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”.

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

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.

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.

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.

^{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.

UN Special Rapporteur, Clément Nyaletsossi Voule, has stated that the increasing surveillance in Sri Lanka in 2019, particularly after the Easter Sunday attacks, “is clearly aimed at creating a climate of intimidation," and warned that the North-East remained "heavily militarized".

Australian State MP Hugh McDermott revealed that he was subject to threatening messages of violence and a vicious hate campaign launched by the Sri Lankan government condemning his decision to release a statement in solidarity with the Tamil community on Tamil Genocide Remembrance Day in May this year. 

While he was “shocked at first” at the hate comments he received for his statement, McDermott was thankful for the support of the Tamil community and said he was “very very lucky that the Tamil community rallied behind to show that I wasn’t alone.”

During an interview with BBC Sinhala, Sri Lanka’s former President, Maithripala Sirisena, denied responsibility for the Easter Sunday bombing which left over 250 people killed.