or inclusiveness."
In the meantime, the government has worked hard to project an image of peace and redemption to the world. It insists Tamils have embraced its plan to rebuild homes and shattered lives. It is playing up the Indian Ocean island's reputation as a tourist destination, building airports, seaports and new roads. It's even ordered an army headquarters to be converted into a luxury beachside hotel.
But in the ethnic Tamil heartland in the north, resentment has been building.
From the school where he sleeps at night, principal Asirvatham Soosainathar watches the troops who are still living in his house in the village of Murikandy. On weekends, he visits his family in the home they have rented 50 miles (80 kilometers) away.
More than 100 families in the village were displaced by troops and the government has promised to soon return their homes. But in two years, Soosainathar said he's seen no evidence of it.
"I have 106 coconut trees on my land, but nowadays I have to pay for my coconut," Soosainathar, 44, said in a telephone interview. "The army has been telling me for two years that it will leave my house, but they are still cultivating my land."
Visvalingam Komathy has also been ousted by the army from her home in the former rebel stronghold of Kilinochchi, where she lived off the chicken and cattle she raised. She has pawned her jewelry for living expenses and legal fees in trying to free her son detained on charges of helping the rebels.
"We only want the house that is rightfully ours," said Komathy, 52.
Many Tamils fear that the soldiers in their homes are the vanguard of a government plan to send majority Sinhalese settlers into their area to dilute Tamil power and prevent any new push for a separate homeland for the minority. Tamil lawmakers say the military is seizing land that was in private hands before the war.
"The army is doing everything to be there permanently," said lawmaker Suresh Premachandran, of the Tamil National Alliance. "They are putting up permanent camps, cantonments and of course they are very much part of the entire administrative system in the northern province."
Electricity has been restored and roads repaired. Supermarkets, banks and Internet cafes have opened outlets in areas closed to business during the war.
But many people whose homes were destroyed continue to live under tents or in small huts covered only by tin sheets. Many families who lost their belongings and breadwinners remain in extreme poverty.
On the other hand, military camps have mushroomed and grand monuments have been erected to honor the fallen soldiers. The army also runs roadside restaurants catering to Sinhalese tourists who have flocked to see areas recaptured from the rebels.
Ahead of local elections in the north last month, the government painted the polls as a referendum on its development-oriented reconciliation efforts. But the ruling coalition was crushed, and Tamil politicians in favor of self-determination won 20 of 25 seats on local councils. Officials have since played down the results, and the local positions are unlikely to change the government's policy.
The government insists it is pursuing reconciliation and taking care of the victims.
"Rapid resettlement and economic empowerment is taking place ... though obviously much more needs to be done," said Rajiva Wijesinha, a lawmaker and adviser to Rajapaksa.
He denied that the military was taking over private land, and said it would pay compensation for any land it acquires.
Ananthi, a mother of three who goes by only one name, is still searching for her husband, Sinnathurai Sasitharan, a political leader for the Tamil Tigers whom she last saw being escorted away by the military after surrendering on May 18, 2009.
"He was not going to surrender. He wanted to send me off and commit suicide by swallowing cyanide," she said, recounting the final moments of the war. "But I cried and begged him to surrender so that he could live the rest of his life for his family."
The whereabouts of her husband, known by the nom de guerre Elilan, and scores of other rebels who mounted the last stand against the government forces, as well as a Catholic priest who mediated their surrender, are still unknown, she said.
Ananthi says she appealed to the government, the Red Cross, the national Human Rights Commission and the United Nations to no avail.
Though the government announced that it had rehabilitated many of the 11,000 former rebels it captured at the end of the war, the relatives of many rebel fighters last seen accompanied by soldiers say they have never been told the whereabouts of their loved ones. Families have searched in hospitals, camps and detention centers.
Sandana Murugaiah, a father of seven, is awaiting news about a son and daughter forcibly conscripted by the Tamil Tigers and not heard from since the war ended.
"I do not know if they survived the fighting," Murugaiah said.
