Reviews and comments on the film Sri Lanka Killing fields by C-4
Sri Lanka Brief Update /16 June 2011
Reviews and comments on the film Sri Lanka Killing fields by C-4
Channel 4′s Sri Lanka documentary draws 700,000 viewers
Sri Lanka’s Killing Fields: Channel 4, 11.05pm – The documentary presented by Jon Snow investigated alleged war crimes carried out in the final weeks of the Sri Lankan civil war in 2009 and was broadcast in a late evening slot due to the shocking nature of some of the footage. The documentary attracted 700,000 viewers and an 8.3% audience share in its slot, with about another 100,000 watching an hour later on Channel.
What new footage and new evidence of war crimes is in the Channel 4 documentary?
Amnesty International
• Previously unaired mobile phone footage of point-blank extrajudicial executions of three people, including a woman.
• Previously unaired mobile phone footage of dead Tamil Tigers, including women, that suggests sexual abuse.
• First video testimony of a Tamil woman who says she and her daughter were gang-raped by Sri Lankan Army soldiers.
• Evidence and testimony that the Sri Lankan Army systematically and knowingly bombed hospitals and civilians, with the oversight of senior military and government officials.
Fake, made for LTTE money
Secretary Defence, Sri Lanka
“Once again some pro-LTTE elements have used the Channel 4 news agency after giving money to them (Channel 4) in order to tarnish the image of both the Sri Lankan government as well as the army,” Mr. Rajapaksa said. He also said that during the war, the army was always committed to save the lives of innocent civilians and never harmed their lives.
Expect to see progress of Investigation by end 2011
Alistair Burt, Foreign Office minister, UK
Alistair Burt, the Foreign Office minister, said he was shocked after watching scenes that showed screaming Tamil civilians running for cover during shelling attacks and blindfolded and bound female rebel fighters being executed with a gunshot to the back of the head. "Since the end of the conflict, the UK has called for an independent, thorough and credible investigation of the allegations that war crimes were committed during the hostilities, and the UK Government expects to see progress by the end of the year,"
Innocents in the line of fire
by Tom Sutcliffefor The Guardian
Nothing you saw in the first half of the programme could conclusively prove that charge, or confirm the belief that the Sri Lankans would pause after one shell and then fire another to kill the rescuers, though it did corroborate eyewitness descriptions of appalling conditions on the shrinking strip of land occupied by the Tamils. Because it was filmed by the victims, it’s all too easy for the Sri Lankan government to argue that it represents only the chaos of an ugly war, rather than hard evidence of a war crime. But their only workable strategy with the film that followed, though, was to dismiss it as a fake, since it incontrovertibly showed Sri Lankan soldiers executing prisoners in cold blood.
Why show it to members of another nation?
Serena Davies for The Telegraph
Watching these films made me retch and I wonder quite what the purpose was of viewers being exposed to such horror. Snow said he believed the films should be made public, but why to the British public? Should untutored members of another nation, one on the other side of the world and with no claims now over its former colony, be the people to bear witness to such grotesque behaviour, watching a sequence of these squalid little films and adding a final violation of the victims’ privacy?
Evidence that won’t be buried
Guardian Editorial
‘Sri Lanka trying to pretend events of summarily executed prisoners are history, as the economy and tourism pick up. They are not’
Evidence that won’t be buried: On this occasion there are reasons why it was right to dispense with the responsibility broadcasters have to avoid causing distress
Where was the International community ? and why now?
INTERNATIONAL BUSINESS TIMES
While the war crimes that were committed need to be investigated and the Sri Lankan government need to be held accountable for the violence that gripped the country, will an intervention from the international community in denouncing the atrocities really help the Sri Lankan society heal its wounds and move forward? And with a tribunal likely to
be set up in The Hague, how will the population on the island feel involved in the judicial processes that will take place?
Would hurt SL internationally not locally
Director General ,Media Centre for National Security, SL
…..even if viewed by locals, would not diminish the morale or image of the military because within the country it was a forgone-conclusion that the footage was manipulated. However he admitted that the video would hurt Sri Lanka’s international image. “It is definitely going to look bad for Sri Lanka internationally. Yet it
has been internationally recognized that the Sri Lankan forces are one of the most disciplined forces in the world, especially during the humanitarian operation,” Mr. Hulugalle said.
Oversees Sri Lankans should try to break the wall of denial
By Savi Hensman – . Ekklesia
Sri Lankans overseas, and all worldwide who care about the wellbeing of the people of Sri Lanka, can play a part in trying to break through the wall of denial. Though there were well-meaning individuals in the ranks of the Tigers and still are in the armed forces, their top leaders behaved in ways that inflicted terrible harm on non-combatants. Whether or not the perpetrators of abuses are punished, the grief and suffering
of those who were hurt deserves to be acknowledged, and efforts made to ensure they have a secure future.
One of the best pieces of television journalism on conflict
Andrew Stroehlein, Communications Director, International Crisis Group
The other thing that makes this documentary so good is that the Channel 4 journalists keep themselves out of the story. Neither Jon Snow nor anyone else working on the piece inserts their own take on things or distracts from the real issues with me-me journalism. The story thus speaks for itself.
Sri Lanka Brief update – Reviews and comments on film Sri LankaKilling Fields 16.06,2011.pdf
Sri Lanka Brief update -Rreviews and comments on film Sri LankaKilling fields 16.06.2011..docm
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