Writing on the anniversary of the Mullivaikkal genocide, Madura Rasaratnam, Interim Executive Director of PEARL & Ambikai Akilan, Advocacy Officer of PEARL, detail hold Sri Lanka accountable for the war crimes committed in 2009 continues to afflict the island and provides a useful lesson for the Israel-Gaza conflict. In their piece, they reflect on 2009 massacres and the similarities with current conflict in Gaza. Sri Lanka is accused of a litany of war crimes during this period which includes the deliberate targeting of “no fire zones”, food distribution centres and hospitals. The...
Writing in Scroll.In, Meenakshi Ganguly, the Deputy Asia Director at Human Rights Watch (HRW) stated that the "unaddressed legacy of war" has led to Sri Lanka's "abuse, impunity and misgovernance that still blight the country." Ganguly highlights that although 15 years have passed since the genocide at Mullivaikkal, there has been no justice or accountability for the Tamil community. "Successive governments have appointed a series of commissions ostensibly to investigate reported abuses, while in practice blocking investigations and shielding the abusers. The fate of the thousands of '...
This week marks the 76th anniversary of the Nakba, when over 700,000 Palestinians were made refugees after they were expelled from their land by armed Israeli settlers. Fifteen years ago, Sri Lanka’s genocide led to the total military occupation of the North-East and an expanding programme of Sinhala settlements. Week after week, I join millions in demanding a ceasefire in Gaza because I come from a long tradition of Eelam Tamils who oppose the occupation of Palestine. We see direct parallels with the Tamil liberation struggle in the Palestinian liberation struggle. Both are rooted in a history that resists settler colonialism, occupation, and genocide. And, we remember the Tamil genocide as we bear witness to the genocide unfolding in Gaza.
Nalin Jayathunga, a Sri Lankan researcher, wrote on how “protesting the genocide currently unfolding in Gaza” made them question their own position “with reference to violence perpetrated by the Sri Lankan State against the Tamil population”.
The following account is written by a second-generation Tamil from London who was involved in organising the prolonged protest on Parliament Square in Westminster during April and May 2009, the peak of Sri Lanka's genocide of Tamils. Theeban (not his real name), then in his early twenties, was studying at a London university.
Last week, India’s most senior political figures sparked off a row that continues to rage. Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Foreign Minister S Jaishankar expressed their outrage at the 1974 decision by Congress to cede the Katchatheevu islet to Sri Lanka after a set of new documents were publicly unveiled. The small island midway across the Palk Strait remains uninhabited but carries significant political weight, with Indian political parties in Tamil Nadu and beyond seeking to distance themselves from the decision to grant the territory to Colombo. Though the row is domestic for now, it scratches at a deeper issue that remains emotive and crucially important for millions of Tamils – the safety of Tamil Nadu fishermen.
The full text of a speech delivered by Dr A R Sriskanda Rajah at the Genocide to Life Conference in Erbil, March 2024.
In the nation-state identified as Sri Lanka, police and other security forces either committed atrocities toward Tamil citizens or stood by and allowed Tamil homes and communities to be pillaged and bombed. It is outrageous that the Peel Regional Police Chief would plan for a collaboration to strengthen the Sri Lankan police force that is currently led by Deshabandu Tennakoon, who has been deemed guilty by the Sri Lankan Supreme Court of violating many constitutional rights of citizens, police officers, and journalists alike and also personally tortured many while in the custody of the police force.
Several articles and opinions in publications such as the Tamil Guardian and on social media, have criticized and rightly so, the process undertaken by the Global Tamil Forum (GTF) to develop the Himalayan Declaration (HD) and the subsequent meeting with the genocidal war criminal Mahinda Rajapakse. Nevertheless, it appears critical and objective analyses of the document itself are in short supply. An assessment is therefore overdue, on how effectively, this document, brought forward with so much fanfare, serves the interests of the Tamils in Sri Lanka. The assessment is based on two obvious...
Sri Lanka has published a bill to establish a Commission for Truth, Unity and Reconciliation. Though the bill superficially appears to tick several boxes for the international community, a close examination reveals it is deeply flawed and represents a total betrayal of justice for Tamil and Sinhala victims of mass atrocity crimes. This is aside from whether there is political will to implement any truth recovery regarding the country’s violent past.