Self emploment project in Jaffna supported by CCFD

Livelihood promotion program was conducted in Jaffna district .We have given financial support for the Women headed families,Disables,Marginalized families in seven welfare camps in Jaffna district .This is one  of the experiences that we got during last month monitoring visit .please find out the YouTube        

Training on Documentation and UN advocasy

NAFSO and PCHR organize the training on Documentation and UN advocacy at NAFSO training center on 15 th to 17 th October 2013 .We have selected 30 participant from  the 13 district .Members of the Jaffna,Mannar,Trincomalli ,Battcaloa,Ampara, form the north and East ,and Matrra,Galle,Kaluthara,Gampaha,Kurunagala,Puttlam,Badullla,and polonnaruwa .This training  is  conducting Mr. Rukshan fernando.

Link the bridge with north and south youth

01.Youth  Committee Meeting and education work shop  On 2013.07.13-14

At National Fisheries Training Center in Negombo, Sri Lanka

Youth organizations  are reforming in south Districts.Specially Matara,Galle,Kaluthara ,Gampaha,Puttlam,Polonnaruwa, and Kurunagala youth team leaders got together last August and decided to strengthen their groups and activities .In that workshop they had  analyzes the present situation of the country and responsibility of the youth .Then they  prepared plan for the future

conducted the situation analyzes by Herman Kumara

Awareness on culture and how it use for the people mobilization 

Conducted the value of the focus for the future and build the objectives

prepared a action plan 

02.Youth  Committee Meeting and workshop for the North and East team  On 2013.09.12-13

At National Fisheries Training Center in Negombo, Sri Lanka.

We followed the same content in  North and East Youth leaders  workshop.Youth leaders from the Jaffna ,Mannar,Trincamalle,Ampara and Batticaloa participated that Workshop .

Shared the objective of the program -National youth coordinator Laksiri fernando

 

Situation analyzes

Group discussions

prepared the action plan

03.Youth National Committee Meeting On 04-05/10/2013

At National Fisheries Training Center in Negombo, Sri Lanka.

Finally North and South youth team got together for build the NATIONAL COMITY .In that workshop we could selected national coordination team 

National youth comity leaders.presidents from Jaffna and Galle

 

India calls for a political solution in Sri Lanka based on full implementation of 13th Amendment

Mon, Oct 7, 2013, 07:01 pm SL Time, ColomboPage News Desk, Sri Lanka.
Oct 07, Colombo: India today said that it looks forward to an early resumption of the dialogue process to reach a political settlement in Sri Lanka based on the full implementation of 13th Amendment to the Constitution in a timely manner.
Issuing a media statement following a meeting with his Sri Lankan counterpart Prof. G.L. Peiris, the visiting External Affairs Minister of India, Salman Khurshid said India is committed to the unity, sovereignty and territorial integrity of Sri Lanka and ready to offer its assistance to take the process forward.
"It is our hope that the vision and leadership that resulted in an end to armed conflict and holding of elections to the Northern Province, will now be employed to work for genuine reconciliation," Khurshid said.
"We will continue to work with the Government of Sri Lanka, and help in whatever way we can, to take this process forward, in a spirit of partnership and cooperation."
The Indian Minister, who arrived in Colombo this morning on a two-day official visit, held discussions with Minister Peiris this afternoon on all issues of bilateral, regional and international concern and reviewed the progress in various areas, including trade, investment, development cooperation, culture and education.
The two ministers have reviewed the progress made in implementation of the Indian assisted projects for IDPs, particularly the Housing Project, as well as projects relating to the development of railway infrastructure in the North and the South.
They also have discussed the fishermen's issue and agreed on the need to deal with it in a humane manner without resorting to violence under any circumstances.
The two ministers have agreed to encourage fishermen's associations on both sides, which had met in the past and reached some understandings, to meet again to work on resolving the issue.
Minister Khurshid said the India-funded development cooperation projects, including the housing and railway projects are progressing well and are expected to be completed on schedule.
The two sides are to ink 8 agreements related to the Sampur Thermal Power Project and a MoU for Technical Assistance in support of the 10-year National Plan for a Trilingual Sri Lanka later today at the Presidential Secretariat.
With the signing of the agreements, the work on the power plant will commence promptly and will be sped up to complete the project by 2016, Khurshid said.
The visiting Minister said he is hopeful that, through the MoU for implementation of the Trilingual Plan, India will be able to contribute to this important initiative to aid national reconciliation and promote harmony among the various linguistic communities in Sri Lanka.
Khurshid said he was pleased with the significant expansion of bilateral trade in goods which is aimed at reaching US$ 5 billion mark.
Noting India's significant contribution in the area of investments and tourist arrivals, Minister Khurshid pointed out the need to finalize a more comprehensive framework of economic cooperation to sustain the positive momentum in the bilateral trade and economic relations.
The visiting Minister is scheduled to meet the President Mahinda Rajapaksa tomorrow. He will also visit Jaffna to review India-funded development assistance projects and will meet the Governor and the Chief Minister of Northern Provincial Council.
He expressed hope that "successful culmination of elections to the Northern Province will usher a new beginning towards a better future for the people in the North."
"India has been consistent in calling for an early political settlement and national reconciliation through meaningful devolution of powers, so to ensure that all citizens of Sri Lanka, including the Sri Lankan Tamil community, would lead a life marked by equality, justice, dignity and self-respect," Khurshid said.

