Enhanced cooperation between Intelligence agencies is essential for maintaining national and regional security, Sri Lanka's top defence official said today. Regional security could only be ensured from threats of terrorism, human trafficking, drug smuggling and the illegal financial transactions by sharing intelligence, Defence Secretary Gotabhaya Rajapaksa said. Addressing the Joint Working Group on Counter Terrorism and Transnational Crime of the Bay of Bengal Initiative for Multi Sectoral Technical and Economic Cooperation (BIMSTEC) Rajapaksa said, "For Intelligence to be more effective...It needs to be shared amongst nations." [ Full Report ]

    He has never before attended in place of the monarch at the bi-annual gathering of Commonwealth leaders. In 2007, both the Prince and the Queen attended Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting (CHOGM) in Uganda. It was the first time Prince Charles had been to an overseas CHOGM and was seen as an important event for the heir to the throne. [ Full Report ]

    The Queen will not attend this year's Commonwealth summit as the palace reviews her long-haul travel. But there are calls for Britain to boycott the meeting due to Sri Lanka's human rights record. The Queen has been present at every Commonwealth summit in the last 40 years - a sign of the importance she places on her role at the head of the Commonwealth.However Britain is facing pressure to boycott the two-yearly Commonwealth heads of government meeting (CHOGM) altogether, because it is being hosted by the government of Sri Lanka, which is accused of war crimes. [ Full Report ]

    A diplomatic party hosted by the Queen will take place in Colombo in November. Australia won't miss it – not for all the Amnesty International, United Nations and domestic pleas in the world. The Commonwealth Heads of Government meeting is shaping up to be the most controversial engagement for our next Prime Minister. A chorus of human rights activists, international experts and Commonwealth lawyers is advising the Prime Minister to call in sick that week. But thanks to a number of political and diplomatic imperatives, their calls will be ignored. [ Full Report ]

    The palace confirmed the Prince of Wales will go to the meeting, which takes place every two years, in place of the Queen who has attended every meeting since 1973.According to the Queen's official list of engagements, she has seven visits planned for the rest of this month, including visiting Cornwall on May 17 and Cambridge on May 23, both with the Duke of Edinburgh. She also has six events planned for June, including a visit to the Arggyll and Sutherland Highlanders at Howe Barracks in Canterbury. [ Full Report ]

    Fifteen fishermen, who put to sea from in Rameswaram, were on Monday attacked allegedly by the Sri Lankan navy when they were fishing near Dhanuskodi, fisheries department sources said. Click here! The fishermen were fishing near a sand hillock in Indian waters when the Lankan navy came in two boats and allegedly beat them up with sticks, said Plavumin Thiyakarajan, assistant director, fisheries department. [ Full Report ]

    "So are you a Buddhist?" I ask the driver. "No, I am Hindu." "Oh, so you're a Tamil?" "I am a Tamil," the driver says, and then shouts: "BUT I AM NOT A TERRORIST!" Sri Lanka is the travel destination of 2013, at least according to the travel industry. After decades of war, peace is opening up the northern reaches of the wondrous isle off the tip of India. British Airways has just created a route to Colombo via the Maldives. [ Full Report ]

    Human rights groups react with disgust to David Cameron's decision to attend the Commonwealth summit in Sri Lanka this November, as our Foreign Affairs Correspondent Jonathan Miller reports. The Prime Minister’s decision comes amid growing alarm over Sri Lanka’s dismal and worsening human rights record and fears that permitting Colombo to host the Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting (CHOGM) will enable the regime to whitewash allegations of war crimes. The United Nations says at least 40,000 Tamil civilians were killed by Sri Lankan government forces in the final stages of the civil war which ended four years ago amid evidence of war crimes. [ Full Report ]

