[Human Rights Watch]

The United Kingdom should suspend deportations of ethnic Tamil asylum seekers to Sri Lanka and immediately review its policies and information about the country’s rights situation used to assess their claims, Human Rights Watch said today. Research by Human Rights Watch has found that some returned Tamil asylum seekers from the United Kingdom have been subjected to arbitrary arrest and torture upon their return to Sri Lanka.

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[Reuters]

Britain named a special envoy to Sri Lanka Thursday to try to ease hardship caused by the country’s long-running civil war and to help in the search for a political solution. Prime Minister Gordon Brown said the priorities were to achieve a cease-fire and to get a political settlement in Sri Lanka, where tens of thousands of civilians are trapped in a small area held by the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE).”I’ve asked Des Browne, our former defence secretary, to be an envoy for Sri Lanka,” Brown told a parliamentary committee. “I want him to be involved in seeing whether there is scope for political progress in Sri Lanka as well as looking at the issues of humanitarian aid.”

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[Desi Hits]

The heart of Sri Lanka’s civilians, the soul of United Kingdom, and the memories of being a Sri Lankan refugee are all parts of what creates M.I.A’s flow! Maya Arulpragasam, better known as her stage name M.I.A., experienced a journey that is heard through her music. The Grammy Awards nominated artist was born in the UK. Six months after her birth, she and her family moved to Sri Lanka where M.I.A spent the next ten years of her life. During this time, a conflict between the insurgent Tamil separatists and the majority Sinhanlese broke out into a war. M.I.A fled Sri Lanka with her mother and first took refuge in India.

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