The London Declaration of 26 April 1949 has two important provisions. It renamed the “British Commonwealth” (Imperial British Empire) as the “Commonwealth of Nations” and it allows member countries with no colonial links to Britain to join, including monarchies and republics.

The motion for the impeachment of Chief Justice Shirani Bandaranayake has caused the most important constitutional crisis experienced in Sri Lanka in the recent decades.

Travel to Jaffna: Then and Now

When I returned home in 1995 with our pet Dalmatian with its spots, hostile crowds gathered around us at Katunayake with shouts of Koti-Balla (Tiger-Dog). On other trips I had been taken straight to the Katunayake Police Station, and held up at Vanuniya and released after my friend travelling with me was arrested.

The government kicked out Geethanjana Gunawardena, and in his place Senior Minister Dr. Sarath Amunugama was appointed as Deputy Finance Minister from November 1. However, it is claimed that Sarath Amunugama, for some years, has been considered as an incompetent minister. This new position was given to Sarath Amunugama in addition to the senior minister post he holds.

As the Israelis lay siege to Gaza, killing children by the score, our newsroom received a whole new batch of images from the Genocide in Sri Lanka that ended just a little over three years ago. The subject, as you will see at the bottom of this report, is one I have covered for years in great detail.

Sinhala nationalists who deny that the Tamils have any grievances are now campaigning for the abolition of the Provincial Councils under the 13th Amendment. But S.W.R.D the western educated liberal who introduced the Sinhala Only Law realized that an injustice was done to the Tamil people for it was not only an instrument to discriminate against Tamils in State employment but also to force them to deal with the State and its agencies only in Sinhala which the large majority of Tamil people did not know.

On the evening of the November 27 at 06:07 PM (local time), flames were lit in commemoration of Maaveerar Naal 2012 (Martyrs’ Day 2012). It was initiated by the Tamil students from the Jaffna University.

Minister Wimal Weerawansa, nicknamed as the ‘eldest son of the President’, during the 2010 presidential election campaign, came up with a rather serious proposal some two months back: To have a referendum to abolish the 13th Amendment to the Constitution, the constitutional chapter that deals with devolution of power.

A petition addressed to the Russian Ambassador demanding that the Moscow authorities end the ongoing intimidation, harassment and imprisonment of almost 20 Russian pro-democracy socialist activists was submitted today.

There is a huge list of United Nations resolutions that concern Israel; and the Human Rights Council has adopted more resolutions condemning Israel than it has all other states combined. However Israel has not cooperated in many of these but there was no real intervention made by the UN on this issue. From 1967 to 1989, the UN Security Council adopted 131 resolutions directly addressing the Arab-Israeli conflict.

Benjamin Dix, a former UN staffer who spent four years in Sri Lanka from 2004 till 2008 when Sri Lanka asked all NGOs to leave the island, and who with illustrator Lindsay Pollock, is documenting the effects of Sri Lanka war through the story of a Tamil refugee, in an interview given to TamilNet says, "I felt terrible after the UN evacuation from Vanni and very angry that they international system had abandoned civilians at their time of need....

Rev Fr Prof Dr S. J. Emmanuel is an eminent theologian and an academic who devoted much of his time for political upliftment of the Tamil people in Sri Lanka. The 78 pontiff is the President of the Global Tamil Forum (GTF) and even at his prime age is energetically campaigning for the just cause of the Tamil people.

The photos of prisoners, like thugs, holding a few machine guns on the roof of Welikada Prison, challenging a government which is capable of terrorizing an entire country, what do they tell us? The news of the mass murder which was a response to that challenge, what does that tell us?

Jayasuriya Chrishantha Weliamuna - better known as JC Weliamuna - is a leading constitutional and human rights lawyer, who has been active in the field of human rights for almost two decades. He is the former Executive Director of the Sri Lankan chapter of the Transparency International (TISL) - the global coalition of civil society organisations working against corruption.

EXECUTIVE SUMMARY AND RECOMMENDATIONS

The Sri Lankan government’s refusal to negotiate seriously with Tamil leaders or otherwise address legitimate Tamil and Muslim grievances is increasing ethnic tensions and damaging prospects for lasting peace. The administration, led by the Sri Lanka Freedom Party of Mahinda Rajapaksa, has refused to honour agreements with the Tamil National Alliance (TNA), broken promises to world leaders and not implemented constitutional provisions for minimal devolution of power to Tamil-speaking areas of the north and east.