    Even if most Sri Lankans did not realise it, this week’s developments came as further proof that the Government is on reverse gear over important domestic and external developments. In essence, it reflects a clear policy change in some areas and underscores a new resolve to address issues differently. On the domestic front, President Mahinda Rajapaksa announced at the UPFA’s well attended May Day rally that some drastic changes would be made to the recently raised electricity tariffs. That was indeed a paradox. The revision of tariffs was done with his concurrence. The Ceylon Electricity Board (CEB) cleared it through a statutory mechanism in place to look after consumer interests. [ Full Report ]

    Immigration Minister Brendan O'Connor returns today from a visit to Sri Lanka, where he discussed the challenges of refugees and people smuggling. Part of the ''Gillard government's commitment to deepening Australia's relationship with Sri Lanka'', the visit aimed to progress the Bali Process goals of tackling those difficult ''migration management'' issues. [ Full Report ]

    Andrew Bennett, Canada’s Ambassador for Religious Freedom, today issued the following statement: “Canada condemns the arrest of Azad Sally, leader of Sri Lanka’s newly formed Muslim Tamil National Alliance. Mr. Sally was reportedly taken into custody by Sri Lankan authorities on May 2. “We call for Mr. Sally’s immediate release. We understand his arrest is likely motivated by his work on human rights, in particular his defence of religious freedom, including the right of religious communities to practise their faith in Sri Lanka without fear of reprisals. [ Full Report ]

    Opposition political parties and civilians in the Northern Province are looking at initiating legal action against the military’s acquisition of lands that were demarcated as a high security zone (HSZ) during the period of the war. TNA MP, M. A. Sumanthiran said the party was collecting information and statements to file a case against a proposed military cantonment in the Palaly area. An official notice has stated that about 6,400 acres around the Palaly airport in the North and East of Valikaman were being acquired for a military cantonment. [ Full Report ]

    The Committee on Conferences that advises the General Assembly (GA) on matters pertaining to the organisation of United Nations (UN) Conferences, elected Chamithri Rambukwella, daughter of Minister Keheliya Rambukwella, as Chair, for its 2013-2014 term, at its organisational session on April 29. She was endorsed by the Asia Pacific Group of States.This is the first time that Sri Lanka is a member of the Committee on Conferences, and Ms Rambukwella, Second Secretary of the Permanent Mission of Sri Lanka to the UN in New York, at 27, is one of the youngest to hold the position of Chair, since the establishment of the Committee on Conferences. [ Full Report ]

    Five hundred people attended a Rally For Unity on Sunday (28) on Nelum Pokuna Mawatha. Former ambassador Dayan Jayatillaka and TNA MP M. A. Sumanthiran attended the event, and statements from MPs like Ranjan Ramanayake and Arjuna Ranatunga were streamed at the event. But the question is, is it enough? Unlike the recent candlelit vigil on Sambuddatva Jayanthi Mawatha, which was disrupted, the rally on Sunday was escorted by police and went off mostly peacefully, until a group of people infiltrated the rally to hand out leaflets. [ Full Report ]

    Esan Satkunarajah doesn’t feel anger towards the Conservative government, even if he believes it bears some responsibility for recent events in his native Sri Lanka, and hasn’t treated Tamils like himself fairly over the years.Canada is standing alone in threatening to boycott this year’s Commonwealth leaders’ summit in Sri Lanka because of that country’s abysmal human rights record and refusal to reconcile with the minority Tamil population.“Obviously yes, in my view Canada and the international community should have done more before,” Satkunarajah said by phone from his office in Scarborough, Ont. “Many problems could have been prevented if they had taken action. But better late than never.” [ Full Report ]

    Of all the moral precepts instilled in Buddhist monks the promise not to kill comes first, and the principle of non-violence is arguably more central to Buddhism than any other major religion. So why have monks been using hate speech against Muslims and joining mobs that have left dozens dead? This is happening in two countries separated by well over 1,000 miles of Indian Ocean - Burma and Sri Lanka. It is puzzling because neither country is facing an Islamist militant threat. Muslims in both places are a generally peaceable and small minority. In Sri Lanka, the issue of halal slaughter has been a flashpoint. Led by monks, members of the Bodu Bala Sena - the Buddhist Brigade - hold rallies... [ Full Report ]

