An "online safety bill" that mandates five-year prison sentences for any social media post government regulators consider to be "false" or causing offence is set to be presented to parliament this week.

The draft law compels social media platforms to divulge the identity of anonymous users accused of those crimes with a 10 million rupee ($31,000) fine for non-compliance.

"This is a very draconian piece of legislation that will have a chilling effect on the entire population," Lasantha Ruhunuge of the Sri Lanka Working Journalists' Association told reporters.

Read More

Fr Amila Jeewantha Peirism is asking for the Court's protection to safeguard his fundamental rights and prevent his arrest. He has been a key figure during Sri Lanka's anti-government protests.

The priest says as a responsible citizen he actively participated in the peaceful anti-government struggle, but is concerned he may be arrested on false charges.

The police say they have orders to arrest him and a court has put a foreign travel ban on him.

Over 1,600 Catholic priests, nuns and brothers have made statements on his behalf. They are lobbying against attempts to pressure Jeewantha and other protesters.

A student who worked with Jeewantha said he "always stood for non-violence and could never [despite accusations] cause damage to public property."

Protesters have been arrested

Prominent protester Dhaniz Ali was arrested when he was about to board an international flight from Colombo last week.

Unidentified men in civilian clothes abducted Veranga Pushpika. He is a former student activist and journalist who had also been active in the anti-government protest.

Police have launched an investigation against Kayleigh "Kayz" Fraser. The British woman is said to be actively involved in the protests. The Department of Immigration confiscated her passport on Tuesday.

Authorities said that she had brought disrepute to Sri Lanka and its security forces on the international stage.

Human Rights Watch (HRW) is not impressed with the Sri Lankan government.

It is using emergency regulations to harass and arbitrarily detain activists seeking political reform and accountability for the country's economic crisis, HRW says.

"The government needs to end its repressive policies and practices and act urgently to address people's basic needs, win public trust and uphold the rule of law by holding those responsible to account."

Shehan Malaka is an activist who was abducted for seeking justice for Easter attack victims. He says there is a need to safeguard priests, nuns, activists, students and lawyers involved in anti-government protests.

Source

• UCA News

The situation blew up when a resident apparently misunderstood a Muslim man's Facebook post as posing a threat to Christians.

The Muslim man has been arrested.

Meanwhile, armed soldiers searched the congregation for explosives and guarded Colombo's St Theresa's Church during its first mass since the deadly Easter bombings that targeted Catholics and luxury hotel visitors.

Armed military forces and police patrolled the streets leading to churches. Everyone entering was required to produce identity cards and was body searched.

In addition volunteers were stationed at the gates of churches to identify parishioners and look for suspicious individuals.

Sri Lanka has been under a state of emergency since the Easter bombings which have been blamed on a local militant Islamic group.

Military forces and police have been given sweeping powers to arrest and detain suspects for long periods.

Religious tensions are high, with violence often spilling over. Last week for example, an argument between two men degenerated into religious violence leaving three people wounded.

Muslims make up around 10 percent of Buddhist-majority Sri Lanka's 21 million population. Christians represent about 7.6 percent of the population.

Source

• Al Jazeera
• Dawn
• Image: DW

If they don't, they risk the community taking justice into its own hands, warns Cardinal Malcom Ranjith of Colombo.

"I want to state that we may not be able to keep people under control in the absence of a stronger security programme," Ranjith says.

"We can't forever give them false promises and keep them calm."

He urged the government to "implement a proper programme in order that the people don't take the law into their own hands".

In his opinion, Ranjith says the government is "placing responsibility on others" when it comes to investigating what happened on Easter Sunday.

He says the government is creating a commission to conduct an investigation formed by "pensioners" and retired officials instead of applying the law and guaranteeing the safety of the Christian community.

Ranjith says he hasn't seen government taking the necessary steps to guarantee the safety of students, decreeing that schools should remain closed for the time being.

"Instead, I see a lot of bouncing of responsibilities around," he says.

"The result is that the country and the population continue to suffer. If the current regime doesn't have the adequate structures to fight terrorism, it will be impossible to contain the masses in the future."

Rather than wasting time "mulling over the past," Ranjith thinks the government should assume the responsibility of putting political differences aside in the search of a solution to the question of national security, hence freeing the country "from this pitiful state".

To achieve this, all political parties should put their political differences aside he says.

In addition to failing to meet its responsibilities, Ranjith says there's no "co-ordination" in the security operation. In this respect he posed questions, such as "who offered support to the terrorists" and who gave them access to the explosives.

