In a heated parliamentary debate on human rights in Sri Lanka, British Minister of State for the Foreign Office, Anne-Marie Trevelyan, avoided commenting on the growing bi-partisan calls for sanctions on Sri Lankan officials.

Conservative MP, and Chair of the All Party Parliamentary Group for Tamils, Elliot Colburn, raised this question directly as he asked the minister of state;

Sri Lanka’s Court of Appeal has acquitted two soldiers who were initially sentenced to death over the 1996 gang rape and murder of a Tamil woman in Jaffna.

The decision, made by the Court of Appeal last week, saw two defendants, soldier Hevapedike Sarathchandra and Corporal Gamage Kitsiri, acquitted of all charges.

A third soldier Corporal Gamini Saman Liyenake has been ordered to have a retrial.

23-year-old Rajini Velauthapillai, from Urumpirai, was raped and murdered by the Sri Lankan military manning a checkpoint at Kondavil on September 30, 1996.

Standing with the Eelam Tamil community in their struggle against oppression and injustice. We must find a permanent solution based on their right to self-determination that ensures stability and peace in the Indo-Pacific. pic.twitter.com/x2boQ4cek4

More Tamil diaspora organisations have spoken out against a declaration signed by the Global Tamil Forum (GTF) and Sinhala Buddhist clergy, stating it gives Sri Lankan president Ranil Wickremesinghe an “opportunity to hoodwink the international community”, as backlash continues to grow this week.

The GTF had met with Wickremsinghe in Colombo last week, where the group handed over a ‘declaration’ it had signed with several Sinhala Buddhist monks.

The Tamil Information Centre (TIC) hosted the annual International Human Rights Day event in London, UK, on 10 December 2023. The event, attended by renowned journalists, human rights activists, professionals and politicians, shed light on the role the international human rights system has played both in the past and continuing human rights abuses faced by the Tamil population in the North-East and in the diaspora.

**Content warning - scenes of animal cruelty**

Valaichenai police have refused to register a complaint after a Tamil livestock farmer alleged that his cow was shot by Sinhala settlers in Madhavanai.

The cow, Mappillai Nampan, was worth Rs.1,50,000, and belonged to Nimalan, the Cattle Farmers Association President. 

The Tamil Eelam Liberation Organisation (TELO), a constituent party of the Tamil National Alliance (TNA), has denounced a Sri Lankan government-backed initiative by the Global Tamil Forum (GTF) and some Sinhala Buddhist monks as “irresponsible” and one that “misdirects our entire political aspirations”.

Tamils in Batticaloa held a protest today on Human Rights Day to highlight the ongoing human rights abuses perpetrated against the Tamil people by the Sri Lankan state.  

Tamil civil society activists, politicians, farmers and clergymen drew attention to the human rights violations taking place in Batticaloa, in particular the cruelty faced by Tamil farmers, threats by Sri Lankan police and repression of Tamil civil society and media. 

Tamil families of the disappeared protested in Mullaitivu and Vavuniya today to renew their calls for international accountability and mark Human Rights Day. 

The leader of the Tamil National People’s Front (TNPF) refused to meet with the Global Tamil Forum (GTF) this week, after the diaspora organisation signed a declaration with Sinhala Buddhist monks that has been labelled a “whitewash”.

Gajendrakumar Ponnambalam told the Tamil Guardian that he had “nothing to talk” about with the GTF, after the announcement of their initiative this week.

“This government has been one of the most oppressive, if not the most oppressive, since the end of the war,” said Ponnambalam.