Sri Lanka: Freedom of expression violations

By Sunanda Deshapriya

Overview

(February 04, Colombo, Sri Lanka Guardian) The year 2009 saw an escalation of the conflict with a military offensive launched by the government against the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) concluding in May 2009 with the security forces asserting control over the areas held and controlled by the LTTE in the Vanni District of northern Sri Lanka. The brutal end of the conflict cost thousands of lives and devastated the Vanni. It is estimated that tens of thousands of civilians and thousands of combatants perished during the first six months of the year. Both sides to the conflict violated international law in the course of the conflict. The Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) used Tamil civilians who were trapped in Vanni as human shields and the Sri Lankan government forces used their superior fire power indiscriminately killing civilians in their last battles to defeat the LTTE. The LTTE was also accused for firing on fleeing civilians. Although there have been allegations raised as to crimes against humanity, allegedly perpetrated by both sides, no independent observers were present during the conflict not has there been any independent investigation permitted by the state in the immediate post-conflict period.

Following the end of the conflict, over 300,000 Tamil civilians who had fle the Vanni during the last weeks of the war were confined to internment camps controlled by security forces, denied their freedom of mobility and left without any access to independent observers, including media and humanitarian workers. By the end of the year most of these civilians had been released from the camps mainly due to international pressure.

The conflict ended within a political environment in which draconian laws such as the Emergency Regulations and the Prevention of Terrorism Act continued to be in force and human rights abuses, suppression of media freedom and political opposition to the war and to corrupt practices was endemic. Hundreds continued in arbitrary detention and torture in Police custody was commonplace. Special Rapporteurs of the UN Human Rights Council have made repeated requests to the government of Sri Lanka for better compliance with the state’s human rights obligations but to no avail.

President Mahinda Rajapakse continued to block the appointment of the Constitutional Council under the 17th amendment to the Constitution, thereby undermining the independence of the National Commissions on public services, judicial services, human rights, police, and bribery and corruption.

I In the wake of the war victory, the Inspector General of Police launched a campaign against ‘criminal elements’leading to a steep increase in suspects being arrested by the police and killed in fake ‘encounters’ . The opposition charged that the war against the underworld was politically motivated.

Since June 2009, the Government held provincial council elections on a staggered basis to maximize the political mileage instead of holding them in one day. The ruling party won power in these provincial council elections. The central government continued to entertain and maintain 114 ministers in a country with 20 million population, making the number of ministries a world record.

At the end of the year President Rajapaksha decided to advance the presidential election by two years in the hope of capitalizing the war victory. In an unexpected turn of events a broad front led by the main opposition party, the liberal democratic United National Party, and the Peoples Liberation Front (JVP) joined together to support former army commander General (Rtd.) Sarath Fonseka as common candidate. This led to a sudden revitalization of political discourse on democracy, peace and governance in Sri Lanka.

The Media and communication in Sri Lanka:

Mass communications in Sri Lanka are either controlled or regulated by the state. There are 12 television stations/networks, with 15 channels, of which3 are state controlled, and most importantly, are the only ones with an islandwide outreach. There are 31 radio stations with 38 FM channels,10 of which are state controlled. Licenses are granted to private companies that run radio and television stations on an annual basis. There are 12 newspaper establishments with 17 dailies (3 state controlled) and 20 weeklies (3 state controlled). Printing laws regulate the publication and dissemination of printed material. The majority of non-state Sinhala and English language media institutions are owned by political associates of the ruling party.

There is no published code of ethics and supervisory mechanism in any of the media institutions in Sri Lanka. The Sri Lanka Press Complaints Commission (PCCSL), a self-regulatory mechanism, has adopted the code of professional practice of the Editors’ Guild of Sri Lanka and received less than 50 complaints during the first half of 2009.
The number of cellular mobile subscribers hit 12,658,483 mark by June 2009 bringing mobile subscription per 100 people to 62. The number of fixed telephone lines stood at 3,391,484 by the same period. Internet subscribers are relatively low, by June there were only 240,000 (provisional). Computer literacy among vernacular language journalists is low and news rooms are neither networked nor equipped with computers. Statistics for TV and radio prevalence for the recent years are not available. The official figures of newspapers circulation are exaggerated and not reliable in Sri Lanka.

Media freedom situation:

• The freedom of expression continued to be restricted in Sri Lanka throughout the year 2009. During the conflict the Government of Sri Lanka used all methods at its disposal to keep the media under strict control and to prevent any independent coverage of the situation in the areas where fighting and displacement was taking place.. Media was forced to adopt a strict self-censorship, especially on matters related to the war and the aftermath of the war.

