Turkish embassy strongly rejects ‘baseless allegations’ made by Buddhist extremist monk

by Sharmini
Jun 19, 2020

The Turkish Embassy “strongly rejects the baseless allegations” made by Galagoda Aththe Gnanasara associating Turkey with extremist activities in Sri Lanka.

In a press release, the Turkish embassy rejected the allegations made by the extremist monk in a statement published online on Lankadeep on June 15, 2020.  

An unofficial translation of Gnanasara’s statement:

“There is a network of Arabic international schools that conducts extremist teachings in the country under the guidance of former Minister Rishad Bathiudeen and with Turkish aid. Nearly 30 such schools have been established in the country. If a name of such a school is declared, the name of the school will be changed the next day. You can’t find such a name, especially on the internet.”

Galagoda Aththe Gnanasara was previously found guilty on two counts and sentenced to six months in prison for threatening the wife of Prageeth Eknaligoda; a critic of the then government in 2010. He was later released following a presidential pardon.

Earlier this year, Galagoda Aththe Gnanasara and Athuraliye Rathana, former parliamentarian and founder of Jathika Hela Urumaya (JHU), formed a joint coalition to contest in Sri Lanka’s parliamentary elections. Both candidates and their respective parties have called for right-wing Sinhala nationalist policies.

See the full press release here.

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Amaran - Problematic propaganda

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The genre of war epic makes its grand re-entry to Tamil cinema with director Rajkumar Periasamy’s sophomore feature film, ‘Amaran.’ As is often the case with this genre, one cannot help but feel the events of the ‘true story’ onscreen have been heavily modified for easy consumption.

 

 

 

The patriotic military films of Tamil cinema had taken a back seat for a while. The subject matter is now seldom a prominent theme of a film, instead lurking in the shadows peeking through such as via the heroes in the works of Nelson Dilipkumar. The genre of war epic makes its grand re-entry to Tamil cinema with director Rajkumar Periasamy’s sophomore feature film, ‘Amaran.’ As is often the case with this genre, one cannot help but feel the events of the ‘true story’ onscreen have been heavily modified for easy consumption.

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Official trailer for film below.

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un_spcial

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