Several Tamil political prisoners languishing in prisons across the island have been forcibly taken to hospital after entering their 5th day on hunger strike on Thursday.

An estimated 18 Tamil political prisoners were taken to hospital after entering their 5th day on hunger strike to demand their release.

A further 13 fasting prisoner remain in a worsening condition within the prison said the  former TNA MP Suresh Premachandran. 

The Northern Provincial Council Chief Minister in a meeting with Sri Lanka’s president Sirisena was told that all Tamil political prisoners could not be released at once. Sirisena said that he did not have the power to release all the prisoners at once and that legal processes would have to be followed.

Writing in the Diplomat, Taylor Dibbert said it was time for Sri Lanka’s political leadership to explain the content of the UNHRC resolution clearly to all its citizens and explain the importance of reforms.

Adding that Colombo “has been reluctant to take even small steps to reach out to the Tamil community,” Mr Dibbert questioned whether “worries over a Sinhala-Buddhist backlash would again be used to justify prevarication form those in power.”

Full piece reproduced below.

Sri Lanka’s new government, led by President Maithripala Sirisena, has now made a range of assurances via an extensive reform agenda and is now faced with the trickier task of implementation. Elections in January (when Sirisena defeated the increasingly authoritarian Mahinda Rajapaksa in his quest to win an unprecedented third term) and August parliamentary polls, combined with the recently passed UN Human Rights Council (HRC) resolution on Sri Lanka, have presented the country with an unanticipated opening.

Amnesty International called on the UN Working Group on Enforced and Involuntary Disappearance to investigate secret detention camps and mass grave sites during its visit to Sri Lanka.

Calling on the working group to investigate secret detention centres with a view to holding state actors accountable, the briefing note said,

The Sri Lankan navy took part in a Buddhist ceremony in Nainativu this week, where the Commander of the Navy laid the foundation stone for a new statue of the Buddha to be built.

The navy participated in the ceremony held at the Nagadeepa Purana Rajamaha Viharaya, a Buddhist temple situated in the Jaffna peninsula islet, with the military stating the “Northern Naval Command of the Sri Lanka Navy extended all the supportive measures to make the event a successful one”.

Following an all-night chanting ceremony, the Chief Incumbent of the temple “invoked blessings on the Sri Lanka Navy for their meritorious act and for all the assistances provided,” stated the Ministry of Defence.