From a profile of Sri Lanka’s president, Mahinda Rajapaksa, written for The (UK) Independent by a “special correspondent,” “a Sri Lankan who wishes to remain anonymous because of possible threats to his life” (h/t, The Awl):
If one were to set aside the remarkable victory against the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) for just a moment, the other most significant legacy of Rajapaksa’s presidency is the veritable death of the free Sri Lankan media. The independent press has been muzzled, strangled, beaten and killed in the last four years and the intimidation is by far the worst the country has ever seen. Coercion of the media commenced shortly after the government decided to push for a military victory over the Tamil Tigers.
While previous Sri Lankan governments used press censorship and criminal defamation laws to keep the media in check during sensitive military operations, Rajapaksa would have none of it. Instead, he continued his monthly meetings with newspaper editors and year-end media galas, at which he assured the country’s top journalists that he had no axe to grind with them and promised to solve all their problems. But all the while, Sri Lankan journalists were being abducted, brutally assaulted and in several tragic instances, killed, every time they took a tough stand against the government or the military…Where attempts to beat and kill media personnel into submission have failed, the administration has simply purchased publishing houses for millions of rupees or convinced newspaper proprietors to join the ruling party, effectively suppressing any dissenting views being expressed in those publications…
All something of a “metamorphosis” for Rajapaksa, the Independent’s “special correspondent” notes, a man who way back when was a “starry-eyed” agitator “determined to secure the rights of the oppressed and release them from the brutal grip of state terror,” and then,”when he was minister of labour and later prime minister,” someone who was known as “the ‘cabinet reporter’…for leaking sensitive cabinet information to his many friends in the media,” including Lasantha Wickrematunge, “the slain editor of Sri Lanka’s Sunday Leader newspaper, killed on Rajapaksa’s watch” (something Wickrematunge predicted here).
There is no judicial or press freedom in Sri Lanka. Everything is dictated by the Rajapakse brothers whose family members own over sixty percent of national wealth.
The majority sinhalese are fed with 'racist remarks against the minority and vulgar triumphalism' for ethnic-cleansing.
20-year sentence to journalist is a gift basket to Mr. Obama.
#1 Posted by Peter Ellesmere, CJR on Tue 1 Sep 2009 at 12:57 PM
Slain Sunday Leader Editor, "Letter from the Grave":
"Murder has become the primary tool whereby the state seeks to control the organs of liberty. Today it is the journalists, tomorrow it will be the judges. For neither group have the risks ever been higher or the stakes lower.
Why then do we do it? I often wonder that. After all, I too am a husband, and the father of three wonderful children. I too have responsibilities and obligations that transcend my profession, be it the law or journalism. Is it worth the risk? Many people tell me it is not. Friends tell me to revert to the bar, and goodness knows it offers a better and safer livelihood. Others, including political leaders on both sides, have at various times sought to induce me to take to politics, going so far as to offer me ministries of my choice. Diplomats, recognizing the risk journalists face in Sri Lanka, have offered me safe passage and the right of residence in their countries. Whatever else I may have been stuck for, I have not been stuck for choice.
But there is a calling that is yet above high office, fame, lucre and security. It is the call of conscience
-Letter from the Grave –Sunday Leader Editor Mr. Lasantha Wikramatunga
#2 Posted by Sandra, CJR on Tue 1 Sep 2009 at 04:47 PM