by: Dr. Tissa Abeysekara

“Behind the fear were the hunger and the thirst, and behind the hunger and the thirst was fear again.”

Much has been said of how DA followed SWRD Bandaranaike across the well of the House of Parliament when the latter crossed-over into the Opposition ranks. For me there was a deep significance in that move. In that historic photograph, which I first saw as an unknowing little boy, D.A. Rajapaksa seems to follow Bandaranaike, effortlessly.

For him, it was coming home. Perhaps he was never easy within the ranks which represented the privileged class. With that memorable line opens Leonard Woolf’s novel, Village in the Jungle, which according to the great Chilean Poet Pablo Neruda is a masterpiece ‘both true to life and literature’. Woolf’s line as quoted above sums up with almost clinical precision the harsh and brutal nature of life in the arid deep south of Sri Lanka at the turn of the last century.

by:C. S. Poolokasingham  

SCOPP Deputy Secretary General remembers 

The late Dr. Premasiri Khemadasa, fondly known as ‘Master’, passed away at the age of 71 on October 24th at a private hospital in Colombo. He had been ailing for some time.
Recognising his contribution to the art world in Sri Lanka, the Government organised a funeral with state honours at Independence Square. Dr. Khemadasa’s remains were brought in a procession from his home in Rajagiriya, taking almost two hours to cover the short distance with many thousands of his followers accompanying the cortege.

I was asked to give the funeral oration in Tamil, having known and closely associated with Dr. Khemadasa and his family over the last 15 years. 

Given below are extracts from a collection of articles and speeches made by Dr. Jayatilleka (from March 2008 up to now) in which he has made direct references to Barack Obama.  

• Extract taken from a speech given at the UN: Take Barack Obama’s historic speech as example in approaching racism, racial discrimination, appeals Sri Lankan ambassador Dr.Dayan Jayatilleka at UN Human Rights Council (26th March 2008)

  “A new way which puts us on a far higher analytical and ethical vantage point. A new way has opened up to regard and discuss these problems. I refer to the historic speech made by Barack Obama, confronting honestly but not aggressively, these phenomena in his own society, but with a far wider relevance than purely to his society alone. My appeal is that our own discussions, our search, our strivings in the inter-governmental working group, in other Durban related spaces, and in any discussion of this interrelated scourges, we must take into account and seek to emulate that example of Senator Obama which I personally consider to have opened up a new paradigm, may be even a new episteme, in discussing this subject.” 

Web link: Take Barack Obama’s historic speech as example in approaching racism, racial discrimination, appeals Sri Lankan ambassador Dr.Dayan Jayatilleka at UN Human Rights Council

by: DAYAN JAYATILLEKA 

"…change this country, and change the world!" – Barack Obama

"He is a transformational figure coming onto the world stage"- Colin Powell

History sometimes hits a high note, sweet and soaring, clean and clear, as if from Satchmo’s horn. The most intelligent, interesting and inspirational of contemporary political personalities is about to be the President of the most powerful nation on the planet. Things will never be the same again. Obama will "electrify the world" predicted Colin Powell.

Obama’s achievement, in and of itself, already changes the world; is a step forward in socio-political achievement. No country however idiosyncratic or culturally narcissistic can live outside the stream of world history. This is more so in the Information Age— the era of "interconnectivity", as Obama terms it. The Obama Effect will be globalized, albeit unevenly. We shall all feel its push and pull factor.

by: Prof. Rajiva Wijesinha

The Thimpu talks

Discussions with the LTTE began with what are termed the Thimpu talks in 1985. The LTTE and other militant groups attended along with the TULF, the main Tamil political party, elected to Parliament in 1977 but no longer there because they vacated their seats consequent to the 6^th amendment to the Constitution passed in 1983. In any case, following the anti-Tamil riots of 1983, influence amongst Tamils had passed from the TULF to militant groups, which all attended at Thimpu. Both sides claimed the intransigence of the other led to the breakdown of the talks. However, to quote Kethesh Loganathan, who represented one of the militant groups at the time, ‘The Tamil organizations took the position that the burden of presenting a broadly acceptable formula lay with Colombo.

The Tamil delegation, instead, subjected the Sri Lankan government delegation to a series of ‘lectures’ on what constitutes the ethnic question and as to why the burden lay with Colombo to come out with a solution “worthy of our consideration”’.Even more significantly, the LTTE used this period to strengthen itself at the expense of the other Tamil groups. They decimated the EPRLF and eliminated Sri Sabaratnam, the leader of TELO, and by the time the talks broke down had emerged as by far the most powerful of the groups.

By:Dayan Jayatilleka

"All along the watchtower, princes kept the view"
- Bob Dylan, All Along the Watchtower

by Prof. Rajiva Wijesinha

Bishop Lakshman Wickremesinghe died 25 years ago, on October 23rd 1983, exactly three months after the July racist riots began. In death he exemplified the Christian faith he subscribed to, for he sacrificed his life for his fellow men, the Tamils he realized had been indelibly scarred by the riots.He was in England when the riots happened, on sabbatical after being advised to rest following a heart attack.

by: Dayan Jayatilleka

by: Dayan Jayatilleka

While I worry and agonize about the country and its prospects – a habit of decades—I refuse to succumb to the pessimism that seems to consume most commentators writing in English on Sri Lankan affairs. That pessimism and negativism stems from two broad sources. Insofar as several are pacifist "civil society" liberals as distinct from Realist or pragmatic liberals (such as Barack Obama), they lament the Sri Lankan armed forces military drive and the prospects of a Sri Lankan military victory over the LTTE, preferring a ceasefire and negotiated solution between the two belligerents. These critics have been joined by Sri Lankan commentators who mistakenly see a parallel between the policies and ideology of the Rajapaksa administration and those of the Bush administration. Not only do they confuse an internal war of self–defense and reunification against secessionist terrorism with a war of aggression against a sovereign country, their perspective is very far from the pragmatic liberalism of the Obama ticket.

by: Kalana Senaratne 

Japan has risen amazingly from the ashes of the Second World War, with renewed vigour and vitality. Devastated as it were from the atomic bombings in Hiroshima and Nagasaki, the rest of the world would have expected it to be smarting from rancour, bent on taking revenge from those who inflicted such devastation. Not so. On the contrary, it has risen to be the principal actor in the realm of peacebuilding and fostering peace around the world. Indeed, the magnitude of its work makes one pity its solitude; for those who, at the end of WWII, assumed for themselves the responsibility of promoting peace are currently engaged in doing exactly the opposite.