The Church of St Peter at Navaly commemorated over 140 Tamil civilians killed in its premises by Sri Lankan Air Force bombs 24 years ago during the presidency of Chandrika Kumaratunga.

On July 9 1995, the Sri Lankan Air Force bombed the St Peter’s Church in Navaly and the nearby Sri Kathirgama Murugan Kovil, which were both sheltering displaced Tamils from army bombardment.

Sri Lanka’s Criminal Investigations Department (CID) concluded that there is “no justification” for the arrest of a Muslim doctor accused of sterilising Sinhala women, yet the man continues to be held in custody.

The acquittal of Sri Lankan Special Task Force (STF) troops over the murder of five Tamil students in 2006 demonstrates the need for “a court with international participation” said Human Rights Watch in a joint statement with Amnesty International on Monday.

Both Sri Lanka and Myanmar are “on the forefront of a radical religious-nationalist movement,” said Hannah Beech, the Southeast Asia Bureau Chief for The New York Times this week, in a piece that looked at the growing “militant Buddhism” in both regions. 

A Sri Lankan navy officer accused of aiding a key suspect involved in the abduction and murder of 11 Tamil youths was the guest of honour at the passing out ceremony of hundreds of Sri Lankan Special Forces troops last month.

Admiral Ravindra C. Wijegunaratne, Sri Lanka’s Chief of Defence Staff, was given a special guard of honour at the ceremony and awarded Special Forces badges and Colours to troops, before addressing the crowd.

Sri Lanka’s most notorious hardline Buddhist monk, the recently pardoned from jail Galagoda Aththe Gnanasara, has called on Sri Lanka’s 10,000 Buddhist temples to campaign for a Sinhala government to protect Sinhala interests.

Hundreds of Tamils flocked to Mullaitivu on Saturday as a Hindu temple, formerly on the verge of being colonised by Buddhist monks, held a festival for the first time in over a decade.

The Organisation of Islamic Cooperation (OIC) warned that it had been “monitoring closely the situation of Muslims in Sri Lanka” and that it was concerned over “the rise in incidents of intimidation, anti-Muslim rhetoric and hate speech” on the island.

Muslims shops in Kandy will remain closed this weekend as extremist Sinhala Buddhist monks from the Bodu Bala Sena (BBS) announced it will meet in the town tomorrow.

“All Muslim-owned shops are likely to be closed on Sunday to avoid any possible confrontation, as thousands of monks are expected in the town for the conference,” Niyaz Muheeth, president of the Kandy Muslim Traders Association, told Reuters.

Tensions were high in Batticaloa on Friday as the Sri Lankan military and police carried out a round-up making over twenty arrests, following the theft of a handgun from a police officer.

Black Tigers Day was marked at the Tamil National Alliance office in Kilinochchi on Friday.

Sri Lanka’s Supreme Court has granted interim relief in a petition filed by a death row prisoner who was due to be executed by the state, delaying the death penalty until at least October of this year.

The Sri Lankan military claimed that it did not receive any surrendering Tamil fighters during the closing stages of the armed conflict in 2009, in an extraordinary denial of its role in the disappearances of hundreds of LTTE cadres.

Responding to a Right To Information (RTI) Act request, the Information Officer of the Sri Lanka Military, Brigadier Sumith Atapattu, who was part of the Mechanised Infantry regiment claimed “LTTE members have not surrendered themselves to the Sri Lanka military during the last stages of the war and they have handed themselves over to the Sri Lankan government”.