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Since the end of the war, thousands of Tamil families in the north and east have been concerned about enforced disappearances

Hundreds of Tamil mothers on Friday took out a rally in Sri Lanka’s northern Kilinochchi district to mark 2,000 days of their relentless struggle, seeking truth and justice for their loved ones who forcibly disappeared during and after the civil war.

Women wearing black sarees and headbands marched in Kilinochchi carrying photographs of their missing relatives. “Where are children who surrendered to the army?”, “Arrest Gotabaya who was involved in a genocide”, “We want justice”, they chanted.

“We’ve been agitating for 2,000 days now, but justice has not been served. We want to draw attention to our struggle and highlight this long-pending issue before the Human Rights Council session meets in Geneva next month,” Kadirgamanathan Kohilavani, leader of a Kilinochchi-based group of families of disappeared told The Hindu. “We really hope they [Council] will do something to ensure justice for us,” she said.

Major concerns

Enforced disappearances have been among the chief concerns of thousands of Tamil families in the north and east lingering for over 13 years since the war ended. Families are relentlessly seeking information on the whereabouts of those who surrendered to the army. Their ongoing struggle, led by women, is among the longest agitations seen in Sri Lanka.

Sri Lanka has one of the world’s highest numbers of disappearances, according to rights watchdog Amnesty International. There is a backlog of 60,000 to 1,00,000 complaints, it notes, including from the island’s Sinhala-majority south where thousands of youth went missing around the armed insurrections led by the leftist Janatha Vimukthi Peramuna (JVP) in the early 1970s and late 1980s.

Several groups of families, spread across Sri Lanka’s northern and eastern districts that were the site of the nearly three-decade war, have been persisting with their agitations, braving frequent intimidation by the military.

The groups have at times had differences, in their demands and as well as the strategy for their struggle, but are bound by a shared resolve to continue seeking answers to the troubling questions that haunt them every day. At least 138 people, mostly mothers of these disappeared children, have died during the struggle, according to the women involved in the demonstrations.

Face enormous hardships

“Many of the mothers of these disappeared children, especially those depending on a daily wage job, are facing enormous hardships while continuing to agitate for justice. Some of them are eating only one or two meals instead of three because of the current situation,” Kohilavani said, pointing to the impact of the island’s harrowing economic crisis on the women. “No matter how hard things get, we will not stop demanding justice for our children,” she said.

The families have engaged with several domestic mechanisms, but to no avail, Amnesty International said in a tweet on Thursday.

Pointing to “many incidents of state repression” including “intimidation, harassment, and surveillance, restrictions on peaceful protests”, that are “long time challenges” for the families of the disappeared, the global human rights organisation urged the Sri Lankan government to “urgently and genuinely” take account of the demands of families of the disappeared, “prioritise, respect and facilitate” the families’ rights to truth, justice, and reparations without exerting pressure on them to close the cases on their missing loved ones.

Meera Sreenivasan is The Hindu Correspondent in Colombo

The first of two maritime patrol aircrafts that Sri Lanka is acquiring from India after a protracted negotiation process will arrive at Katunayake Air Force base next Monday (15) The Sunday Morning reliably learns.

The Dornier 228 Maritime Patrol Aircraft (MPA), a licensed built aircraft by the Hindustan Aeronautics Limited (HAL) of India will be ferried to Sri Lanka by a Sri Lanka Air Force crew, it is understood. The SLAF had dispatched a 15-member crew for training on the aircraft to India in April 2022 who have completed their training and qualified to fly and maintain the aircraft. The aircraft is to be maintained by a trained SLAF ground crew under the supervision of Indian engineers.

It is understood that the arrival of the (MPA) will be witnessed by senior government officials including the President and Indian diplomats.

Sri Lanka has been pursuing the acquisition of a fleet of dedicated MPA since the mid 1990’s. Sri Lanka is also expected to acquire a Beechcraft King Air 360ER maritime patrol aircraft from the United States in the future. Earlier, the Ministry of Defence had considered acquiring surplus Lockheeed Martine P-3C Orion MPA’s from Australia and Japan. However, the plans had failed to move forward.

The Dornier 228’s entry into the Sri Lankan armed forces service, comes following a government-to-government discussion which began in 2018 when Sri Lanka requested to acquire two aircrafts from India to improve the islands’ maritime surveillance capabilities. Sri Lanka has been proactive over the last few years in capacity building to ensure it has adequate awareness and response capabilities to respond to maritime crime and security threats in its Exclusive Economic Zone (EEZ) and the high seas.

Earlier this year, the Cabinet of ministers granted approval for two Dornier 228 MPA’s to be acquired from India. The first MPA, arriving next Monday is one which was in service with Indian Naval Fleet Air Arm on gratis basis for initial two years.

According to sources at the Ministry of Defence, this is due to the production time required to manufacture a new aircraft at HAL for the program. Under the agreement between both governments, Sri Lanka will purchase one new MPA from India, while another new aircraft of the same make is to be gifted to Sri Lanka by India.

Spokesman for the Sri Lanka Air Force, Gp. Capt Dushan Wijesinghe confirmed the aircraft’s arrival next week. “The SLAF intends to effectively employ the aircraft to conduct Maritime and Coastal Surveillance Operations within the Exclusive Economic Zone (EEZ), Search and Rescue Operations (SAR), Casualty Evacuation (CASEVAC) and Maritime Pollution Monitoring and Control within Sri Lankan Search and Rescue Region (SRR), he said.

