Category: Politics

COLOMBO, March 19, 2014 (AFP) – Sri Lanka has released two leading rights activists after their detention under strict anti-terrorism laws triggered international condemnation, police and supporters said on Wednesday. Sri Lanka has previously said it needs more time to address issues of accountability and reconciliation after ending the 37-year conflict, which according to UN […]

COLOMBO, March 17, 2014 (AFP) – Sri Lanka has arrested two leading rights activists including a Catholic priest under anti-terrorism laws, police and campaigners said Monday, ahead of an expected UN censure later this month.Father Praveen Mahesan, head of the Peace and Reconciliation Centre in the war-torn Jaffna region, and Ruki Fernando of the Colombo-based […]

GENEVA, March 5, 2014 (AFP) – Sri Lanka on Wednesday dismissed a UN report calling for an international probe into allegations of war crimes at the end of its civil war as “fundamentally flawed.” Foreign Minister Gamini Lakshman Peiris said his government rejected a report from UN human rights chief Navi Pillay “in its entirety,” […]

COLOMBO, March 4, 2014 (AFP) – A US-led resolution calling for an international probe into allegations that 40,000 civilians were killed at the end of Sri Lanka’s separatist war has been filed with the UN’s top rights body. The resolution is “totally based on information of questionable veracity”, the monks said in a petition to […]

COLOMBO, February 28, 2014 (AFP) – Sri Lanka’s president on Friday acknowledged his discomfort at the prospect of being censured by the UN’s top rights body, as he accused Washington of treating Colombo like Muhammad Ali’s “punching bag”.Although the exact text of the resolution is still not known, the US has said it will file […]

COLOMBO, March 1, 2014 (AFP) – Another unmarked mass grave has been found in Sri Lanka’s former war zone, police said Saturday, as Colombo braced for a US-led censure resolution at the UN rights forum next week.A family on Friday stumbled upon nine bodies buried in the garden of their home in the district of […]

WASHINGTON, February 27, 2014 (AFP) – From China’s crackdown on activists to flawed elections in Cambodia and widespread violence against Muslims in Myanmar, Asia’s human rights record in 2013 remained poor, US officials said Thursday. Releasing its annual Human Rights report, the State Department documented a litany of abuses across the continent, with especially strong […]

COLOMBO, February 25, 2014 (AFP) – Sri Lanka Tuesday accused the UN rights chief of “unwarranted interference” by calling for an international inquiry into allegations troops killed thousands of civilians at the end of the civil war.The government of President Mahinda Rajapakse formally rejected the demand by rights chief Navi Pillay for an external investigation […]

COLOMBO, February 23, 2014 (AFP) – Afghan President Hamid Karzai cancelled a two-day state visit to Sri Lanka Sunday, the foreign ministry in Colombo said, as Taliban insurgents killed 20 of his soldiers in eastern Afghanistan.“Please note that the visit of the President of Afghanistan to Sri Lanka has been cancelled,” the ministry said without […]

NEW DELHI, February 20, 2014 (AFP) – Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh denounced plans to free former premier Rajiv Gandhi’s killers as an attack on the nation’s soul Thursday as his government launched a legal battle to stop their release. Seven Tamil extremists are due to walk free from prison by this weekend after the […]

COLOMBO, February 14, 2014 (AFP) – Sri Lanka’s government said Friday it is probing incorrect and insulting translations of signs into the minority Tamil language, including one that says seats “reserved for pregnant dogs” instead of women. The government said they have received 218 complaints of misleading, wrong or offensive public notices that were correctly […]

CHICAGO, February 15, 2014 (AFP) – Advances in genetic sequencing are giving rise to a new era of scientific racism, despite decades of efforts to reverse attitudes used to justify the slave trade and Nazi theology, experts said Friday.Another concern is the ancestry tests that are now commonly sold online, a trend which feeds the […]