A Beautiful tale … with British humour … and stunning pictures …. disguising the hard yards
A MUST SEE: http://www.elakiri.com/forum/showthread.php?t=1687848
A Pol Pot Hell-Hole: Thamilini’s Disenchantment with Prabhakaran and the Tigers in 2009
T. N. Gopalan, courtesy of newsminute … 17 March 2016, where the title is “Woman LTTE leader’s memoir exposing their brutality has created a furor among Tamils” … with a few footnotes added by the Thuppahi editor nad highlights deployed to assist reading.
“No question now, what had happened to the faces of the pigs. The creatures outside looked from pig to man, and from man to pig, and from pig to man again; but already it was impossible to say which was which.” Thamizhini, aka Sivakami Subramaniam,** in-charge of the political wing of the women’s section in the LTTE, might not have been familiar with the devastating close of the celebrated Animal Farm by George Orwell. But she perhaps felt as much when she learnt of the instructions to shoot at the legs of those innocent Tamils crossing over to government-controlled areas in the closing stages of the war in 2009. Continue reading
Filed under accountability, atrocities, authoritarian regimes, Eelam, Fascism, governance, historical interpretation, life stories, LTTE, mass conscription, military strategy, politIcal discourse, power politics, prabhakaran, Rajapaksa regime, Sinhala-Tamil Relations, sri lankan society, Tamil civilians, Tamil Tiger fighters, the imaginary and the real, unusual people, war crimes, war reportage, world events & processes
Reuters in Word and Image: Depicting the Penetration of the LTTE’s Last Redoubt, 19-22 April 2009
Michael Roberts
On the night of Sunday, the 19th April, the SL Army’s special forces crossed the waters of Nandikadal Lagoon and “blasted through a massive earthen wall built by the LTTE” (Hull & Sirilal 2009a) at a point near Pokkanai (see Figs. A & B) and secured a beachhead within the area that is best described as the Last Redoubt (rather than the “Second No Fire Zone – because that phrase is not legally valid). In doing so the Government of Sri Lanka was disregarding instructions, supported by threats, from the US government via its ambassador Robert Blake not to enter that arena.[1]
A=Graphic Map composed by International Crisis Group
Dual Citizenship on the Rise: Sri Lankans ALL
News Item in Hiru News … http://www.hirunews.lk/128603/more-applicants-for-dual-citizenship
Pic from www.kolahstudio.com
The heightened interest to obtain dual citizenship by Sri Lankans living abroad is a testimony on the positive political and economic development of the country, Minister of Internal Affairs S. B. Navinna said speaking at the citizenship awarding ceremony yesterday (March 14). Dispelling any fears that awarding dual citizenships is to be suspended again, he assured that the government plans encourage Sri Lankans living abroad to return to the country and contribute to its development. Over 1200 Sri Lankans living abroad were awarded dual citizenship by the Immigration Department while 4232 Sri Lankans have so far obtained the citizenship.
According to the Controller General of Immigration over 20,000 applications have been received by the department. This is in comparison to the 30,000 applications received during the 24 year period dual citizenship was awarded, before its suspension in 2011. Another batch of over 1000 applicants will be awarded dual citizenship by April, the minister said. The delay in application processing is due to the complicated process followed in evaluating all applications and due to sheer volume of applications received, Minister Navinna said.
Pic from www.nondualitymagazine.org
Musings I: The Gambler’s Guide to Sri Lanka’s Prospects at the T20 World Cup
Michael Roberts, courtesy of islandcricket.lk… http://www.islandcricket.lk/columns/michael_roberts/471830215/wt20-sri-lankas-prospects-and-the-gambler-s-guide
KOLKATA, INDIA – MARCH 13: Heavy security presence during a Pakistan training session at Eden Gardens on March 13, 2016 in Kolkata, India. (Photo by Jan Kruger-IDI/IDI via Getty Images)
“Dim and Slim.” That was (and remains) my answer to a question presented by Hilal Suhaib of islandcricket.lk about Sri Lanka’s chances at the World Twenty-Twenty in India. That question was asked a week back. I was going to add another quotable quote as caveat: “but that can be a plus — with nothing to lose Lanka can spring surprises.” Continue reading
The Contretemps surrounding Kishani Jayasinghe’s Operatic “Dunno Budunge”
Izeth Hussain, in The Island, 11 March 2016, here the title is “The Politics of Kishani Jayasinghe”
Probably Kishani Jayasinghe will say that she has no politics at all. She is an opera singer by profession, indeed by vocation, which requires much time and unceasing effort, leaving no space in her life for engagement or even interest in politics. She therefore leaves politics alone. But she realized on February 4 that while she may want to leave politics alone politics won’t leave her alone. That is not the consequence of her being a celebrity. It is the fate of all of us who have to cope with modernity that politics will not leave us alone. That is why there have been so many articles and letters to the editor about the fate that befell her on February 4, including one by Kishani J herself. All of them have focused on the politics of what happened on February 4, more particularly on the question of the alleged outrage to national sentiment in her operatic rendering of Dunno Budunge. Continue reading
Filed under British colonialism, cultural transmission, economic processes, female empowerment, heritage, historical interpretation, Indian Ocean politics, landscape wondrous, life stories, modernity & modernization, patriotism, performance, politIcal discourse, self-reflexivity, Sinhala-Tamil Relations, sri lankan society, unusual people, world events & processes
In the Ecumenical Service of Humanity: Fr. Paul Caspersz, s.j.