coal power plant at Sampur in the Trincomalee district of the Eastern Province

Sri Lanka, India to finalize agreement on power plant during Indian Minister's visit tomorrow
Sun, Oct 6, 2013, 08:10 pm SL Time, ColomboPage News Desk, Sri Lanka.
Oct 06, Colombo: Sri Lanka and India finally will finalize the deal to set up a 500 MW coal power plant at Sampur in the Trincomalee district of the Eastern Province, during India's External Affairs Minister Salman Khurshid's visit to the island tomorrow.
Additional Secretary of the Power and Energy Ministry, Ranjith Gunawardena said the Sri Lankan and Indian parties have managed to finalize a power purchase agreement for the proposed 500MW coal power plant.
The joint venture plant between the Ceylon Electricity Board and India's National Thermal Power Corporation (NTPC) has been delayed due to disputes over several issues including the parameters that indicate the efficiency of the plant and maintenance fees.
NTPC Limited signed a Memorandum of Agreement with Government of Sri Lanka and Ceylon Electricity Board (CEB) for development of a 2X250 MW Coal based Power Project at Trincomalee in December 2006 and the project was to be developed through a joint venture company between NTPC and the CEB.
A Joint Venture company named Trincomalee Power Company Limited (TPCL) was incorporated in Colombo in September 2011 with equal equity participation from NTPC and CEB for the US$500 million investment to set up the two 250 MW coal based power plants in Sampur.
However, the discussions over technical parameters and power purchase agreement dragged on delaying the implementation of the project.
Following India's voting for the US-sponsored resolution against Sri Lanka, speculations were swirling in both countries that Sri Lanka would hand over the mega project to China.
Power and Energy Ministry official said that international tenders for the coal power plant project would be called soon after signing the agreement and the two, 250 MW coal power generators will be installed.
A 240 kilometer long 220 kV transmission line will be constructed from Sampur to the 20kV/132kV Grid Substations at Veyangoda to connect the power plant to the national grid. A coal unloading jetty will also be constructed in Sampur for coal shipments.
The Power and Energy Ministry expects to link the power plan to the national grid in 2017. The inking of power generation to the national grid is expected to minimize the CEB's dependence of purchasing power from private suppliers and the operation of fuel and thermal based power plants.
The project is expected to significantly enhance the generation capacity of the CEB and enable it to reduce average generation cost of a unit.

