I begin my article with some quips and observations from friends and colleagues on Mangala’s new political party and his political vision as articulated by him to the media recently. Clearly, the field is not united in their appreciation of Mangala - some see him as a bold new visionary, others see old wine in [...]

“Ignorance and prejudice are the handmaidens of propaganda, and in most modern conflict, the men of war prey on the ignorance of the populace to install fears and arouse hatreds.”
Sashi Tharoor, Bookless in Baghdad
Mark Whitaker captures well the perversity of Sri Lanka today in a compelling biography of murdered Tamil journalist Sivaram Dharmeratnam (Taraki) [...]

Unveiling his political vision for a ‘new Sri Lankan order’ this week, Mangala Samaraweera challenged Sri Lankans to envision a better future. Dare, he said, to dream which, as a rallying cry in these miasmic times, has an even more piquant ring to it in the Sinhalese ‘Sihinaye Abhiyogaya’.
The SLFP-Mahajana Wing’s discussion document [...]

Last week’s revelation that Tamilnet had been blocked to Sri Lankan citizens took the country yet another step further away from media freedom, posing the question: How much worse must the situation become before things start to improve? It was against this bleak backdrop that journalists, academics and human rights activists and colleagues gathered at [...]

War, Abductions, killings, human rights violations, and evictions are synonyms widely used to describe the current situation in Sri Lanka especially in the international area. Are we facing the gravest period of Sri Lanka history? One would say the accusations lodged against country are accurate and the situation demands immediate intervention and another would argue [...]