• Incidents of Freedom of Expressions violations in Sri Lanka has been documented by Media Freedom Sri Lanka (MFSL) and has recorded in 2009 the following incidents of violence against media persons: 8 killings (including 6 media workers reported killed in the war zone ), 7 abductions, 13 arrests, 17 cases of physical assaults, 72 threats, 9 police interrogations. There were 6 incidents of arson reported by media institutions. MFSL also recorded 24 instances of censorship during this period and 8 cases of refusal of entry visa or non extension of visa and deportation related to freedom of expression issues. 33 media personnel fled the country in the same period due to fears for their personal security, following threats and intimidation.

• The GoSL made a commitment during its bid for election for the UN Human Rights Council in 2006 to invite the Special Rapporteur (SR) on Freedom of Expression to investigate press freedom violations. In August 2009 a request was made by the office of the SR on freedom of expression to visit Sri Lanka . So far, the GoSL has not responded to this request.

• Impunity for crimes against media remained as the main characteristic of all attacks against the media. None of the killings, abductions, assaults, threats and acts of intimidation have been investigated to completion. Among them is the assassination of Sunday Leader editor Lasantha Wickrematunga in January 2009. Government political leaders and high ranking officials continued to make public allegations against media and journalists without any evidence. Defense Secretary Gotabhaya Rajapaksea and his website, defence.)lk named a number of media personnel as terrorists, even after some of them were cleared by the judiciary. In late May when the war victory jubilation was at its height, most senior armed services and police officers appearing on state controlled TV leveled charges against unnamed free media activists as LTTE collaborators who allegedly received money from the LTTE. . The President as well as the media minister said on record that the GoSL has a list of journalists who were on LTTE payroll. For example, when representatives of media organizations met with the President on 1 June 2009 he then stated that the government has a list of journalists who were on the payroll list of the LTTE.

• On 19 July 2009 this writer in his weekly political column, published in the Sinhala language weekly Ravaya, challenged the government to publish any such list with evidence and file charges under normal law. So far the GoSL has not responded or taken any action to this challenge.

• Threats and intimidation remained the main tools in suppressing media for the most part of the year. Naming and shaming by government politicians, abductions, assaults, threatening telephone calls, repeated harassments by police were the main tactics used in enforcing the strategy of media control. The number of threats recorded by MFSL during 2009 was 72. This number must be considered as only those incidents reported by the media, however, some threats and intimidations directed and received at media personnel by various authorities are not reported to media due to fear of reprisal.

• Censorship and self-censorship became the norm in reporting the last stage of war, in which thousands of civilians perished. Although bribery and corruption is a major issue in Sri Lanka today corruption investigation reporting became non existent in all most all news media. The Morning Leader, the mid-week newspaper of the Sunday Leader group vanished from the newsstands after the murder of its sister newspaper Sunday Leader editor Lasantha Wickrematunge on 8 January 2009. A website with critical content Lankadissent.com disappeared from cyber space in the wake of Wickrematunge’s killing. Mawbima, a popular newspaper which was forced to close down by the regime had to abandon plans to re-launch the newspaper even after recruiting a new editorial staff in early 2009. Co-opting media and leading journalists into the government propaganda network became an open secret. On 1 February 2009 Defense Secretary named CNN, Al-Jazeera, and BBC and warned them of dire consequences “if they do not follow the government line”. Morality-based arguments were used to ban websites with sexual contents and to ban certain films.

• Although powerful sections of the GoSL promoted a Bill to prohibit religious ‘ conversion’ (the so-called "Anti conversion bill"), it was not submitted to the parliament for approval. However, the debates around religious conversion created a hostile environment for smaller religious groups and sects and on a number of occasions places of religious worship of minority communities came under attack.

• Independent coverage of war was completely banned. The GoSL allowed only two state controlled TV stations and one private pro-war TV station to cover the war as embedded reporters. The GoSL and the LTTE propaganda arms distributed news and visuals on the war regularly. Independent verification of war casualties was not possible. Four government doctors — T. Varatharajah, the Vanni regional director of the health services, V. Shanmugarajah, a medical superintendent, T. Sathiyamurthy and Ilancheliyan Pallavan—who ran hospitals in the war zone became the only source of information for the world. All of them were detained at the end of war and branded as LTTE supporters. They were released on bail and were asked to handover their passports. Even after six months of war coming to end the GoSL has not allowed any independent media to areas where decisive last battles were fought. During 2009 Jaffna, the capital city of the Northern Province, faced the brunt of the censorship. No foreign media was allowed to visit the city independently. Even local journalists had to obtain permission to visit Jaffna at the end of the year.