'It's the small-scale producers who feed the world – promote and protect them'

Herman Kumara talks about his work to safeguard the future of Sri Lanka's fishing communities and the threats to his personal safety in doing that work

• Guardian Professional, Wednesday 2 October 2013 11.07 BS

Fisheries advocate, Herman Kumara. Photograph: Nafso

How did National Fisheries Solidarity Movement (Nafso) start?
I was the training and admission officer of Caritas Sri Lanka from 1991-1997. During my time there, my director asked me to organise fishing communities under one wider network, through which I would arrange charitable activities such as sharing boats, front campaigns and undertake advocacy work. My superiors then became unhappy about the fact that some of my work meant going against government policies, so they asked me to keep quiet and discontinue my involvement with the network I had been building. I decided that I wanted to pursue this work, so I left Caritas in 1997 to set up Nafso.
Why is protecting fishing communities in Sri Lanka so important to you?
I began my work in the fisheries field because they [fishing communities] were – and still are – one of the most marginalised groups in our society. In Sri Lanka, we still have a caste system, and fishermen are considered to be among the lowest and most oppressed in our culture. They are often uneducated, and while they are very knowledgeable about their own industry, they don't necessarily understand the social, economic and political matters that affect them. We wanted to bring these people into the mainstream and create a dialogue, while helping them to understand the key issues affecting their livelihood.
What kind of work do you carry out day-to-day, and how has this changed from when Nafso first began?
When I first started the organisation, I had to study and analyse materials that would help me to educate both individual fishermen and fishing organisations. I prepared policy documents, organised certain agitations, did field work and research into topics such as deep sea fishing legislation. Nafso still does all of these things, but I now have a team who carry out the work with me, and we have expanded our areas of concern to include areas such as human rights, natural resources, environmental justice and economic development. Here we make decisions collectively, working from the bottom up instead of the top down. We're more in touch with people on every level, and encourage them to be a part of the activities we plan and decide.
What effects has Sri Lanka's political unrest had on its fisheries?
During the civil war, bans on deep sea fishing were put in place as well as limiting fuel for fishing boats, which then led to the government resorting to importing, rather than exporting, sea products. Fishing was banned completely in certain areas and only allowed between certain hours in others, and the high-security zones implemented to prevent conflict saw thousands of fishermen displaced and without a livelihood. This, followed by the tsunami in 2004, affected the trade very badly, with an estimated 32,000 fisher people being killed in the natural disaster.
What are the biggest threats currently facing the country's fisher people?
Sri Lanka is trying to attract more investors, so the country needs to provide more facilities that cater to their needs such as harbours and roads, which are big infrastructural changes. The country is trying to draw 2.5 million tourists by 2016 and 4 million by 2020, which is putting pressure on the fishing industry as the coastal areas are unable to be used by fisher people. Added to this, a number of top level ministers and politicians receive commission from the private companies fishing and parking their vessels in Sri Lankan waters, so they don't care that the livelihood of their own fisher people is under threat.
After anti-government protests led by fishing communities in 2012, you were pursued by the authorities. What happened?
Last February, the government announced a spontaneous 50% increase on fuel prices. Protests against this took place because fishing communities believed this was a serious threat to them, and that they would be unable to survive as a result. The government sent the police to curb the protest, which led to the death of fisherman Antony Warnakulasuriya, who was shot by the authorities. When discussing the events in parliament, the minister for fisheries Rajitha Senaratne purposely mentioned my name, stating that I was the culprit of the protest and subsequent killing of the fisherman. Politicians then began spreading rumours that I had run away from the country, when in fact I was in Rome attending meetings on agricultural development. They tried to prevent me from returning home, but I wanted to come back and respond to those who had made allegations against me.
What's your vision for the future of your organization?
We want to the fishing industry to have a sustainable future, and to have a policy that can be put in place across the country. We submitted a document of this nature to the fisheries ministry and officials in 2004 with 450,000 signatures. We are fighting to change the situation for fishers, and believe that they should have the ability to own waters and be its custodians. We also want to educate on environmental issues to build the best possible future for Sri Lanka's fisheries.
What, to you, is the future of development?
Research tells us that it's the small-scale food producers who feed the world, and not big industries. We need to promote and protect them, and the environment, to ensure they continue to be able to do this. Our government is getting behind mega-scale fishing reserves but this will not help to sustain future generations and provide food for the population.
What do you think makes a good leader?
A good leader should have comprehensive knowledge of what's going on, the ability to analyze the situation and to think strategically about the future. He needs to bring people together towards pursuing their convictions, and lead them in the right direction which will empower people and create a better future for society. He should guide them and focus on the collective, building the community, the society and its future. You have to sacrifice a lot of things, listen to others and fight against the evils which exist today.

