Extracts from a report by the Washington Post on Friday:
Three years after the war ended, human rights groups and opposition leaders warn that the country is descending toward dictatorship, with dissent brutally crushed, the media cowed and the minority Tamils, whose insurrection caused the war in the first place, still treated like second-class citizens.
The military still runs northern and eastern Sri Lanka, with locals complaining that its control of every aspect of daily life is deeply intrusive and humiliating, and that anyone who challenge it risks deadly retribution.
Most who have disappeared since the end of the war are Tamils, but also at risk are moderate Sinhalese who raise their voices.
Foreign Minister G.L. Peiris said the accusations about disappearances and intimidation are vastly overblown, a “cloud” thrown up by people who want to claim political asylum abroad.
In March the United States, with India’s backing, sponsored a resolution at the U.N. Human Rights Council urging Sri Lanka to act on the recommendations of its own reconciliation commission.
The Sri Lankans reacted with anger, organizing almost daily protests outside the U.S. Embassy in Colombo and using state-run media to denounce those Sri Lankans who had testified against the government in Geneva as “traitors.”
Indian attempts to prod Sri Lanka were also rebuffed. India’s Foreign Minister S.M. Krishna emerged from a meeting with Rajapaksa in January saying the president had promised to honor a 15-year-old amendment in the country’s constitution that would give limited autonomy to the Tamil-dominated north.
No sooner had Krishna left the country than Rajapaksa denied having ever made such a commitment, to India’s fury.
