Jaffna Monitor - Unafraid and Unbowed

U.N. Says Sri Lanka Risks Losing Its Chance to Break With a Past of Impunity

GENEVA — Nearly two years after Sri Lankans elected a government that promised to dismantle the machinery of impunity, the United Nations human rights office said Thursday that the opening for change was closing. In a report to the Human Rights Council, the office credited the government with moving against corruption and reopening several political killings and disappearances. But it found that Colombo has gone on detaining people under the counterterrorism law it pledged to abolish, has made

Our Reporter

Sep 4, 2026 — 5 min read

Sri Lanka and India Move Closer to Agreement on Kankesanthurai Port

September 2026

Our Reporter

Sep 3, 2026 — 3 min read

‘TELO Killed My Father’: Siddharthan Confronts the Bloody Past Behind Today’s Tamil Alliances

JM Exclusive September 2026

Our Reporter

Sep 3, 2026 — 3 min read

A Small School in Mallakam Produces Sri Lanka’s Tamil-Medium Topper

September 2026

Our Reporter

Sep 3, 2026 — 2 min read

London Businessman Gives Rs. 5 Million to Expand Fertility Care at Kilinochchi Hospital

KILINOCHCHI, Sri Lanka — A London-based businessman has donated 5 million Sri Lankan rupees to help expand fertility treatment services at Kilinochchi General Hospital, providing support for a specialized area of care at one of the Northern Province’s main public hospitals. The donation, from Thangarajah Kalamohan, was formally presented at the hospital on Thursday as part of a project undertaken by Kili Makkal, Tamil for “Kilinochchi People”, an organization founded by members of the Kilinochc

Medical September 2026

Our Reporter

Sep 3, 2026 — 1 min read

M.K. Sivajilingam Moved to Intensive Care in Colombo

JAFFNA, Sri Lanka — M.K. Sivajilingam, a veteran Tamil nationalist politician and former member of Parliament who underwent a kidney transplant in June, has been moved to the intensive care unit of a private hospital in Colombo, according to people familiar with his condition. Mr. Sivajilingam, who currently serves as chairman of the Valvettithurai Urban Council, had remained in Colombo for continuing treatment after undergoing the transplant. He was admitted to the hospital again last week and

September 2026

Our Reporter

Sep 3, 2026 — 1 min read

Bimal Does It Again: New Development Remark Revives KKS, Palaly Questions

COLOMBO, Sri Lanka — Transport Minister Bimal Rathnayake said Wednesday that Sri Lanka would not pursue development projects that failed to benefit ordinary people, remarks likely to renew scrutiny of the government’s approach to two Indian-backed gateways in the Tamil-majority north: Jaffna International Airport at Palaly and Kankesanthurai Port. “Economic development projects must be connected to the everyday lives of the people,” Mr. Rathnayake said. “We will not pursue development projects

JM Exclusive September 2026

Our Reporter

Sep 2, 2026 — 2 min read

U.S. Reveals Wider Role Behind Colombo’s 463-Kilogram Meth Seizure

COLOMBO, Sri Lanka — The seizure of 463 kilograms of crystal methamphetamine at the Port of Colombo this week grew out of a weeks-long international intelligence operation involving American, Pakistani and Sri Lankan authorities, according to new details released Wednesday by the United States Embassy, offering a fuller account of an interdiction initially described largely through the actions of Sri Lankan investigators. The Embassy said the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration’s New Delhi Cou

September 2026

Our Reporter

Sep 2, 2026 — 3 min read

UNAFRAID AND UNBOWED

Archbishop, Archbishop, why hast thou forsaken us in our hour of sorrow and slaughter?

