Author: Richard Edwards

Sri Lanka Tweet

Posted on by Richard Edwards

<blockquote class=”twitter-tweet” data-lang=”en” data-theme=”dark”><p lang=”en” dir=”ltr”>It is very sad that we Sri Lankans havent been able to let go of our cruel traditions. <br>A New Year Celebration &quot;game&quot; : Elephant Race <br>The participants are made to take part by force and torture held in chains and stabbed by bullhook. <a href=”https://t.co/88duwIrZou”>pic.twitter.com/88duwIrZou</a></p>&mdash; RARE Sri Lanka (@RARE_SriLanka) <a href=”https://twitter.com/RARE_SriLanka/status/1650743638950047750?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw”>April 25, 2023</a></blockquote> <script async src=”https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js” charset=”utf-8″></script>

This tweet talks about the cruel New Year traditions that Sri Lanka continues to this day. The tradition is called elephant racing and it is when elephants are chained and hooked by stabbing so they can race. This is pure example of animal abuse because there harming and forcing the animal to engage in the historical tradition. The tweet condemns those who participated in the acts and wishes that fellow Sri Lankans “let go of our cruel traditions”

HR: Twitter

Encryption: Sri Lanka Special Task Force assault Tamil landowners

Posted on by Richard Edwards

Situation:

Four Vavuniya homeowners were attacked and hurt on Saturday by Sri Lankan Special Task Force (STF) officers when they were clearing their land.While the locals of Maraiyadiththakulam, Vavuniya were removing the underbrush that had grown on their land, the policemen in civilian garments invaded the area. The STF officers entered as they were clearing the field and made an effort to stop them by saying that the land belonged to the Forest Department. The victims alleged that when the officers returned in the evening and assaulted them, they were drunk. The National Housing Development Authority had given the residents permission to clear their land, the MP responded when he was questioned about it. He added that he had checked with the Forest Department to see if there were any questions about who owned the land, and he confirmed that there weren’t any. He also said that he had complained to the STF’s IGP, Pujith Jayasundara, about the behavior of the STF officials. The incident occurs against a background of escalating conflicts between landowners in Sri Lanka’s North-East and state forces and agencies. Land robberies in the Tamil homeland are frequently carried out by the Sri Lankan Forest Department.

 

Encryption: Once again we’re denied our birth given rights. Again the state officials disrespect us and the land our forefathers have gave us. The root of the issue? The state, the ones at the top, the ones who are corrupt. For just trimming a bushes that happen to be overgrown and on pieces of Tamil owned land. The law abiding citizens of this land that previously got the greenlight from the NHDA to take care of part of the land were harassed and assaulted by the Special Task Force. My Sri Lankan brothers and sisters, when will this stop. The purging of the Tamil homeland must be stop once and for all. At what cost will change happen? Will it take another incident like this or even include death to stop the robbery of our home land?

 

HR:https://www.tamilguardian.com/content/sri-lanka-special-task-force-assault-tamil-landowners

Sri Lanka News: “An increasingly authoritarian regime that fears the voting public”

Posted on by Richard Edwards

In this new article I discovered that there is fear within the Sri Lankan society to go out in practice democracy in fear authoritarian regime. The author, Frederica Jansz, criticizes the government makes decisions based off the economic elite and the nations military. She then suggest that if local authorities had more power than the central government that it could have more of positive impact on politics nationwide. My question is for this is, why won’t there be a country wide Civil Disobedience movement? Sri Lanka already has a bright light shining on them internationally, so if there were to be a movement, change would have to come.

 

 

 

 

 

The link to the article is: https://english.newsfirst.lk/2023/2/20/opinion-an-increasingly-authoritarian-regime-that-fears-the-voting-public

 

HR: https://english.newsfirst.lk/2023/2/20/opinion-an-increasingly-authoritarian-regime-that-fears-the-voting-public

Sri Lanka News: “Kalutara locals use torches to protest against tariff hike”

Posted on by Richard Edwards

The news article presented by NewsFirst talked about how a local tariff on electricity is affecting the livelihood of low income citizens in Kalutara. On February 15th the Public Utilities Commission approved a 66% increase on the electricity tariff that would help generate additional income for Ceylon Electricity Board. This cost a lot of frustration with the locals in Kalutara because most of the citizens living there are on the border line of living in poverty and this new tariff is just making this worst. The approval of the tariff was already in question when the proposal came up. When this idea was introduced several members of the Public Utilities Commission resigned. However a day later new board members were appointed to the empty spots and the proposal was approved under new leadership.

One of the questions I have about this article is, why did the motion to increase the tariff get approved so quickly after board members resigned the previous day in fear of backlash from the public? If this proposal had that much issues that caused board members to resign, shouldn’t it be reviewed carefully and not voted on so hastefully?

 

Link to article: english.newsfirst.lk/…/kalutara-locals-use-torches-to-protest-against-tariff-hike

 

HR:Instagram to find the News Channel and english.newsfirst.lk/…/kalutara-locals-use-torches-to-protest-against-tariff-hike.

Sri Lanka Tweet

Posted on by Richard Edwards

The tweet I picked today was about misinformation post that circulated around Sri Lanka about Free Jobs being given out. In the tweet Sri Lankan journalist Azzam Ameen tweeted “nearly 1000 individuals had traveled to Colombo from across Sri Lanka today after a fake social media post was circulated on free jobs offered in Turkey”. Knowing the political crisis that has decimated Sri Lanka’s government, that post caused a lot of public uproar. The police had to be dispatched to Colombo because the crowd that arrived there for jobs turned into a mob that starting in-sighting violence. After learning the difference between fake social media post (Misinformation- wrong information handed unintentionally and Disinformation- false information purposely disseminated, usually by a government, for the purpose of creating a false impression), I would label that job posting as misinformation. Although the posting of free job did insight violence, the post was not meant for Sri Lanka it was meant for Turkey. The country is already facing political turmoil so a post like this would make citizens very desperate .

 

 

Helped received: Twitter and Notes from in class