IDPs: Detainees and Escapees
“Nearly 20,000 escape from IDP centres was the headline of an English language broadsheet yesterday. The strap line read –“Most believed to be LTTE cadres”. The article quotes the SSP for Kandy…
Vavuniya
Two testimonies from families released from Menik Camp
[Editors note: Two short testimonies on the plight of IDPs released from Menik Camp sent to highlight significant challenges facing reconciliation and resettlement in post-war Sri Lanka and the urgent need for…
Doing the Right Thing: Freedom for Vanni IDPs
[Editors note: An edited copy of this article appears in the of 27th September 2009. This is the full version.] It was a relief to hear that the government was at last…
Sacrificing essential liberty for temporary safety in Sri Lanka
Despite the successful military victory over terrorism, we continue to be warned by the state that a critical threat to national security continues to stalk the country. Consequently, we have passively assented…
The Internment – A Collective Punishment?
The widespread indifference to the continuing misery of 280,000 interned IDPs, most of them already unlawfully detained for about four months without any charges, is a sad reflection on the moral values…
Linking North and South: What trains cannot do
Part 2 Weeks before coming to Sri Lanka, I shared with some friends; a desire to help war affected Sri Lankans in whatever capacity possible while I am home. I had a…
End of a conflict: An ideal time to bear witness to a brutal war
Part 1 The strap of my bag unbuckled under the strain as I squeezed out of the bus in Kurunegala. The clock tower read an unrushed 6.40 am on its weary face.…
A video of shame and outrage: Responses, positions and clarifications
The video broadcast Channel 4 last week generated a number of responses from the readership of , the New York Times news blog. Of the many comments in response to it, this…
Unshed Tears
Baby Elephants- dearly beloved elders were killed before their tender eyes Baby Elephants-arms, legs, teeth shriveled with the pain of the bullet Baby Elephants- loose wrinkled skin hangs off starving, haunted frames…
Bearing Witness: Submit content on IDPs and Police brutality to win a Flip Ultra video camera
Through Bearing Witness, seeks to engender critical citizen journalism on two vital issues confronting polity and society in post-war Sri Lanka. The ground conditions in Menik Farm, worsened by recent flooding, are a…
Status of IDP’s and the ‘Right to Protect’
The ‘divide and rule policy’ of the British colonial administration in Sri Lanka covertly took advantage of the country’s ethnic profile to appoint better educated Tamils in key government positions  to act…
Sri Lanka: Vanquished Tiger, Roaring Lion
The stakes of life and death, hope and despair, peace and conflict are now higher than they were when the war was declared “over”. The Tiger was declared dead, and the Lion…
The shame of Menik Farm
The floods that affected significant swathes of the expansive Menik Farm a week ago generated interesting responses from government. One of the most revealing was the deafening silence of the usually loquacious…
Confessions
Stop this struggle He pleads Of his comrades A revolutionary leader Broken in pain In State Custody They set me on the wrong path He blames, pointing to his friends A young…
A first hand perspective of Sri Lanka’s largest IDP camp: Are they really ‘our people’?
This is an interview in English secured by Vikalpa with a Sri Lankan Tamil who had visited his family at the “Ramanathan Transitional Relief Village” in May. His family is amongst 260,000+…