It does not take much persuasion to convince someone that holding a countrywide snap parliamentary polls on the eve of a global Coronavirus pandemic is a dangerous idea. More so when the local health officials advocate social distancing. Public gatherings are discouraged. Schools are closed and unnerved public are panic buying. And if the global trend of the rapid spread of the virus is anything, Sri Lanka, now with 18 proven cases (as of yesterday noon) and 1723 returnees from abroad in quarantine is bound for a leap in the patients and a looming health emergency.
Given the current circumstances, avoiding the internal/communal transmission of the virus and plan and implement policies to that end is the best that the government could do to avert a major outbreak. However, the government seems to be distracted by other competing priorities. President Gotabaya Rajapaksa has said that the elections will go ahead as planned. Fittingly, he said so in a video conference with fellow South Asian leaders on the regional preparedness to coronavirus.
To understand how fatalistic this decision could turn out to be, have a glance at Sri Lanka’s current status in the epidemic. There are 18 cases in hospitals, all but one have contracted the virus from a foreign source, and most of them while abroad. The overwhelming majority are Sri Lankans who recently returned from Italy and were sent to a military administered quarantine facility, two others are also from Europe. There is also a local tour guide who contracted the virus from an Italian tour group. A colleague caught the bug.
In other words, Sri Lanka’s coronavirus cases are imported. Except, in the instances of the two tour guides, there are no known cases of internal transmission. That is the silver line in the dark cloud. If the country manages to send Sri Lankan returnees and a dwindling number of foreign visitors to mandatory quarantine, Sri Lanka has quite an opportunity to avoid the communal spread of the virus.
However, there are reservations whether the quarantine of returnees was implemented too late. There are also concerns that some of the returnees might have evaded the quarantine process. These problems are understood. Sri Lanka cannot replicate an aggressive and at times thuggish forced measures akin to China, without triggering a much larger upheaval. Protests at the airport early this week are proof.
(Text of Address to the Nation Delivered on March 17th 2020 by President Gotabaya Rajapaksa)
Salutations to the Most Revered Prelates of the Maha Sangha
Salutations to Religious Leaders of Hindu, Catholic and Islam Faiths
Dear Mothers, Fathers, children
Today, I am addressing you to explain the the steps we have taken and the current status regarding the Coronaviruas, also known as CORVID-19.
This January, while the world was just getting to know about the Coronavirus, I took the decision to bring back the 34 Sri Lankan students who were studying in the Wuhan Province in China. At the time, there was not a single infected case reported from within Sri Lanka. Yet, to face a possible detrimental situation that could arise in the future, on 26 January we established a special National Task Force Committee.
On 27 January, a Chinese lady who had come to Sri Lanka as a tourist was identified to be the first infected case in the Island. She was immediately admitted to the IDH hospital and treated. On 19 February, after recovering fully, she left the country.
A special aircraft flew in the Sri Lankan students from Wuhan to the Matthala Airport, where they were quarantined and then taken to a quarantine center in Diyatalawa that was specially set up for this purpose. They were quarantined for two weeks in this camp and sent home on 14 February. At the same time, the necessary instructions were given to the airport authorities to take steps to conduct a preliminary examination of the health of all those who are arriving via the Airport to Sri Lanka.
After the first case was detected with the infected Chinese lady, for up to about a month, no other case was found. Yet, as there was a danger of this virus being spread to countries apart from China, it was decided to quarantine all arrivals from Italy, South Korea and Iran for 14-days. This decision was taken on 10 March. Accordingly, directing travelers to the Kandakadu Qurantine Center in Batticaloa began. When this process first started, some of the travelers who came from Italy and South Korea vehemently protested against it and some even tried to escape en route to the quarantine center.
(Text of a press release issued by the TNA Media Office)
This statement is being issued consequent to all party leaders of the Tamil National Alliance consulting together:
The Tamil National Alliance is concerned about the threat posed to the people by the possible spread of the COVID19 virus in the country. The safety of the public is our paramount concern.
In October last year, twelve Malaysian Nationals of Tamil origin were arrested by the Malaysian Police over suspected links to the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) and alleged involvement in terrorist activity. The head of Malaysian Police Special Branch Counter-Terrorism division Deputy Commissioner Ayob Khan Mydin Pitchay went to town with claims of a huge terrorist conspiracy and network being uncovered. He also said investigations were continuing and that more details of terrorist financing and a plot to attack the Sri Lankan High Commission in Kuala Lumpur would be available soon.
Attorney – General Tan Sri Tommy Thomas
All twelve were arrested and detained under the Malaysian Security Offences (Special Measures) Act 2012, known as SOSMA. However they were charged in courts for several offences relating to terrorism under the Malaysian Penal Code.Yet five months later in February this year when the trial date grew close, the Malaysian Attorney – General Tan Sri Tommy Thomas announced that he was dropping all charges against the dozen.
The head of Sri Lanka’s Roman Catholic Church Sunday alleged that the highly contagious Coronavirus may be man-made and wanted those responsible prosecuted for “genocide.”
Malcolm Cardinal Ranjith addressing the faithful during a closed-door Sunday mass said the United Nations should initiate an international investigation into the origin of COVID-19 which he said was causing death and destruction.
He said a “rich and powerful nation” was behind the virus, but stopped short of naming names. However, his remarks, both in Sinhala and English, were on the lines of the Chinese foreign ministry claim on Friday that the US military was behind it.
President Gotabaya Rajapaksa today (15) proposed to leaders of South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation (SAARC) to formulate a collective response to combat COVID – 19. He further called for SAARC Ministerial Meeting to discuss measures to overcome this deadly health threat.
President Rajapaksa made these proposals participating in a video conference with all SAARC leaders under the theme of “SAARC Leader on Combating COVID – 19, Setting an Example to the World”. This was an initiative by Narendra Modi, Prime Minister of India.
President Gotabaya Rajapaksa noted that presently there are 11 confirmed cases in Sri Lanka. The first identified was a Chinese tourist. She was successfully treated at the specialized Infectious Diseases Hospital (IDH) and has since returned back to china. The second case was a Sri Lankan tourist guide, but the tourists he was with who he had obviously contracted the virus from had already returned to their home country. Sri Lanka too has not reported any deaths due to the virus.
*Two-week quarantine period for Sri Lankans arriving from Europe
Measures to disinfect public transport
*Case studies on China’s success
*Directives to minimize public gatherings
*Utilize internet for educational and service purposes
Several firm decisions have been taken under the guidance of President and Prime Minister to combat COVID -19 in the country. Measures initiated by the Government since January have been instrumental in preventing the disease coming into the country. Sri Lanka is in the forefront among the few countries that established a task force to tackle this global health threat.
President Gotabaya Rajapaksa and Prime Minister Mahinda Rajapaksa instructed officials to take every necessary action to develop and maintain this positive trend and to safeguard the well-being of the people in the country during a meeting on preventing the spread of COVID – 19 held at the Presidential Secretariat today (13).
Much like the covid-19 virus which attacks the respiratory systems of victims with lethal force and has brought the global North virtually to its knees, Sri Lanka is being invaded by an anti-democracy virus. We are told that, democracy leads to bickering, that a strong man is needed to rule with a rod of iron, that civil liberties do not matter and that constitutional amendments that fetter the powers of rulers are a nuisance.
A deadly familiar cry
That chant is drummed into our ears as Parliamentary elections approach in a backdrop of undermining whatever little democratic checks and balances left. Re-installing authoritarianism cloaked in the thin garb of decisive rule to benefit the country has reached feverpitch. The Pohottuwa cry to give us a two-thirds majority in the Parliament so that we can repeal the 19th Amendment and restore stability to the country is disingenuous if not contemptible for that very reason.
Indeed, this cry would be amusing if it was not so deadly familiar. This is exactly how politicians commandeered the country for their ruinous purposes in the past. This ranged from leftist politicians who dismantled Sri Lanka’s judiciary and the public service to become subservient handmaids of the political establishment in the early seventies to the Jayewardene installing of a monarchic Executive Presidency. The Rajapaksa decade of enthroning one-family rule underlined by brute thuggery and overt racism for political gain was an organic development in that background.
Sri Lankan President Gotabhaya Rajapakse is rapidly militarising the state administration through the appointment of retired armed forces officers to key posts. Promoted into the higher ranks during the final stage of the communal war against the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE), these senior officers are close associates of the president.
Rajapakse’s new appointments are in preparation for a confrontation with the working class. This was spelled out by Sri Lanka’s new defence secretary, retired Major General Kamal Gunaratne, at recent meeting of the so-called Social Media Professional Forum.
The main challenges facing the new government, Gunaratne declared, were “radicalisation, the re-emergence of terrorism, separatism, religious extremism, organised crime, drug-trafficking, and internal disturbances, such as strikes.”
The relations between Sri Lanka and the United States are in for a hard time in 2020-2021 as Sri Lanka’s concerns over its sovereignty and independence clash with the geo-political interests of the US.
Though couched in the language of goodwill for Sri Lanka and Sri Lankans in the short and the long term, America’s interest in the island nation is essentially, if not exclusively, in preventing it from going into the waiting arms of China, the regional and global rival. The bitter pill of geo-political interest is sweetened by economic offers.
If the bid to make Sri Lanka sign the Status of Forces Agreement (SOFA), reflects America’s geo-political game plan, the offer of US$ 480 million as grant under the Millennium Challenge Corporation Compact (MCC) is meant to sweeten the bitter pill.
Since the Rajapaksas (President Gotabaya and Prime Minister Mahinda Rajapaksa) took charge of the country following Gotabaya Rajapaksa’s good showing in the November 16, 2019 Presidential election, Sri Lanka has asserted its sovereignty in the UN Human Rights Council (UNHRC) by opting out of the co-sponsorship of resolution 30/1 of 2015, which had required it to solve the problem of post-war ethnic relations in ways which are politically unsustainable and constitutionally untenable.
The supporters of Sajith Premadasa seem to attribute his defeat at the Presidential Election to Ranil Wickremesinghe and the UNP group supporting him. It is publicly implied that Ranil Wickremesinghe delayed the process of naming Sajith Premadasa deliberately as the presidential candidate of the UNP, with the intension of sabotaging the campaign by not giving them sufficient time to organise it.
After the election, they held media conferences and accused the Sirikotha faction of the UNP of withholding funds and forcing the campaign managers to downsize the campaign. Some seem to think that Ranil’s reply to the media that he will be the PM in the event the UNP wins the Presidential Election was an act of sabotage. The fact remains that Ranil was the Prime Minister at the time and in the event of Sajith becoming the President he still remains as PM until the General Election. Even after winning the General Elections, Ranil would continue to be PM as long as he is the Leader of the Party.
The analysis of the causes of Sajith’s defeat does not hold water if one looks at things rationally. A more realistic analysis not driven by hatred and self-interest, could be more useful for Sajith’s political future and help the UNP to plan a more effective campaign to win the General Election.
Were there fundamental weaknesses in Sajith’s campaign?
Many disagree with the analysis of Sajith’s supporters regarding the reasons for his defeat. Some see it as an attempt by his supporters to cover up their failure. Some feel that Sajith was misled by some of his over-enthusiastic supporters who misread the political picture and who hated Ranil for various reasons and had their own agenda. Whether this is true or not, it is the difference between the UNP campaign and the SLPP campaign that finally mattered.
The present state of the UNP after the presidential election of November 16, 2019 is in many ways reminiscent of the state the SLFP was in the wake of the defeat of 1977, when the latter experienced declining public support and disunity within its ranks. As we pen these words, the UNP is on the verge of a major split, with the possibility that the Ranil Wickremasinghe faction will contest under the elephant symbol and the Sajith faction under a different symbol. This is reminiscent of the way the SLFP split after the 1982 presidential election. Things are now moving with a momentum of its own. The Parliamentary election has already been declared. Applications have already been called for postal voting. The Elections Commission is to begin accepting nominations on Thursday this week (12 March) to close on 19 March. If the political parties are to hand in nominations before the closing date they will have all of ten days between now and that deadline to finalize their lists – which is arguably the most difficult part at any parliamentary, PC or local government election.
