Jaffna, Sri Lanka – On this International Day of Victims of Enforced Disappearance, we stand in solidarity with the Families of the Disappeared in Sri Lanka, most of whom were disappeared by the Sri Lankan state and whose disappearances have yet to be accounted for. Fourteen years since the end of the armed conflict, the…
19 July 2023 The Government of Sri Lanka (GOSL) has proposed a new National Unity and Reconciliation Commission (NURC) to promote truth and reconciliation internally. This is in no way aligned with the demands of the victim-survivor community, nor does it address the underlying causes that led to the armed conflict. In light of past…
18 May 2023 Jaffna, Sri Lanka – On this day marking fourteen years since the end of the war in Mullivaikkaal, we commemorate all those lives lost during the last phase of the war, in particular the tens of thousands of Tamils that were killed by the inhumane atrocities committed during the Sri Lankan state’s…
July 14, 2022 Jaffna – On July 13, 2022, Gotabaya Rajapaksa fled Sri Lanka leaving the island in political chaos. Many among the island’s Sinhala majority and the international community have heralded this moment, a culmination of months of protest, as a potentially revolutionary moment. And indeed, the departure of a president who has overseen…
ACPR Statement May 18, 2020 Today we commemorate all those lives that we lost during the war, especially the tens of thousands of Tamil lives that were taken by horrific atrocities perpetrated during the final phase of the war and as a result of the numerous massacres and atrocities committed during the Sri Lankan state’s…
ACPR Statement March 30, 2020 The Adayaalam Centre for Policy Research condemns the decision of Sri Lankan President Gotabaya Rajapaksa to grant a presidential pardon to Staff Sergeant Sunil Ratnayake. Ratnayake was convicted for killing eight unarmed Tamil civilians including three children on the 19th of December 2000 in Mirusuvil, Jaffna. As described by the…
In Solidarity with those affected by recent events May 4, 2019 We the undersigned Tamil civil society organizations unequivocally condemn the horrific Easter Sunday attacks which took more than two hundred and fifty lives, and also express our wholehearted solidarity and support to our Christian communities, targeted in this cowardly act of violence by extremists….
January 30, 2019 We the undersigned civil society groups, in particular from the North and East of Sri Lanka, members of war victims’ associations, other likeminded organisations and individuals concerned about the current state of affairs in Sri Lanka and lack of progress on peace and justice, bring to your kind attention the following issues…
(Jaffna/Washington, 14 January 2019) The undersigned organisations strongly condemn the Sri Lankan Government’s decision to appoint Major General Shavendra Silva, an alleged war criminal, as the new Chief of Staff of the Sri Lankan Army. Brigadier Silva as he then was, led the Sri Lankan Army’s 58 Division during the last phase of the armed…
This week we commemorate the 35th anniversary of the Black July pogrom in which state-sponsored Sinhala mobs attacked Tamils in Colombo and elsewhere killing approximately 3000 Tamils and displacing over 200,000. 35 years have passed and to date, there has been no accountability for this horrific week of genocidal violence, nor even an attempt at…
