Sources
Top Sri Lankan editor shot dead, BBC, 8 January  2009; Grievous blow to Sri Lankan media, BBC, 8 January 2009; Sri Lankan newspaper editor shot dead, The Guardian, 8 January 2009; ‘We know who is behind my death’: Sri Lankan editor continues fight from grave, The Guardian, 13 January 2009.

Quotations

“We find ourselves in the midst of a civil war ruthlessly prosecuted by protagonists whose bloodlust knows no bounds. Terror, whether perpetrated by terrorists or the state, has become the order of the day. Indeed, murder has become the primary tool whereby the state seeks to control the organs of liberty. Today it is the journalists, tomorrow it will be the judges. For neither group have the risks ever been higher or the stakes lower,” Lasantha Wickrematunge.

“The LTTE is among the most ruthless and bloodthirsty organisations to have infested the planet. There is no gainsaying that it must be eradicated. But to do so by violating the rights of Tamil citizens, bombing and shooting mercilessly, is not only wrong but shames the Sinhalese, whose claim to be custodians of the dhamma is for ever called into question by this savagery – much of it unknown to the public because of censorship,” Lasantha Wickrematunge.

“I believe it is my duty not to accept anything the government tells us at face value and it is especially our duty not to allow the press in Sri Lanka to be brow-beaten or censored. We need to tell the outside world about the horrific nature of the war in which we are currently involved,” Lasantha Wickrematunge.

“When finally I am killed, it will be the government that kills me. In the wake of my death I know you will make all the usual sanctimonious noises and call upon the police to hold a swift and thorough inquiry. But like all the inquiries you have ordered in the past, nothing will come of this one, too. For truth be told, we both know who will be behind my death,” Lasantha Wickrematunge.

“My government and I most vehemently and unequivocally condemn the murder of Lasantha Wickrematunge, editor of the Sunday Leader, which took place yesterday. I am both grieved and shocked by his tragic death as Mr. Wickrematunge was a close friend of mine who I have known for many years as a courageous journalist. This heinous crime points to the grave dangers faced by the democratic social order of our country, and the existence of forces that will go to the furthest extremes in using terror and criminality to damage our social fabric and bring disrepute to the country. It is significant that such an attack was carried out at a time when the country is gaining repeated victories over the forces of terrorism, in our efforts to establish freedom and democracy throughout the country,” statement made by President Rajapakse.

“Sri Lanka has lost one of its more talented, courageous and iconoclastic journalists. President Mahinda Rajapaksa, his associates and the government media are directly to blame because they incited hatred against him and allowed an outrageous level of impunity to develop as regards violence against the press. Sri Lanka’s image is badly sullied by this murder, which is an absolute scandal and must not go unpunished,” Reporters Without Borders.

Opinion
The murder of Lasantha Wickrematunge and Sri Lanka’s future, groundviews, 8 January 2009; And then they came for me, Sunday Leader, 11 January 2009.

Over the weekend, the BBC’s World Service asked the actor Bill Nighy to read Lasantha Wickrematunge’s final editorial for its Newshour programme.

“You will have no choice but to protect my killers”, Newshour, BBC World Service

Related events
29 April 2005
2 July 2006
9 January 2007
23 May 2008
2 January 2009
6 January 2009

Other features
Feature: Historical roots of conflict in Sri Lanka
Feature: Assassination of an activist
Feature: LTTE expels northern Muslims, 1990
Feature: “Black July”, 1983

Major General Perera is credited with some of the army’s biggest victories over the Tigers, including a 1996 battle in which allegedly 200 LTTE cadres were killed with the loss of just one soldier. The Tamil community accused him of being responsible for hundreds of deaths and the torture of Tamils in the region during the period. Amnesty International raised similar concerns.

Sources
Suicide blast hits Sri Lanka town, BBC, 6 October 2008; Sri Lanka suicide blast kills 27 including former military chief, Times, 6 October 2008.

Related events
6 April 2008
6 June 2008
26 May 2008

Source
Roadside bomb kills top Catholic priest and rights activist in the north, rebels say, Associated Press, 20 April 2008.