During the ten days that remain until nominations close, the two warring factions of the UNP will have to decide who will be on the national list and who will contest in the districts. Once the lists are finalized, they cannot be changed without more conflict. Hence the coming days will be crucial for both factions of the UNP and particularly for the Sajith Premadasa faction which is the breakaway group. The UNP under Ranil Wickremasinghe is at a slight advantage because they represent the established political party with the party symbol, the party headquarters and the party branch organizations or what is left of them. The Sajith Premadasa faction will face the additional challenge of having to build a political party from scratch on the eve of a parliamentary election. The Samagi Jana Balawegaya which the Sajith faction has set up has a name and a symbol and a significant group of UNP parliamentarians supporting it. But they don’t have any grassroots party organizations.
Sri Lanka Presidents office confirms the first Sri Lankan within Sri Lanka infected with Covid – 19 (Coronavirus), a 52 year old male from the tourism sector, found & now being treated at IDH Hospital.
Chief Epidemiologist Dr. Sudath Samaraweera noted that initial tests have confirmed that the patient had contracted Covid-19.
Inspections have been launched to identify the individuals that this patient has had contacts with and the places where the tourist group accompanied by him had travelled to.
Things cannot get any more ludicrous than this. As the Sri Lankan voters go to vote for a new Parliament on April 25, in little more than six weeks from now, the United National Party is feuding over who will own the party’s symbol.
This should not have been a problem at all. The aged old elephant is both familiar and invokes a sense of nostalgia of its glorious past.
However, Sajith Premadasa, the deputy leader and his loyalists who are indulging in a self-destructive fratricidal battle bemoan that though the elephant is dear to them, Ranil Wickremesinghe, the party leader who has the final say over the party affairs cannot be trusted.
A bitter internecine war that is being waged right now is more likely to damage both factions and hand over the election on a platter to the formidable Pohottuwa.
Earlier, Mr Wickremesinghe survived the calls to hand over the UNP leadership to Mr Premadasa. As a concession, the latter was made the opposition leader.
The UNP working committee also appointed him as the prime ministerial candidate, the leader of the new alliance and the chairman of the election nomination committee for the General Election. However, they also decided that the new alliance contests under the official regalia of the UNP, the elephant.
Court of Appeal will today take up the Writ petitions filed by former Finance Minister Ravi Karunanayake and Arjun Aloysius as well as two others contesting the warrant of arrest issued on them in respect of the Treasury bond auction scam.
The Bench comprised Justices A.H.M.D. Nawaz (President/CA) and Arjuna Obeyesekere.
Faisz Musthapha PC with Rienzie Arsecularatne PC, Shavendra Fernando PC, Senani Dayaratne, Faiza Markar, Riad Ameen instructed by Gowry Shangary Thavarasha appeared for Ravi Karunanayake.
The United National Party (UNP) yesterday informed the Elections Commissioner that it would be contesting all 22 electoral districts, at the parliamentary polls fixed for April 25.
Confirmation was made in writing by the General Secretary of the party, Akila Viraj Kariyawasam.
The official announcement comes amidst the Samagi Jana Balawegaya (SJB), formed by UNP Deputy leader Sajith Premadasa saying that the SJB and UNP should contest the General Election as an alliance under the ‘Telephone’ symbol.
Criminal Investigations Department (CID) sleuths yesterday carried out searches for former Finance Minister Ravi Karunanayake and eight suspects wanted in connection with the case related to the Central Bank bond scam, but failed to find them, a senior CID officer said.
He said several locations where they believed Mr Karunanayake would be taking shelter were searched within the day, but the CID could not locate him.
Journalists and photographers who gathered outside Mr Karunanayake’s residence, off the Parliament drive, in Sri Jayawardenepura-Kotte were told by his aides that the former MP might surrender on Tuesday. However, there was no confirmation.
The CID officer said about 25 teams had been deployed to search for the suspects, in line with the arrest warrant and search operations would continue until they were found or they surrendered.
The CID’s Airport detectives have also been alerted about the arrest warrant issued on the suspects.
Ever the consummately expedient political strategist, Sri Lanka’s Prime Minister, (and former President), Mahinda Rajapaksa wishes to rejuvenate the controversial anti-Conversions Bill that was discarded more than one and a half decades ago following enormous public concern and an adverse ruling by the Supreme Court.
Factors behind this move
This wish, expressed in the Rajapaksa ‘comfort zone’ of a recent gathering of the All Ceylon Buddhist Council, attended by the adoring faithful, had been articulated with charm and a wink, as the media informs us. The Rajapaksa articulation has been to the effect that, if this Bill is re-activated, it must have unanimous support ‘across the board’ as otherwise, it will rebound negatively on his Government.
Probably, an objective assessment would conclude that no time would be better for the bringing back of this Bill if not now. Helped largely by the culpable blindness of the previous Government and their equally blind ‘civil society’ supporters who closed their eyes to viciously creeping jihadism in the country, the Easter Sunday attacks on churches and hotels last year will soon be somberely marked as its one year anniversary comes up next month. One direct consequence of this unforgivable failure was the pan-Sinhala vote that propelled Gotabhaya Rajapaksa to the Presidency last November.
A receptive environment has thus been fashioned for the hardening of religious sentiment across the board. Never mind that a ‘non-mainstream’ church targeted in Batticaloa by the jihadists suffered unprecedented loss with forty children being killed while frolicking after prayers. Such distinctions were lost in the nationalist religious hysteria that deepened since that attack. However, the poisonous germination of this disease was long before. It started menacingly a decade ago, as communities which had co-existed despite religious differences, fractured as Sinhala Buddhist majoritarianism grew and religious minorities withdrew into frightened corners.
Provincial Council Elections are likely to follow hot on the heels of the General Election, Prime Minister Mahinda Rajapaksa said yesterday, paving the way for the Government to move forward with plans to introduce a new Constitution.
Rajapaksa, speaking to senior media personnel at Temple Trees, insisted that the Government remained focused on removing the 19th Amendment, insisting it creates administrative issues that undermine governance. He argued that the 19th Amendment had created confusion and imbalances of power that impinged on the public, and commissions established under the Constitutional Council failed to be as independent as promised.
The meeting at Temple Trees was also attended by Sri Lanka Podujana Peramuna (SLPP) Chairman Prof. G.L Peiris, Senior Advisor on Economic Affairs to the Prime Minister Ajith Nivard Cabraal, and Ports and Shipping Minister Johnston Fernando and Cabinet Spokesman Minister Bandula Gunawardena.
Security in North and East has been tightened since last Thursday following the arrest of six prominent former LTTE cadres on charges of planning to assassinate a prominent Tamil politician in the North, informed sources said.
They said earlier this week, Military intelligence and Terrorist Investigations Department jointly raided a safe house in the North and found some latest communication equipment and a stock of powerful explosives.
It is evident that the Podu Peramuna Government led by Gotabaya Rajapaksa, the new President, wants desperately to withdraw the cases filed during the Yahapalana regime against corruption and criminal acts alleged to have committed during the previous regime of Mahinda Rajapaksa. However, in the absence of the support of the Judiciary, it appears clearly that a cold war situation has arisen between the Government and the Judiciary.
Some of them involved in those lawsuits publicly supported Gotabaya Rajapaksa at the Presidential Election while presidential candidate Gotabaya Rajapaksa also defended them vigorously on election platforms.
The new President, soon after assuming office, appointed a three-member Presidential Commission to look into the alleged political reprisals during the Yahapalana regime. Perhaps he might have thought that it would be an easy way to rescue all those involved in litigation.
The Presidential Commission, in response to a complaint made by Wasantha Karannagoda, a former Navy Commander and D.P.K. Dissanayake, a former Navy Spokesman, issued a directive to the Attorney General to suspend the case relating to the abduction and disappearance of 11 youths until the Commission completes its investigation. The Commission may have believed that the Attorney General would disregard the law and accept the directive issued by them on behalf of the new Government which had assumed office after a huge electoral victory.
But the Attorney General refused to accept the order issued by the Commission and informed it that it is only a Commission of Inquiry, and as such the Commission had no power to issue such an order to the Attorney General who is empowered by the Constitution to pursue the case; moreover, the Attorney General informed the Commission that his department had filed the case merely on the basis of evidence presented at the inquiry and not on any other grounds. The Commission could not challenge the Attorney General’s position. This can be considered the first conflict the new Government has created with the Judiciary.
President Gotabaya Rajapaksa yesterday said in the first 100 days of his rule much was achieved, but opined that he was not satisfied with the progress as per his standards.
“Yes we did a lot in the first 100 days. But as per my standards, I am not satisfied,” Rajapaksa said during a luncheon meeting with editors.
Rajapaksa pointed to the lack of a two-thirds majority in Parliament, and partly blamed the 19th Amendment of the Constitution, for the failure of a more progressive and successful first 100 days of Presidency.
As an example, he noted that the Amendment to the Vote on Account had to be withdrawn, since the Opposition was wary. The Government sought Rs. 367 billion to settle overdue payments, and to increase limit on borrowing to Rs. 1088 billion, but the UNP opposed the increase. Rajapaksa said that as a result, a few of the pledges made in his election campaign could not be completed.
The President insisted that securing a two-thirds majority at next month’s General Election was critical to more effective and smoother governance, including the amendment of the Constitution.
Cinematic history was made on 9 February at the Dolby Theatre in Los Angeles where the 92nd awards ceremony of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences (AMPAS) was held. For the first time in its ‘nonagenarian’ lifetime, the Academy award known as Oscar was presented to a non-English film in the prestigious Best Picture category.
Bong Joon Ho, Best Picture, Best Directing, Best International Feature Film, Best Original Screenplay for “Parasite” 📽️ Pic via: Facebook/TheAcademy
The recipient of this singular honour was the TheKorean film ‘Gisaengchung’ known to the world at large in English as ‘Parasite’. In addition to the Best Picture award, ‘Parasite’ also won Oscars in the Best Director, Best Original Screenplay and Best International Feature Film categories. “Parasite” was directed by South Korean Film maker Bong Joon -ho who also co-authored the film’s screenplay. Continue reading ‘Korean Film Maker Bong Joon-Ho’s “Parasite” Makes Oscar History 🇰🇷🎬🌏’ »
Colombo Fort Magistrate Ranga Dissanayake yesterday imposed a travel ban on former Minister Ravi Karunanayake and 10 others, including all the Directors of Perpetual Treasuries who are facing charges of criminal misappropriation, market manipulation, cheating and insider dealing in relation to two bond auctions held in March 2016.
The Magistrate also said he would rule tomorrow on whether to issue arrest warrants for the suspects after the Attorney General’s Department made submissions seeking a court order to arrest the 11 suspects who face charges under the Penal Code, Offences against Public Property Act and the Registered Stock and Securities Ordinance in connection with two bond auctions held on 29 and 31 March 2016.
The estate sector wage hike remains stuck in a stalemate, with plantation companies awaiting a decision from the Government and trade unions.
“We have not heard a decision from the Government yet although we have submitted three alternatives,” Regional Plantation Companies (RPCs) told the Daily FT.
RPCs proposed three models, including out-grower, productivity-based incentives and revenue sharing.
“We have done our part and it is now the Government’s responsibility,” the RPCs added.
An Employers’ Federation of Ceylon (EFC) spokesperson also noted that it had not been informed of a decision on the estate wage hike thus far.
The hike, starting from this month, was proposed by the Government. Despite multiple attempts, Plantation Industries and Export Agriculture Minister Dr. Ramesh Pathirana or Treasury Secretary S.R. Attygalle were not available for comment.
The day after the Government’s declaration in Geneva of withdrawal from the co-sponsorship of the 2015 Resolution and its successors, UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Michelle Bachelet, tendered her observations on the human rights situation and trends worldwide, with reports on an array of countries including Sri Lanka.
Michelle Bachelet is a two-time President of Chile, who won with 53% of the vote the first time (2006) and 62% in her comeback (2013). She was a Socialist leader, a former defence minister, the daughter of an Air Force General, and a victim of torture – as were her parents, one of whom died of the experience—under a rightwing military dictatorship.