    One of the biggest insults a government can deliver to another — the diplomatic equivalent of a slap in the face — is for the leader of one country to refuse to attend a high profile gathering hosted by another. Well, Canada has just slapped Sri Lanka. Late last week in London, Foreign Minister John Baird denounced a decision by his Commonwealth counterparts to approve Sri Lanka hosting the organization’s heads of government meeting in November. The Commonwealth, he said, was “accommodating evil” in agreeing to stage the meeting in the South Asian country despite strong criticism of its human rights record. [ Full Report ]

    Sri Lanka is not fit to host this year's Commonwealth Heads of Government meeting, writes Keith Locke. The Government needs to explain why it is not supporting Canada's campaign to have the November Commonwealth heads of government meeting (CHOGM) moved from Sri Lanka. Canada has given three main reasons for shifting the summit. First, Sri Lanka has avoided any accountability for the thousands of Tamil non- combatants who were killed, mainly by government shelling, near the end of the civil war in May 2009. Estimates of the deaths range from 10,000 to 40,000. [ Full Report ]

    Prime Minister Stephen Harper won’t be attending the Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting (CHOGM) in Sri Lanka next November, The Huffington Post Canada has learned. The decision may ostracize Harper as the only G8-level leader not attending the meeting with Britain, Australia and New Zealand all expected to send their prime ministers, but it is expected to be very popular with Tamils, a new community the Tories are going after. [ Full Report ]

    Sri Lanka’s high commissioner to Canada is accusing the Canadian government of strengthening “evil forces” through its threat to boycott an upcoming Commonwealth summit in Colombo. But Foreign Affairs Minister John Baird dismissed the criticism Thursday, saying Canada would continue to find ways to “increase pressure” on Sri Lanka’s government to protect human rights. In a statement, Chitranganee Wagiswara, Sri Lanka’s high commissioner to Canada, said it was “appalling and unprecedented for certain quarters to express views” opposing a decision by heads of state a few years ago about who would host of the 2013 Commonwealth summit. [ Full Report ]

    It appears Canada’s call for the Commonwealth to address Sri Lanka’s human rights shortcomings by, among other things, refusing to allow it to host November’s Commonwealth leaders’ summit has generated mixed reactions abroad. On the other side of the spectrum is Kamal Wickremasinghe, who writes in the Sri Lankan newspaper the Daily News that Canada should “clean their own backyard” before criticizing Sri Lanka, taking specific issue with Canada’s treatment of its Aboriginal Peoples and Prime Minister Stephen Harper’s “anti-democratic practice of proroguing whenever he is about to face difficult questions in Parliament.” [ Full Report ]

    "The goal of the Commonwealth's partnership with the Human Rights Commission of Sri Lanka is to support Sri Lanka's national efforts and plans to provide access for all its citizens to a life of dignity and opportunity in keeping with the values of the Commonwealth" - Sharma Commonwealth Secretary-General Kamalesh Sharma received the Chair of the Human Rights Commission of Sri Lanka, Justice Priyantha R P Perera, and his delegation at Marlborough House yesterday. [ Full Report ]

    In Mullivaikaal, we witnessed the zenith of Tamil civilization. We witnessed an unimaginable heroism of the fighters for Tamil sovereignty and the people who nurtured them, the people for whom they acted as human shields against a genocidal army. We saw them enduring starvation, thirst, disease, Kfirs, shells, claymores, cluster bombs, chemical weapons. We saw people whom we called amma, anna, thambi, machaan, appa, akka getting killed, tortured, raped and crippled by the tens of thousands. We saw families evaporating, widows becoming staggering statistics, and numbers replacing persons. In ways more than one, we were left orphans. [ Full Report ]

