The role of the mainstream media in reporting hard news while also taking compromising advertising is an intriguing one. The Guardian recently discovered this and mis-fired badly. To its credit, they’ve now run this strong piece by Chris Elliot, the Readers Editor: Sri Lanka‘s civil war, in which tens of thousands of people were killed…
Showing all posts tagged Sri Lanka
Blood on British hands; sending Tamils back to be tortured
These serious allegations are horrific. A government’s duty of care is paramount and yet in this case it seems that the desire for Britain (and indeed, Australia, who says very little about war crimes in Sri Lanka) to have a good relationship with Colombo is central. Also note the use of a private, chartered plane,…
Sending Tamils back to Sri Lanka’s police state
How dare we lecture the developing world about human rights when this happens (via the Independent)?: Dozens of Tamil asylum-seekers will be forcibly removed from Britain on a secretive deportation flight today despite credible evidence that they face arrest and retribution on their return. A chartered plane, PTV030, is due to take off at 15.30…
Sri Lanka’s killing fields – unpunished war crimes
The latest in a series of stunning Channel 4 documentaries about war crimes in Sri Lanka (here’s the first part from last year):
Defending online news by playing hardball
As autocratic regimes, hackers, trouble-makers and fools aim to bring down websites that challenge authoritarian rule, such spaces need to be nurtured and protected. Reporters Without Borders on an important project: Filtering, denial of service attacks, withdrawal of content – censors use many different methods to silence news websites. In addition to drawing attention to…
While Sri Lanka shuns interest in human rights we must shun them
Sri Lanka remains a nation ruled by war criminals who rather love the idea of isolating and killing Tamils. For this reason, many people, including me, globally called for the boycott of the 2011 Galle Literary Festival due to its links to the Colombo establishment … and attempts to avoid serious discussion about the country’s police…
The Left must not ignore Sri Lanka
It is an issue that receives far too little attention, despite the government in Colombo committing egregious human rights abuses for years. Mass murderers run the country. Emanuel Stoakes, a colleague, writes the following for New Statesman: Earlier this week, a piece was published by the… Daily Telegraph… that contained the latest in a powerful body of…
From inside the Sri Lankan military comes charges of war crimes
This was only a matter of time. I’m hearing that growing numbers of civil society groups inside Sri Lanka will continue pushing for accountability of Colombo’s vile aggression. The International reports: The Sri Lankan army ordered extra-judicial killings and assassinations… during the final days of the country’s civil war, according to… allegations made by a former member…
What Australia is doing to refugees in the middle of the steamy desert
My following investigation appeared in Crikey this week: The drive from Broome in Western Australia to Derby, the town closest to the remote Curtin detention centre in the Kimberley, is two-and-a-half hours through endless, surprisingly green desert. Mobile phone reception soon dies after the journey begins and from there you see few people or cars…