The Indian built MPA is expected to enter service with the SLAF’s No.03 Maritime Squadron which is based at China Bay, Trincomalee.

Sri Lanka Navy, in accordance with naval traditions, ceremonially welcomed the Pakistan Navy Ship (PNS) Taimur, arrived at the Port of Colombo Friday (12th August).

The 134m-long ship is commanded by Captain M Yasir Tahir and it is manned by 169 as the ship’s complement.

In the meantime, the Commanding Officer of PNS Taimur is scheduled to call on Commander Western Naval Area at the Western Naval Command Headquarters today.

The ship is expected to remain in the island until 15th August and the crew of the ship will take part in several programs organized by the Sri Lanka Navy to promote cooperation and goodwill between two navies.

Further, PNS Taimur is expected to conduct a naval exercise with the Sri Lanka Navy in western seas on its departure on 15th August.

PNS Tughril an identical warship belongs to the Pakistan Navy arrived in Sri Lanka on an official visit on 13th December 2021 and conducted a successful naval exercise with SLNS Sindurala off the western coast on 16th December.

Naval exercises of this nature with regional navies will enable each partner to overcome common maritime challenges in the future, through enhanced cooperation, Sri Lanka Navy said.

The protesters at the Galle Face protest site “GotaGoGama” have completetly vacated the site today after 125 days.

They dismantled their last tent from the site this afternoon.

A group of protesters who continued to stay at the protest site near the Presidential Secretariat on the Galle Face Green had already left the site on August 9.

However, several protesters stayed at the location until this afternoon.

They dismantled all the remaining canopies after police again today told the protesters who were occupying the site to leave within 15 minutes.

The Committee on Parliamentary Business has decided to hold a four-day debate in the House on the Budget Amendment Bill 2022.

Accordingly, the parliament will meet between 9.30 am and 4.30 pm from August 30, 31 and September 01 and 02 for the said debate.

The amendment bill with regard to the Appropriation Act No. 30 of 2021 for the year 2022 was presented to the Parliament by Prime Minister Dinesh Gunawardena on August 09

Meanwhile, the adjournment debate moved by the Opposition on the electricity tariff revision is scheduled for August 29.

The Harbour Master for the Hambantota Port says that the Yuan Wang 5, a ballistic missile and satellite tracking ship in China’s research vessel fleet, will not reach port today.

He said that no vessel can enter the Hambantota Port without his permission.

The Sri Lankan Foreign Ministry already requested China to defer the arrival of the Yuan Wang 5, a ballistic missile and satellite tracking ship in China’s research vessel fleet.

However, there is no announcement on whether or not this vessel will be allowed to enter the Hambantota Port.

The Yuan Wang 5 left its Chinese Port of Origin on the 14th of July, and until now it has not entered a single port along its route.

The vessel has been sailing for approximately 28 days with zero replenishment.

On the 28th of June 2022, China announced that the Yuan Wang 5 would reach the Hambantota Port and the Foreign Ministry granted approval on the 12th of July.

However, on the 8th of August 2022, Sri Lanka’s Foreign Ministry in a letter to the Chinese Embassy requested for the ship to be delayed, however, the Yuan Wang 5 had already entered the Indian Ocean by that time.

However, the statement from the Foreign Ministry did not specify the reason for such a request.

In recent days, Indian media reports suggested that Indian authorities had voiced their protest against the arrival of the Yuan Wang 5, citing security concerns.

When News 1st made an inquiry from the Indian High Commission in Sri Lanka on Wednesday (10) on this matter, the High Commission said NO COMMENT.

On Wednesday (10) vessel trackers showed that the Yuan Wang 5 was moving away from its course to Sri Lanka, however, on Thursday (11) the vessel was back on its course to Sri Lanka.

The Yuan Wang 5 was approximately 600 nautical miles away from the southern port of Hambantota in the Sea of Sri Lanka as of Thursday (11) evening.

The vessel is now facing the Bay of Bengal from the east of Sri Lanka.

An observation of the course of the Yuan Wang 5 revealed that it was passing over the Ninety East Ridge, a mid-ocean ridge on the Indian Ocean floor named for its near-parallel strike along the 90th meridian at the center of the Eastern Hemisphere.

On Tuesday (9) the Yuan Wang 5 made a slight change to its course and proceeded over the Ninety East Ridge, at low speed.

In 2021, a Chinese government survey ship, the Xiang Yang Hong 03, was operating in the same region in the Indian Ocean and carrying out a search pattern west of Sumatra.

A Pakistan warship is on its maiden voyage to Pakistan while exercising en route with Cambodian and Malaysian navies. The ship is expected to be at Colombo port from August 12-15, 2022.

Chinese built Pakistani-guided missile frigate PNS Taimur to make a port call at Colombo while on its way to join the Pakistan Navy in Karachi, and India too had focused its attention on this vessel as well.

While Sri Lanka permitted the Pakistani guided missile frigate to make a port call at Colombo, it is understood that the ship was denied permission to make a port call at Chattogram port by the Sheikh Hasina government from August 7-10 after making a port call at Lumut port in Malaysia.