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“I’ve lost all hope that I can have a life here”

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“I’ve lost all hope that I can have a life here”

Four years after the civil war ended, many Tamils have no expectation of peace or safety in Sri Lanka’s Northern Province, reports Emily Howie. This is what drives boat migration

30 September 20

 

Campaigners from the Movement for Equal Rights protesting in the capital of Sri Lanka’s Northern Province, Jaffna, in December last year.
Vikalpa/ Groundviews/ Centre for Policy Alternatives

BRAMI has rushed from work to meet me. She arrives on her bike and tells me she must be home soon to care for her three children. We sit down to talk in a small office in a village in Sri Lanka’s Northern Province, beneath the unforgiving glare of a bare light bulb. Very soon it is dark outside.

Brami, who is thirty-six but looks much younger, is quiet and well-dressed, and smiles frequently as we talk. Although she seems a little nervous, she wants to tell me about her experiences as a Sri Lankan Tamil, a widowed mother of three children, and a survivor of Sri Lanka’s three-decade civil war. She is also one of nearly 10,000 Sri Lankans who paid people smugglers to take them to Australia last year.

Sri Lankans have never before come to Australia by boat in such large numbers. Since January 2012, 8000 of them – including more than 1700 so far this year – have journeyed to Australia without passing through an official Sri Lankan port. In 2012, a record year for boat arrivals, Sri Lankans made up the biggest single national group for the first time. Even during 2009, at the end of Sri Lanka’s civil war, the numbers were significantly lower.

Both the Australian and Sri Lankan governments say that the surge is fuelled by “economic migrants,” but the evidence from migrants themselves reveals complex motivations, with economic concerns linked inextricably to political problems, persecution and other forms of discrimination and injustice. These concerns are shared outside Sri Lanka: after a visit to Sri Lanka in August this year, the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights highlighted the impunity enjoyed by government forces, the failure of the rule of law and the fact that president Mahinda Rajapaksa’s government was “heading in an increasingly authoritarian direction… despite the opportunity provided by the end of the war to construct a new vibrant, all-embracing state.”

Over the past three years, Sri Lankan authorities claim to have caught around 4500 people trying to leave by boat. But reports suggest that parts of the Sri Lankan government are complicit in people-smuggling operations. Australia relies heavily on the Sri Lankan navy to combat people smuggling, but what if our partner is part of the problem in more ways than one?

SIX months before I met her, Brami paid a people smuggler to take her and her three children to Australia. Travelling with a group of people from her village, they were caught by Sri Lankan authorities and arrested.

When I asked Brami why she tried to leave, she told me that she was concerned for her children’s future and wanted to make sure they received a good education. She was also fearful of being home alone without her husband, who she later told me had been taken away five years earlier and not seen again. She described her concerns as “commonplace.”

But as our conversation continued, Brami disclosed that officers from the Sri Lankan Police Criminal Investigation Department, or CID, have visited every month since her husband disappeared. These men would “stay a short time if my children were there but longer if they weren’t,” she told me. “They would call me and ask to go somewhere, that kind of thing.” CID has her phone number and she gets “midnight calls” where they “talk rubbish.” “They know I’m alone so they are trying to get a benefit.”

Although Brami characterised herself as an economic migrant with the same everyday fears as many women in female-headed households, her words suggested that she also feared physical, and probably sexual, harm at the hands of police. It is difficult to imagine that her story is unique; she is one of an estimated 40,000 women living in female-headed households in the country’s former conflict zones. These are among the most highly militarised regions in the world, with an estimated one soldier for every five civilians. The UN High Commissioner recently highlighted her concern that women and girls in female-headed households are vulnerable sexual harassment and abuse, including at the hands of military personnel.

Kedish, a young Tamil man in the Vanni area of Sri Lanka’s northern province, also tried and failed to go to Australia to improve the financial situation of his family. His family was displaced frequently during the final phase of the war and then held in a refugee camp for nearly a year. Before the war, they had a paddy field, a house and vehicles, but when they returned they found just a few coconut trees and bushes; everything else had been destroyed in aerial attacks. “I want to go abroad to earn money for my family,” Kedish told me. “Earlier we were wealthy people and now I feel like poor people so I want to leave.”

