Against whom are the draconian laws?
The government has declared military rule with a parliamentary election due before the end of August. Conditions in the coming period may be worse than they are now, and the government still cannot, under any circumstances, refrain from holding the election.
Circle of a crisis
Sri Lanka has become a country caught in a vicious circle of crises with no way out, and the special feature of that circle is that each crisis is bigger and more dangerous than the one before it. Five passages of this column were removed by the censor and stand in the printed text as the single word Censored.
A new age of terror
The government called the harassment of the singers Rukantha Gunatilaka and Chandralekha Perera a robbery, and the levelling of Anoja Weerasinghe’s house at Moneragala a personal grudge. Set those explanations beside each other, Ivan argues, and a pattern appears that the country has seen before.
Who killed Kumar Ponnambalam?
Kumar Ponnambalam was the most courageous of Sri Lanka’s political commentators. He lived in Colombo among Sinhala people, most of his associates were Sinhala, and knowing exactly what it cost to defend the LTTE from Colombo he went on saying what he thought, fearlessly and well.
Towards another reign of terror!
The leaders of the People’s Alliance mean to stay in power for at least one more term whatever the people think of it. Consent and democratic principle are laughable matters to them: the feeling is that if the UNP held power for seventeen years, they are owed a minimum of one term more.