• Covering humanitarian issues was an challenge in the context of widespread self-censorship. During the last phase of the war when 300,000 civilians were trapped in the war zone and going through untold hardships the mainstream media failed to report on the reality of the situation. The Sinhala language media by and large supported and strengthened the goevrnment’s attacks against the UN and other relief operations in relation to the humanitarian crisis in Vanni. In general, Sinhala and English mainstream media had become cogs and wheels of the GoSL war propaganda. Media monitoring on the coverage of humanitarian issues carried out by the media unit of the Centre for Policy Alternatives has extensively documented the self-censorship and biases that prevailed in mainstream media.

• The emergency regulations and the Prevention of Terrorism Act (PTA) - the Emergency (Miscellaneous Provisions and Powers) Regulation 2005 and the Emergency (Prevention and Prohibition of Terrorism and Specified Terrorist Activities) Regulation 2006 - were used to arrest, detain and imprison media personnel during the year 2009. For the first time three media personnel were charged under the PTA. On 31 August 2009 senior journalist J.S. Tissanayagam was sentenced to 20 years rigorous imprisonment under PTA. Emergency regulations were used widely in curbing the right to association and the right to protest as well. Challenged by the opposition to repeal emergency regulations and PTA after the declaration of the end of the war, the GoSL categorically stated that these laws cannot be repealed in the near future.

• New media became the main arena for unfettered dissent and opinion in a dangerously shrinking free media environment in Sri Lanka. Tamil language websites and blogs have been playing a vital role in Tamil nationalist discourse for years. While a number of English language websites provided space for critical opinion, trilingual news websites provided alternative news and another point of view. The much awaited Sinhala Unicode fonts started to make a real impact on Sinhala language bloggers in the course of 2009. A new generation of youthful Sinhala language bloggers was increasingly invading the Sri Lankan blogsphere, opening up vast areas for interaction ranging from poetry to postmodernism. Some of the most critical and thoughtful analysis on developing socio–political situation on Sri Lanka are found in the Sinhala language blogs sphere today . Despite these encouraging developments civil society is yet to make any impact in using ICT. For example, 23 websites maintained by the largest NGOs based in Colombo do not include Sinhala or Tamil language sites to communicate their messages in vernacular languages . The privately owned Times group of newspapers has become the pace-setter in using the new media : Its newspaper run websites has breaking news as well as audio visuals other than posting just the print edition on internet.

• Media freedom campaign within the country took a nose drive after attacks aimed at media in January 2009. Many press freedom activists had to leave the country for their safety. At least 34 media personnel left the country in the course of 2009, 24 of them have applied for political asylum in western countries. In the wake of the number of physical and verbal attacks that took place in the first three months of the year fear- psychosis griped the media community. The safe house and media centre maintained by 5 Media Collective in Colombo had to close down. Regular press releases on Freedom of Expression violation ceased to be issued. Anti- media proclamations by politicians remained unchallenged. State controlled media continued to level all kinds of charges against media freedom organizations and media activists. By the end of the year - thanks to the political space created by the presidential election campaign - media freedom gathered some strength and submitted an agenda for reform to all presidential candidates. In opposing the re-establishment of the government controlled Press Council the media community came together and demanded that the GoSL put on hold the Council Act indefinitely. The 10th anniversary of the "Colombo Declaration for Media Freedom and Social Responsibility' also brought media stakeholders together.

• Free and fair elections are part and parcel of freedom of expression rights. In 1998 judgment Supreme Court of Sri Lanka stated that "The freedom of ‘speech and expression’ guaranteed by that Article should be broadly construed to include the exercise of the right of an elector to vote at the election" . Nominations for the 5th Presidential election in Sri Lanka were called for by the election commissioner on 17 November 2009. The Presidential election campaign has been marred by the misuse of state resources, including island-wide and powerful state controlled media, and by violence unleashed against opponents by the ruling party. The election commissioner had threatened to resign in the face of non-compliance of his directives by the police and state authorities . The Centre for Monitoring Election Violence has recorded 619 incidents of which 275 were of serious nature, 344 were minor incidents and in 89 cases firearms had been used . Misuse of public resources had climbed to unprecedented levels as recorded by Transparency International, Sri Lanka .

