killing fields,GOSL responses,NGO taken over by MOD etc
Sri Lanka Brief Update /20 June 2011
- First ever interview with Journalists for Democracy in Sri Lanka (JDS)
- Film ‘Sri Lanka killing fields’ continue to make headlines
- Secretary defence accept the killing of arrested LTTE leader and says killed VOT journalist is a LTTE leader
- Defence ministry talks over a NGO, appoint a brigadier
Our video make IC interested on war crimes in Sri Lanka – JDS
The international community took up the issue of the war crimes taking place in the course of the armed conflict between the Sinhalese state and Tamil rebels. The international discourse changed dramatically after the posting of the video of the executions (by JDS). Until then, the international community had only been interested in the situation of internally displaced people. – Rohitha Bashana Abewardana speaking to RSF
Sri Lanka’s “Novel way to kill tens of thousands”:
-The Times
And he was right. Within three months of the UN leaving, the Sri Lankan Government was herding between 300,000 and 400,000 Tamils into a “safety zone” to the east of the island. With no international witnesses left, these, then, became the killing fields of the Killing Fields — not fields at all, but a beach, a sandy spit of land that must have featured in thousands of tourist photographs. In a grotesque perversion of humanity, the military had considered the mechanics of human grieving and come up with a novel way to kill tens of thousands.
Lanka seeks dialogue with UN rapporteur on C 4 allegations
-Minister Maninda Samarasinghe
Sri Lanka has accused Britain’s Channel 4 Television of not providing the government with a copy of the video titled ‘Sri Lanka’s Killing Fields’ but assured that it is ready “to constructively engage” with the UN Rapporteur on Extrajudicial, Summary or Arbitrary Executions. The offer to engage with Rapporteur Christof Heyns was made when Minister Mahinda Samarasinghe, who led Sri Lanka’s delegation to the UN Human Rights Council sessions in Geneva, tabled the Government’s response to the Channel 4 video at the sessions last week.
Graphic footage of the murder of Tamil civilians should move the world to seek justice
Chris Cobb, The Ottawa Citizen
Should the worst of the images have been shown? Absolutely. The outpouring of outrage across the world, and the calls for a long-overdue independent inquiry, are evidence enough of the documentary’s positive impact…In what would be a laughable comment if the circumstances weren’t so horrific, the Sri Lankan Defence Ministry accused Channel 4 of failing to meet “standards and fairness” expected of a respectable TV network.Killing Fields also makes the point that the rebel Tamil Tigers were no innocents.
‘Sri Lanka killing fields ‘: Colonel Ramesh killing justified
Special reporter LeN
‘In the channel 4 documentary it was shown that an LTTE leader being arrested by the Army and interrogated, and later his dead body was found . They are blowing this incident out of proportion . But they do not say who this terrorist is . This terrorist is the leader who killed our Buddhist prelates in the East in cold blood. He is the individual who killed 600 policemen who were unarmed. He is the one who killed innocent mothers and children in the villages. This documentary displays scenes without explaining who this individual is’.
‘Sri Lanka Killing fields’: (VoT Journalist) Issipriya a LTTE combatant
- Ministry of Defence, GOSL
Channel 4 News revealed that one of the victims was a high profile member of the Tamil Tigers – but claimed she was just a journalist rather than a direct fighter as a result of a heart condition. Issipriya was born in 1982 in Jaffna and was subsequently recruited by the LTTE and underwent military training in the Wanni. She then served in the LTTE Military Wing and subsequently joined the "Voice of Tigers", the official radio station of the LTTE.Read More
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