Kedish now lives in a militarised area of the Northern Province under a tarpaulin, in fear of war returning. With large numbers of military officers in the area, he also fears for his sisters’ safety. “There is a narrow road to home and the military are on both sides. They tease women as they pass. In the evening the girls do not go out,” he said.

Not surprisingly, former cadres of the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam, or LTTE, are also among the boat migrants. The Sri Lankan government says it has now “rehabilitated” 11,770 ex-cadres who surrendered to security forces at the end of the Sri Lankan civil war in 2009. In Sri Lanka’s case, rehabilitation involves detention without judicial oversight or legal representation, and monitoring by local security forces when ex-cadres return to their villages.

Some former combatants feel threatened and harassed by this monitoring, and by visits to their homes by security forces or requests to go to local military bases for questioning. They also report having difficulty getting loans or employment because of prejudice or fear in the community. The Jaffna High Court acknowledged earlier this year that private firms are reluctant to employ rehabilitated former LTTE cadres and that banks are reluctant to provide them loans. This discrimination leads to economic disadvantage, the court said, and causes people to leave the country illegally in search of a better future.

Parathis, a young former LTTE combatant in the eastern province, told me he had tried to leave for Australia because of poor employment opportunities. He had been forcibly recruited as a boy and lost years of schooling in service to the LTTE, but he had not fought during the final stages of the war or been “rehabilitated.” He was about to graduate from university, but he was not a confident student and he believed his prospects were limited.

Parathis had no immediate security concerns, but he believed that war could break out again because the government had done nothing to address the grievances of Tamils. He worried that his past association with the LTTE meant that he would be the first to be blamed and targeted if war came. “So far [I have] no problem with the army, but a bit of concern if war comes that we will be subjected to torture,” he told me. Only Sinhalese people get job opportunities in police and military services, he believes, and even the unskilled workers on development projects in the Eastern Province come from other communities.

For other people I met, it was the unchecked operations of pro-government paramilitary organisations that drove them to flee. Aingkaran, a bicycle repairman in the Northern Province, was intercepted en route to Australia by Sri Lankan authorities. He initially cited economic pressures for leaving, particularly the difficulty of bringing up girls and finding dowries after the death of an uncle who had been a source of financial support. But he had also been forced to give money to “unknown people” after he was threatened by phone, and on one occasion a grenade was thrown into his home, killing his dogs and damaging the property. Despite reporting these incidents to the police, he has had no news of an investigation.

Aingkaran’s experience illustrates the wider problem of impunity and a breakdown in the rule of law – problems that extend to the failure of the Sri Lankan government to investigate allegations of war crimes at the end of the civil war and the unconstitutional impeachment of the chief justice, Shirani Bandaranayake, in January this year.

A striking feature of the tone of many of my discussions with Sri Lankans who have tried or would like to leave was their feeling that circumstances were unlikely to improve. Four years after the war, many Tamil people had no expectation of peace or safety in the Northern Province. “I’ve lost all hope that I can have a life here; there is no guarantee for life here,” one man said. “It is better to go to other countries so that I can live peacefully.”

IT IS a violation of Sri Lanka’s immigration law to leave the country other than through an official port. If boat migrants are caught by Sri Lankan authorities they are detained and charged with illegal migration under Sri Lankan law, or with people smuggling offences if they organise the boats or are members of the crew.

Australia works very closely with Sri Lankan authorities on anti-people smuggling operations inside Sri Lanka. Since 2009, and perhaps for longer, Australian Federal Police officers have worked in Sri Lanka to support authorities’ efforts in this area. Australian officials share intelligence and provide training and resources to Sri Lankan police, navy and coast guard.

Despite these significant commitments by Australia, and massive increases in the budget of the Sri Lankan defence ministry, nearly 6500 people slipped through Sri Lanka Navy’s net in 2012 and only around 3000 were caught. The sheer scale of the boat migration and the openness with which agents and sub-agents operate in the villages raises question about the role of Sri Lankan authorities.