    Bureaucratic inefficiency or negligence on the part of the Justice Ministry or the Economic Development Ministry had resulted in Sri Lanka losing a US grant equivalent to Rs.450 million. It was to be given for the purpose of upgrading the country’s judicial system by bringing it on par with modern technology and prevent legal delays. “The grant had to be suspended as we could not reach an agreement with the Sri Lankan government authorities. The grant is aimed at promoting the effectiveness of the judiciary,” US Embassy spokesman said. [ Full Report ]

    For Sri Lanka, holding the CHOGM in November has become the litmus ticket of its acceptance among the community of nations. Having won the brutal and lengthy civil war against the Tamil Tigers, President Mahinda Rajapakse....Since then, the Sri Lankan government has done little to reconcile the Tamil community, and gi­ve them the slightest degree of au­to­nomy. What has replaced the state of war in the north is a victor’s peace. The military presence is overwhelming, with the Army running many commercial enterprises against which local Tamils simply cannot compete. The Ta­mi­ls remain a marginalised community, battered and bullied into submission. [ Full Report ]

    Choosing Sri Lanka might have seemed a laudable gesture towards a country that emerged from civil war in 2009. But this decision was still a mistake. President Mahinda Rajapaksa can fairly claim to have brought peace, but he did so in a manner comparable to Rome’s pacification of Carthage: Sri Lanka’s conflict ended in a welter of bloodshed when government forces cornered the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Elam on a tiny patch of territory, and pounded them mercilessly, regardless of the presence of thousands of civilians. [ Full Report ]

    David Cameron is facing mounting calls to boycott an important Commonwealth meeting in Colombo amid continuing allegations that the Sri Lankan government is failing to end human rights abuses. The Queen, or else another member of the royal family, is also due to take part in the biennial event. But there are growing demands that Mr Cameron and the British delegation should not take part amid continuing concern about abuses in Sri Lanka. [ Full Report ]

    The special value of the Commonwealth is that it brings together nations in many different phases of development, which view current affairs through the prism of their own experience. At best, this makes it a forum of impassioned and significant debate, in which mutual understanding can be enhanced. But when tolerance of alternative ideas gives way to indifference or cynical acceptance of what should be loudly denounced, the organisation risks sliding into irrelevance or worse. [ Full Report ]

    Diplomats said the Government had not yet decided to attend the Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting (Chogm) because of concerns over human rights abuses in the country but that the Palace must also take into account the views of 15 other countries where she is head of state on her presence. "The Queen does consult the prime minister on travel to the Commonwealth but she also seeks the wider advice from her other realms among Commonwealth governments," an official said. [ Full Report ]

    Are we witnessing the end of the “American age”? It depends whom you ask. But one thing is certain: Thanks to the near-bankruptcy of the American welfare state, Washington is losing both the means and desire to project power across the world. Inevitably, nations with deeper pockets — China, most notably — will fill the void. This process already is underway in many parts of the world. That includes large swathes of Central Asia, where Beijing’s billions are beginning to revolutionize regional infrastructure and alliances — in dazzling but potentially dangerous ways. [ Full Report ]

    Foreign Affairs Minister John Baird says the Commonwealth is failing its greatest test by letting Sri Lanka host this year’s leaders summit — but that Canada has no intention of leaving the organization. Canada has been alone in threatening to boycott November’s Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting in Colombo unless Sri Lanka improves its human rights record and moves towards post-civil war reconciliation with the country’s Tamil minority. In addition to hosting the summit, Sri Lanka is also in line to serve as the institution’s chair for the next two years — which Canada and other critics believe would seriously undermine the group’s moral authority and its ability to persuade other errant regimes to mend their ways. [ Full Report ]

    As Sri Lanka gears up to host a meeting of Commonwealth leaders in November, testimony from torture survivors, and the absence of justice in their cases, challenge government claims to making human rights progress. “I was burnt all over my body with cigarettes,” said Kumar. “I was also kicked all over the body. They kept me in a dark cell with no windows, where I had to sleep on the floor.” Kumar was 16 when the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) – an armed opposition group fighting since 1983 for an independent Tamil state – forcibly recruited him in January 2008. [ Full Report ]

