Jan 30th 2009 – 1.10pm
Something ruined my day and at the same time made it super efficient. How can that happen?
I listened to an interview on TamilNatham, with a guy called Uthayan who has been “illegally” detained in the Colombo prison for 9 years without any credible charges. 9 years! He was on his way to go overseas, when he was arrested, tortured and put in prison.
His desperate voice and details ruined my day and I plunged into a depression, but at the same time, I sprung into action and did everything more quickly and efficiently knowing how precious time is.
***
I am very worried about reports of increasing incidents of rape/sexual abuse of Tamil women and girls.
http://www.tamilnet.com/art.html?catid=79&artid=28176
Apart from the continuing multi barrel artillery shellings and aerial bombardments of civilians in the Vanni region, this new report is about refugees/fleeing civilians who are detained for “security reasons”. The detention centres for IDPs (Internally displaced people) are called “welfare centres” or “rehabilitation centres”, and many such centres have sprouted in the North and East.
Detentions and torture, rape and death in custody has been going on for a long time – Amnesty internation report in 1999.
***
Since I lived in Sri Lanka for 2 decades before fleeing my hometown during the war, I know how culturally true the below quote in TamilNet is. The Sri Lankan Army (99.9% Singhalese) does have a habit of getting hapless victims to take their clothes – men or women. Remember the widely circulated picture of the stripped naked Tamil man in 1983 about to be killed? Search utube to see what the Sri Lankan soldiers did to the dead body of a female LTTE fighter…
“It is an inherent culture in the Sinhala army to use the weapon of rape that is very sensitive to Tamil mind, in the long history of the ethnic war to subjugate Tamils.
It is not only rape, but the open exhibition of Sinhala chauvinism’s insatiable desire to see Tamils naked, whether man, woman, dead or alive that needs attention of the civilized world, the MP commented”
True!
The news item on Tamilnet also gives the history of some high profile rape cases against the Sri Lankan Army.
Also note that 108 Sri Lankan soilders/peacekeepers were sent away from Haiti (by the UN) for sexual abuse involving minor Haitian girls. Do you think they were punished by the Sri Lankan government?
If they (SL Army) can do that as peacekeepers, what more can they do as an attacking army – given a free hand by a racist governement to do anything, as long as the victim is a Tamil?
