A Violent Past, An Uneasy Present
The true stories of the violence on July 1983 are not captured in newspaper headlines. 36 years ago, Page One of the Daily Mirror read, “Anti-Govt forces behind rioting and looting.” A…
Author: Raisa Wickrematunge
Thicker Than Water
On April 21, 2019, the doctors working at the National Blood Transfusion Services woke to chilling news. A series of suicide bomb blasts had occurred across the island. As of June 11,…
Systemic Violence: Mapping Police Statistics On Sexual Abuse
In 2016, mapped incidents of street harassment for International Women’s Day. None of these incidents had been reported to the police. Those who contributed their stories to the map recounted experiences that remained…
Standing for unpopular causes: Ten years on
The first thing to catch my eye in Sandya Eknaligoda’s home was a comic book. It was an illustrated copy of Sherlock Holmes. Peeking out underneath was a leaflet bearing a familiar…
Managing Chaos: Why Sri Lanka Needs To Think Long Term For Disaster Response
In 2017, filed a series of RTI requests to ascertain more about Sri Lanka’s early warning system. (Click here and here to see the original RTI requests filed with the Metereological Department and…
Deep Impact: Emmerson’s Report Reveals Lasting Legacy of PTA
On July 23, former UN Special Rapporteur on Counter-Terrorism and Human Rights, Ben Emmerson released a report following on from his visit to Sri Lanka in 2017. Emmerson pulled no punches in…
RTI Reveals Lanka E News Blocked On Order from President’s Office
In December 2017, received a list of 13 websites that had been blocked from 2015 onwards by the Telecommunications Regulatory Commission (TRC), via a Right to Information request. The documentation uncovered the…
UPDATE: Flip-flopping on Accountability – A Timeline
Featured image courtesy ada.lk On March 21, 2018, the Minister of Foreign Affairs, Tilak Marapana flagged the operationalisation of the Office on Missing Persons, the use of the Right to Information Act,…
Corruption and Complicity: Perceptions from across Sri Lanka
Discussions around corruption and its prevalence often focus on the highest echelons of power. In Sri Lanka, irregularities around the Central Bank bond issue continue to make the news – with the President most…
The Crackdown on Corruption
On November 8 President Maithripala Sirisena called the irregularities around the Central Bank bond issue a (a huge destruction) and said that those behind it must accept responsibility. He was speaking at…
Blocked: RTI requests reveal process behind blocking of websites in Sri Lanka
On November 8, 2017 news began to spread that website Lankaenews had been blocked across all Internet Service Providers (ISPs) in Sri Lanka. The website itself has continually been mired in controversy…
#MeToo – Analysing The Conversation
On October 15, actress Alyssa Milano tweeted a request that inadvertently breathed new life into a movement. ‘Me Too’ was initially coined by Tarana Burke, who eventually formed a non-profit organization to…
Roti and Rice: Examining Imbalances in Nutrition for Children in the Estate Sector
It’s 10:30 am at the Social Institute for the Development of Plantation Sector (SIDPS) pre-school on the Strathspey estate in Maskeliya. The children, most of them around five years old, queue up…
The Road to School: Access to Education in the Plantation Sector
For children living in Spring Valley estate, close to Badulla, the day begins at 5:30 am, when they begin to get ready for the bus to school. The bus leaves at 6:20…
A Honeymoon in a Refugee Camp – Remembering Black July, 34 Years Later
S Sornalingam had always thought he would have happy memories of July 1983. On July 15 that year, he and Suhenthra Muthuraja got married in a civil ceremony in Jaffna. At the time,…