Any inspiration Joanna?
Some excellent goals scored, some unbearable moments of anguish celebrated as teams win and lose in an imperfect system, some stunning comebacks, terrible bouts of pain vanishing instantly once the arbitrator with…
Reconciliation
Compilation of special edition on the end of war in Sri Lanka
Download the 162 page compilation of content as a PDF in high quality (25.4Mb), or low quality (3.7Mb). The low quality version is good enough to read, but the photos will look and…
Human rights: Hackneyed or heightened in post-war Sri Lanka?
My conversation with Lakshan Dias, Programme Manager, Centre for Human Rights and Development, was pegged to the issue of human rights in post-war Sri Lanka. Lakshan was in the news recently when…
Mass Marriage, Vavuniya
What a large and dramatic idea occurred to the brigadier in charge of rehabilitation , to organize a mass wedding to spur former Tiger troops into formation under a different philosophy and…
Celebrating war victory and banning commemoration of dead civilians: this is “home grown & indigenous†reconciliation and freedom in Sri Lanka?
Today, 18th June 2010, has been declared a public holiday by the government. Many Sri Lankans, especially Sinhalese from the South are expected to respond enthusiastically to the government’s elaborate plans to…
Ground realities in Jaffna and its environs: Two key perspectives
From the psycho-social trauma and destruction of the social fabric in Jaffna after close upon three decades of brutal war to the challenges of post-war development, entrepreneurship and economic revival, these two…
Learning Old Lessons from a New ‘Lessons Learnt’ Commission: the ‘Home-Grown’ Way?
One year after the war, President Mahinda Rajapaksa has established another commission; known as the ‘Lessons Learnt and Reconciliation Commission’. Eight eminent members have been appointed. The Commission is chaired by a…
The latest Commission of Inquiry in Sri Lanka: Another Exercise in Deception
Louise Arbour of the International Crisis Group is reported to have said during an interview in the BBC that the government violated the laws of war by blurring the line between combatants…
A Tribute to our Unsung Heroes
The teenage girls singing a Tamil song “Tomorrow is Ours” is interrupted by my wife Samantha and I walking in to the classroom. They giggled coyly as we looked around at them.  …
The importance of not forgetting
One year ago, the war that had defined our lives for the last 30 years ended. Brutally, callously and mercilessly fought like most wars are, it ended amidst allegations of immense suffering…
Beyond the war psyche in Sri Lanka
Dust is finally settling on the euphoria generated by last year’s military defeat of the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE). Old concerns naturally give way to the new and a year…
Living with the Other in post-war Sri Lanka
I often have to remind myself that I live with a Tamil. My housemate, Vanessa is a Tamil, married to a Sinhalese and I have been living with her and her husband…
CHALLENGES TODAY: WEEVILS IN THE MIND
Daya Somasundaram was in Jaffna town in late 1995 when the Sri Lankan army advanced south and eastwards from Palaly. As the LTTE decided upon a strategic withdrawal, they insisted that all…
What is there to celebrate? Rumblings of a Jaffna Tamil
The question that I have been repeatedly asked by people outside Jaffna is whether we Tamils are not happy that the war is over. An immediate follow up question is whether we…
The end of war and Sri Lanka’s future: Videos from Vikalpa in Sinhala and English
Vikalpa, the sister site of with citizen journalism in Sinhala, produced this mini-documentary on Jaffna a year after the war ended. Vikalpa also produced a series of interviews in Tamil, Sinhala and…