Looking from The Other Side
The Other Side is a documentary series that is focused on sharing the perspectives of three women belonging to the families of some of the alleged perpetrators of the Easter Sunday attacks…
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Sit Down and Shut Up or You Will Be Next: The Threat to Human Rights Defenders
The days of white vans and enforced disappearances may be on the wane but President Ranil Wickremesinghe and his regime have embarked on a just as insidious method to suppress people’s freedom…
Religion as a Business and the Heart of Corruption
There is a roaring Hajj business in Sri Lanka. As a friend of mine commented, no business is as good as the religious business. The Hajj committee, whose members are appointed on…
Debt Crisis, Corporate Culpability and the Apparel Sector: Labour Reforms in Perspective
industriall-union My exchange with friend and colleague Ben Selwyn came out of sharing union statements on illicit transfer of capital out of Sri Lanka’s corporate world. These numerous statements have a bearing…
Sri Lanka’s Human Rights Failings Under UN Spotlight
As the United Nations Human Rights Council (HRC) prepares to gather from June 19 to July 14, the situation in Sri Lanka is once more on the agenda. An oral update from…
Kurundi: A Runway to ’56?
In his fifth labour, Heracles cleans the Augean Stables by rerouting the rivers Alpheus and Peneus through the filthy abode of King Augeas’ divine cattle. Many believed that the aragalaya would have…
Romesh Gunesekera on Connecting with His Homeland
Sri Lanka authors have been in the limelight recently, hitting a peak with Shehan Karunatilaka’s 2022 Booker Prize for The Seven Moons of Maali Almeida. Kanya D’Almeida won the Commonwealth Short Story…
#ArchivesMatter and So Do Archivists
One of the few government officials who knows what she’s doing, Dr Nadeera Rupesinghe, remains a cut above the rest. Deeply committed to her work, she epitomises in every way the enormity…
Innovative Social Protection Measures Vital for Children to Recover from Economic Crisis
It should be universally acknowledged that the socioeconomic impact of the multiple crises which have been unfolding in Sri Lanka since the COVID-19 pandemic has invalidated all human development indicators measured since…
Combatting the Scourge of Human Trafficking
COVID-19 and the severe economic crisis has resulted in an increase in human smuggling, illegal migration and forced labour in Sri Lanka. People are heavily in debt after taking loans to tide…
Sri Lanka Barometer Survey Reveals What People Think About Freedom of Expression and Religion
The Sri Lankan government is once again in the eye of the storm for the arrest of comedian Nathasha Edirisooriya over a joke about Buddhism using the International Covenant on Civil and…
Beating the Plastic Menace
Increased deforestation, greenhouse gas emission, coal mining, chemical waste and solid waste mismanagement are some of the grave global environmental issues faced at present. The government’s initiative to establish a Climate Change…
Arming Farmers is Not the Answer to the Human-Elephant Conflict
Policymakers cursed with a lack of original thinking, especially with the possibility of elections in the offing, resort to knee jerk reactions to long standing problems rather than seek informed advice and…
Kilinochchi: A Story of Trauma and Resilience
In Himali McInnes’ story, Kilinochchi, which is short listed to win the Commonwealth Short Story Prize for 2023, the protagonist is Nisha, a Tamil tea plucker with a turbulent past who moves…
State Formation and Contemporary Policy Issues in Sri Lanka
The starting point of the analysis in this article is to question the conventional approach to studying a state. The conventional approach treats the state as a concrete, self-contained entity that has…
