Category Archives: news fabrication

June 21, 2019 · 2:34 am

American Hands behind National Thawheed Jamath and 21/4?

Lasanda Kurukulasuriya, in Dateline-Lanka, where the title reads “Sri Lanka Easter bomb attacks and the role of Western intelligence agencies”

Speculation that Western intelligence agencies had a hand in the well-coordinated, precision-timed Easter suicide bombings in Sri Lanka arises from a number of sources and circumstances. Analysts are still trying to figure out how the little known group ‘National Thawheed Jamaath’ (NTJ) could have orchestrated such a feat. The terror group known as Islamic State in Iraq and Syria (ISIS), also known as Islamic State (IS) or Daesh, claimed responsibility through online videos. ISIS”s enemy is the West, and so Western governments unanimously expressed solidarity with Sri Lanka in its fight against the new terror (in a way they did not, with regard to Sri Lanka’s 30-year war against LTTE terror). One might recall how US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said “This is America’s fight too.” Though IS is fronted for the attacks, answers to more specific questions such as who the handlers of the nine suicide bombers were, remain murky.

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May 9, 2019 · 10:05 am

Political Intolerance on the Rise. Fostered by Social Media

Chris Kenny, in The Australian, 8 May 2019, where the title runs “Egg attack on Morrison hints at rotten state of public debate”

The Albury egging was so pathetic it didn’t even crack the egg. But there would have been milliseconds of sharp concern and shambolic reactions, with one woman knocked to the ground, that ruined what otherwise would have been a terrific event for the Country Women’s Association. And while they will be outwardly phlegmatic, Scott Morrison, his staff and the Australian Federal Police close personal protection officers will be — pardon the pun — walking on eggshells for a while.

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April 26, 2019 · 8:46 am

Waleed Aly’s Violent Misreadings of the Sri Lankan Scenario on DISPLAY

Waleed Aly, in The Age,  25 April 2019, entitled “The Sri Lankan attacks are uniquely senseless”

Every terrorist attack in which innocent people are killed is devastatingly tragic. Every one of them is heinous. But what we’ve seen in Sri Lanka this week exists on a rarefied level of depravity. Of course, there’s the supreme violation of slaughtering people in worship – now an established feature of terrorism and particularly Islamic State’s violence in places like Egypt or the Philippines. Then there’s the nauseating symbolism of the day itself. Easter Sunday: perhaps the holiest day on the Christian calendar, but more than that, the day Christians mark the resurrection. The very idea of life’s triumph over death deformed into a day of death above all else.

Catholic nuns and others participate in a vigil outside Sacred Heart Cathedral in remembrance of victims.
Catholic nuns and others participate in a vigil outside Sacred Heart Cathedral in remembrance of victims.CREDIT:AP

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April 4, 2019 · 4:14 am

Retd Brigadier Halangode highlights Alan Keenan’s Misrepresentation

A NOTE from Retd Brigadier Hiran N. Halangode (of Gemunu Watch)

Michael   [Alan Keenan’s recent press release] is a typical tale of the sort of stories peddled in the Northern and Eastern Provinces of Sri Lanka. The socio-economic conditions prevailing in the neighbouring districts of Uva and the North Central Provinces are very similar.  These INGOs spread unfavourable messages about the country when the government is bending backwards to Reconcile. It is the Tamil politicians and INGOs that spread distorted versions of the state of the country in those regions without doing any productive work themselves. I have attached a website reference http://www.cimicjaffna.com/Cimicnews_2019_04_04.php to show you what the Army is doing in the North to bring about  resettlement, rehabilitation and reconciliation.

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March 25, 2019 · 4:54 am

Undermining ISIS from within the Dungeons of the Cyberworld

Paul Maley, in The Australian, 25 March 2019, where the title is “How Aussie Spies won Propaganda War against ISIS”

In late-2016, as coalition aircraft pounded Islamic State targets in Syria and Iraq, the Australian ­Defence Force’s Commander of Joint Operations, David Johnston, issued a secret order to the Australian Signals Directorate. For the first time, Defence wanted ASD to use its vast cyber capabilities not for intelligence gathering or targeting — the agency’s traditional missions — but to take down and destroy ­Islamic State’s propaganda ­machine. What followed was a two-year campaign in which a small team of offensive cyber operators working out of a squat, grey building in Canberra’s Russell Defence ­precinct, waged war on Islamic State’s information warriors.