• International advocacy became the major force in defending media freedom in Sri Lanka throughout 2009 as the movements for media freedom within the country had to lie low and their main focus had become safety. In February 2009 the Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) issued a special report on Sri Lanka entitled "Failure to Investigate" . CPJ impunity index of March 2009 rated Sri Lanka at 0.452 unsolved journalist murders per 1 million inhabitants . On 21 April 2009 the CPJ Asia Program Coordinator Robert Dietz testified on the press freedom situation in Sri Lanka before the Tom Lantos Human Rights Commission of the House of Representatives, Washington, D.C.. The testimony included a set of recommendations to the international community, the US government, and the GoSL. Reporters without Borders (RSF) press freedom index 2009 ranked Sri Lanka among the worst press freedom violators placing at rank 162 out of 175 countries. In May 2009 the International Federation of Journalists (IFJ) - Asia Pacific office published its South Asia report "Under Fire, South Asia Press Freedom Report 2008 – 2009" which dealt on Sri Lanka at length. International Press Freedom Mission sent its forth mission led by IFJ to Sri Lanka in November 2009. The final report published in January 2010 includes a section on recommendations for the media and the GoSL. In the Human Rights Council sessions in March, June and September 2009 a number of governments and non-governmental organizations continued to raise concerns of the deteriorating media freedom situation in Sri Lanka. The European Union emphasized media freedom and ending impunity as a pre-condition for the renewal of GSP plus tax concessions to Sri Lanka. Many political leaders in Western countries expressed their concerns on the media situation in Sri Lanka including Barack Obama, the President of the United States. Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch continued to raise media freedom issues in Sri Lanka at various levels including at the UN, the EU, and other international forums.

• Prospects for 2010 are invariably linked with the Presidential election in January 2010 and the parliamentary election due in April 2010. The Presidential election has opened up more space for media and media freedom debate in Sri Lanka. Among other issues, it has brought the role of state controlled media into the centre stage of political discussions due to its flagrant violation of election commissioner's guidelines and blatantly biased coverage of the Presidential campaign in favor of incumbent President Rajapaksha. Rajapaksha's election manifesto does not include any policy guidelines on media freedom or improving rule of law which is a tacit statement that no radical improvement of the media freedom situation is envisaged. The main opposition party, the UNP, which backs Fonseka candidacy has stated that it will introduce a ‘Freedom of Information Act’ and will transform state controlled media into an independent trust. In addition, it will also address conflict of interests in media ownership. Rajapakse’s re-election campaign is based on economic revival in post-war Sri Lanka and lacks a comprehensive agenda for democratization. His main contender, Fonseka, has as a main agenda to abolish the Executive Presidential system and to transfer power to a new parliament to be elected before April 2010.

Postscript:

Post-presidential election period has become an open season for attacks against media and journalists who did not follow the incumbent and elected Presidential Candidate Mahinda Rajapaksa. The election campaign itself became one of the most violent campaigns in Sri Lanka's electoral history. Post-election violence against opposition supporters has reached unprecedented levels. Common opposition candidate General (rtd) Sarath Fonseka has come under immense pressure and target of insinuation campaign. Media was banned, journalists have been arrested, assaulted, threatened; more than a dozen journalists have been interdicted. An number of leading journalists are in hiding in Colombo. For more information please see: MFSL updates at http://sunandadeshapriya.wordpress.com/mfsl-reports/. Human Rights Watch, Amnesty International, Reporters Without Borders, the International Federation of Journalists, the Commonwealth Press Union, International commission of Jurists and the Committee to Protect Journalists in press statements have demanded that post-election crackdown of media in Sri Lanka to be stopped immediately. Yet there are no signs of the Government of Sri Lanka reversing its tested policy of media control aiming at transforming whole Sri Lanka into submission.

Freedom of Expression Violations:

Killed:

08 January Lasantha Wickramatunga, chief editor Sunday Leader
12 February Puniyamoorthy Sathiyamoorthy, freelancer, Jaffna

Media deaths due to war: (independent verification was not possible)
Maheswaran, Mullaitivu district in-charge for Eelanthan daily, the newspaper that was coming from the LTTE controlled Vanni,
Antonykumar, storekeeper and reporter, Eezhanaatham.
Rooban, computer operator in Eezhanaatham,
Sasimathan, Eezhanatham’s distributor for Mullaitivu district,
Densey, media worker, Eezhanaatham.
Anton, media worker

Abducted:

26 Feb. N. Vithiyadharan, chief editor, Sudar Oli & Uthyan (assaulted and handed over to police)
11 March Prof. Dammika Ganganath Dissanayake, threatened and released
29 May Tissa Senadeera, released next day
01 June Poddala Jayantha, journalist, Secretary Sri Lanka Working Journalists’ association (assaulted and abandoned)
24 June Krishni Kandasamy, female journalist, threatened and released later
27 Aug Prageeth Eknaligoda, cartoonist and writer (released next day)
21 Sep Family relatives of former IDP Gannakumar Tamilvani because of her interview on British Guardian Newspaper: Tamilvani stopped talking to the media after the abductions of her family members