In the time since the attacks the Church has been doing what it can to bring relief to those affected.

Besides visiting all the families and expressing condolences and solidarity, the Church is collecting information on those killed and wounded, and on the damages caused by the six bombs that exploded in three churches and three hotels to plan a "response programme."

Source

• Crux Now
• Image: America Magazine

The closures follow a series of church and hotel bombings at Easter which killed over 250 people.

The Archbishop of Colombo, Cardinal Malcolm Ranjith, said church officials had seen a leaked security document describing Catholic churches and other denominations as a major target for attackers.

Besides closing the churches, he asked the faithful to stay home for their own safety.

"We don't want repetitions," Ranjith said.

Instead, Ranjith celebrated Sunday's Mass from a small, private chapel at his home.

Several priests and political leaders, including President Maithripala Sirisena, prime minister Ranil Wickremesinghe and opposition leader Mahinda Rajapaksa attended the Archbishop's Mass which was broadcast via television to Catholics at home.

In his homily Randith said: "This is a time our hearts are tested by the great destruction that took place last Sunday. This is a time questions such as does God truly love us, does he have compassion towards us, can arise in human hearts."

Islamic State has claimed responsibility for the attacks. Dozens of suspects have been arrested.

Source

• The Tablet
• Vatican News
• Image: NBC News

He was giving the homily at a service to remember the victims of the Easter Sunday bombings in Sri Lanka.

"Speak out and be very clear that the extremists and the terrorists do not dictate or determine the conversation of interfaith dialogue and relations.

"The Sri Lankan community is small but deeply hurting, so it's important that we as a nation surround them with our love and our prayer," he said.

About 300 people from different faiths and communities lit candles and prayed during the special mass at St Mary's Catholic Church in Northcote on Saturday night.

The Mass was led by the assistant priest at St Mary's, Father Jude Algama, who was originally from Sri Lanka.

He said this week had been a very difficult time for his nation and also his local community in Auckland.

"They are really in a very desperate situation, crying and in pain and in fear.

"We have lost peace which we were enjoying the last few years after our civil war," he said.

A service was also held at St Peter and Paul's Church in Lower Hutt on Saturday evening.

A spokesperson for New Zealand's United Sri Lanka Association, Dr Chula Rajapakse, said the service was to show solidarity for those affected by the bombings.

Earlier in the week at the Anzac Day service in Auckland, Msgr Kiely had offered a prayer for the victims of suicide bombing attacks in Sri Lanka.

He asked for a moment's silence "to pray for our brothers and sisters affected by the atrocities in Christchurch and Sri Lanka.

"We pray for those who have grieved, for those who have died, for the wounded and for those disabled in body and mind," he said.

Source

• www.dailymail.co.uk
• radionz.co.nz
• tvnz.co.nz
• Image: impic.ie

Cardinal Malcolm Ranjith, the archbishop of Colombo, said Pope Francis will visit the Shrine of Our Lady of Madhu, 260 kms north of the capital.

This is in the heart of the former conflict zone.

The Pope will meet victims of Sri Lanka's civil war, which lasted from 1983 to 2009.

Francis's pilgrimage to the 400-year old shrine is expected to highlight ongoing human rights abuses and the deteriorating circumstances of Tamils, following the crushing of the Tamil Tiger insurgency.

Since then the north of the country has been under military occupation.

Reconciliation has stalled as the Sri Lankan government has refused to acknowledge war crimes.

Continue reading

Malcolm Ranjith, the archbishop of Colombo, said he was urging President Mahinda Rajapakse and the main ethnic Tamil party to hammer out a political settlement or risk an international probe.

"Foreigners should not tell us what to do... We are not a pack of fools," the cardinal said. "But if we do not resolve these issues, then we open ourselves to foreign intervention."

Sri Lanka has resisted international calls to investigate allegations that up to 40,000 ethnic Tamil civilians were killed by security forces in the final months of fighting in 2009.

At a Commonwealth summit hosted by Colombo last month, Britain's Prime Minister David Cameron warned that he would push for an international inquiry under the auspices of the UN unless Sri Lanka ensures accountability by March.

In a pastoral letter, the Church warned that failure on the part of Colombo to ensure accountability for alleged war crimes could trigger international investigations that will be a "serious threat to the sovereignty of the country".

Christians are a small minority in the mainly Buddhist country, but the Catholic Church wields considerable influence over the government and Ranjith is regarded as close to Rajapakse.

Since the 37-year separatist war ended in May 2009, there have been no attacks blamed on the defeated Tamil Tiger guerrillas who fought for independence for the island's ethnic Tamil minority.