In this Nov. 18, 2017 photo, construction workers carry a generator as a bulldozer remove debris from destroyed shops in the Old City of Mosul, Iraq. Along the neighborhood’s gutted roads, a handful of people are beginning to rebuild but the task ahead will take years _ and billions of dollars. (AP Photo/Felipe Dana)

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March 17, 2019 · 2:06 pm

Fooling Around in Preparation for Geneva

ONE = Rajeewa Jayaweera, in Island,  17 March 2019, where the title is “Will Marapana play Ace or Joker @ UNHRC”

President Maithripala Sirisena, known for changing his mind on crucial issues has done it again. His delegation comprising of former Ministers and UPFA Parliamentarians Sarath Amunugama and Mahinda Samarasinghe together with Dr. Suren Raghavan, Governor of Northern Province to attend the 40th session of the UN Human Rights Commission (UNHRC) in Geneva announced last week has now been scrapped. Their purported mission was to seek the possibility of withdrawing from the Geneva Resolution.

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March 6, 2019 · 10:36 am

UNHRC Sessions: Three Strands in the Responses of the Sinhala Press

Item in  MEDIA ANALYSIS, February 25, 2019 – March 03, 2019

UNHRC: Positions reflecting politics …. Issue: The 40th session of the United Nations Human Rights Council (UNHRC) in Geneva commenced on February 25, 2019 and is currently underway. The Core Group on Sri Lanka, comprising Canada, Germany, (North) Macedonia, Montenegro and the United Kingdom, is yet to submit a final draft of a new resolution on Sri Lanka.

Analysis: Three major positions emerged in the Sinhala press on the resolution and the UNHRC.

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March 4, 2019 · 7:18 am

Dushni and Sisira shoot down Western Picture of Chinese Debt Trap

Dushni Weerakoon and Sisira Jayasuriya

Global media and numerous ‘experts’ routinely assert that Sri Lanka was forced to cede a strategically important port to China after being lured into a debt trap by easy Chinese loans. This story has now become part of the wider narrative of how China is using the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) to achieve its diplomatic and strategic aims through debt diplomacy. But it is a story based more on fiction than fact.

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January 30, 2019 · 2:46 pm

Marie Colvin’s Media Lies about Homs in Syria

Rick Sterling, in off Guardian, 29 January 2019, where the title is “Marie Colvin, Homs and Media Falsehoods about Syria”

n April 2014 I was part of an international delegation which visited Syria for five days. The delegates came from many different countries. Among the notables were the Irish Nobel Laureate Mairead Maguire, a Syrian-British heart surgeon and Julian Assange’s father. We spent time in Damascus, then traveled by bus to Latakia and then Homs. In each city we had meetings with political, religious and social leaders but also had time to wander about and talk with people on the streets.

In Latakia, I met Lilly Martin, an American woman who married a Syrian and has lived there, raising a family for the past twenty-five years. She told me how wrong the western media coverage was. Contrary to media claims, she said protests in Latakia were violent from the start. After the first outbreak of violence, Syrian police and military were ordered to not carry weapons. Protesters continued to burn and destroy government offices with incidents of knifing and shooting unarmed police. Continue reading →

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January 30, 2019 · 12:51 pm

British Government Stance on War and Aftermath castigated by Defenders of Lanka’s Realm

Rajeewa Jayaweera. in Island, 26 January 2019, with this title “Boycott UK Defense Advisor”

According to a recent media report, UK government (GoUK) has recently appointed a Resident Defense Advisor in Sri Lanka after an absence of ten years. The story was accompanied by a photograph of the newly appointed Colonel David Ashman with Chief of Defense Staff Admiral Ravindra Wijegunaratne taken during a courtesy call paid by the British RDA on the CDS. His purported mission is to help the Sri Lankan military to fulfill the obligations as required by the UNHRC 30/1 Resolution originated by the US and UK and so pusillanimously co-sponsored by the Sirisena-Wickremesinghe-Samaraweera triumvirate.

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