I’ve had to respond pointedly to two of Bachelet’s predecessors as UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, Louise Arbour and Navi Pillay, resisting on behalf of fair play for Sri Lanka. Regrettably I never had the privilege of facing Zaid al Hussein. Resolution 30/1 of 2015 which then Prime Minister Wickremesinghe and Foreign Minister Samaraweera co-sponsored, explicitly rested upon and flowed from his selective, imbalanced and highly subjective if not downright biased OISL tome on Sri Lanka.
Michelle Bachelet is very different from all three former UN High Commissioners of Human Rights.
(Text of a News Release Posted on the Human Rights Watch website on March 3rd 2020)
Sri Lanka: Security Agencies Shutting Down Civic Space
Rights Activists, Journalists Facing Surveillance, Threats
(New York)– Sri Lankan security agencies are stepping up surveillance, harassment, and threats against human rights activists and journalists, Human Rights Watch said today.
Since November 2019, when the government of President Gotabaya Rajapaksa came into office, there has been a rapid closing of civic space and freedom of expression.
In interviews with 15 Sri Lankan human rights defenders working in different locations around the country, Human Rights Watch heard consistent accounts of increased surveillance and pressure from security agencies.
Several said that intelligence officials had asked activists and victims about their advocacy plans ahead of the current United Nations Human Rights Council session, which began on February 24, 2020 in Geneva. “We fear that international lobbying and travel to Geneva may not happen in future because of this situation,” one activist said.
Nine key officers of the Commission to Investigate Bribery or Corruption (CIABOC) had been transferred suddenly, former MP Lakshman Senewiratne told media.
Prime Minister Mahinda Rajapaksa is driving the governing party’s Parliamentary Election campaign and at the outset has taken a hard right turn.
He has also revived the discussion over the controversial anti-conversion Bill.
In the week preceding the dissolution of Parliament which happened at mid-night Monday, Rajapaksa has been seen with dozens of leading Buddhist Monks, offering them gifts and alms and on occasion appointments and honors.
Rajapaksa has been and is the undisputed political leader for the Right-wing Sinhala Buddhist community in the island and this opening period of the campaign is being spent shoring up that base.
(Text of a Press Release Issued by the Public Opinion Committee on March 3rd 2020 Under the Heading “Is the Government all set to sign the MCCC?)
A high-profile member of the Millennium Challenge Corporation Compact (MCCC) review committee has revealed that the report submitted by them to the President was not prepared according to established process.
A Presidential Committee was appointed to conduct a ‘Comprehensive study on the Millennium Challenge Corporation Project’ and submit recommendations to the Government in mid-February this year. Neither the review Committee’s mandate nor its terms of reference were made public.
Head of the four-member MCCC Committee, Professor Lalithsiri Gunaruwan has disclosed that the Committee did not follow due process, followed an anti-scientific approach ‘going backwards’ from recommendations / conclusions to methodology and implied that only information reinforcing their initial postulate was taken into account, continuing the charade of respecting the views of ordinary people.
Was the MCCC review committee part of a pre-determined agenda? If so, whose? These are legitimate questions that the MCC review committee’s admission poses.
President Gotabaya Rajapaksa yesterday (Mar 2) dissolved the Parliament and fixed 25 April for the next General Election, fuelling concerns Sinhala-Tamil New Year month will be effectively unproductive.
The President also fixed the date for the new Parliament to meet for 14 May and the period between 12 and 19 March as the nomination period, during which nomination papers will be received by the Returning Officers for candidates contesting the election.
The Gazette notification dissolving the House was issued by the President hours after the current Parliament completed four-and-half-years of its five-year term under powers vested in him under by Article 70 of the Constitution and under the provisions of the Parliamentary Elections Act No. 1 of 1981. The President is empowered to dissolve Parliament only after the completion of four-and-a-half years after the enactment of the 19th Amendment to the Constitution.
Having failed to reach a consensus with the group headed by UNP leader Ranil Wickremesinghe on the forthcoming general election, UNP Deputy Leader Sajith Premadasa, yesterday (02) launched Samagi Jana Balavegaya (SJB), at the Nelum Pokuna Theatre.
Ranil Wickremesinghe, UNP General Secretary Akila Viraj Kariyawasam and several other Wickremesinghe loyalists boycotted the event.
The Samagi Jana Balawegaya (SJB) alliance launched yesterday with its leader Sajith Premadasa insisting that it will be a long-term effort to build a new political culture beyond the Parliamentary Elections but the decision over the alliance symbol remains in doubt.
The SJB, a largely United National Party (UNP) creation, will be led by Opposition Leader Sajith Premadasa. It was launched with the participation of a number of UNP parliamentarians, minority party politicians and civil society supporters at a function held at Nelum Pokuna Theatre.
The launch saw the 12 political parties and civil society groups sign a MoU, formally joining the SJB alliance. Addressing the gathering, SJB Leader MP Sajith Premadasa said that the launch signified a democratic, progressive people’s revolution targeted at the Parliamentary Elections. Addressing the gathered, SJB General Secretary Ranjith Madduma Bandara said that 95% of UNP electoral organisers and parliamentarians were present at the launch.
(Text of a Media Advisory Issued in San Francisco by the Center for Justice and Accountability on March 2nd 2020)
San Francisco, March 2, 2020: Last week, the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals granted Ahimsa Wickrematunge’s request to vacate the lower court’s ruling that Gotabaya Rajapaksa is entitled to common law foreign official immunity for acts committed while he was Secretary of Defense of Sri Lanka. Ahimsa’s lawsuit, filed last April, sought to hold Rajapaksa – now the president of Sri Lanka – responsible for his alleged involvement in the assassination of her father, famed journalist Lasantha Wickrematunge, and in the widespread and systematic targeting of journalists perceived to critical of the government. Ahimsa is represented by the Center for Justice and Accountability (CJA) and Debevoise & Plimpton LLP.
The Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals also granted Ahimsa’s request to dismiss her case without prejudice, as Rajapaksa’s accession to the presidency of Sri Lanka last November gave him immunity from suits in US courts for so long as he remains president. The Ninth Circuit’s decision clears the way for future litigation against Rajapaksa once he no longer enjoys immunity as a head of state.
“May you live in interesting times.” is a saying that is believed to be an ancient Chinese curse. Many writers and speakers often use this expression or phrase and attribute Chinese origins to it. In spite of the widely held belief about Chinese links, recent studies by Etymologist scholars and linguistic researchers have revealed that there is no evidence of this saying having a Chinese origin. Fred R.Shapiro the editor of “The Yale Book of Quotations” has stated “No authentic Chinese saying to this effect has ever been found”. Furthermore Ralph Keyes has noted in “The Quote Verifier” that “nobody has ever been able to confirm the Chinese origin claim”.
Secretary of State Mike Pompeo – pic via: @SecPompeo
Despite these doubts about the Chinese origins of this saying how did this expression and belief first enter the English language realm? It was Sir Austen Chamberlain the brother of former British Prime minister Neville Chamberlain who reportedly alluded to this so called “Chinese curse” first. As is well -known Neville Chamberlain with all good intentions entered into a concessionary agreement with Adolf Hitler in Munich and returned to London triumphantly proclaiming “Peace in our lifetime”. Hitler did not honour the accord and World War two broke out. The umbrella carrying Chamberlain had to quit as PM carrying the disgrace of trying to “appease” Hitler. Continue reading ‘Was Recent US Action Against Army Chief Shavendra Silva Due to Sri Lanka’s Problematic Chinese “Connection”?’ »
Former Foreign Minister Mangala Samaraweera has said that the decision to co-sponsor Geneva Resolution 30/1 was taken by the yahapalana government under the leadership of then President Maithripala Sirisena.
Samaraweera, in a statement issued on withdrawal from Resolution 30/1 and subsequent resolutions extending its mandate in the UN Human Rights Council, has said:
“At a time when Sri Lanka was in dire straits, the government changed in January 2015, and the Government of the day, under the leadership of President Sirisena decided, based on the 100-Day Programme, to bring all these issues back home from the international arena, by taking local ownership and taking charge of all processes through Resolution 30/1. This was a reassertion of Sri Lanka’s sovereignty and regaining Sri Lanka’s lost respect and dignity among the international community once again. It was also an opportunity for Sri Lanka to prove that Sri Lankan justice is fully capable of ensuring credible accountability. Resolution 30/1 gives Sri Lanka and NOT the international community or an international court that responsibility.
Sri Lanka co-sponsored the resolution on Oct -1, 2015.
Michelle Bachelet, the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, has said at least one thing that rings true in the minds of most Sri Lankan people. It is the lack of belief in the appointment of another Commission of Inquiry by the Government.
Her concern was about addressing impunity for past violations of human rights. Our objection is much wider. We seem to be the country with the world record for Presidential Commissions of Inquiry with the more important aspect of Commissions that achieve nothing; the reports of which are often kept secret. Commissions that have become a political joke in a country, where political humour is the stuff of the vulgar!
The current political mood, the mood of political power, is one of great joy and triumph; rejoicing at Sri Lanka’s withdrawal from co-sponsoring the UN Resolution 30/1 that related to the postwar situation in this country, and especially the situation of the victims of the war, that of missing persons, and the wider postwar issues that relate to democracy and human rights.
Whatever thinking Foreign Affairs Minister Dinesh Gunawardena may have had when talking of a new Commission of Inquiry (CoI) headed by a Justice of the Supreme Court, to review previous Sri Lankan CoIs on Human Rights and International Humanitarian Law, his mind may have had a block about the wider Sri Lankan attitude to such commissions, whether headed by a Justice of the Supreme Court or not.
Michelle Bachelet says the Sri Lankan State should work for “all its people and the needs of all communities, particularly the minorities”. Come on. She must know the political history of this oldest democracy in Asia. We are a majority-led nation. That has been the growing tradition from the time we obtained freedom or independence from colonial rule. We are today the proudest advocates of Sinhala-Buddhist dominance and power in our country. They are the majority voters, and how can one have true democracy, without the satisfaction of the majority?
There is a dreadfully fractured logic in what the Government of Sri Lanka articulated before the United Nations Human Rights Council (UNHRC) as it withdrew from UNHRC Resolution 30/1 this week. This is playing to the nationalist gallery with an eye to the impending General Elections. It has disastrous consequences for the country, make no mistake.
The hoopla surrounding the Resolution
Let me be clear. This is not about Sri Lanka agreeing to co-sponsor this Resolution of much fame in 2015. It is not even about whether, as some would cogently argue, that the Resolution, despite all its hoopla, only brought about cosmetic changes while leaving intact, the gigantic apparatus of security sector impunity. Though if we are to dwell a moment here, one does not have to go very far to validate that logic.
For the past five years, parents of Sri Lanka’s ‘disappeared’ have been camped out on the roads of the North, asking for justice even as they die, one by one, as the relentless pressure takes its toll. Indeed, as the Resolution’s key sponsors within the ‘yahapalanaya’ Government bragged many a time, this was a ‘device’ to free the country from being called to order in the halls of the Council.
True, legislation was enacted to criminalise enforced disappearances. But what good is that when the two primary arms of the State tasked with law enforcement and prosecution remained so pitifully vulnerable to political pressure without clear institutional reforms being pushed through? We see that result now as the criminal law enforcement machinery breaks down leaving even Courts helpless when the police refuse to adhere to a direction of the Attorney General and evade serving summons on military personnel. We will return to that matter later.
Ahimsa Wickrematunge, daughter of slain journalist Lasantha Wickrematunge, has lodged a complaint with the Commission to Investigate Allegations of Bribery or Corruption (CIABOC) alleging that CID Director Senior Superintendent of Police W. Thilakaratne and other officers in the Department are colluding with the intent to confer a wrongful and unlawful benefit, favour, or advantage on Sri Lanka’s former Ambassador to Russia Udayanga Weeratunga, who is facing charges under the Public Property Act in connection with the MiG aircraft purchase deal.
In a letter sent to the Commission last week, Ahimsa cited the transfer of CID officers who had been investigating the case for nearly ten years by CID Director Thilakaratne, so as to stifle the investigations and take the case forward.