Related event
6 March 2008

Sources
Blast kills Sri Lankan Minister, BBC, 6 April 2008; Suicide blast kills Sri Lanka minister, Tigers blamed, Reuters, 6 April 2008.

Quotations

“Minister Fernandopulle belonged to both a religious and ethnic minority and could have played a greater role in rebuilding relations between the ethnic communities and the warring parties. Instead he was a proponent of the government’s strategy of military confrontation with the LTTE which claimed his life. At the same time he assisted civil society groups such as ours when it fell within his domain of authority despite our critical stances. Minister Fernandopulle was one of the government’s key speakers, and his absence will be felt at the forthcoming Eastern Provincial elections where he would have played an important role. We urge the government to ensure that all high risk candidates at these elections, icluding leader of the Sri Lanka Muslim Congress Rauf Hakeem whose security is being sought to be reduced, should be provided with additional security.” Path of violence and war is too costly, Press release, National Peace Council, 8 April 2008.

“This is most likely the work of the LTTE. It follows closely on the Fort Railway Station bombing, in which also several young schoolboy sportsmen from D S Senanayake College were killed. The massacre of the innocents anywhere, benefits no just cause and has no place whatsoever in any agenda for dignity and peace for Sri Lankans. Such provocative acts of violence spread fear, suspicion and anger. They further widen the gap between our communities and further reduce whatever chances may have existed for peace conversations.” Rt Revd Duleep de Chickera, Bishop of Colombo, 7 April 2008.

“Amnesty International condemns the suicide bomb attack of 6 April 2008 in Gampaha district, Weliveriya, near Colombo. … The Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam has been blamed for the bomb attack that targeted a local sports event. Amnesty International reiterates that attacks targeting civilians and indiscriminate attacks violate international humanitarian law which binds all sides to the conflict and constitute war crimes.” Sri Lanka: Mounting Civilian Casualties as Conflict Persists, Public Statement, Amnesty International, 9 April 2008.

Related events
6 March 2008
8 January 2008
1 January 2008
10 November 2006
25 December 2005
12 August 2005

In its 29-page report released today, it names a local Muslim home guard and two constables as the killers of most of the group, which took place around 4.30 pm on 4 August 2006. The report details the killings, the role of senior police officials in the murders, and criticises the government’s failure in properly investigating the crime.

Sources
Report details Sri Lanka aid massacre, blames forces, Reuters, 1 April 2008; Sri Lanka defends lengthy inquiry into the massacre of 17 charity workers, The Independent, 3 April 2008.

Quotations

“The evidence shows state security forces, including police, killed the 17 aid workers and that senior police officers covered it up…The killing of civilians during time of conflict is a war crime. The perpetrators and their superiors should be brought to justice.” Rajan Hoole, University Teachers for Human Rights.

“It does more than name the names of those responsible for the brutal ACF killings. It shows the government investigations into the massacre were little more than a bad joke played out on the victims’ families and the international community.” James Ross, Senior Legal Adviser, Human Rights Watch.

“We want the truth to come out. We can’t dictate the course of justice, we can only encourage the process by facilitating its work.” Rohitha Bogollagama, Foreign Minister.

“The country has learnt to be comfortable with grave crimes going unpunished one after another, with the certainty that even graver ones would follow. The answer to the question why Sri Lanka is steeped in recurrent gross crimes, especially against the minorities, that go unchecked is not far to seek. For years, the state has gone on denying, obfuscating, abusing detractors, intimidating or killing witnesses and making matters progressively worse.” Unfinished Business of the Five Students and ACF Cases – A Time to call the Bluff, Special Report No.30, University Teachers for Human Rights (Jaffna) Sri Lanka, 1st April 2008.