The cardinal said the majority Sinhalese and Tamils should ensure reconciliation and politicians on both sides should be flexible and hammer out a political power sharing deal.

Source

AFP/UCA News
Image: Wikimedia Commons

He'd been away from Sri Lanka since February of 2010, when he fled the country for security reasons, and was looking forward to seeing his family.

But the happy homecoming would be short lived.

On January 28, a little over three weeks after he'd returned, he was abducted by a group of armed men in a white van.

"They accused me of being an LTTE [Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam] member who had come to Sri Lanka to regroup the LTTE," he said over the phone from the United Kingdom, where he has claimed asylum.

When Rojananth repeatedly denied these accusations, the men began torturing him.

"They beat me on the soles of my feet with pipes and electrical wires, and they beat me with wires and plastic pipes filled with sand on my back," he said. "They submerged my head in water and held me under until I suffocated."

The next day he was hung upside down and the torture continued.

"I was severely beaten," he said. "My head was covered with a petrol-sprayed polythene bag. I was suffocating and eventually became unconscious."

"When they asked questions or interrogated me, they burned me with cigarettes on the chest, shoulders and back," he added. Continue reading.

Source: UCANews

Image: Scars criss-cross the back of an ethnic Tamil man, who was tortured by Sri Lankan security forces in Batticaloa in September of 2012, UCANews

Ethnic tensions in Sri Lanka have traditionally occurred between the largely Buddhist majority Sinhalese, who make up around three-quarters of the country's 20 million residents, and its minority Tamils.

A series of violent attacks against Muslims by extremist Buddhist groups, often led by monks from an organization known as the Bodu Bala Sena, have recently erupted.

"This incident is particularly troubling in light of a number of recent attacks against the Muslim community in Sri Lanka," the US Embassy in Colombo said in a statement.

Police last week deployed commandos and imposed a curfew on a Colombo neighbourhood after a Buddhist-led mob attacked the mosque.

Sources

Financial Times

AFP/Straits Times

AP/The Washington Post

Image: Reuters/IBN Live

Cardinal Malcolm Ranjith, archbishop of Colombo, condemned "unhesitatingly" the military shooting that killed three people and wounded more than 50 others last week.

"We wish to condemn unhesitatingly the attack that was carried out by some elements of the [armed] forces on people," the archbishop said.

"Such actions cannot be accepted by anyone... We do not accept using one's power in a repressive manner to suppress protests, even if they get out of hand."

The military opened fire on Thursday on thousands of unarmed residents who were protesting against the contamination of their ground water supply, allegedly by chemical waste from a rubber glove factory.

Government ministers said the military was acting in self-defence because protesters threw petrol bombs and shot at them at the instigation of a third party bent on discrediting the government.

On Wednesday, priests and nuns joined hundreds of faithful in staging a candle-light vigil in the capital to protest against the military action.

Sources

Al Jazeera

AFP/Inquirer

AP/The New York Times

Image: AFP/Al Jazeera

Fairfax Media in Australia reported that Bernard Kevin McGrath flew out of Christchurch a few months ago, some time after 252 abuse charges were laid in a Newcastle court on June 27.

The charges relate to the 65-year-old McGrath's time at Church-run institutions in Newcastle-Maitland diocese during the late in 1970s and 1980s.

New South Wales police intended to extradite McGrath from Christchurch, where he had lived since being paroled in 2008. But a New Zealand police source said the formal extradition request did not arrive until November 15.

A Fairfax Media report said McGrath is now living on a tea plantation in the highlands of Sri Lanka.

The report said Sri Lanka is a known haven for paedophiles, particularly in its rural areas where criminals run large, organised child-sex operations. It quoted the online Factbook on Global Exploitation as saying that 10,000 to 12,000 children from rural areas in Sri Lanka are trafficked and prostituted to paedophiles by organised crime groups every year.

Although Australia does not have a direct extradition treaty with Sri Lanka, it can extradite suspects from there under the London Scheme, which enables Commonwealth countries to extradite fugitive criminals to each other upon the presentation of prima face evidence.

McGrath was a teacher and dormitory master at Marylands, a St John of God boarding school near Christchurch for boys with learning and behavioural difficulties.

In 1993 he was sentenced to three years' jail for offences at Marylands and the Hebron Trust, a learning centre for street kids.

In 2002, more complainants contacted New Zealand police concerning sexual assaults by McGrath, culminating in his conviction in 2006 on 22 abuse charges.

Source:

The Age

Image: NDJ World