December 24, 2014 · 5:07 am

Channel News Asia reviews Sri Lankan Presidential Election

Hop, Step and Jump with click to http://www.channelnewsasia.com/news/video/unexpected-competition/1522508.html …. 10 December 2014

An attempt to stay on in office that hasn’t gone quite to plan. Sri Lankan president Mahinda Rajapaksa called for snap elections, asking voters to give him an unprecedented third term. But he’s now facing a stronger than expected competition. Has the president made a miscalculation?

ANSWER as ADDENDUM; … not if his astrologer and horoscope’s guidance was on the button. OR if the deities at Thirupathi have any say in Lanka?

MR puja in India

MR + wife at THIRUPAHI

 

Leave a comment

Filed under accountability, authoritarian regimes, democratic measures, legal issues, life stories, performance, politIcal discourse, power politics, Rajapaksa regime, Sinhala-Tamil Relations, slanted reportage, sri lankan society, the imaginary and the real, world affairs

December 24, 2014 · 1:17 am

Tina Faulk’s “The Island of Singing Fish: a colonial childhood in Ceylon”

 

singing fishCeylon is a magical island which has enchanted adventurers, writers and soldiers for thousands of years.   It has, over six centuries, been ruled by three Great European Powers, Portuguese, Dutch and British. The legacy of these remain, in the language, culture, architecture and –most of all- the islanders themselves. The Island of Singing Fish is the story of a Sri Lankan family that began over five hundred years ago when Roelof Dircksz, a young Dutch trader working for the East India Company (the VOC) came ashore and married into a spice trader family in Galle Fort …. It’s the story of a family, a community and an island, written with love, nostalgia and the yearning for an island we all once called home…. Continue reading →

4 Comments

Filed under australian media, British colonialism, communal relations, cultural transmission, female empowerment, heritage, historical interpretation, landscape wondrous, life stories, literary achievements, Portuguese in Indian Ocean, sri lankan society, the imaginary and the real, unusual people, world affairs

December 23, 2014 · 9:56 am

Introducing Ranjit Ratnaike’s SARADASI

SARADASI cover  Saradasi-TheProphecy-cover-1

In a narrow valley, desolate and beautiful, surrounded by mountains heavy with snow, the Astral Lords chant softly, guiding the small spacecraft to tell its three passengers about The Prophecy. The leaders of the weary cosmic armies of good and evil have agreed each would field a small team to decide the fate of the Nereima Galaxy. The evil Prince Vira suggested virtue as the only weapon the divine astral Lord Gaima’s team would need for victory. Lord Gaima accepts members of the treacherous Saradasi race as his team, believing he can transflux enough virtue into them during their many cycles of rebirth before the battle. The Prophecy is fulfilled and the battle for the Nereima Galaxy begins. Shanaz, the beautiful young High Chancellor of the Saradasi Empire, leads Lord Gaima’s team into a parallel universe to begin the battle. Continue reading →

Leave a comment

Filed under cultural transmission, heritage, landscape wondrous, life stories, travelogue

December 21, 2014 · 1:42 pm

Attack on Pakistani GHQ: the confessions of a terrorist mastermind highlighted by DAWN

Dawn, 21 September 2011 …. http://www.dawn.com/news/660572/attack-on-ghq-confessions-of-a-terrorist-mastermind

Shortly after the attack on the Sri Lankan cricket team in 2009, Aqeel Ahmed alias Dr Usman alias Kamran alias Nazir Ahmed fled to Waziristan where he met the head of Tehrik-i-Taliban Pakistan’s Amjad Farooqui Group, Ustad Aslam Yasin and Ilyas Kashmiri.  The venue was Miramshah. The attendants of the meeting included some of the most notorious militants of Pakistan. And their agenda was nothing short of explosive — an attack on the GHQ with the aim to take military officers hostage.

GHQ attack item  Security forces on alert–Dawn

Shortly after the attack on the Sri Lankan cricket team in 2009, Aqeel Ahmed alias Dr Usman alias Kamran alias Nazir Ahmed fled to Waziristan where he met the head of Tehrik-i-Taliban Pakistan’s Amjad Farooqui Group, Ustad Aslam Yasin and Ilyas Kashmiri.

It was at this meeting that the idea of the attack on the General Headquarters was floated, reveals the main accused of the attack, Ahmed, in a confessional statement. He along with his seven accomplices was convicted by a military court on Aug 11, 2011, for the audacious attack on the GHQ in October 2009. Shooting their way into the military’s main headquarters, cowboy style, the militants took men hostage in one of the buildings. They remained there till the next morning when commandos finally entered the building, killing most of the militants and rescuing the hostages. Continue reading →

1 Comment

Filed under accountability, atrocities, Islamic fundamentalism, jihad, life stories, security, terrorism, trauma, unusual people, vengeance, world affairs, zealotry

December 21, 2014 · 12:41 pm

Mastermind of Attack on Sri Lankan Cricket Team has just been judicially executed

Courtesy of Sunday Times, … http://www.sundaytimes.lk/141221/news/hanged-kingpin-in-attack-at-lahore-on-lankan-cricket-team-128194.html, where the title is “Hanged: Kingpin in attack at Lahore on Lankan cricket team”

Aqeel Ahmad alias Dr. UsmanAqeel Ahmad alias Dr. Usman–Pic from Dawn

The suspected mastermind behind the bloody attack on the Sri Lankan national cricket team in the Pakistani city of Lahore in 2009 was hanged on Friday along with another terrorist suspect, foreign media reported. Aqeel Ahmad alias Dr. Usman was captured at a location in Lahore in October 2009 after he was injured while trying to blow himself up, the reports said. Continue reading →

3 Comments

Filed under atrocities, fundamentalism, governance, historical interpretation, Islamic fundamentalism, life stories, politIcal discourse, power politics, security, Taliban, terrorism, the imaginary and the real, world affairs, zealotry

December 20, 2014 · 1:14 pm

MARGA Institute presents itself

MARGA has refurbished its web site at http://www.margasrilanka.org/…. OR http://www.margastorehouse.org/ And several useful reviews of events and literature are now available for downloading as pdf via drop box pathways. Listed below are incisive documents on the last stages of Eelam War IV and its turbulent aftermath. One must go teach title and click on the links.

