[Channel 4]

The Lessons Learnt and Reconciliation Commission, appointed by the Sri Lankan government last year, admitted that some isolated allegations of civilian abuses by security forces at the end of Sri Lanka’s civil war in 2009 need to be investigated further.

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[BBC]

Sri Lanka is close to completing a census of the number of civilians who died in the final phase of the civil war, the defence secretary has said. Gotabhaya Rajapaksa said the count proves the number of people killed as a result of government action was “far too small” to constitute war crimes.

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[Channel 4 News]

One of these eyewitnesses, an army officer, accuses Defence Secretary Gotabaya Rajapaksa - the president’s brother - of ordering Brigadier Shavendra Silva to execute Tamil rebel leaders, whose safe surrender had been guaranteed by the president.

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[AFP]

India on Friday urged Sri Lanka to examine claims made in a British documentary that said it targeted civilians while crushing Tamil Tiger rebels two years ago. The Channel 4 documentary, “Sri Lanka’s Killing Fields” aired last month on British television contained footage of what it said were prisoner executions.

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[ABC News]

Produced by the Channel 4 in Britain, the program forensically investigates allegations that up to 40,000 Tamil civilians were killed as Sri Lankan Government forces moved in to destroy the Tamil Tiger army. The program provides evidence that while the ‘Tigers’ used civilians as human shields, the Government forces repeatedly shelled civilians who had been offered sanctuary in “no fire zones”. The Government of Sri Lanka denies this, questioning the numbers killed and the authenticity of the visual evidence. You can judge for yourself.

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[AFP]

Sri Lanka’s president Mahinda Rajapakse has cited constitutional immunity and refused to go before a US court where he is being sued for $30 million over the killing of a Tamil man, an official said Sunday.

A US-based Tamil lobby had filed the case claiming damages from him as commander-in-chief of the Sri Lankan armed forces for the alleged killing of Raghiar Manoharan, a member of the island’s ethnic Tamil minority.

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