He is accused of accepting money from terrorists (the Tamil Tigers) and inciting ethnic violence.
J. S. Tissainayagam, editor of the North Eastern Monthly magazine, wrote articles highly critical of a government military offensive against Tamil Tiger rebels who had controlled a large chunk of Sri Lanka’s north. The government decisively defeated the Tigers in a bloody final battle on a strip of beach in northern Sri Lanka in May. Mr. Tissainayagam was arrested in 2008 and charged under Sri Lanka’s powerful emergency laws, which were enacted in response to the Tamil Tiger insurgency. The insurgents, members of the Hindu Tamil minority, sought a separate state from Sri Lanka’s Buddhist, Sinhalese majority.
Yesterday was the International Day of the disappeared. Sri Lanka figured prominently in Amnesty International’s report. (HT: Danny Fisher)