Foreign Relations Minister Dinesh Gunawardena has assured Geneva-based United Nations Human Rights Council (UNHRC) that the existing reconciliation mechanisms established by an Act of Parliament such as the Office on Missing Persons (OMP) and the Office of Reparations (OR) would be continued, with appropriate adaptation in line with the Government policy framework. With regard to the issues on missing persons, steps would be taken, after necessary investigations, to issue death certificates or certificates of absence, while also providing livelihood and other assistance to affected families, the minister said, in his second statement in Geneva on Feb 27.
The first statement was made on Feb 26.
Minister Gunawardena’s statementis as follows –
“Notwithstanding withdrawing from co-sponsorship of this Resolution, we emphasised our commitment to achieving accountability and human rights within the framework of our Constitution, towards sustainable peace and reconciliation – through the appointment of a domestic Commission of Inquiry, by implementing policies rooted in the Government’s commitments to operationalise the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), and by continuing to work with the assistance of the UN and its agencies.
The Government has decided not sign the $ 480 million Millennium Challenge Corporation (MCC) agreement, taking into consideration the recommendations of a four-member Committee that studied it and found some of its features threaten national security and social and economic welfare of Sri Lanka, Cabinet spokesman Minister Bandula Gunawardena said yesterday.
The four-member committee headed by Professor Lalithasiri Gunaruwan, which submitted its interim report to President Gotabaya Rajapaksa last week, pointed out there were clauses and conditions in the agreement that would negatively affect national goals and objectives, sovereignty, and national security, and were inconsistent with the legal framework and Constitution of the country, the Minister said. The report was presented to the Cabinet by Prime Minister Mahinda Rajapaksa on Thursday, and a decision was taken not to sign the agreement, he said.
United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights Michelle Bachelet yesterday expressed regret over Sri Lankan Government announcing a very different approach to the commitments previously made in UNHRC resolutions, and warned that this “risks setting back efforts to advance reconciliation, accountability and human rights.”
In her oral updates to the 43rd session of the UNHRC, Bachelet said the State must work for all its people, and the needs of all communities, particularly the minorities, must be acknowledged and addressed.
“I urge the Government to preserve and build upon the gains which have been made over the last few years. In particular, I encourage the Government to ensure the Office on Missing Persons and the Office of Reparations are provided with political and resource support. The families of missing persons from all communities deserve justice and redress,” she said.
United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, Michelle Bachelet, yesterday told the 43rd Session of the Human Rights Council that she didn’t believe that appointment of yet another Commission of Inquiry by the Sri Lankan government would address impunity for past violations.
On Wednesday Minister of Foreign Affairs Dinesh Gunawardena said that the government would appoint a Commission of Inquiry (COI) headed by a Justice of the Supreme Court, to review the reports of previous Sri Lankan COIs, which investigated alleged violations of Human Rights and International Humanitarian Law (IHL), to assess the status of implementation of their recommendations and to propose deliverable measures to implement them keeping in line with the new Government’s policy
In his open-necked purple shirt, Nishantha Wickremesinghe is chuffed to be seen with his arm around a long-time friend. Businessman Nimal Perera is feting his sixtieth birthday at the Colombo Hilton and the former SriLankan Airlines Chairman is a guest.
The party was just weeks ago. On Wednesday, the Fort Magistrate banned Wannakawattawaduge Don Nimal Hemasiri Perera from overseas travel. This was after hearing that an account held by one of his companies in a Singapore bank received a chunk of the monies Airbus had funnelled into an entity owned by Priyanka Neomali Wijenayake, the wife of former SriLankan Airlines Chief Executive Officer Kapila Chandrasena.
Happy Birthday: Nishantha Wickremesinghe, former Chairman of SriLankan Airlines, birthday boy Nimal Perera, owner of–among other things–NP Capital, and Sumal Perera, Founder and Chairman of the Access Group of Companies
England’s High Court last month fined Airbus a record £3bn in penalties for paying huge bribes on an “endemic” basis to land contracts in 20 countries. One is Sri Lanka and involves the purchase of six A330 and four A350 airbuses and the lease of four other planes in deals agreed to between 2012 and 2013.
Airbus SE had hired Ms Wijenayake as a business partner through a dummy company she registered in Brunei. It then paid into this entity’s account in the Standard Chartered Bank (SCB) in Singapore a sum of US$ 2mn (Rs 362mn) out of a total US$ 16.84mn (Rs 3bn) promised in return for ensuring that SriLankan bought aircraft from Airbus.
Colombo Fort Magistrate Ranga Dissanayake yesterday refused bail and re-remanded Sri Lanka’s former Ambassador to Russia Udayanga Weeratunga until 11 March, after Police filed a certificate in Court confirming the offence committed by the latter is of a value of more than Rs. 25,000.
Counsel for Weeratunga sought bail for him on grounds that the certificate had not been filed on the first day of the hearing, and urged that the Magistrate decline to consider it.
However, the Magistrate said there was no requirement under the provisions relating to the granting of bail under the Offences Against Public Property Act to file such a certificate on the first day.
He said that once a gazetted officer not below the rank of Assistant Superintendent of Police (ASP) certifies that the value of the offence committed exceeds Rs. 25,000, such a person can be kept on remand until the conclusion of the trial.
Foreign Relations Minister Dinesh Gunawardena yesterday formally announced Sri Lanka’s withdrawal from the United Nations Human Rights Council (UNHRC) Resolution 30/1 and others adopted after 2015, but assured members the Government is committed to “comprehensive reconciliation”, delivered through a domestic mechanism.
Delivering his address to the UNHRC in Geneva, the Minister emphasised that the decision to withdraw was made according to the wishes of the people of Sri Lanka, while following a non-aligned, neutral foreign policy.
“Our Government is committed to examining issues afresh, to forge ahead with its agenda for ‘prosperity through security and development’, and to find home-grown solutions to overcome contemporary challenges in the best interest of all Sri Lankans,” he told the Council. “It is in this context that I wish to place on record Sri Lanka’s decision to withdraw from co-sponsorship of Resolution 40/1 on ‘Promoting reconciliation, accountability and human rights in Sri Lanka’, which also incorporates and builds on preceding Resolutions 30/1 of October 2015 and 34/1 of March 2017.”
Minister of Foreign Relations Dinesh Gunawardena yesterday’, while informing the 43rd Session of the Human Rights Council in Geneva that Sri Lanka was withdrawing from co-sponsorship of UNHRC Resolutions pertaining to the country, explained that the commitments made by the previous government had contributed to the lapses that resulted in the Easter Sunday attacks in April 2019.
The dictated changes in the country pursuant to Resolution 30/1, undermined the national interest and compromised national security, including weakening national intelligence operations and related safeguards, which are deemed to have contributed to the lapses that resulted in the Easter Sunday attacks in April 2019, which targeted churches and hotels, resulting in loss of life, including those of foreign nationals, which poses challenges to our government to restore national security.
Given below is the full text of the speech:
It was over a decade ago, on 18 May 2009 that Sri Lanka defeated LTTE terrorism militarily, bringing to an end three decades of conflict and suffering. The end of the brutal conflict advanced, secured and protected one of the fundamental human rights – the ‘right to life’ for all Sri Lankans- Sinhalese, Tamil, Muslims and others. I would like to state with pride that since May 2009, not a bullet has been fired in the name of separatist terrorism in Sri Lanka.
Sri Lanka never had any illusion that the end of the conflict against the LTTE terrorists, will overnight convert to a lasting peace. Although Sri Lanka was not a case of nation building, like many conflict situations that this Council is dealing with, we were mindful that Sri Lanka needed certain reviews and strengthening of existing structures, as part of a sustainable peace and reconciliation programme.
The government led by the then President Mahinda Rajapaksa, of which the current President Gotabaya Rajapaksa was the Secretary to the Ministry of Defence, initiated a sustainable reconciliation process in Sri Lanka to bring about ‘healing and peace building’, taking due cognizance of the ground realities at that time. This was viewed as an incremental and inclusive process, as it had taken even better-resourced countries several decades to address and achieve.
The Geneva 2015 resolution is a hidden tripwire linked to a maze of claymore mines, some buried, some planted in ditches, others nested in trees. When this article appears, Sri Lanka may have nudged that tripwire. There was another, smarter, safer way.
The Geneva 2015 resolution was explicitly based on and legitimised the utterly tendentious Zaid al Hussein report with its outrageous, unfounded allegation of “system crimes” and its hostile recommendations.
One error cannot be corrected by another, nor one extreme by another, which is why the Buddha urged the Middle Path, and Aristotle, the Golden Mean. By a precipitate unilateral withdrawal from the criminally treacherous co-sponsorship of the ghastly Geneva 2015 resolution, is Sri Lanka extricating itself from a quagmire or sinking deeper into a larger one?
We could have calibrated our moves better. We could have used the negative factor of our co-sponsorship to good effect and flipped it, pointing out that it is precisely as co-sponsors that we wish to constructively propose a raft of corrective
amendments—an argument that would be difficult for the Western co-sponsors, the actual drivers of the resolution, to be seen to reject outright without apprehension of unmasking and exposure. We could have used our misplaced co-sponsorship as a handle; leveraged our status of ‘share-holders’. To quote Mao Zedong, we had the chance to “turn bad into good” – or colloquially, lemons into lemonade.
All eyes will be on Foreign Relations Minister Dinesh Gunawardena as he addresses the United Nations Human Rights Council today(Feb 26), in a statement expected to announce Sri Lanka’s decision to withdraw from Resolution 30/1 and others presented after 2015, as well as outline the path ahead on engagement with the UN and other agencies to promote reconciliation and address accountability concerns.
Minister Gunawardena, who is leading Sri Lanka’s delegation to the 43rd session of the UNHRC, left for Geneva on Monday. He will address the UNHRC session today, where he will announce Sri Lanka’s decision to withdraw from co-sponsorship of Resolution 40/1 of March 2019, which also incorporates and builds on preceding resolutions 30/1, of October 2015 and 34/1 of March 2014.
Minister Gunawardena will also meet with UN Human Rights High Commissioner Michelle Bachelet on Friday to brief her on Sri Lanka’s decision to withdraw from co-sponsorship of the UNHRC Resolution on Promoting Reconciliation, Accountability and Human Rights in Sri Lanka, official sources said yesterday.
Former Army Commander and now Sri Lanka Ports Authority Chairman Daya Ratnayake has criticized the former government for failing to protect the image of the Sri Lanka military in the international arena within the past 5 years which led to Lieutenant General Shavendra Silva and his family from being banned to enter the US.
Ratnayake also questioned the timing of the ban, stating that some people were trying to create instability in the country just before an election.
Amnesty International yesterday wrote to President Gotabaya Rajapaksa, requesting that he and the Government take concrete steps to create a safe and enabling environment for journalists and other media workers.
The letter, which is also signed by the Committee to Protect Journalists and Reporters Without Borders, calls on the Government to create and environment where journalists can carry out their vital work freely and without fear. T
hey also request the Government to carry out an effective and independent investigations into all alleged incidents of attacks, threats and intimidation of journalists, and to hold perpetrators to account with a view of preventing such incidents in the future.
Successful regional integration — both economic and security — depends on the South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation (SAARC) becoming fully functional at the highest levels, Sri Lanka’s former Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe said.
Emphasising the need for countries in the region to link up both strategically and economically, Mr. Wickremesinghe said the postponement of the Kathmandu SAARC Summit in 2017 due to heightened tensions between India and Pakistan had brought the regional grouping “to a standstill”.
Urging the neighbours to iron out differences — including on cross-border terrorism — he said, “Otherwise you may find outsiders coming and telling [you] sort it out…not us in South Asia.”
“SAARC is deadlocked. While BIMSTEC is not a substitute for SAARC, it is, nevertheless a starting point for integration,” he said, in his keynote address at The Huddle, a two-day thought conclave organised by The Hindu in Bengaluru.
UNP MP Eran Wickramaratne has accused the Government of engaging in a witch hunt against professionals – including lawyers, journalists and Police officers – and expressed fears that judicial officials standing up for what is right could be next in line.
Speaking during the debate on the Airbus bribery scandal in Parliament on Thursday (20 February), Wickramaratne also expressed dismay at the lack of support from the peers of those who are being unfairly targeted by the Government for doing their job.
