May 5, 2019 · 10:56 am

The Demons within Sri Lanka: Long-Term Methods of Abatement?

Michael Roberts

Here I reproduce the second half of a longer article presented in October 2018 where I pinpointed the hidden dangers to Sri Lanka resting within the implications of Mark Field’s visit to the island then — conveying a message that was one part of the continuing Western nation-cum-UNHRC project to punish Sri Lanka and foist a devolutionary political system on the island. Obviously, this essay was coined before the explosive manifestation of another divisive time-bomb within the Sri Lankan body politic: that of Islamic extremists motivated by the Wahhabi ideology hostile to specific ‘pinnacles’ in any Westernized body politic – such as (a) the Papacy and (b) high-rise hotels marking wealth and ‘debauchery’.**

This traumatic moment on Easter Sunday 21st April 2019 reminds us of two earth shattering moments: the LTTE attack on the Central Bank in Colombo on 31st January 1996 and the Al-Qaida attack on the World Trade Centre in New York on 9th September 2001 (9/11 in shorthand).***

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May 4, 2019 · 10:08 am

The Death Toll in Sri Lanka: Ethnicity

An Email Note from Muttukrishna Sarvananthan to Professor Chandra Dharmawardena, 4 May 2019

Dear Prof. Dharmawardena,

I remember you asked this question on May 01, 2019, via email to my institutional email  address. I apologise profusely for not replying to you earlier.

Please remember that the Kochikade church where the suicide bomb blast took place is in  Colombo-13 (Kotahena – opposite Jampettah Street) and NOT in the Kochikade area of  Negombo. The blast at Kochikade took place during the time of the Easter Services in Tamil.  Therefore, overwhelming majority of the casualties were Tamils. In most churches within  the Colombo City and the suburbs church services (e.g. Sunday services) take place in both  Sinhala and Tamil languages separately. In a few churches (especially within the city of  Colombo), the services are done in all three languages separately.


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May 3, 2019 · 5:00 pm

Ranil’s Interviews. Faux Pas Galore. Total Failures

Major General (Retd.) Lalin Fernando, in Asian Tribune, .with this title “When does a Prime Minister Resign?…. http://www.asiantribune.com/node/92706

When PM Wickramasinghe was asked by BBC’s Channel 4 why he had not taken action against ISIS terrorists who had returned to the Island in 2017, his fatuous reply was that it was not illegal in SL to take part in terrorist actions abroad.

The PM has a basic degree in law. He likes to continuously impress his ill educated but fawning parliamentary minions and Colombo’s socialites. But with the Channel 4 man the PM was clearly out of his depth and clearly in fear of personal repercussions for the Easter Sunday massacre. There were 250 dead, almost all Christians, and 450 wounded. A colossal intelligence failure was blamed for it. The PM thought it and anything else was not enough to damn him. Continue reading →

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May 3, 2019 · 2:08 pm

Where Terrorism carved out a Nation: Israel out of Palestine

Jayantha Somasundaram, in Island, April 2019, where the title is“Palestine: Where Britain lost the war against terror”

What happened in British mandated Palestine in the run-up to Israeli statehood in May 1948 is a classic example of the triumph of terrorism. The British captured Palestine from the Ottomans during World War I and were mandated by the League of Nations (the precursor to the United Nations) to progress Palestine towards independence. Out of a population of 700,000, the religious breakdown in Palestine was about 500,000 Muslims, 90,000 Jews and 70,000 Christians. Up to the first century AD Palestine had been Jewish-majority, then a Christian-majority society (second to the eleventh century) and thereafter Muslim-majority. (DellaPergola)

Della Pergola

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May 3, 2019 · 10:18 am

After the Easter Sunday Terror, 4/21: The Way Forward

Zahrah Imtiaz, D.B. Subedi, and Muttukrishna Sarvananthan, in Eurasia Review, where the title is “Sri Lanka’s 4/21 Moment. A Way Forward to Countering Violent Extremism” ….. https://www.eurasiareview.com/01052019-sri-lankas-4-21-moment-a-way-forward-to-countering-violent-extremism-oped/ … with highlighting emphasis added by The Editor, Thuppahi

Sri Lanka is once again in the spotlight of the world; regretfully for ugly and vile reasons. This is Sri Lanka’s 4/21 moment (aka 9/11 in the USA and 11/26 in India). The Easter Sunday massacre of gigantic proportions (253 dead and still counting among a total population of around 21.5 million in the island nation) calls for genuine soul searching as regards how the people of this island nation should arise from this tragedy.

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May 3, 2019 · 8:11 am

Explosives! US Embassy Plot in Colombo sniffed out by Police Dogs?

Special Item Lanka Enews, 30 April 2019, entitled  “Police dogs render US diplomats speechless!” ….. https://lankanewsweb.net/news/special-news/42367-police-dogs-render-us-diplomats-speechless

In the wake of the recent suicide bombings at three luxury hotels on Easter Sunday, the management of Hilton Hotel Colombo had recently requested defense forces to inspect the hotel premises.