Related events
4 August 2006
6 November 2006
5 July 2007
23 April 2007
6 March 2008

Sources
Sri Lankan minister killed by bomb, The Guardian, 8 January 2008; Sri Lankan minister dies in blast, BBC news, 8 January 2008

Source
Tamil MP is killed in Sri Lanka, BBC, 6 March 2008

Sources
Sri Lankan Tamil MP assassinated in temple, AFP, 1 January 2008
Leading Sri Lanka Tamil MP killed, BBC, 1 January 2008

Source
Sri Lankan air force kills Tamil Tigers leader, The Guardian, 2 November 2007; Air raid kills top Tamil Tiger, The Independent, 2 November 2007; Sri Lankan air force raid kills Tamil Tiger political chief, Jane’s, 5 November 2007.

Quotations

“With deep sorrow we announce to the people of Tamil Eelam, the Tamil people living all over the world and the international community, that at 6am today [the] head of our organisation’s political wing Brigadier SP Thamilselvan was killed by the Sri Lankan air force aerial bombing”. LTTE website

“This is a message that we know their leaders’ location. This confirms that our information is very accurate”. Gotabhaya Rajapaksa, Sri Lankan Defence Secretary.

“The loss of Thamilselvan in this way would be a very big setback to any hope of peace talks in the near future – which in any case were not apparent either”. Jehan Perera, National Peace Council.

“Tamilselvan first rose to prominence when he played an influential role in the 1995 peace negotiations with the government of then president Chandrika Kumaratunga. The former head of the political wing subsequently played a key role in all the peace processes, although the LTTE’s chief negotiator, Anton Balasingham, who died last year, remained the international face of the rebel group. Indeed, the significance of Thamilselvan’s death is arguably comparable to the assassination of Sri Lanka’s foreign minister Lakshman Kadirgamar in 2005,” Jane’s, Sri Lankan air force raid kills Tamil Tiger political chief, 5 November 2007.

Related events

Source
Lanka president attacks ‘cowards’, BBC, 17 July 2007.

“A prominent Tamil politician died in hospital after he was shot near his home in the Sri Lankan capital early Friday, a party member and a hospital official said. One of his guards was also killed. Nadaraja Raviraj, of the Tamil National Alliance was shot as he left his house in Colombo, said K. Sivajilingam, a fellow member of Parliament. Sivajilingam said that Raviraj also worked as a lawyer and was going to the court … when some people came and fired at him.” From: Tamil member of Parliament killed in Sri Lankan capital, International Herald Tribune, 10 November 2006.

Sources
Sri Lankan MP killed in Colombo, BBC, 10 November 2006; Prominent Tamil politician assassinated, Associated Press, 10 November 2006.

Nadarajah Raviraj: Assassination of an activist
In the spirit of citizen’s journalism, unionblackcolombo remembers his friend Raviraj.

Quotations

“Both sides, while talking peace, are engaged in other activities. The Sri Lankan government is involved in such activities. The LTTE is also acquiring arms and strengthening themselves. This is natural and is anticipated. The issue is how can we curtail it? If we are sincere in finding a solution to the ethnic problem by way of talks, we must sit together and thrash out the matter. After all this is a small country. The Tamil people and majority of the Sinhalese people know each other and are not communal minded. I am a person who is very close to the Sinhala people. I go for TV interviews with my broken Sinhalese not to gain political mileage – none of the Tamils watch those – but I go because I need to build an understanding with the Sinhalese and to tell them the plight of the Tamil people. If we work with a peace agenda we can definitely achieve peace,” Nadarajah Raviraj, from Begin talks without conditions, Sunday Leader, 24 September 2006.

“As a parliamentarian he worked tirelessly for the Tamil nation…He shattered the false propaganda of the Sinhala state infusing his arguments with his legal expertise. He stood firm and fought injustice in the face of threats from paramilitary violence. Mr Nadaraja Raviraj is a great man. He possessed rare characteristics. He is not the one to be pushed and pulled around for personal gains. He had a deep affection for the Tamil homeland and its people. He is an exceptional politician. He understood law and justice in its true sense. He possessed a progressive spirit and a desire to follow novel approaches. He was brave and he possessed a purity of heart. His youthful energy with all of the above stole the hearts of all who came in contact with him,” Vellupillai Prabhakaran, Leader LTTE.