“We passed the 19th Amendment to bring rigor to key public sector appointments and gave the Opposition a voice in the selection of senior judges and civil servants. Even as a member of the Opposition, I was hopeful that this Government would look forward and not backward, but what we have seen instead is a witch hunt of unprecedented proportions,” the UNP MP said. Wickramaratne said that as someone with a long track record in the private sector, many raised concerns when he decided to enter politics because of the risk in reprisals.
“Professionals, lawyers, doctors, journalists, Police officers, accounts, bankers, businesspeople, career diplomats and other civil servants should not be penalised by political opponents when governments change. That is the only way to redeem our country,” Wickramaratne said
Three months after Sri Lanka’s feared former security minister Gotabaya Rajapaksa won a shock presidential victory, rights groups say security forces and intelligence agencies have intensified surveillance and intimidation of activists and families of victims of his former regime.
New York-based Human Rights Watch has called on the new government to end the intimidation of activists and families of those forcibly disappeared during the country’s 28-year civil war, including the 10 years in which the Rajapaksa family held power until its defeat in 2015.
HRW South Asia director Meenakshi Ganguly told The Australian that fresh intimidation of activists and families of the disappeared, who were still seeking answers, had already had a chilling effect and many were now scared to speak up.
Sri Lanka has requested a meeting with the UN Human Rights High Commissioner Michelle Bachelet as the country begins to work towards the closure of a contentious UNHRC Resolution on Promoting Reconciliation, Accountability and Human Rights in Sri Lanka at the 43rd Session of the Council in Geneva later this week.
Official sources said a request has been made for Minister of Foreign Relations Dinesh Gunawardena to meet with Bachelet, but no date has been fixed yet.
The Minister will lead Sri Lanka’s delegation to the HR sessions and will be accompanied by Justice Minister Nimal Siripala de Silva and State Minister Mahinda Samarasinghe. The Foreign Relations Ministry officials will join them in Geneva.
When Sri Lanka’s President, Gotabaya Rajapaksa reportedly articulates that, ‘unnecessary judicial interventions are harmful to democracy’ (The Island, February 21st, 2020), one is intrigued.
A praxis of bizarre happenings
Pray, what would a Presidential definition of ‘unnecessary’ be, it might be ‘necessary’ to ask? That question becomes pertinent in the context of strange developments in Sri Lanka during recent months impacting on the very function of judges, judiciary and the law, which have been the theme of this column for some weeks now.
But, of course, the President’s reported sentiments must be read in context. What was said at one of Colombo’s numerous law conferences recently is that, while the executive and the legislature must not interfere with the judiciary, the judiciary also must not interfere with other arms of the State. In theory, there is nothing very problematic about this reminder as it is the fundamental principle underlying the separation of powers after all.
Equally, the President’s injunction that, even if the independence of the judiciary is secured, it will not suffice to deliver justice if the judicial system is ineffective and sluggish, is only commonsensical.
But these sentiments need to be read against the bizarre praxis of what is actually happening in the country. It seems that judges are also expressing their angst regarding the stranger-than-fiction dramas that are played out in their courts.
Opposition Leader Sajith Premadasa has displayed his immaturity by blocking the Government’s efforts to obtain loans to settle the soaring debts and his action will cause immense hardships for the masses in the months to come, Information and Media, Higher Education , Technology and Innovation Minister Bandula Gunawardene told a media conference at the Information Department yesterday.
“Had Ranil Wickremesinghe been the Opposition Leader today, he would have supported the Government to pass the Vote on Account to obtain Rs.367 billion to provide relief to the people,” he said.
Foreign Affairs Minister Dinesh Gunawardena is scheduled to meet the UN Human Rights High Commissioner Michelle Bachelet to convey Sri Lanka’s decision to withdraw from the co-sponsorship of Resolution 40/1 of March 2019 since it violated the country’s constitution and served only to appease extremist sections and vested interests, the Minister’s Media office stated.
The Cabinet of Ministers on Wednesday unanimously decided that the government should withdraw from the Resolutions 40/1 on promoting reconciliation, accountability and human rights in Sri Lanka’ which also incorporates and builds on preceding Resolutions 30/1 of October 2015 and 34/1 of March 2017.
The core of President Gotabaya Rajapaksa’s foreign policy is standing up for Sri Lanka’s sovereign rights. But his cast-iron nationalism is not mindlessly jingoistic or confrontational, disregarding geo-political and economic realities.
Gotabaya’s first international move was to reach out to India, which had been unhappy with elder brother Mahinda Rajapaksa’s Presidency between 2010 and 2014 for its economic and geo-strategic tilt towards India’s Asian rival, China. The Rajapaksa brothers suspected that India had been part of an international conspiracy to bring about a regime change in 2015 by propping up a united national opposition with Mithripala Sirisena as the candidate in the January 8 2015 Presidential election. Mahinda lost the election.
It was only in 2017 that the frosty relationship began to thaw when India realized that the Yahapalanaya government headed by President Sirisena and Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe had failed to deliver on the promises it had made, and was cosying up to China instead. While almost 15 major Indian project MOUs were gathering dust, China was given new projects including a 99-year lease on, and a 70% stake in, the strategically located Hambantota port.
Be that as it may, India still hoped that United National Front’s Sajith Premadasa would win as he was thought to be amenable. But when Sajith was defeated and Gotabaya won the November 16, 2019 Presidential election, Indian swiftly extended its hand of friendship to the new President in the belief that it is the early bird which catches the worm. Foreign Minister Dr.S.Jaishankar flew down to Colombo and got Gotabaya to agree to make an official visit to India quickly.
Foreign Affairs Minister Dinesh Gunawardena must have been diplomatically polite when he conveyed the Sri Lanka Government’s displeasure and objections with regard to the travel ban to the United States imposed on the Sri Lanka Army Commander and his family, when he met with the US Ambassador Aliana Teplitz earlier this week.
This meeting must have revived Minister Dinesh Gunawardena’s memories of his father, the late Philip Gunawardena, who had his higher education in the US, where he began his left-wing and socialist political career; in association with the many prominent American socialists of the time and leaders of the movement for equality to the black people.
Ambassador Teplitz’s assurance of conveying the related concerns and objections of the Sri Lanka Government to the Washington DC authorities was the reality of diplomacy, and nothing to do with the larger issues involved in the aspect of good relations between the US and Sri Lanka, in the context of current politics and governance in both countries.
Apart from the diplomatic objections raised by Minister Gunawardena, Ambassador Teplitz should also convey to the Secretary of State, Mike Pompeo, the much wider concerns among the Sri Lankan people about the very situation of democracy in the US today, and the issues of pardoning those who have committed crimes against humanity.
The Government yesterday abandoned a move in Parliament to amend the Vote on Account (VOA) to obtain an additional sum of Rs. 367 billion for Government expenses, as well as increase the limit of borrowing, after the UNP-led opposition refused to support the move.
Leader of the House Minister Dinesh Gunawardena told the House that the Government would not move the relevant regulation as the Opposition was attempting to sabotage the move to obtain additional funds. The ruling UPFA has only 96 seats in the 225 legislature, and hence would have needed support from the Opposition to have the resolution passed. But the UNP opposed the move to increase the limit on borrowings to Rs. 1088 billion from Rs. 721 billion, saying this would put additional burden on the public and economy.
The escalating clash of words (hopefully, not arms) between the Attorney General (AG) and the acting Inspector General of Police (IGP) over the failure to ‘immediately’ file charges against an interdicted High Court judge on the basis of allegedly attempting to fabricate evidence as revealed in leaked phone conversations with a parliamentarian, has thrown up some interesting dilemmas.
Strange happenings in this isle
Post 2019 Presidential polls, Sri Lanka is witnessing the stage being set for an wholesale overhaul of our constitutional systems. This drama is being beautifully played out in a scenario where the Offices of the AG and the IGP have become central points of dispute. That frames an overall attack on constitutional institutions in the name of ‘stability’ and ‘national security.’
First, we have an interdicted Inspector General of Police (IGP) in jail over dereliction of duty in the 2019 Easter Sunday jihadist attacks and only last week granted bail. Yet, this individual, and wondrously so, remains Sri Lanka’s IGP. Parliament, it seems, in all its collective wisdom, or lack thereof which is more the case, has not seen fit to bring in the statutory removal process for this IGP. Instead, leading lights (I use that term in its most caustic sense), of the Pohottuwa and Sri Lanka Freedom Party (SLFP) lambast the 19th Amendment for not ‘permitting’ the President to remove the IGP.
But the 19th Amendment had nothing to do with the matter at all. It is the Removal of Officers (Procedure) Act (2002) ancillary to the 17th Amendment, which brought in statutory safeguards in respect of the removal of the IGP and the AG, akin to the parliamentary process regarding removal of superior court judges. That was close to thirteen years before the 19th Amendment.
By
Dr. H. M. Gunatilake, Former Director, Asian Development Bank
The telephone recordings of Mr. Ramanayake, a Member of Parliament, which revealed deeply entrenched corruption across Sri Lankan society overwhelmingly shattered the confidence about the entire governance system in the country. It also highlighted the utmost importance of reinvigorating dialogue on corruption and empowering people to demand for a corruption free society. In this context, the upcoming parliamentary election is very good platform for making corruption the major issue of election debate. As I mentioned in my previous face book article on Presidential election, finding an election wining alternative to two major parties, which are competing to be the most corrupt, is not possible at this time. The newly elected president seems the only hope left for Sri Lankans in this regard.
Those who seek alternative to mainstream political parties should continue to raise their voices against corruption. If we can avoid some highly corrupt politicians going to Parliament in the upcoming election, it would be a major achievement to begin with. Understanding why corruption prevails in democratic governance system is the initial step in combatting corruption in the long run. It helps forming realistic expectations of reducing corruption. This article attempts to shed some light on prevalence of corruption in democracies. It also provides some suggestions for immediate actions to reduce corruption.
What is corruption?
Amongst many definitions, one simple way to define corruption is the abuse of entrusted power for private gains by political leaders, or public officials. It is a form of dishonesty or criminal activity undertaken by a person or organization to acquire illicit benefits. Forms of corruption vary, but include bribery, extortion, cronyism, nepotism, parochialism, patronage, influence peddling, graft, and embezzlement. Corruption occurs in both the public and private sectors and media personnel and civil society actors can also be involved in corruption. Actors can be individuals, companies, or organisations such as a political party.
Pandemonium reigned at the UNP Working Committee Meeting, yesterday, at Sirikotha. Some MPs manhandled others over their disagreements on the symbol to be used by the UNP-led alliance.
Following a heated argument UNP senior MP Ravindra Samaraweera, who argued in favour of the Swan symbol, tried to hit his fellow MPs who favoured the Elephant symbol, but he was restrained by others.
The ‘diplomatic drone strike’, the dramatic US strictures against the Army Commander, Lt. Gen. Shavendra Silva, tells us that Big Brother IS watching. This isn’t the usual suspects, its way out of their league. This is the Big League, the big boys and girls.
Secretary of State Mike Pompeo – pic via Facebook/Dept of Stste
I have five main takeaways.
Firstly, the document was not only issued under Secretary of State Pompeo’s name—which is probably the correct official format for such a declaration—but was followed by a tweet from Mike Pompeo himself, the most prominent member of the US administration after President Trump, and a man taken seriously even by rivals, competitors and adversaries (as I know from my stint in Moscow). This Secretary of State is not a Hillary Clinton type liberal. He is an ex-military man who topped his class at West Point, and was later the Director of the CIA. The language of his tweet was brusque: ‘Shavendra Silva’, not ‘Lt. General’. Both the tweet and the language were unusual.
Secondly, and contrary to hardline Sinhala ideological identification with President Trump, the US has sent an unambiguous signal that it will move on accountability; a signal that could be read as a greenlight, and have a multiplier or domino effect (to paraphrase The Guardian, UK).
Thirdly, the Israeli connection cannot or will not ensure the Sri Lankan government immunity from the US.
(Text of Statement Issued by Prime Minister Mahinda Rajapaksa on 19 February 2020)
The United States of America has prohibited the Commander of the Sri Lanka Army Lt. Gen. Shavendra Silva or members of his family from entering that country. Even though we are now in the 21st Century, even members of his family who have not been accused of any wrongdoing have been subjected to a collective punishment reminiscent of the practice in medieval Europe.