"Cry aloud, spare not, lift up thy voice like a trumpet, and shew my people their transgression, and the house of Jacob their sins." - Isaiah 58:1 His Eminence Malcolm Cardinal Ranjith, Archbishop of Colombo and chief shepherd of the Catholic flock in all of Sri Lanka, has recently marked fifty years in the sacred priesthood. As the highest-ranking prelate whose dominion spans the entire island, he now stands as a mighty voice crying for justice, calling upon the nations of the earth for interv

Editorial July 2025

Kaniyan Pungundran

Jul 14, 2025 — 12 min read

Jaffna Library Burning: The Day They Burned the buddha and his dhamma

Why South Asia Reveres Books-and Fears Their Destruction Irrespective of religion, across the Indian subcontinent, books have long held an exalted status. In the indigenous spiritual traditions that emerged from this land-Hinduism, Buddhism, Jainism, and Sikhism-knowledge is not merely valued; it is venerated in the highest order. In homes, temples, and schools across the region, people treat books with profound reverence-never touching them with their feet, and if done accidentally, offering a

Cover Story June 2025

Aruliniyan Mahalingam

Jun 16, 2025 — 14 min read

Chemmani: Where Justice Was Buried

The dead do not speak - but the earth does A few years ago, I visited Cambodia. My original aim was to see the Angkor Wat temple complex. But, as always, my journalistic instincts led me deeper into rural Cambodia, where I found myself in quiet conversations with a few former soldiers of the Pol Pot regime, now living ordinary lives as toddy tappers, farmers, and small shop owners. One of them - a former henchman of the Khmer Rouge - opened up after a few glasses of toddy. In a hauntingly calm

Editorial June 2025

Kaniyan Pungundran

Jun 16, 2025 — 7 min read

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Thanthai Chelva Monument Smashed in Jaffna

JAFFNA, Sri Lanka — A monument honoring S.J.V. Chelvanayakam, the founder of the Ilankai Tamil Arasu Kadchi and one of the most consequential figures in Sri Lankan Tamil politics, has been damaged at his family’s ancestral burial ground in Tellippalai, in what people familiar with the site said appeared to be a case of theft rather than a politically motivated attack. The monument stands in the Church of South India cemetery along the Vallai-Araly Road, within the Tellippalai Police Division, w

September 2026 JM Exclusive

Our Reporter

Sep 2, 2026 — 2 min read

Sri Lanka Is Reopening Its Worst Cases but Not Finishing Them, Human Rights Watch Says

JAFFNA — Almost two years after Anura Kumara Dissanayake won the presidency on a promise to reopen Sri Lanka’s most notorious killings and disappearances, Human Rights Watch has found that his government has pushed a handful of those cases further than any administration before it, and has largely left the rest of the country’s apparatus of impunity untouched. The report, “Not Genuine with Justice,” comes days before the United Nations high commissioner for human rights updates the Human Rights

JM Exclusive August 2026

Jaffna Monitor

Sep 2, 2026 — 10 min read

New Chinese Ambassador Pledges Stronger Sri Lanka Ties, More Investment

COLOMBO, Sri Lanka — China’s new ambassador to Sri Lanka has pledged to deepen relations between the two countries and encourage greater Chinese investment, saying he had felt “no sense of being a foreigner” since arriving on the island, according to an account of his meeting with a senior leader of Sri Lanka’s governing political movement. Ambassador Wei Huaxiang made the remarks during a meeting with Tilvin Silva, general secretary of the Janatha Vimukthi Peramuna, or J.V.P., at the party’s h

August 2026

Our Reporter

Sep 2, 2026 — 2 min read

Rs. 15 Billion ‘Ice’ Haul at Colombo Port Exposes Pakistan-Linked Drug Route

COLOMBO, Sri Lanka — Sri Lankan authorities have seized nearly half a ton of crystal methamphetamine concealed in a shipping container at the Port of Colombo and arrested several people, including three Pakistani nationals, in one of the country’s largest recent narcotics seizures. Police sources say Pakistan-linked drug trafficking has become a growing concern in Sri Lanka, with the number of major narcotics cases involving Pakistani nationals and networks rising sharply in recent years. The

August 2026

Our Reporter

Sep 1, 2026 — 3 min read