The Tamil Tigers, long seen as one of the world's most effective and brutal insurgent groups, had fought to create an independent state for ethnic minority Tamils after decades of marginalization by governments controlled by the Sinhalese majority.
The militants, who ran a de facto state in the north, sent suicide bombers into crowded train stations, while the military was accused of shelling civilians and hospitals in the war zone. Footage allegedly taken by front-line soldiers and aired on Britain's Channel 4 television appeared to show blindfolded prisoners being shot at close range.
A U.N. expert panel report in April accused both sides of potential war crimes and recommended an independent international inquiry.
The government has denied the accusations, though it did acknowledge for the first time last week that some civilians were killed in the final offensive in 2009. The U.N. panel has said tens of thousands of civilians were killed in that offensive.
Jehan Perera, an analyst with activist group National Peace Council says true reconciliation requires a "heart and mind strategy" after a brutal war. Entrenching the military will not serve the purpose, he said.
"A great deal of transparency is required in terms of who is held in custody and what happens to them." Despite promises to Tamil lawmakers to give such a list, the government has not done so, Perera said.
Sunday, June 19, 2011
A senior Sri Lankan Army commander and frontline soldier have told Britain’s Channel 4 !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
A senior Sri Lankan Army commander and frontline soldier have told Britain’s Channel 4 News that point-blank executions of Tamils at the end of the civil war in May 2009 were carried out under orders ‘from the top’. In an extended segment on Sri Lanka Tuesday, Channel 4 broadcast translated video interviews with the two soldiers.
Surrendering LTTE fighters and their families were detained, tortured and shot, the trooper said. Channel 4 also interviewed in the studio the former Chief Prosecutor for the International Criminal Tribunals for the former Yugoslavia and for Rwanda, Louis Arbour, who slammed the impunity enjoyed by Sri Lankan forces throughout the armed conflict. Sri Lanka’s ambassador to the United Nations, Palitha Kohana, failed to show up, despite agreeing beforehand to appear to defend his government’s record.
The senior Sri Lankan army commander said: "I don't think we wanted to keep any hardcore elements, so they were done away with. It is clear that such orders were, in fact, received from the top."
"Definitely, the order would have been to kill everybody and finish them off,” he said. “It is clear such orders would have been received from the top.”
Tthe Sri Lankan trooper said: “Our commander ordered us to kill everyone. We killed everyone.”
He confirmed he killed civilians. Surrendering LTTE fighters and their families were detained and tortured before being shot, the soldier also said.
Channel 4 News broadcast several photographs taken by soldiers from the killing fields in Northeastern Sri Lanka, showing piles of bodies, lines of corpses and terrified civilians. Some of the bodies had their hands tied behind their backs.
The program quoted soldiers’ as saying LTTE leader Pirapaharan’s thirteen year old son had also been shot dead after surrendering with his bodyguards.
Speaking on the Channel 4’s flagship news program at 7pm, Louis Arbour said there was no possibility of Sri Lanka holding a proper inquiry into the war crimes, noting that since the conflict began there had been impunity.
She questioned the viability of the Sri Lankan government investigating the conduct of its own armed forces.
A senior Amnesty International official told Channel 4 News his organisation had this week launched a world-wide campaign to highlight the need for an independent international investigation into war crimes in Sri Lanka.
London-based Amnesty International and New York-based Human Rights Watch have joined Brussels-based International Crisis Group in this regard, Channel 4 said.
This week International Crisis Group, of which Arbour is currently head, released a detailed account of the mass slaughter during the final months of the conflict last year. The report said “the scale of death was much higher than reported at the time, and certainly high enough to triple the UN’s internal figure of 7,000.”
Noting that both the LTTE and the Sri Lankan armed forces were responsible for war crimes, the report made clear that “all but a small portion of these deaths were due to government fire”
“Eventually, an independent and impartial survey of those still living in the Northern Province will be needed to establish this part of Sri Lanka’s history,” ICG said.
On Monday night Arbour told an audience at Chatham House – the foreign policy think tank – that "the [Sri Lankan] government's refusal to distinguish between combatants and non-combatants" and the "sheer magnitude of civilian death and suffering" dealt what she called "the most serious of body blows to international humanitarian law".