The people should be the judge of how fair this is. Even though this collective punishment has been meted out on the grounds that the Army Commander had committed violations of human rights, no one knows what these allegations are. Even though the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights says that until a person accused of a crime is proved guilty according to law, he should be deemed innocent, this principle does not seem to apply to Sri Lanka’s Army Commander or even to members of his family.
Our government has already conveyed our displeasure in this regard to the government of the United States in the strongest possible terms.
(Text if Press Release Issued by the Presidents Media Division)
President Gotabaya Rajapaksa has directed all Provincial Councils and Local Authorities to suspend the imposition of any extra levy or raising any existing rates or taxes. Furthermore, these bodies have been requested to review the entire local authority rate and fees structure to simplify it within 30 days from to date (19).
The government has decided to immediately withdraw from the United Nations Human Rights Council (UNHRC) resolutions 30/1 and 40/1 co-sponsored by the Yahapalanaya Government in 2015 and 2019.
pic via: UNHRC
A special meeting in this regard had been held last morning at the Presidential Secretariat and attended by Foreign Minister Dinesh Gunawardena, several senior ministers of the government and officials attached to the Foreign Affairs Ministry.
Colombo Fort Magistrate Ranga Dissanayake yesterday reprimanded some of the CID officers while emphasising that the manner in which they acted when Udayanga Weeratunga was arrested and produced in Court in connection with the alleged MIG-27 deal was unusual and questionable because they had failed to follow the procedure laid down under the Public Property Act.
As such he refused to release the suspect on bail considering the gravity of the US$7 million loss caused to the government.
The Magistrate said he was not prepared to satisfy the sardonic pleasure of the prosecution because the remanding of a suspect was not a police matter but a legal process.
At the outset of the inquiry, the Magistrate pointedly questioned the CID officers regarding the removal of the previous investigating officer of the FCID, Inspector Nihal Francis from the ongoing investigations.
Sri Lanka’s former President Maithripala Sirisena, who defected from the Mahinda Rajapaksa government to the rival political camp before being elected to office in 2015, has re-joined his former colleague and current Prime Minister Mr. Rajapaksa.
pic via: Facebook/Maithripala Sirisena
Mr. Sirisena’s Sri Lanka Freedom Party (SLFP) on Monday formed an alliance with the Sri Lanka Podujana Peramuna (SLPP or People’s Party) to contest the general election scheduled this summer.
Significantly, President Sirisena — who remained neutral in the November presidential election though the SLFP backed President Gotabaya Rajapaksa — will contest the parliamentary election as part of the new alliance in his home constituency Polonnaruwa (North Central Province), according to SLFP general secretary Dayasiri Jayasekara, who is also a State Minister.
The Sri Lanka Podujana Peramuna (SLPP) and the Sri Lanka Freedom Party (SLFP) ironed out their differences yesterday and forwarded an application to the Election Commission to register a new alliance under the Flower Bud symbol to contest the upcoming parliamentary election.
The nine-party alliance to be called the ‘Sri Lanka Nidahas Podujana Sandanaya (SLNPS)’ will be led by Prime Minister Mahinda Rajapaksa while its Chairman will be former President Maithripala Sirisena. The General Secretary of the Party will be former Minister Basil Rajapaksa. The National Organisers of the SLNPS are MP Dayasiri Jayasekara and Wimal Weerawansa.
UNP MP S.M.Marikkar yesterday said, no Sri Lankan should apply for US visa until the US government revoked its decision to prevent the Army Commander Lt. Gen. Shavendra Silva and his family members from visiting that country.
An application was filed at the Elections Commission to register a party named Patriotic United National Party (PUNP) yesterday under the ‘heart’ symbol.
PUNP comprises a breakaway faction of the UNP that pledged support to President Gotabaya Rajapaksa during the 2019 presidential election. The application was filed by Sugath Hewapathirana.
(Text of Media Release Issued by Human Rights Watch)
Sri Lankan security forces and intelligence agencies have intensified surveillance and threats against families of victims of enforced disappearance and activists supporting them since Gotabaya Rajapaksa became president in November 2019, Human Rights Watch said today. The Sri Lankan government should fulfill its commitments to the United Nations Human Rights Council to strengthen efforts to locate the “disappeared” and bring those responsible to justice.
Activists working in six locations in the northern and eastern parts of the country on behalf of relatives of the forcibly disappeared told Human Rights Watch that there has been a significant increase in government surveillance and intimidation. One activist said that prior to a recent victims’ meeting, “every one of the mothers got at least six telephone calls from different intelligence agencies asking, ‘Where is the meeting?’ ‘Who is organizing the meeting?’ ‘What is being said?’” Another activist said, “We can’t do any visible programs.… We’ve stopped everything.”
“The families of Sri Lanka’s ‘disappeared’ have spent years waiting for answers, but with the Rajapaksas back in power, security forces are threatening them to drop their demands for truth and accountability,” said Meenakshi Ganguly, South Asia director at Human Rights Watch. “The government needs to stop the harassment immediately and abide by Sri Lanka’s pledges to the UN to uncover the fate of the ‘disappeared’ and provide justice to victims’ families.”
Sri Lankan Prime Minister Mahinda Rajapakse ended a four-day trip to India on Tuesday. It was the third visit to New Delhi by leading figures of the Colombo government in the three months since the election of President Gotabhaya Rajapakse.
Three days after Gotabhaya Rajapakse won the election, Prime Minister Narendra Modi sent his foreign affairs minister, S. Jaishankar, to invite the Sri Lankan leader to visit New Delhi. Gotabhaya Rajapakse responded with a two-day tour in late November. In early January, Sri Lankan Foreign Minister Dinesh Gunawardena also travelled to India for talks.
The trips are part of the ongoing diplomatic efforts of the US and India to prevent the new Sri Lanka government developing close relations with China. Washington and New Delhi are determined to counteract Beijing’s influence on the strategically-located island nation that straddles key Indian Ocean sea lanes stretching from Africa and West Asia to the Malacca Straits in the east.
During the January 2015 presidential elections, India backed the US regime-change operation to oust Mahinda Rajapakse as president and replace him with Maithripala Sirisena. While the US and India supported Sri Lanka’s war against the separatist Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam, and Colombo’s repressive authoritarian methods, they were hostile to Rajapakse’s close relations with China. While former President Rajapakse later claimed some Indian intelligence officials and foreign countries worked against him, he never publicly named them.
Following his elevation into the presidency, Sirisena, with the assistance of Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe, quickly brought Colombo’s foreign policy into line with US and Indian geo-strategic demands and integrated the country’s armed forces with the US Pacific Command and its military planning against China.
Likewise, the Modi government, and the former Congress administration, systematically transformed India into a frontline state in America’s increasingly provocative operations against China. Washington is prepared to wage war against Beijing in an attempt to block its rise as an economic and geostrategic competitor.
Following the recent arrest of former SriLankan Airlines Chief Executive Officer (CEO) Kapila Chandrasena and his wife Priyanka Niyomali Wijenayake, after investigations revealed their alleged involvement in the corrupt deal with European aircraft manufacturer Airbus, fresh details of the financial trail as well as the complex banking and corporate web that had been spun to avoid detection by law enforcement authorities have been discovered by The Sunday Morning.
Through extensive investigations and the study of a set of highly confidential documents, we have produced a point-to-point illustration of this network and the financial trail which implicates Chandrasena and his wife.
The Government yesterday conveyed Sri Lanka’s strong objections on the imposition of travel restrictions on Army Commander Lt. Gen. Shavendra Silva and members of his immediate family and requested the US Government to review its decision.
Foreign Relations Minister Dinesh Gunawardena summoned and conveyed to US Ambassador to Sri Lanka Alaina Teplitz Sri Lanka’s strong objections on the imposition of travel restrictions by the US Government on the Commander of the Army and Actg. Chief of Defence Staff, as well as his immediate family when the two met at the Ministry yesterday.
During his discussion, the Minister reiterated that Lt. Gen. Silva was appointed as the Commander of the Army by the then President Maithripala Sirisena taking into account his seniority and that there were no substantiated or proven allegations of human rights violations against him.
His elevation as the Actg. Chief of Defence Staff by the current Head of State President Gotabaya Rajapaksa was on account of his being the senior most serving military officer.
Plantation Industries and Export Agriculture Minister Dr. Ramesh Pathirana says no final decision has been made yet on the three proposals submitted by the Regional Plantation Companies (RPCs).
Accordingly the three models proposed by the RPCs include outgrower, productivity-based incentives and revenue sharing model.
“We are still in the process of exploring how best we can work this out, to be able to provide a Rs. 1,000 daily wage for the estate workers March,” the Minister told the Daily FT.
With few more days to finalise the modality of the wage hike, when asked the Minister of the three proposals which seems to be considered best option, he said it was still difficult to disclose as the discussions with stakeholders were still ongoing.
On January 14, President Gotabhaya Rajapakse’s office issued a media release declaring that the president wanted the minimum daily wage of tea plantation workers increased to 1,000 rupees ($US5.50), starting on March 1.
The announcement was immediately hailed by Ceylon Workers Congress (CWC) leader Arumugam Thondaman, a cabinet minister in the new government, who claimed that it fulfilled a promise made by Rajapakse during last year’s presidential elections.
Rajapakse’s announcement is a patent fraud. The president and his Sri Lanka Podujana Peramuna (SLPP) minority government, who are preparing a snap general election sometime in April, are sitting on a social time bomb, with rising working-class opposition over low wages and the high cost of essential items. Key sections of the working class, including the tea plantation workers, have been involved in a series of wage struggles over the past 18 months.
Rajapakse’s pay proposal is a crude attempt to diffuse the mounting anger of plantation workers over wages and win their votes in the forthcoming election. He hopes to win a two-thirds parliamentary majority for the SLPP and push through legislation to establish authoritarian methods of rule.
United States Ambassador Alaina B. Teplitz has been summoned to the Foreign Relations Ministry today to be told of the government’s displeasure over the travel ban on Army Commander, Lt. Gen. Shavendra de Silva, considered a ‘war hero’ in Sri Lanka, and his family.
Foreign Minister Dinesh Gunawardena, who will meet her at noon today, will tell her that Sri Lanka is not pleased with the action of US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo.
On Friday, the US designated that the current Commander of the Sri Lanka Army and Acting Chief of Defence Staff be blacklisted due to “credible information” of his involvement, through command responsibility, in gross violations of human rights, namely extrajudicial killings, by the 58th Division of the Sri Lanka Army during the final phase of Sri Lanka’s Civil War in 2009.
Mr. Pompeo made the declaration under Section 7031(c) of the Department of State, Foreign Operations, and Related Programs Appropriations Act.
A Foreign Relations Ministry source said the meeting today, despite being a Sunday, underscored the importance Sri Lanka attached to the issue.
The United States has imposed an entry bar on Sri Lanka’s army chief, Lt. Gen. Shavendra Silva, citing his alleged involvement in war crimes during the final stages of the country’s civil war.
The travel restriction on the general is the first significant international penalty to be imposed on a Sri Lankan official over atrocities committed during the country’s 26-year civil war with Tamil Tiger militants, which ground to a halt in 2009.
The United Nations estimates that up to 40,000 Tamil civilians died in those final stages, many in extrajudicial killings, accusations the Sri Lankan government has denied.
The move was a rebuke to a Sri Lankan government that is stacked with officials accused of rights abuses during the civil war — including Gotabaya Rajapaksa, who won presidential elections last November.
Mr. Rajapaksa was the defense secretary during the final years of the war, and has appointed or promoted several officials accused of war crimes to important positions.
With the Ranil vs Sajith debate dragging on we are now moving to a battle on symbols. Ranil is not ready to give the elephant symbol to the new Sajith-led alliance. So we are moving to the heart of the matter. Sajith has picked on the heart symbol, and the polls commission has also agreed to it.
We will be fast moving to the politics of the heart, or “hadavath deshapalanaya”. The elephant symbol of green politics moved out of the battle ground some decades ago, although the UNP kept the largely unused symbol. From the campaign of Gen. Sarath Fonseka as presidential candidate in 2009, the elephant was kept in the UNP Zoo, and not brought out for big campaigning. The jumbo’s last show was in the local government polls in 2018, where it was a real ‘ali parajaya’ or massive defeat.
