The Committee to Protect Journalists said Sri Lankan authorities should immediately return the seized laptop of journalist Dharisha Bastians and spoke out against what it termed a “intimidation campaign”.

“CPJ strongly objects to the seizure of journalist Dharisha Bastians’ laptop and is concerned it could further endanger her sources,” said Aliya Iftikhar, CPJ’s senior Asia researcher.

Sri Lanka’s prime minister Mahinda Rajapaksa launched an attack on the previous government, accusing them of being involved in “foreign and local conspiracies”, as he called on the public to “chose proven ability over yahapalana lies and deception”.

“The formation of the 2015 yahapalana government was a result of foreign and local conspiracies,” claimed Rajapaksa last week. “Their defeat in November 2019 however, did not put an end to such conspiracies.”

The families of the disappeared in Vavuniya marked International Father’s Day with a tribute to the Tamil father who died earlier this month.

The father from Vavuniya, Sinnachami Nallathambi, had been searching for his son that had been abducted outside a court. He passed away at the age of 71, when he fell from a tree in his home in Koomankulam, Vavuniya.

Human Rights Solidarity commemorated refugee week and world refugee day by speaking to Gayathri Thivyaa, a medical student at Imperial College London and the child of Tamil refugees who fled the genocide of Tamils in Sri Lanka.

Speaking with People for Equality and Relief in Lanka (PEARL), Dr Nimmi Gowrinathan, Founder and Director of the Politics of Sexual Violence Initiative and Visiting Research Professor at the City College New York, gave an enlightening discussion on gender and militancy.

European Union ambassadors met with Sri Lankan president Gotabaya Rajapaksa this week to discuss economic policies following the COVID-19 crisis, despite his records of human rights abuses.

President Rajapaksa, formerly Sri Lanka’s Defence Secretary, oversaw a military offensive that killed tens of thousands of Tamils during the final phases of the armed conflict and has several war crime allegations against him.

Sri Lanka’s State Intelligence Services (SIS) Major General Suresh Sallay filed a formal complaint with the United Nations and European Union last week, claiming that the Executive director of the International Truth and Justice Project, Yasmin Sooka had made "defamatory remarks" in a press release outlining his role in detaining a Tamil doctor.

His complaint comes after a Letter of Demand was sent to Sooka earlier this month demanding 1 Billion Rupees as damages, claiming that Sallay’s reputation had been “slandered”.

Sri Lanka’s war crimes accused defence secretary told troops stationed in the Tamil North to “take measures to strengthen security to maintain law and order in Jaffna, Kilinochchi, Mullaithivu and Vauniya,” as he concluded a trip to Jaffna this week.

The Sri Lankan navy held a large scale Sinhala Buddhist ceremony in Kankesanthurai this week, as it announced the opening of a berthing facility at its occupying military base.

Senior Sri Lankan navy officers were flanked by Kandyan drummers as they paid respects to Sinhala Buddhist monks at the ceremony, as the military inaugurated the new construction.

^{Updated 1800 GMT}

A 24-year-old man has died after being shot and killed by Sri Lankan army soldiers earlier this evening, with locals taking to the streets to protest his murder.

The incident occurred this evening in Muhamalai, at approximately 6:15pm.