Sri Lankan police officers visited the Colombo office of the Tamil diaspora TV station, IBC Tamil two times over a four day period and sought the personal details of staff members.
"The visit was on the same day a news item published in a Sinhala ultra-nationalist daily carrying accusations against an unnamed "Tamil Tiger diaspora TV" that provides information to London on "protests against government, security forces activities in the north and allegations against the government by visiting UN officials", JDS reported.
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Extract published below:
"On Monday (17 July) two men in civvies claiming to be from police headquarters (who showed ID) visited the IBC office again asking for personal details of staff.
Upon inquiries from staff, the two said they are looking for a Tamil journalist called 'Mano'. They were informed that IBC doesn't have a staff member with that name.
The two men were requested to obtain any information regarding IBC TV and its staff from the government information department where all media institutions and journalists are registered.
The second visit came following an article by Mr Warnakulasuriya accusing IBC TAMIL TV as an "Eelam Diaspora" media organisation "that disseminates false information regarding Sri Lanka". It went further to question Sinhala organisations for inviting IBC and Tamil journalists to a press briefing.
"Isn't these parties coming to a press briefing a dangerous situation?" he asks in his regular weekly column."