    The Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper and his Foreign Minister John Baird are leading the charge against Sri Lanka as the venue for this year’s Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting (CHOGM) in November. The language used by Harper and Baird, including references to “evil” and “appalling”, seems quite out of proportion to the significance of CHOGM as an international gathering, as well as its utility to Sri Lanka as perceived by Sri Lankans. [ Full Report ]

    The Sri Lankan government is intensifying its crackdown on critics through threats, harassment, imprisonment and violent attacks, Amnesty International said in a report released today. The document, Assault on Dissent reveals how the government led by President Mahinda Rajapaksa is promoting an official attitude that equates criticism with “treason” in a bid to tighten its grip on power. [ Full Report ]

    The UK based Global Tamil Forum (GTF) yesterday vowed to intensify its campaign aimed at discouraging the Queen and main member states from attending the Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting (CHOGM 2013) though its project to thwart the meeting failed. GTF spokesman Suren Surendiran told The Island that it would go all out against the Sri Lankan government to make it impossible for world leaders to shake hands with President Mahinda Rajapaksa. [ Full Report ]

    Amnesty International has joined the calls for Commonwealth nations to relocate a major meeting from Sri Lanka, days after the Indian secretary general of the Commonwealth indicated that such a move would be rejected. In a report titled “Assault on Dissent,” Amnesty International said the Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting in November should be moved from Colombo in protest over the country’s human rights record. Human Rights Watch made a similar request in February. [ Full Report ]

    Amnesty International has accused Sri Lanka of intensifying a crackdown on dissent and urged the Commonwealth not to hold its summit there unless the human rights situation improves. It says the government is responsible for harassing and imprisoning critics. Sri Lanka has rejected the allegations, saying that a rehabilitation process is under way after years of conflict. Last week Commonwealth foreign ministers agreed to hold the summit in Colombo despite objections by Canada. [ Full Report ]

    Tamil National Alliance (TNA) Parliamentarian M. A. Sumanthiran yesterday defended campaigning in London against Sri Lanka hosting the Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting (CHOGM) in Colombo later this year. The TNA wanted the venue shifted to a suitable venue regardless of a previous decision to allow Sri Lanka to host the meeting. Govt. lashes out at Sumanthiran, Dr. Pakiasothy! [ Full Report ]

    Some five weeks after the foreign policy fiasco on the US-sponsored resolution against Sri Lanka in the United Nations Human Rights Council (UNHRC) – which earned the Congress-led UPA government the hostility of all sections in Sri Lanka and the Tamil political parties in India – New Delhi seems to have gone back to sleep on the issue.The issue of human rights of the Tamil minority in the north-east of Sri Lanka, with its potential to erupt afresh as a crisis, is crying for attention now — before it raises tensions between India and the island republic, and again becomes a flash point in Tamil Nadu, one of the 28 states of India situated in the southernmost part of the country. [ Full Report ]

    Yasmin Sooka, who was asked by UN chief Ban Ki-moon to investigate allegations of human rights abuses during Sri Lanka's war, says the country is still perpetrating abuses against its own civilians. "People continue to be tortured and disappeared," she told ABC radio on Monday. "Sri Lanka is quite frankly descending into a state where the rule of law no longer holds sway." [ Full Report ]

    Sri Lanka's punishing 26-year civil war ended in May 2009, but the story of the last six months of a brutal conflict will not go away. Now alleged war crimes are being pushed onto the agenda of the Commonwealth. "Bad things happen in war, but there has to be a full accountability by both the government and the opposition for war crimes," Canada's Foreign Minister, John Baird, told me on a visit to London for the Commonwealth Ministerial Action Group (CMAG). [ Full Report ]