“[The assassination] is one more reprehensible act by those opposed to dissent and political pluralism in a democratic society,” Mahinda Rajapakse, President of Sri Lanka

“It is government forces or forces aligned to the government, there can be no question. This is an attempt to stifle… and silence those who can justifiably espouse the Tamil cause,” R. Sampanthan, leader of the Tamil National Alliance (TNA).

“Raviraj functioned as a bridge to North and South. His murder is a challenge to people who voice for peace. Raviraj who also addressed the problems faced by the people of South, participated in many demonstrations organized on their interests. He had many Sinhala friends. He joined us in advocating the release of S.B. Disanayake. We see his loss as the same as late Vijaya Kumarathunghe,” Rajitha Senaratne, United National Party MP, Kalutura district.

Related events
5 January 2000
25 December 2005
12 August 2006
6 November 2006
6 March 2008

This event was the subject of a feature: Assassination of an activist.

Sources
Sri Lankan government clashes with Tamil rebels, The Guardian, 15 August 2006; Ketheeswaran Loganathan and the Tamil Dissidents’ Dilemma, University Teachers for Human Rights (Jaffna), 15 August 2006; Ketheesh: Champion of Tamil Rights in United Lanka, D.B.S. Jeyaraj, Transcurrents, 18 August 2006.

Quotations

“Sinhala and Tamil nationalism have reached their respective cross-roads. They, now have to decide whether to part company or to map out a common cause leading to meaningful co-existence – that of diverse identities, as opposed to the hegemony of one identity over the other,” Kethesh Loganathan (1996), Sri Lanka: Lost Opportunities: Past Attempts at Resolving Ethnic Conflict.

“One more person capable of rising above hatred and insanity in present day Sri Lanka is no more. With his departure one more Tamil who wanted his people to live with equal rights in a united Lanka and champion that cause in the face of danger has been done away with. Only a few of us are left now.  … At the time of his death Ketheesh was Deputy Secretary-General of the Secretariat for coordinating the peace process (SCOPP) and Secretary of the All Party Representative Committee (APRC). This makes him appear as a pro-government “establishment” man. The eulogies heaped on him by the “government guys” reinforce this impression. This is perhaps the unkindest cut of all,” D.B.S. Jeyaraj, 18 August 2006.

“Kethesh Loganathan was a valued colleague, a former Director of the Centre for Policy Alternatives (CPA) and the first head of its Peace and Conflict Analysis Unit. He was a passionate advocate of human rights, an unflinching champion of the rights of the Tamil people and of an end to the ethnic conflict in Sri Lanka with democracy, justice and dignity for all. … Whilst Kethesh was an ardent and proud nationalist, he brought the same fervour, passion and commitment to the cause of unity in diversity, multi-culturalism and a settlement of the ethnic conflict based on meaningful power sharing. He uncompromisingly believed that the liberation of a people could not be founded on fear, the celebration of death, the negation or even suspension of basic democratic values. This made him a stringent and fearless critic of the LTTE for their insistence on being the sole representatives of the Tamil people and for their reliance on terror, repression and violence,” Dr. Pakiasothy Saravanamuthu, Center for Policy Alternatives (CPA), August 2006.

“Ketheeswaran was consistent in his dedication to the welfare of the Tamils in Sri Lanka. In the early 1980s which saw growing communal violence directed at Tamils it was natural for a decent left oriented Tamil with an intellectual bent to join the EPRLF, which he did. The struggle he joined was destroyed by the LTTE in 1986. After very difficult times for his people, Ketheeswaran found openings for his interests in justice and a political settlement among Colombo-based NGOs. He strongly objected to the degradation of human rights in the 2002 ceasefire agreement and on occasions was almost alone in voicing his concern over the conscription of children in the Colombo NGO fora, which Norway, the NGOs and the government wanted to downplay. Erik Solheim was quick to mark him out as an adversary. Ketheeswaran never forgot that he had been a militant. He stayed on in the EPRLF and left it only in 1994 after differences with an individual who too later left. His background enabled him to easily make the transition to activism in civil society. He was constant in his concern that other militants too should be given the means and opportunity to come out into civil and political life. He pushed for the Norwegian initiated peace process to address this cause for all militants including from the LTTE. But after the Karuna split the Norwegians pinned the label ‘paramilitary’ on all non-LTTE groups, this effort came to a standstill,” Rajan Hoole, University Teachers for Human Rights (Jaffna), 15 August 2006.