ONE: Jayantha Somasundaram, reminding us today via an article he penned in 2009 entitled “Paul Caspersz: The Politics of Religion” on his 80th birthday
Rev. Fr. Paul Caspersz, SJ, who celebrated his eightieth birthday was recently felicitated with a national seminar that dealt both with global as well as national issues of development. This reflection on the politics of religion in Sri Lanka is penned as a tribute to him.
The secularisation of life and thought that the thinkers of the Enlightenment foreshadowed has yet to come to pass. The last priest has not yet been strangled with the entrails of the last king. Despite the efforts of men and women of faith to disassociate themselves from politics, no world view or ideology can be impervious to the issues surrounding our social and political relationships. This is why the American Evangelist Billy Graham said: The choicest places in hell are reserved for those who are neutral on the big issues of life. Continue reading
Lessons from Napoleon’s Army for Today’s Military
Fred Reed, courtesy of the unZ Review, 3 March 2016 … http://www.unz.com/freed/reviving-napoleons-army/ .. where the title is “Reviving Napoleon’s Army – “Cry havoc, and Let Slip the Frogs of Yore”
It is curious how little military men know about war. You would think they would think about it more. Yet, oddly, they regularly misjudge practically everything concerning the dismal trade. Their errors are not the sort that inevitably must occur in a contest, as when a quarterback doesn’t pick up a blitz. They are fundamental misappreciations of war itself. The foregoing sounds both arrogant and improbable, like saying that dentists do not understand teeth. Actually it is neither.
The reasons are several. First, the military attracts certain kinds of men—authoritarian, hierarchical, conformist—who are not imaginative and do not think independently. Second, the appeal of the military is visceral, emotional, hormonal. Neither of these things is true of dentists. 
SEE https://www.google.com.au/search?tbm=isch&q=trench+warfare+photos+World+war+I&gws_rd=cr,ssl&ei=uRnhVoLBDcjujwOc_K3wAg#tbs=simg%3Am00&tbnid=Bf7qrmahwyhL2M%3A&docid=zJIqjHIqZHvxTM&tbm=isch&imgrc=JIqheGROOQLZvM%3A
Gotabaya Rajapaksa Clarifies, III: American Volte Face in 2008
Michael Roberts, courtesy of Colombo Telegraph
During the telephone conversation with former Defence Secretary, Gotabaya Rajapaksa, on Monday 7th March a tangential path developed towards the end of the session: namely, USA’s striking shift of emphasis and increasing hostility to the government of Sri Lanka at some point in 2008. Gotabaya Rajapaksa agreed with my allusion to this change. The information below does not follow the sequence of my notes, but adheres to a temporal order.
Ebden, Rice & Obama Continue reading
Filed under accountability, american imperialism, authoritarian regimes, economic processes, governance, historical interpretation, Indian Ocean politics, law of armed conflict, life stories, LTTE, politIcal discourse, power politics, prabhakaran, Rajapaksa regime, Responsibility to Protect or R2P, Sinhala-Tamil Relations, slanted reportage, sri lankan society, Tamil migration, Tamil Tiger fighters, truth as casualty of war, unusual people, war reportage, world events & processes
Empowered Sri Lankan Women: In Past Times and Now
Rochana Jayasinghe, courtesy of The Island, 10 March 2016, where the title is “A parallel between Sri Lankan woman and her western counterpart. ‘Being but a woman, raise not the sword?’”
Pic from DBS Jeyaraj
In divorce, too, western women were in a precarious position. A husband needed only to show evidence of his wife’s adultery to obtain a divorce, her property and custody of their children. The wife had to show evidence of other marital shortcomings besides adultery to get a divorce, for example, cruelty, incest, rape or desertion. Then again, beating one’s wife was LEGAL at the time. Well, the entire world just celebrated the day of the woman on March 8th. On this note, it would be quite fitting to look upon the role of women in our own country – whether women in Sri Lanka have overcome the perennial role of the second fiddle that women have always occupied throughout world history, or whether they are currently at an impasse. Continue reading
Filed under British colonialism, cultural transmission, discrimination, economic processes, female empowerment, heritage, historical interpretation, Indian traditions, island economy, landscape wondrous, legal issues, life stories, politIcal discourse, power politics, self-reflexivity, social justice, sri lankan society, the imaginary and the real, welfare & philanthophy, world affairs
