Category Archives: news fabrication

Investigative Journalism? Scilla Alecci’s Outrageous Essay

Edward Upali, whose  preferred title is Deceit in Reportage from ICIJ and Alecci”

Edward Upali is a Sri Lankan engineer who migrated to Alberta in Canada, where he resides now. His commentary on the partisanship and the muckraking pursued by the International Committee of Independent Journalists in their campaign against Sri Lanka is of considerable relevance. The highlighting in this Item is my imposition….. Editor, Thuppahi

ONE: Hi Michael, it is good that you are taking a more critical look at this piece by Scilla Alecci of ICIJ. In this “news report” Scilla is trading on the good name of the ICIJ to make a series of allegations by publishing some historically inaccurate “facts” as investigative journalism. I have given below the link to the Pandora Papers site’s listing of offshore account holders of Sri Lanka and other counties: viz. = Browse by country Sri Lanka | ICIJ Offshore Leaks Database

 Tamils and allies in New York stage a protest at City Hall Park, NYC,

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Scilla Alecci’s Scurrilous Failure

Gerald Peiris

What causes more surprise than all else in the recently published ‘Pandora exposures’, supposedly produced through intensive investigations conducted worldwide by a Washington-based outfit named the ‘International Consortium of Investigative Journalism/ICIJ)’ on shady transactions by those at political and business elite levels is that, among many thousands of such exposures, there is only one from Sri Lanka, attributed to a relatively minor political leader having kinship ties with the two Rajapakshas – Mahinda and his brother Gotabhaya, presently at the apex of the government of Sri Lanka – and her husband, a person who, despite being wealthy, has somehow maintained relatively low profile in Sri Lankan affairs.

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Thiru Nadesan & Nirupama Rajapaksa’s Shady Dealings?

 Scilla Alecci, in Pandora Papers, where the title is longggggggggggggg …… https://www.icij.org/investigations/pandora-papers/sri-lanka-rajapaksa-family-offshore-wealth-power/

In early 2018, workers in a London warehouse carefully loaded an oil painting of Lakshmi, the Hindu deity of wealth, onto a van bound for Switzerland. The painting, by 19th-century Indian master Raja Ravi Varma, depicts the four-armed goddess clad in a red sari with gold ornaments and standing atop a lotus flower. It was one of 31 works of art, altogether worth nearly $1 million, that were being shipped to the Geneva Freeport in Switzerland. That vast, ultra-secure warehouse complex, larger than 20 soccer fields, stores among its many treasures what the BBC once called “the greatest art collection no one can see.”

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Vicious Victimization of Dr Danielle by the Western Cabal and THE AGE

Fair Dinkum

For telling the truth about Wuhan as she knew it, this Australian virologist Dr Danielle Anderson has been  attacked, smeared and had her life threatened because her statement did not align with American Australian narratives about the origins of covid19. She was sent a threatening email that read, “Eat a bat and die, bitch.” The threatening emails continue and the Singapore police are taking it seriously  The anti-China campaign has become hysterical, insane and extremely dangerous as it spreads around the world,  with the help of Western governments.

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Lessons Derived from the Anti-Muslim Riots of 1915 …. For Today

Walter Wuthmann, in Daily News, 7 May 2018, where the title runs: “Revisiting 1915: Lessons from A Violent Past”

The recent mob attacks[ against Muslim families and property in Kandy is another sad chapter in Sri Lanka’s history of ethnic violence. Now, many are re-examining the past, looking for reasons for why this ugly strain of communalism will not subside, and for ways to fight it for the future. Because before Digana in March, and before Aluthgama in 2014, there was 1915.

  An old photo of the Mosqueat Castele Street inKandy where the initial spark for the “1915 riots”originated

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Kunanayakam’s Incisive Review of the West’s Machinations at Geneva and Lanka’s Failures

Gus Mathews

This is a very incisive interview with Tamara Kunanayakam, a former ambassador to the UNHRC in Geneva. In a no-nonsense manner she unravels why the pursuit of Sri Lanka by the Western nations is taking place.

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A Humanitarian Military Act in an Era of Horrendous Powerplays

Capt Elmo Jayawardena, in The Island, 24 March 2021,where the title is “The Pilot”

The UNHRC is in full swing. The ‘merchants of Geneva’ are getting ready to shoot their arrows of justice against the offenders of this planet. Of course, it is done democratically, by honourable people in Saville Row suits who sit around polished mahogany tables and determine by a count of votes who is guilty and who is not. That is the showpiece; but the truth could be so very different. Powerful people call the tune, and the theme is “You lend me your mule and I will remember you when it is your turn to take the stand. Then I’ll lend you my donkey.”

 SL Air Force’s “Marchetti”

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High-Level Western Picture of Uyghur Genocide directed towards Shaming China

Ajit Singh: Independent’ report claiming Uyghur genocide brought to you by sham university, neocon ideologues lobbying to ‘punish’ China” … 17 March 2021, at https://thegrayzone.com/2021/03/17/report-uyghur-genocide-sham-university-neocon-punish-china/

US media hailed a Newlines Institute report accusing China of Uyghur genocide as a “landmark” independent analysis. A look beneath the surface reveals it as a regime change propaganda tool by interventionist operatives at a sham university.

Ajit Singh

Throughout March 2021, headlines in corporate media outlets from CNN to The Guardian blared about the release of the “first independent report” to authoritatively determine that the Chinese government has violated “each and every act” of the United Nations convention against genocide, and therefore “bears State responsibility for committing genocide against the Uyghurs.”

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Trump and Hitler in Same Bed? Generating Love and Hate?

A NOTE from Richard Koenigsberg, March 2021 …. in an Item presented four years back and headed thus: “Is Trump Stealing Hitler’s Playbook? How does One Test the Truth of a Hypothesis: Predictive Validity.” 

Hitler addressing rally in May 1937 — Associard Press Photo …https://www.nytimes.com/2020/08/05/books/review/the-nazi-menace-benjamin-carter-hett.html  

  Donald Trump  speaking at Phoenix on 23rd June 2020 (https://www.latimes.com/opinion/story/2020-06-24/trump-phoenix-speech-demagogue)

A wonderful Internet radio program, Howard Bloom Saves the Universe, is hosted by Chad Dougatz. Howard invited me to join the show to explore the question, “Why does Donald Trump stir us (either negatively or positively).”

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The Far Eastern Bureau and Its News Reels during World War II

Tony Donaldson

I enjoyed reading Michael Roberts’s short essay titled “Michael’s Testimony for VE Day in Britain, 8th May 1945,” published at Thuppahi on 10 May 2020. But I felt the story ended too quickly, leaving me to ponder where the story goes next. It would be good if Michael could continue this story. In the meantime, the following short note was triggered by Michael’s comment about the “insidious impact of Movietone News or Pathe News.”

After 3 September 1939, when Britain went to war with Germany, the British Ministry of Information (MOI) began arranging with numerous companies the release and distribution of their newsreels. One example was The Battle of Tobruk which was sent by plane to Colombo in March 1941. It was cleared through customs and distributed to cinemas in Colombo in time for screening at the evening shows on the same day the film arrived in Ceylon.

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