    Slamming the Centre on the issue of attacks on Indian fishermen allegedly by Sri Lankan navy, former UPA ally DMK said the government's response was limited to making a statement in the Parliament. Party chief M Karunanidhi said Tamil Nadu was expecting the Centre to show "at least one per cent", of the concern it was showing in the Italian marines' case, where two are charged with gunning down two fishermen off Kerala coast last year. [ Full Report ]

    Greens leader Christine Milne has accused the government of placing domestic politics ahead of human rights by refusing to boycott the coming Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting in Sri Lanka. And Amnesty International says the violations there should be more seriously considered when Australia is forming refugee policies. Its campaign co-ordinator, Ming Yu, said a new Amnesty International report to be released on Tuesday, titledSri Lanka - Assault on Dissent, provided ample evidence that violations were escalating. [ Full Report ]

    This book recounts the horrific experiences of Tamils in the last few months of the conflict between Sri Lankan armed forces and the separatist Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE). President Mahinda Rajapaksa declared victory on 18 May 2009. Frances Harrison, a BBC correspondent in Sri Lanka for a number of years, describes her book as follows: “It is not a history of the whole war… It is an account of the victory from the perspective of the defeated”. Each chapter tells the story of a particular individual and his or her closest family. As their stories run concurrently, and follow people forced down a narrow corridor of northeast Sri Lanka, the narrative can be repetitive. [ Full Report ]

    Bob Carr rules out boycotting CHOGM in Sri Lanka over allegations of human rights violations. Foreign Minister Bob Carr says he will not boycott the Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting (CHOGM) in Sri Lanka over allegations of human rights violations. Former prime minister Malcolm Fraser called for Australia to skip the conference, which is scheduled to be held in November, following reports of the torture of Tamil civilians and government-sanctioned abuse of journalists, judges and opposition politicians. [ Full Report ]

    The Canadian Tamil Congress (CTC) is disappointed that decisive action on Sri Lanka was not taken during the 39th meeting of the Commonwealth Ministerial Action Group (CMAG) held today in London, England. CMAG was established in 1995 as a mechanism charged with the crucial responsibility of addressing violations of Commonwealth values including democracy, rule of law and freedom. Yet, despite calls from international human rights organizations, lawyers associations and civil society members, CMAG missed an opportunity to uphold the confidence of the very people it represents. [ Full Report ]

    Canada's foreign minister John Baird said it was "not a good day for the Commonwealth" that its secretariat was going ahead with plans to host the heads of government meeting (CHOGM) in Sri Lanka in November. Sri Lanka will also take on the chairmanship of the Commonwealth after the summit - amid mounting concerns that some of the Commonwealth's key democratic values are being ignored in the country. [ Full Report ]

    “I haven’t seen anything that would make me change my recommendation,” Mr. Baird said in an interview after the London meeting. “Canada is appalled that Sri Lanka is poised to host the summit.” “Reconciliation – not with terrorist organizations, but with the Tamil people, for ordinary Tamil families,” he said, so they can return to their homes, make a living “and live in peace and security with their Sinhalese neighbours.” “We were tough on the Tigers, and now that the civil war is over, we’re being tough on the government,” he said. [ Full Report ]

    The international community is clearly concerned that if it takes too strong a line with Sri Lanka, it will simply slip into China’s sphere of influence, and so lose all ability to promote Commonwealth values. However, this view fundamentally misinterprets Sri Lanka’s relationship with both China and the Commonwealth. Worse, systematic human rights violations continue to occur as the government uses militarisation to pacify the Tamil areas and destroys democratic institutions as President Mahinda Rajapakse and his family consolidate power in Colombo. [ Full Report ]

    FORMER prime minister Malcolm Fraser is among dozens of prominent Australians calling on the federal government to consider boycotting a major Commonwealth summit in Sri Lanka this year. Mr Fraser has added his name to a petition calling on Australia to join with Canada in avoiding the biennial Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting (CHOGM) in the Sri Lankan city of Hambantota in November. [ Full Report ]