Imprisoned:

01 Aug J.S Tissanayagam, editor North Eastern Herald and senior journalist (sentenced to 20 years of RI under PTA)


Arrested:

22 January Prakash Shakthi Velupillai, freelancer, detained at TID
26 Feb. N. Vithiyadharan, chief editor, Sudar Oli & Uthyan detained at Colombo Crime Division
05 March Sritharasing, manager of the Poobalasingam Book Depot at Wellawatte because of distribution of the South Indian Magazine Annada Vikadam
27 March Santha Fernando, Executive Secretary Commission for Justice and Peace – National Christian Conference, Sri Lanka, for having documents related to civilians casualties in war zone, detained at TID
01 June Benet Rupasinghe, news editor lankaenews.com
02 June Sandaruwan Senadeera, editor/owner lankaenews.com
12 August Udul Premaratne and Gihan Seneviratne, student leaders for putting up posters on educational crisis
14 August Two staff members of Lanka Irida, a Sinhala weekly arrested while putting up newspaper's posters
02 Sep. Shalika Wimalasena, Daya Neththasinghe and Ravindra Pushpakumara, editorial staff of Lanka Irida, detained under PTA
17 Oct Chandana Sirimalwatta, chief editor, Lanka Irida

Assaulted/Attacked:

02 January MTV/MBC net work, attacked with fire bombs
06 January MTV/MBC net work, set on fire after shooting
22 January Upali Tennakoon, editor, Rivira, cut with sharp objects
31 January Sun TV office in Vavuniya attacked with granades
01 April M.I. Rahmahetulla, editor Vara Uraikal, attacked with knives/swords
07 May Tushara Saliya Ranawaka, Gampaha correspondent, Sirasa TV beaten
25 June Jaffna news papers burned
03 Oct. Kishan Jeewaka Jayaruk of Lankadeepa, Chandika Jayawardana and Shaman Chanuka of Sirasa TV, Kalum Jayaweera of TNL TV
16 Nov. Sanjeewa Rathnayaka, provincial correspondent, Swarnawahini TV
03 Dec. Teachers’ peaceful protest march attacked with tear gas
06 Dec. 5 persons TV crew of ITN assaulted at UNP convention
10 Dec. JVP propaganda team assaulted by ruling party thugs

Death Threats:

01 January Iqbal Athas, associate editor and defense correspondent of the Sunday Times
04 January Punithaseelan Piratheepan, Tamil language journalist, Eastern Sri Lanka
07 January Sanath Balasooriya, associate editor Dinamina
29 May Sunanda Deshapriya, columnist Ravaya, former editor
June Thilak Kodagoda, journalist, Ravaya
04 June Neth FM, journalist,
12 June Ruwan Weerakone, correspondent for Asian Tribune and the Bottom Line newspaper,
Prasanna Fonseka, formerly with Lake House and currently with Siyatha newspaper,
Tissa Ravindra, Rivira newspaper,
Mihiri Fonseka, Lakbima
Amal Samantha, Rupavahini Corporation
26 June Full staff of Uthayan news paper, Jaffna
10 July Sundaralingam, Vadamarachchi, Jaffna
24 June Veeman, correspondent, Sri Lanka Guardian
20 August P. Saravanamuttu, academic and HR activist
02 Sep Poddala Jayantha, President, SLWJA
13 Sep Saman Samarakkody, Lakbima News
22 Oct Frederica Jansz, editor The Sunday Leader
Munza Mushtaq, news editor The Sunday Leader
06 Dec Duruthu Edirimuni Chandrasekera, Sunday Times

Deported/visa denied:

18 Feb Jesse Hardman, journalist and staff member of InterNews Sri Lanka
26 April Jeremy Page, South Asia Correspondent of Timesonline – sent back form the air port
01 May The Immigration and Emigration Department had restricted the issue of visas for 837 persons including foreign media personnel
09 May Channel 4 TV crew deported
Reporter Nick Paton Walsh
Producer Bessie Du
Cameraman Matt Jasper
9 June Bob Rae, a prominent Canadian politician outspoken in his criticism of the GoSL military campaign – denied entry
22 July Ravi Nessman, The Associated Press bureau chief in Sri Lanka - visa extension denied
11 Sep James Elder, Head of Communication, UNICEF, Sri Lanka