[The Global and Mail]

For Tamils, the end of Sri Lanka’s civil war has brought no peace dividend; for Tamil women, peace has brought with it a continuation – and in some cases an intensification – of violence and insecurity. In the country’s predominantly Tamil-speaking north and east – a region half the size of Nova Scotia – tens of thousands of “war widows” have been living under the control of the central government and Sinhalese security forces since 2009 and the end of the civil war, whose last few months saw as many as 40,000 civilians killed.

[Full Story]

[BBC]

The Tamil National Alliance (TNA) took 18 out of 26 councils in what is being seen as a rare electoral setback for the government of President Rajapaksa.

[Full Story]

[BBC]

On the face of it, President Mahindra Rajapaksa has fulfilled his election promise to defeat the Tamil Tigers and end their military campaign for a separate homeland in the north and east of the country for good. But dig a little deeper and the matters become much more complicated. Although the Tamil Tigers are unquestionably on the back foot, it would be dangerous to discount them as a spent force. They have proved time and time again over the past 20 years that they are a disciplined, organised and at times ruthless guerrilla outfit.

[Full Story]

[ AHRC ]

The government’s declaration that the terrorism represented by the LTTE has been substantially defeated, despite of a small area which remains under LTTE control, should provide a much needed opportunity to deal with the widespread lawlessness in all parts of the country, the south, north and east; the most unprecedented types of corruption that has spread into all areas of public life and the collapse of all public institutions under the perverse influence of the rogue constitution of 1978, which in its 30 years of existence has virtually diminished the vigour and authority of all public institutions.

[Full Story]

[ AP ]

Sri Lanka’s Tamil Tiger separatists are open to restarting peace talks with the government, despite the continuing military offensive aimed at crushing the group, a senior rebel official said. The two sides have been fighting for more than 25 years over the rebels’ demands for an independent state for minority Tamils in the north and east of this Indian Ocean island nation. A new military push deep into the rebel heartland in recent months has forced the Tamil Tigers to retreat from vast swaths of land they once controlled, and the government has said it expects to finish off the group in the coming months.

[Full Story]

[ IPI ]

Media in the North and East of the country have continued to bear the brunt of the worst forms of insecurity. Media access to war-affected areas is heavily restricted with journalists forced to reproduce information disseminated by the conflicting parties. Media are constantly threatened by all parties to the conflict in an effort to curtail independent and critical reporting. The International Mission condemns the murder of P. Devakumar in Jaffna in May 2008, as well as over a dozen other murders documented since 2005. The Mission is worried about the dangerous precedent this sets for all media nationally and internationally.

[Full Story]