A group of British parliamentarians have written to the UK’s foreign secretary warning that “Sri Lanka’s political stability is at grave risk” and called for discussion on the suspension of trade concessions to Colombo.

Sri Lanka’s arrest of Tamil parliamentarian Vijayakala Maheswaran, following her remarks on the LTTE, is a “flagrant abuse of the rights to freedom of expression,” write human rights lawyers Samir Pasha and Naga Kandiah in The Interpreter this month.

“Any citizen has a right to dissent against government actions and raise issues affecting communities,” they wrote. “There is an unarguable difference between this and making a call to violent uprising, promoting hatred or hostility… The government’s claim in protecting the public can only be exercised in criminal proceedings where absolutely necessary. In Maheswaran’s case, this distinction was not made.”

The former captain of Sri Lanka’s cricket team announced that he had joined Mahinda Rajapaksa’s Sri Lanka Podujana Peramuna party this morning.

Tillakaratne Dilshan took up party membership this morning, amidst Sri Lanka’s political turmoil which has seen Rajapaksa attempt to gain the office of prime minister.

Families and loved ones of the disappeared held a demonstration today in Jaffna, calling on the US and EU to urge action over Sri Lanka's genocide of Tamil people. 

Families across the North-East have been protesting for over one year and expressed their disappointment and anger at the coalition government's failure to act. 

33 years later, families of the victims recalled how 13 young Tamil men were rounded up and made to walk with their ID cards in the air. STF troops shot them in the neck or head, except the youngest, Maju, who they shot in the chest.

On September 6, the U.S. Congressional Caucus on Ethnic and Religious Freedom in Sri Lanka hosted a briefing on security sector reform in Sri Lanka.

The co-chairs of the Caucus, Representatives Bill Johnson (Republican – Ohio) and Danny Davis (Democrat – Illinois), gave opening remarks about the need to pressure the Sirisena government to implement security sector reforms.

Representative Johnson noted that “essential reforms to Sri Lanka’s security sector are still badly needed,” citing the need for the Sirisena government to repeal the Prevention of Terrorism Act. He also echoed the finding of a UN expert that “the use of torture is deeply ingrained in the security sector in Sri Lanka.”

A vigil was held today to remember the Indian Peacekeeping Force’s (IPKF) massacre of 14 Tamils in Batticaloa district 31 years ago.

After being targeted by a landmine on November 5, 1987, IPKF soldiers fired indiscriminately at Tamil civilians in Kaluvanchikudi, killing 14.

Over 16,600 families have been affected by heavy rains and subsequent flood this month in Batticaloa, with 242 families displaced. 

Students from the Vanthaarumoolai campus of the University of Batticaloa have launched makeshift teaching lessons for children living in camps with their parents, displaced by flooding. 

Sri Lanka’s speaker of parliament has called upon the public to “peacefully accept” the Supreme Court decision to stay the dissolution of parliament, as the political crisis in Colombo continued on Tuesday.

In a special statement, speaker of parliament Karu Jayasuriya said,

“It is important that the general public and especially persons in positions of responsibility conduct themselves in a calm and dignified manner in order to avoid unnecessary provocation and instability”.

“I ask Sri Lankans to peacefully accept the determinations of the judiciary and Parliament”.

The statement praised the Supreme Court decision to temporarily stay Sri Lankan president Maithripala Sirisena’s move to dissolve parliament, with Jayasuriya saying “the public can take pride in our judiciary”.

Jayasuriya’s statement comes after Sirisena met with heads of the military earlier this evening, in the wake of the Supreme Court decision.

Sri Lanka’s president Maithripala Sirisena met with the heads of the military at his office in Colombo this evening, after his move to dissolve parliament was temporarily stayed by the Supreme Court.