Despite Channel 4 ‘desperately’ trying to locate him, Sri Lanka’s ambassador to the United Nations, Palitha Kohana, failed to show up, despite agreeing beforehand to appear to defend his government’s record, news anchor Jon Snow said.
Sri Lanka’s London High Commission meanwhile issued a statement totally denying the allegations of war crimes.
“The High Commission of Sri Lanka in the United Kingdom totally deny the allegations made against the Government of Sri Lanka and its armed forces. As it has been repeatedly stressed and supported by evidence, Government’s security forces were engaged in a humanitarian operation with the objective of rescuing the civilians held as human shields by a terrorist outfit: the LTTE, which was banned in many countries including the UK,” the statement said.
“All internationally accepted standards and norms of such operations were followed in the prosecution of the humanitarian operation by the security forces which were under strict orders to follow a zero civilian casualty policy.” CLICK HERE
The senior Sri Lankan army commander said: "I don't think we wanted to keep any hardcore elements, so they were done away with. It is clear that such orders were, in fact, received from the top."
"Definitely, the order would have been to kill everybody and finish them off,” he said. “It is clear such orders would have been received from the top.”
Tthe Sri Lankan trooper said: “Our commander ordered us to kill everyone. We killed everyone.”
He confirmed he killed civilians. Surrendering LTTE fighters and their families were detained and tortured before being shot, the soldier also said.
Channel 4 News broadcast several photographs taken by soldiers from the killing fields in Northeastern Sri Lanka, showing piles of bodies, lines of corpses and terrified civilians. Some of the bodies had their hands tied behind their backs.
The program quoted soldiers’ as saying LTTE leader Pirapaharan’s thirteen year old son had also been shot dead after surrendering with his bodyguards.
Speaking on the Channel 4’s flagship news program at 7pm, Louis Arbour said there was no possibility of Sri Lanka holding a proper inquiry into the war crimes, noting that since the conflict began there had been impunity.
She questioned the viability of the Sri Lankan government investigating the conduct of its own armed forces.
A senior Amnesty International official told Channel 4 News his organisation had this week launched a world-wide campaign to highlight the need for an independent international investigation into war crimes in Sri Lanka.
London-based Amnesty International and New York-based Human Rights Watch have joined Brussels-based International Crisis Group in this regard, Channel 4 said.
This week International Crisis Group, of which Arbour is currently head, released a detailed account of the mass slaughter during the final months of the conflict last year. The report said “the scale of death was much higher than reported at the time, and certainly high enough to triple the UN’s internal figure of 7,000.”
Noting that both the LTTE and the Sri Lankan armed forces were responsible for war crimes, the report made clear that “all but a small portion of these deaths were due to government fire”
“Eventually, an independent and impartial survey of those still living in the Northern Province will be needed to establish this part of Sri Lanka’s history,” ICG said.
On Monday night Arbour told an audience at Chatham House – the foreign policy think tank – that "the [Sri Lankan] government's refusal to distinguish between combatants and non-combatants" and the "sheer magnitude of civilian death and suffering" dealt what she called "the most serious of body blows to international humanitarian law".
Despite Channel 4 ‘desperately’ trying to locate him, Sri Lanka’s ambassador to the United Nations, Palitha Kohana, failed to show up, despite agreeing beforehand to appear to defend his government’s record, news anchor Jon Snow said.
Sri Lanka’s London High Commission meanwhile issued a statement totally denying the allegations of war crimes.
“The High Commission of Sri Lanka in the United Kingdom totally deny the allegations made against the Government of Sri Lanka and its armed forces. As it has been repeatedly stressed and supported by evidence, Government’s security forces were engaged in a humanitarian operation with the objective of rescuing the civilians held as human shields by a terrorist outfit: the LTTE, which was banned in many countries including the UK,” the statement said.
“All internationally accepted standards and norms of such operations were followed in the prosecution of the humanitarian operation by the security forces which were under strict orders to follow a zero civilian casualty policy.” CLICK HERE
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