In February this year, the Australian alleged that a “senior Sri Lankan government official was complicit in people smuggling” and was effectively undermining the joint attempts to stop boats in Sri Lanka. Australia’s intelligence agencies had identified a “high profile” official “close to Sri Lankan president Mahinda Rajapaksa” who has the “had the power to ‘turn on the tap’ and unleash untold asylum boats.” According to a subsequent article, Australian officials had considered whether the surge in boat migrants to Australia was retaliation by Sri Lankan officials for Australia’s co-sponsorship of a March 2012 UN resolution that called for Sri Lanka to investigate allegations of war crimes committed in 2009.

The Australian government denied having seen evidence of this corruption and Sri Lanka said that there was no truth to the allegations. But in September 2013, the Sri Lankan government was embarrassed by the arrest of four of its officers in relation to allegations that they were involved in people smuggling.

Among people who are trying to leave Sri Lanka on boats there is a widespread belief that the navy and the government either operate the smuggling or condone it, and that this is what makes safe passage possible. As one man in the Northern Province told me, “Last year people didn’t know about the boats but now the agents are starting to function better. This year the military is supporting the operations.”

Some Tamil people believe that the government is involved in the smuggling because it wants them to leave. “In prison in Negombo, the police told me that I should go to Australia,” a Tamil man caught en route to Australia told me. “I think the government wants the young people to go… Those who leave from here are all Tamils – the military are more concerned to catch the Sinhalese. I think they want the Tamils to go abroad,” he said.

With “stopping the boats” now the objective of the bilateral relationship with Sri Lanka, it has become increasingly difficult for Australia to engage critically on human rights issues. The possibility that the Sri Lankan government is involved in organising boats creates a double bind: Australia is forced to cooperate with an unreliable partner in the knowledge that if it displeases Sri Lanka there is a potential for many more asylum boats to arrive. Human rights violations go unchallenged and Australia continues to provide Sri Lanka with intelligence taken from immigration detainees and increased military aid.

In October last year, Australia made a strong statement to the United Nations Human Rights Council outlining concerns about uninvestigated abductions and disappearances in Sri Lanka, and about torture and mistreatment by police and security forces. But since then criticism of Sri Lanka’s human rights record has been muted. Australia made no public statement of concern after the impeachment of chief justice Shirani Bandaranayake in January, despite many like-minded countries and international organisations expressing their concern at the threat it posed to an already compromised rule of law in Sri Lanka.

When the United States sought co-sponsors for another Human Rights Council resolution in March 2013 calling for investigation of Sri Lankan war crimes, Australia only announced its decision to co-sponsor at the eleventh hour. It was widely recognised that Australia was attempting to balance competing interests by avoiding making a statement critical of the Sri Lankan government in the Human Rights Council chamber.

In May this year, after a long hiatus, Australia’s foreign minister at the time, Bob Carr, indicated that he had raised human rights with the Sri Lankan government. While he acknowledged that “media and civil society continue to operate in a difficult environment” and said he had raised concerns about the impeachment of the chief justice, Australia continues to downplay evidence of human rights abuses in Sri Lanka.

The outlook for change is bleak. After a five day visit to Sri Lanka in January 2013, two senior Coalition figures – Julie Bishop, now foreign minister, and Scott Morrison, now immigration minister – praised the reconciliation and reconstruction efforts of the Sri Lankan government and said that they saw no evidence of ongoing human rights abuses. Australia’s new government has committed to using the Australian navy to turn all boats back to Sri Lanka without doing any form of assessment of the passengers’ claims for asylum.

For Brami and others in Sri Lanka, meanwhile, the military occupation of Tamil-majority areas continues and their lives are coloured by economic, political and physical insecurity. Only 1700 Sri Lankans have arrived by boat so far this year, but there is no end in sight to the factors that drive the attempts to leave. •

Emily Howie is the Director–Advocacy and Research at the Human Rights Law Centre and the 2012 Columbia Law School Leebron Fellow. All names in this article have been changed to protect the interviewees. This is a shorter version of an article that appeared in Economic and Political Weekly.