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May 3, 2019 · 4:12 am

Slippages: Where “Muslim” is an Ethnic Label as Well as a Religious Typification

Michael Roberts

From Waleel Aly to Greg Sheridan and Brendan O’Neill[1] the foreign writers who have ventured to comment on the recent Islamic jihadist attacks in Sri Lanka have invariably considered the category “Muslim” to be a religious identity. This is not completely erroneous. But this reading obscures the fact that the term is also an ethnic concept when placed in juxtaposition with the terms Sinhalese (Sinhala) and Tamils. Within the island one must attend carefully to the context of usage. Not surprisingly, these foreign reporters are unaware of these nuances.

A Moor gentleman -as depicted in Wright’s Twentieth Century Impressions of Ceylon 1905

Those whom we refer today in Sri Lankan English as “Muslim” were described till about the 1930s as “Mohammedan” and/or “Moor.” The term “Moors’’ was a racial category rendering them different from the term “Malay” – so that the Malays were a separate category under “RACE” in the 1921 census and counted as distinct from the Sinhalese, Tamils, Moors, Europeans, Burghers & Eurasians, Veddas and “Others.”[2] This differentiation is enshrined in the Sinhala speech insofar as Malays are identified as ja, javun or javo; while the Moors are described as yon or marakkala or thambiyo.

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May 3, 2019 · 3:41 am

Queensland Sri Lankans and FOG set up Fund for Batticaloa Victims

APPEAL from Jayantha Pathikirikorale, President, Federation of Sri Lankan Organisations of Queensland Inc.

Dear friends,  ….. You will be aware of the terrible events in Sri Lanka on Easter Sunday, April 21. A wave of terrorist bombings of churches and hotels claimed the lives of 253 people and injured more than 500. The island nation, its people and indeed the world has been left in shock by these senseless acts. Sri Lanka has had more than its share of horrors and sorrows in the past three decades. The country endured a 26-year civil war that had a heavy death toll; the 2004 Boxing Day tsunami claimed more than 35,000 lives, and this latest atrocity has shattered its spirit.

A relative of a Sri Lankan victim of an explosion at a church weeps outside a hospital in Batticaloa [Lakruwan Wanniarachchi/AFP]

How much more can one country bear?

As the world rallies to help, we in the lucky country, Australia, are called on to do our bit to support the families of victims. As in the past, the Federation of Sri Lankan Organisations of Queensland (FSOQ) is initiating an appeal for help. In consultation with the Honorary Consul for Sri Lanka in Queensland, Anton Swan, and the founder of the Foundation of Goodness, Kushil Gunasekera, the FSOQ will support affected families in Batticaloa, in eastern Sri Lanka – one of the terrorist targets. Immediate past president of the FSOQ Bill Deutrom will oversee the project in Sri Lanka. Continue reading →

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May 2, 2019 · 7:02 am

The Skirmish at Sainthamaruthu and the Suicidal Deaths of Some Wahhabi Jihadists -Jeyaraj as Investigative Journalist

DBS Jeyaraj, in Daily Mirror, 2 May 2019, where the title is “Battle of Sainthamaruthu Zahran’s family members dead in Sainthamaruthu skirmish between security forces and Islamic State terrorists”

Sri Lanka’s security forces have engaged in many battles and armed confrontations during the long war against the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE). The military defeat of the LTTE in May 2009 brought an end to the conflict. Thereafter for ten years, the country has been experiencing peace and relative tranquillity. The armed forces too were confined to barracks most of the time as there was no enemy to combat. The Easter Sunday suicide bomber attacks on Churches and Hotels on April 21st shattered this blissful situation. Sri Lanka was in peril and once again the sacred duty of guarding the nation beckoned to the armed forces after the guns of the Tigers were silenced a decade ago.

  • The firing went on for about three and a half hours from 7.30 p.m. to 11 P.m. 
  • fifteen bodies consisting of six men, six children and three women were found amidst the wreckage
  • One came outside & threw bundle of 5,000 notes in the air As the currency notes scattered the youth shouted out

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May 2, 2019 · 3:56 am

The Dilemma facing Moderate Muslims and the State in Sri Lanka: Incisive Thoughts from Ranga Jayasuriya

Ranga Jayasuriya, in Daily Mirror, 30 April  2019, where the title is “How Wahhabism was fostered until it’s too late”

On Friday, the imam of a Sufi mosque in Saindamarudu was alerted by the locals about a suspicious crowd in a house in the neighbourhood housing scheme called, Bolivia village. That is an exclusively Muslim housing scheme of 400 houses built after the Indian Ocean tsunami. The owner of one of the houses there had given his residence on rent to a man who claims to be a telecom engineer from Kattankudy; since new tenants moved in, he has observed a stream of unusual visitors to his house.

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