MARGA MYRTLE-

                                       TRUTH AND ACCOUNTABILITY

Continue reading →

1 Comment

Filed under cultural transmission, economic processes, education, historical interpretation, Left politics, legal issues, life stories, LTTE, politIcal discourse, power politics, self-reflexivity, Sinhala-Tamil Relations, sri lankan society, welfare & philanthophy

December 20, 2014 · 12:17 am

To use “Cultured Reason” against jihadist martyrdom is to piss into the wind

Chris Kenny , in The Australian, 18 December 2014, where it is entitled “Cultured reason meaningless response in face of death cult” …. while I would also suggest yet another heading, viz., “Idealist civil libertarians are no match for jihadists seeking blood on the path to martyrdom”

THE brutal nihilism of Islamist terrorism is a difficult concept for most of us to understand, but comprehend it we must.  This is an evil that can shoot a teenage girl because she dares to go to school. When Malala ­Yousafzai survived and was rewarded with the Nobel Peace Prize her Islamist extremist ­enemies were not chastened; ­rather, they have marched into a Pakistani school and slaughtered more than 100 children.

Pak school attack 1 Pic from AP ….http://mic.com/articles/106664/heartbreaking-photos-show-the-aftermath-of-the-taliban-s-brutal-school-attack

Continue reading →

3 Comments

Filed under accountability, atrocities, Australian culture, australian media, cultural transmission, democratic measures, disparagement, heritage, historical interpretation, Islamic fundamentalism, law of armed conflict, life stories, martyrdom, politIcal discourse, the imaginary and the real, trauma, world events & processes

December 19, 2014 · 10:16 am

Christina of Bunnik Tours in Raptures over Lanka’s Sights and Sites

Contributor headshot - Christina Pfeiffer dinkusChristina Pfeiffer, 18 December 2014

Women sashay past, saris fluttering and hips swaying rhythmically to the thumping drums. The high-pitched whining of a wind instrument draws me like the call of the Pied Piper. I’m swept along by the crowd of spiritual devotees circling a massive white stupa at Anuradhapura in Sri Lanka’s Cultural Triangle. The region, in the centre of the island, was the seat of two powerful kingdoms, Anuradhapura and Polonnaruwa. It’s the place to visit for statues, relics, ruins and to soak up Sri Lanka’s days of glory. There’s an air of mystery around the Cultural Triangle and although more than 2000 years have passed, I can still feel the seductive tug of power from a long-gone kingdom that was once great.

dd- smilesSmiles here there and everywhere–Pic by Pfeiffer Continue reading →

Leave a comment

Filed under australian media, island economy, landscape wondrous, photography, propaganda, sri lankan society, the imaginary and the real, tourism, travelogue, wild life

December 18, 2014 · 1:47 pm

Challenges remain for China–Sri Lanka Free Trade Agreement

Saman_KelegamaSaman Kelegama, reprint from EAST ASIA FORUM, March 2014

Although China–Sri Lanka trade had been growing steadily beforehand, China was not a large trading partner of Sri Lanka until 2005, which was a turning point in China–Sri Lankan economic relations. In the mid-2000s, China was increasingly asserting its global power via bilateral loans for developing countries in Asia and other continents. In Sri Lanka, a new government was looking for unconditional loans with negotiable repayment periods to defeat a drawn-out separatist war and develop neglected infrastructure in the country.The fusion of both these interests led to Chinese assistance, first in the form of arms and ammunition to win the war and then an overwhelming financial inflow for development of infrastructure projects — so much so that, by 2010, China had become the largest foreign finance partner of Sri Lanka. With so many Chinese projects in operation in Sri Lanka, trade with China has also increased during the last eight years with a widening  trade imbalance against Sri Lanka.

Continue reading →

1 Comment

Filed under accountability, economic processes, historical interpretation, Indian Ocean politics, modernity & modernization, performance, politIcal discourse, Rajapaksa regime, sri lankan society, the imaginary and the real, world events & processes

December 17, 2014 · 11:00 am

The Sydney Gunman Monis: Many Faces & Many Phases

“Greg Bearup, in The Australian 17 December 2014, with the heading “A Convert from Malcontent to Murderer”

ON the afternoon of the September terrorism raids in Sydney and Brisbane, a group of Muslims gathered to protest in Lakemba. One of them was the Martin Place gunman, Man Haron Monis; a man who saw himself as a peace activist. He stood out that day as the only visible Shia in a crowd of Sunni Muslims.

Monis’s gripes against the West were those common to many Muslims around the world, including many moderates. “You don’t feel our pain. Your ­remote-controlled bombs kill our children and no one is ever held ­responsible. Why are the deaths of your innocents atrocities, while the death of our innocents are collateral damage?” MONIS 2 Continue reading →

1 Comment

Filed under arab regimes, atrocities, Australian culture, australian media, Islamic fundamentalism, jihad, life stories, martyrdom, politIcal discourse, psychological urges, the imaginary and the real, vengeance, violence of language, world events & processes, zealotry