Iranaitheevu has been in the news this month after residents steadfastly opposed a government decision to use the island to bury COVID-19 dead bodies. On April 23, 2018, Iranaitheevu residents re-claimed their…
Three years ago, the villagers of Mullikulam in the Mannar district left behind their brick homes with water, toilets and beds to camp out in tents on the land they called home….
In Sri Lanka, the challenge to achieve transitional justice lies not in the process alone but also in coming to terms with the ultimate goal. In a post-war context, what is the…
Maaveerar Naal, otherwise known as Heroes day, is celebrated on November 27 to remember those who lost their lives fighting for the LTTE. While this day has come to be a highly…
It is increasingly evident that the lasting impacts of the Coronavirus pandemic will not be merely health related. In the early stages of government efforts to contain the virus and over the…
“And home isn’t here and home isn’t there” – Deborah Landau, The Last Usable Hour Every story of ethnic cleansing is heart breaking. Some of them have been almost forgotten, overlooked in…
On 18 May 2009, this mother traveled to the army-controlled area via Mullivaikkal Vattuvakal. There she handed over her 33-year-old son to the army. He had refused to come with her, afraid…
It was a dramatic moment: a tall, well-built young man dressed in white with a black band tied across his forehead pushed his way through the closed gates of the church premises…
“I am the luckiest mother in Sri Lanka. I got my son’s body back. There are thousands of mothers who never get their children’s bodies back.” Dr. Manorani Saravanamuttu was speaking after…
Until recently, the Office on Missing Persons (OMP) was housed in a magnificent colonial building in a leafy Colombo suburb that used to house members of parliament; now it has been relegated…
It has been 37 years since the anti-Tamil pogrom of July 1983, a riot that set the country ablaze and sparked a 30-year long and bloody war. But even after nearly four…
July. Referred to as Black July to mark the pogrom against Tamils in 1983 carried out by Sinhala mobs. Pogrom is a Russian word meaning ‘to wreak havoc, to demolish violently’, that…
I was a PhD student in London when the carnage of July 1983 erupted and thank God for the bravery and foresight of my mother and sister, my family was saved from…
In July 1995 the St. Peter and Paul Catholic Church in Navaly, Jaffna, was filled with displaced Tamils seeking refuge and safety from the war. People in Navaly, including members of the…
The Catholic Church in the tiny village of Iranapalei in the Mullaitheevu district was lit up with 1000 lamps yesterday, 18th May. The thousand lamps were to remember the tens of thousands,…