With Ranil embracing the elephant in the final phase of his politics, and Sajith missing the heartbeat of the elephant in his recent presidential defeat campaign, the country is now moving to a new political trend where the heart will face the lotus flower – the hadavatha – nelum mala satana.
The US has imposed sanctions on Sri Lanka’s chief of army staff, Lt Gen Shavendra Silva, for war crimes committed at final stages of the conflict against the Tamil Tigers in 2009, when up to 70,000 Tamil civilians were killed.
The US travel ban against Silva and his family marks the first time any of the leading suspects in the mass killings have been held accountable on the world stage.
The sanctions come three months after the election of President Gotabaya Rajapaksa, the defence secretary during the brutal counter-insurgency.
His victory increased fears there would be a return to impunity for war crimes, and a creeping erosion of human rights protections.
During the 2008-09 conflict, General Silva was the commander of the army’s 58th division, which was accused of shelling “no-fire zones” where ten of thousands of civilians had been told by the government to take shelter as it mounted a final offensive.
(Text of Press Statement Issued by US Secretary of State Michael R.Pompeo on February 14th 2020)
The Department of State has designated Lieutenant General Shavendra Silva, current Commander of the Sri Lanka Army and Acting Chief of Defense Staff, as required under Section 7031(c) of the Department of State, Foreign Operations, and Related Programs Appropriations Act, due to credible information of his involvement, through command responsibility, in gross violations of human rights, namely extrajudicial killings, by the 58th Division of the Sri Lanka Army during the final phase of Sri Lanka’s Civil War in 2009.
Section 7031(c) provides that, in cases where the Secretary of State has credible information that foreign officials have been involved in a gross violation of human rights or significant corruption, those individuals and their immediate family members are ineligible for entry into the United States. The law also requires the Secretary of State to publicly or privately designate such officials and their immediate family members. In addition to the public designation of Shavendra Silva, the Department is also designating his immediate family members.
The Government last night took strong objection against the imposition of travel restrictions by the US against Army Commander Lt. General Shavendra Silva and his family to the United States.
Foreign Affairs Ministry said that the US Department of State has designated Lieutenant General Shavendra Silva, current Commander of the Sri Lanka Army and Acting Chief of Defence Staff and his immediate family members. The public designation makes them ineligible for entry into the United States.
Sri Lanka’s Permanent Representative to the United Nations Ambassador Kshenuka Senewiratne yesterday said external timelines would only hinder the reconciliation process as they function independent of ground realities.
“Timelines evolved externally in achieving stated objectives would only seek to hinder the process of reconciliation since they would be bereft of ground realities,” emphasised Sri Lanka’s Permanent Representative to the United Nations Ambassador Kshenuka Senewiratne during a one-day debate at the UN Security Council, titled ‘Peace-building and Sustaining Peace: Transitional Justice in Conflict and Post-Conflict Situations’, held yesterday, a statement by the Foreign Relations Ministry said.
She added that when seeking mechanisms of transitional justice, related simple theories would need to also take cognizance of the various historical, cultural and religious sensitivities.
MSH Mohamed is an iconic figure in cancer philanthropy in Sri Lanka. He, together with his Fight Cancer Team, toiled with great determination and dedication to fulfill the sole ambition of his late son, Humaid, who succumbed to cancer three years ago. His last wish was to equip the Apeksha Cancer Hospital Maharagama with a PET (Positron Emission Tomography) scanner.
Mohamed’s story
As any other cancer story, Mohamed’s one too is filled with grief and despair. But his sheer dedication turned it into one of hope.
In 2014, Humaid, was diagnosed with osteosarcoma, a type of bone cancer. He was taken abroad for treatment, where millions of rupees were spent, but to no avail. On return to Sri Lanka, he was treated at a private hospital in Colombo for about six months, where again another couple of millions were spent. Three surgeries were performed on him, but with no improvement.
“We were feeling the strain, both economically and mentally. In 2015 we went to Apeksha hospital as we couldn’t afford the cost of treatment anymore,” Mohamed described how medical costs drain a family’s health and wealth today in Sri Lanka.
Commenting on the services available at the Apeksha hospital at that time Mohamed said, “As this is the only government run cancer hospital, and as the patients come from all around the country, we thought this would be of some standing. But we were disillusioned. When you compare the level of care and technology used to treat cancer elsewhere in the world with here, you feel sad and disgusted”.
Could Restorative Justice be the key to healing a deeply wounded society such as ours?
That was the discussion that took place on Monday, February 3rd, at the BMICH, where Barry Hart, Professor of Psycho-Social Trauma, Identity, Dignity and Peacebuilding, of the Eastern Mennonite University, USA and Initiatives of Change (IoC) Global, was the keynote speaker.
The seminar on Restorative Justice was hosted by Initiatives of Change Lanka. IoC works globally to build trust across the many divisions of the world; nationalities, cultures, beliefs and backgrounds.
Restorative justice seeks to repair a wrong by working with the victim, the offender and the community where making amends and accountability are the key roles.
While peacebuilding is a long and continuous process it does not always deal with the intangibles caused through violence, explained Professor Hart. Post-violence initiatives concentrate on the tangibles such as developing infrastructure and the economy while overlooking the psychological trauma an individual or a community has faced. Dignity, that ‘inherent feeling of value and self-worth of an individual or a community’ must be restored, he said, without which the emotional harm experienced would be carried on for generations.
Power without love, matures hate he pointed out, and revenge is not the solution. He explained that even if peace is achieved, it would be a ‘cold peace” where the body would continue to hold onto the trauma inflicted upon it.
Unarguably, Lee Kuan Yew (LKY) is the most universally respected Asian statesman of our time. He is esteemed from Washington to Havana, from Moscow to Beijing; from East to West and North to South, both for the quality of his mind and his conspicuous practical success as a transformational leader.
LKY is also known as the one who encouraged and to a great extent inspired Deng Xiaoping’s economic revolution in a seminal conversation in 1978. Lee made 33 visits to China and was acquainted with five generations of Chinese leaders.
LKY’s main observations on Sri Lanka are available in four texts. His on-the-record views on our country traverse its position at independence, through the post-independence decades right up to its post-war period. He was a man who never suffered fools or foolishness gladly and refused to waste his or other people’s time, so he was crystal clear and brutally frank in whatever he said—leaving no room for ambiguity or misinterpretation.
It is of considerable relevance that Lee’s identification of Sri Lanka’s tragic errors remained consistent over the decades, right up to his extended conversation in ‘The Man and his Ideas’ (1998, 2015), his famous double-volume autobiography ‘From Third World to First: The Singapore Story’ published in 2000, his International Herald Tribune interview (2007), and his exposition in Prof Tom Plate’s book ‘Conversations with Lee Kuan Yew’ in the ‘Giants of Asia’ series (2011).
One of the stranger if not outlandish manifestations of the upending of Sri Lanka’s legal order is the ongoing tussle between the Attorney General and the Presidential Commission inquiring into alleged incidents of political victimisation of public servants during the previous Sirisena-Wickremesinghe Government.
A truly extraordinary directive
The source of this dispute is truly extraordinary. As such, it evokes more than a passing response. The controversy arose over a ‘directive’ issued by the Presidential Commission recently ordering the Attorney General to ‘halt’ investigations into prosecutions launched against former Navy Commander Admiral Wasantha Karannagoda and former Navy spokesman D.K.P. Dassanayake over the abduction and disappearance of 11 youth, ‘until the Commission concludes its investigations.’
The directive was issued notwithstanding the fact that the ‘Navy abduction case, (as commonly referred to), is easily one of Sri Lanka’s most egregious human rights violations, ranking high in an infamous list. The case has implicated several high ranking military officers and their subordinates in a ransom racket where children were allegedly abducted for money during the Rajapaksa (the First) Presidency between 2008-2009 and consequently ‘disappeared.’ There were also allegations of a ‘cover up’ which pointed fingers at senior state prosecutors at the time.
The Election Commission (EC) has recognised Sajith Premadasa as the new leader of Our National Front (ONF) or Ape Jathika Peramuna and MP Ranjith Madduma Bandara as its General Secretary, as well as a change in the party’s name to Samagi Jana Balawegaya or United National Power (UNP), with the new acronym widening divisions within the United National Party.
While Election Commissioner General Saman Sri Ratnayake, in a letter, informed the ONF that the EC had decided to agree to the request to change the names of office-bearers and the party, UNP Legal Secretary President’s Counsel Nissanka Nanayakkara wrote to the EC stating that as the English acronym for both parties was identical, the commission should refrain from recognising another party with the same acronymised name.
The Election Commission (EC) has approved a request from those supporting Sajith Premadasa to rename ‘Ape Jathika Peramuna’ as ‘Samagi Jana Balavegaya,’ and make MP Ranjith Maddumabandara its General Secretary.
The Premadasa faction wants to contest the upcoming general election from ‘Samagi Jana Balavegaya.’
Commissioner General of Elections Commission, Saman Sri Rathnayake in a letter to Secretary of the alliance MP Ranjith Maddumabandara, yesterday, approved the renaming of the Ape Jathika Peramuna as ‘Samagi Jana Balavegaya.”
The UNP Working Committee yesterday unanimously approved the name of MP Ranjith Madduma Bandara as the General Secretary of the new UNP-led alliance to be formed to contest the upcoming General Elections, but differences over the symbol under which the polls will be contested led to several members walking out of the meeting.
“No other names were proposed, and the WC unanimously agreed to support Madduma Bandara,” a UNP source said.
However, while there was consensus on the General Secretary’s post, there was no agreement reached on whether to contest under the elephant symbol or make an alternate selection. A majority in the UNP WC had wanted to go with the elephant symbol, but a group of members supporting MP Sajith Premadasa, who has been named the leader of the alliance, had insisted on contesting under a new symbol.
Premadasa is likely to contest the forthcoming election leading a new alliance called the Jathika Samagi Balavegaya (National Unity Force), officials at the Opposition Leader’s office said.
Bong Joon Ho saved the Oscars. His smile. His crazy hair. The way he walks, and, yes, the way he talks, but especially the way he directs — all of these (literally) winning attributes not only contributed to a history-making 92nd Academy Awards ceremony, but kept it from ranking among the worst telecasts of all time. Thanks to “Parasite’s” four wins — especially its dark horse victories for Best Picture and Best Director — the 2020 Oscars show stands as one of the best ever.
With any other champion, the post-ceremony conversation would already be focused on what to fix next year — and anyone in charge should start making a to-do list now: Hiring a host is a must. Cutting the length down from a bloated three-and-a-half hours is, too. Finding a unifying theme, or even a consistent tone, would be the ethereal pursuit for next year’s producers, while they sit in dread of more speeches like this year’s unmemorable crop. So much of what was put forth during the 2020 Oscars simply didn’t work, and it would’ve added up to an ugly failure on all fronts — if not for our Lord and Savior, Director Bong.
The “Parasite” wins represented everything the Oscars were otherwise lacking, from their element of surprise to the glass ceilings they shattered, but before we all choose to collectively forget the rest of the ceremony, let’s take it one more from the top: By all accounts, the 2020 Oscars looked first looked like a traditional ceremony, opening with a song-and-dance number, a comedic monologue, and a speech from a bonafide movie star. To all the folks wondering why the show’s producers didn’t just name Janelle Monáe host, I have no answers for you. She’s young, charismatic, incredibly talented, and they clearly trusted her to kick off the evening right. Plus, she did set the tone of the night — and it isn’t her fault that said tone was best described as “emotional whiplash.”
(Excerpted From the “Sunday Times” Political Column)
The news came many months after a Criminal Investigation Department (CID) probe into the procurement of Airbus A-350 aircraft by SriLankan Airlines and its findings remained in limbo.
All of a sudden, the Attorney General’s Department directed the Police this week to obtain a warrant from the Magistrate’s Court and arrest Kapila Chandrasena, a onetime Chief Executive Officer of SriLankan Airlines and his wife Niyomali Wijenayaka for alleged bribery. The CID could not locate them and a government minister said they were not in the country. The couple surrendered to their office on Wednesday. Their statements were recorded, and they were produced before Chief Magistrate Ranga Dissanayake and remanded till February 19.