“Kethesh Loganathan’s decision to join the Rajapakse regime’s “peace” secretariat was bewildering at the time. It still is after his assassination, presumably at the hands of the LTTE. … Kethesh’s belief that he could somehow influence what is clearly a rabidly Sinhala nationalist government – work within the system – was, at best, a miserable mistake. But we all misstep, don’t we? Only, Kethesh’s – and make no mistake about it – was an error of judgment made in the interests of peace. For he wanted, as he had all his life, to make a difference. His decision to quit the Center for Policy Alternatives was spurred, in part, by his increasing isolation within the more influential sections of the peace lobby. They think hope is spelled R-a-n-i-l. They understand peace as the absence of war. To Kethesh – no mere nationalist, but a leftist, after all – things were not so simple. He argued consistently [that] peace wasn’t synonymous with appeasing the LTTE at any cost; that the process should be inclusive – of other Tamil, Muslim and Sinhala opinion; that human and democratic rights should not be exchanged merely for an LTTE promise to stop killing Sinhalese. This made him inconvenient to sections of the peace lobby, which has made a habit of excusing LTTE massacres of Sinhala and Muslim civilians, of not protesting its systematic stifling of oppositional Tamils. And, as the UTHR(J) noted, he got marked as an opponent by the Norwegians,” Qadri Ismail, Peace Without Appeasement: Honouring Kethesh.

Related events
January 1984
April 1985
8 July 1985
17 August 1985
6 November 2006
6 March 2008

This event was the subject of a feature: Assassination of an activist.

Sources
Action Against Hunger International Network mourns and demands full inquiry into Muttur “war crime”, ACF, 10 August 2006; Europe accuses Sri Lankan army of assassinating aid workers, The Independent, 31 August 2006; Sri Lanka: ICJ calls for justice as inquest into killing of 17 aid workers concludes, Press Release, International Commission of Jurists, 9 March 2007.

Quotations

“[We are] convinced that there cannot be any other armed groups than the security forces who could actually have been behind the act. Consequently, the killing of the 17 civilian aid workers in Muttur on 4 August 2006 is ruled as a gross violation of the CFA [ceasefire accord] by the security forces of Sri Lanka. The committed act of assassination has approved to be one of the most serious recent crimes against humanitarian aid workers worldwide and has been strongly condemned internationally. I urge the GoSL to take all necessary actions to immediately stop any kind of violence against the civilians of Sri Lanka and to do its utmost that the matter is thoroughly investigated by the Sri Lankan authorities.” SLMM statement, 30 August 2006.

“The Government also deeply regrets that the Head of SLMM who is charged with an extremely sensitive and responsible task of giving professional and objective observations after due diligent investigation, has rushed to hasty conclusions on what is clearly a most reprehensible attack on these aid workers.” Government of Sri Lanka, statement, 30 August 2006.

Related events
6 November 2006
5 July 2007
6 March 2008
1 April 2008

Source
Monthly Bulletin, International Federation of Journalists, 7 July 2006.

Related events
29 April 2005
12 August 2005
24 January 2006
9 January 2007
23 May 2008

Sources
We killed Rajiv, confesses LTTE, Times of India, 27 June 2006;

Quotations

“As far as that event is concerned, I would say it is a great tragedy, a monumental historical tragedy, which we deeply regret, and we call upon the government of India and people of India to be magnanimous to put the past behind and to approach the ethnic question in a different perspective…We have made pledges to the government of India that under no circumstance will we act against the interests of the government of India.” Balasingham, LTTE’s chief negotiator.

“It’s good that after so many years they (LTTE) have admitted to having killed Rajiv Gandhi…For India, it was a national tragedy because Rajiv Gandhi was the most popular leader of his time. Now the question is of fixing responsibility for the crime.” Digvijay Singh, Congress General Secretary.

Related events
31 May 1991
14 May 1992