This unexpected development came after it transpired in a British Court that the wife of SriLankan Airlines (“SLA”) Executive, through a straw company” registered in Brunei, was offered up to US$ 16.84 million by Airbus to “influence SLA’s purchase of ten Airbus aircraft and the lease of an additional four aircraft. The Court heard that the Special Frauds Office (SFO) in London had discovered that only two million dollars of the US$ 16.84 million had so far been paid. Of the ten aircraft to be procured, four were related to the purchase of the new A 350-900 and sparked the CID investigation. The CID’s findings had remained pigeonholed until matters surfaced in a British court. At least one director of SriLankan Airlines knew five years ago that all was not well. He raised issue but did not succeed.
Police Special Task Force (STF) yesterday arrested 21 people, including a Colonel and two soldiers, who were excavating a land in Dharmapuram, Kilinochchi in search of gold buried by the LTTE.
The Colonel and the two soldiers were providing security to those carrying out the excavation. All three were in army uniform and are members of the Vijayaba Regiment. They had previously worked in Kilinochchi but been recently transferred to other parts of the country.
The main opposition United National Party (UNP) challenged President Gotabaya Rajapaksa today to present the audit reports of the ‘Api Wenuwen Api’ fund to parliament.
Instructions have been issued by the President’s Office to all permanent ministry secretaries including the Prime Minister’s Secretary, not to accept or entertain any form of communications from the private staff or any other officer of the Prime Minister’s Office, ministry, or state ministry.
Secretary to the President Dr. P.B. Jayasundera had issued the instructions to all ministry secretaries on Friday (7), The Sunday Morning learnt.
Sri Lankan Prime Minister Mahinda Rajapaksa is on his first visit to India since taking office. He spoke to Padma Rao Sundarji about Sri Lanka’s ship with Pakistan, which India accuses of being involved in cross-border terrorism; proposed changes to Tamil provincial councils instead of giving them greater autonomy under the constitution’s 13th amendment; and the island nation’s strategic ties with China, which is its largest investor.
Edited excerpts:
Q;
One of the subjects you discussed with Prime Minister Narendra Modi today was counterterrorism. Suicide attacks by Islamist bombers killed more than 200 people and injured hundreds in Colombo last year. But you’ve been discussing the same issue with Pakistan, which, for India, is the fountainhead of state-sponsored terror. Isn’t that a contradiction?
A;
We are against terrorism, wherever it comes from. So we discuss the subject with both India and Pakistan, and will continue to do so. And by the way, both Pakistan and India helped us to end the 30-year-long civil war against another kind of terrorism: that of the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE). Pakistan gave us weapons and planes. India too helped, but didn’t want to publicise it at the time. Why, without India’s help, I don’t think we would have won that war.
In his media statement after talks with Sri Lankan Prime Minister Mahinda Rajapaksa here on Saturday, Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi said that he is “confident that the Sri Lankan government will realize the expectations of equality, justice, peace and respect of the Tamil people within a united Sri Lanka.”
But the Lankan Prime Minister did not mention the Tamil question in his media statement. Instead, he spoke of bilateral cooperation in economic, educational and skills development, and defense and intelligence gathering.
The two Prime Ministers deliberated on the entire range of bilateral ties and resolved to further deepen anti-terror cooperation and boost trade and investment.
Sri Lanka wants India to allow debt repayments by Colombo to be deferred for three years, visiting Prime Minister Mahinda Rajapaksa said in order to help the country deal with its massive debt burden. The issue was at the top of the agenda when Mr. Rajapaksa met Prime Minister Narendra Modi in Delhi on Saturday and discussed plans to utilise a $400 million Line of Credit extended by India.
“If the Indian government takes this step, then other governments might agree to do the same thing, including China. The previous government took so many loans, they beggared the economy, and it is a mess. It all [now] depends on the stand India takes,” Mr. Rajapaksa told The Hindu in an interview, when asked about plans to service the approximately $60 billion total foreign and domestic debt his government faces, with about $4.8 billion to be paid this year.
On his first visit after being sworn in as Sri Lanka’s Prime Minister, Mahinda Rajapaksa met with Prime Minister Narendra Modi in Delhi. Mr. Mahinda told The Hindu about his hopes for debt-restructuring, and also about projects now on the anvil, although his government will not carry forward the projects agreed to by the previous Sri Lankan government.
Q;
You have had discussions at some length with Prime Minister Narendra Modi, but no agreements were announced, especially on the $400-million Line of Credit offered by India for infrastructure. Tell us about the talks.
A;
We did speak about several agreements and we have agreed to some of the projects that [the Indian side] were interested in. It was a fruitful and successful meet, for both sides, I would say. The housing project is something that is a priority area for us, and we asked for more funding for that. We have a new initiative, to cover the whole country, every village, and we should like to get some support for that. Apart from housing, there were several projects we discussed.
A Sri Lanka court has remanded the ex-Chief Executive Kapila Chandrasena and his wife over a suspected money laundering offence related linked a purchase of a fleet of Airbus aircraft from 2013, who surrendered to police.
Colombo Fort Magistrate Ranga Dissanyake had remanded Chandrasena and his wife Priyanka Niyomali Wijenayake till February 19, after they surrendered to police on February 06.
Deputy Solicitor General Thusith Mudalige told court that authorities in Singapore had informed that there was a bank account at Standard Chartered Bank, Singapore in the name of Wijenayake.
Both Chandrasena and his wife had made statements to police from October 04, 2019, he said.
Though I no longer support the UNP, because of its recent unpatriotic stance, I still do not, even in the wildest of dreams, wish for its demise. Unfortunately, this exactly seems to be what the leader and his deputy seem attempting to do. Are they so dumb that they do not see rhyme or reason or is it that their hyper-inflated egos simply do not care what happens to the party of the ‘Father of the Nation’? Have they completely lost the art of negotiation? Why are they encouraging battles by proxy rather than sitting down and coming to decisions that will benefit not only their party but also the country at large? Do we have to remind these two so called ’democrats’ that a strong opposition is vital for a vibrant democracy?
I cannot imagine why the UNP conference, which nominated Sajith as the presidential candidate, voted for Ranil to be the leader of the party till 2025. May be it was clever manoeuvring by Ranil. But having not raised his hand against the resolution then, is it not disingenuous of Sajith to attempt to get leadership now? Or, is it that we are to interpret that Sajith’s silence may mean disagreement? During the catastrophic Yahapalana administration, on many issues, Sajith observed the vow of silence, to speak against them later? Or, at worst is Sajith guilty of disloyalty and indiscipline.
Over the past three or four months, Thursday has been the decision-day for the UNP with many supporters waiting, with baited breath, for that never heard news; that the battle between the two big jumbos has ended. But it had been recurring disappointment as the two seem keen on continuing with elephantine errors.
While the publicity blitz on coronavirus seems to be settling down, there is now a political and corruption blitz catching on. It is the ‘Voharika Viganana Prahaaraya’ of Forensic Audit Blitz (FAB).
As the debate on the FAB gets louder the spread of corruption across the political divide in the country gets clearer. The divisions on party politics narrow down speedily when it comes to unity in the pastures of crooked profit and corruption.
While the Central Bank and Treasury Bonds are the formal issues involved in these forensic audits that are now the stuff of twisted debate, what is largely being hidden is how the savings of the vast majority of the people have been robbed by these Bond Scam rogues, and not necessarily the funds of the State.
A forensic audit relates to the application of scientific methods, tests or techniques relating to the detection of crime. The debate we have now is far away from the thinking of science, and closer to the unscientific, hooked and contorted thinking on how a crime could be hidden.
In a recent article in The Island captioned “Alleged war crimes lame excuse to introduce new Constitution”, the writer puts forward the view that the process initiated by the previous UNF government to draft a new Constitution, with the Parliament constituting itself into a Constitutional Assembly in 2016, was as a result of the UNHRC Resolution on “Promoting Reconciliation Accountability and Human Rights in Sri Lanka” of 2015. This resolution which was adopted by consensus in the United Nations Human Rights Council and co-sponsored by Sri Lanka, along with the United States, has been subsequently reaffirmed in the Council in the succeeding years. My article is a refutation of the above view.
It is a well documented fact that the process of constitutional reform commenced nearly 30 years ago. From the time that the 1978 Constitution was passed, setting up an Executive Presidential form of government, there has been opposition thereto in this country. The Sri Lankan people had experienced a Parliamentary form of Government under the Westminster model for many years, and people were not happy with a form of government with so much power concentrated in the hands of one person. As President Jayewardene, who was the chief proponent of the 1978 Constitution, was to say, it gave him the power to do everything except change a man into a women and vice versa. Furthermore, this was a Constitution in the making of which the representatives of the Tamil people had not participated. Hence this was another reason for making a new Constitution which would be acceptable to all sections of the people of the Country.
At every general election, since 1977, the need for constitutional change has been an issue and the party in Opposition made a campaign promise to do away with the executive Presidency and the 1978 Constitution. At the 1994 presidential election, the SLFP and its allies, named as ‘the People’ Alliance’, under the leadership of Chandrika Kumaratunga, pledged to do away with the executive presidency and to introduce constitutional reforms. In 2000, the PA Government presented the Constitutional Reform Bill for a new Constitution in Parliament. The proposed constitution not only sought to do away with the executive presidency but also addressed the need for greater power sharing and devolution of powers to the provinces, a process which had been initiated by the 13th Amendment to the Constitution during the Jayewardene era following the 1987 Indo- Sri Lanka Accord.
Movement for Land and Agricultural Reform (MONLAR) Spokesman Sajeewa Chamikara says the government has caused grave environmental degradation by allowing racketeers to extract granite, soil and sand with hardly any control
Some government ministers had also advised officials to turn a blind eye to environmental destruction caused by ‘development projects’, he alleged.
Martin Luther King Jr is often cited as a shining example of civility, of benign agitation. His was the kind of allegedly meek, half-hearted protestation the liberal intelligentsia of the West nostalgically point to when confronted with today’s youthful, unabashedly disruptive activism. The world’s collective memory of King Jr has been shaped by this flawed narrative so much over the decades that few remember him for the unapologetic radical that he was.
The US civil rights movement has little to do with Sri Lanka, but this revisionist take on King Jr and his brand of activism seems to share some similarities with our own views on protest politics. If the number of ordinary citizens defending yesterday’s announcement of a designated space in Colombo for public protests is any indication, critics say, there has been a serious breakdown in our education of our democratic rights.
An elected government allocating a physical space for public protests that’s literally called Agitation Site, right next door to the ivory towers of a high-end apartment complex no less, may be a cruel Orwellian joke to some; but to many middle class self-styled liberals, no matter which side of the political divide they’re on, it couldn’t have come sooner.
London, Feb 6 (PTI) British mercenary pilots helped Indian troops in their battle against the Liberation Tigers for Tamil Eelam (LTTE) rebels in Sri Lanka in the 1980s, a new book reveals for the first time.
The Indian Peace Keeping Force (IPKF) received air support from these for-hire British pilots despite Indian diplomats publicly condemning the presence of UK mercenaries in Sri Lanka, according to the book, ”Keenie Meenie: The British Mercenaries Who Got Away With War Crimes”, authored by UK-based investigative journalist Phil Miller.
Deputy Solicitor General Thusitha Mudalige yesterday (06) told Fort Magistrate Ranga Dissanayake that part of USD 2 mn received by Priyanka Niyomali Wijenayake, wife of former SirLankan Airlines CEO Kapila Chandrasena, from Airbus SE of France, had been credited to the accounts of one or two persons living in Sri Lanka.
DSG Mudalige said that in addition to the funds transferred to an account or two in Sri Lanka, part of the money received by Wijenayake had been credited to several offshore accounts.
Representing Attorney General Dappula De Livera, Mudalige objected to the suspects being granted bail. The DSG said that investigations could be hampered if they were granted bail.
Magistrate Dissanayake, remanded the suspects till Feb 19 for allegedly receiving a bribe of USD 2 mn to influence the national carrier to acquire ten aircraft.
Colombo Fort Magistrate on Feb 3 issued warrants for the arrest of the two suspects.
