North and East scribes ‘obstructed’ from meeting the President to submit a petition

Tamil journos stopped handing over ‘accountability demand’ to President

Tamil journalists feel ‘discriminated’ after being invited to a meeting with President

Journalists from the North and East were stopped by the President’s security personnel as they tried to hand over a letter containing their demands to him and say they felt ‘discriminated’. 

While Sinhala journalists were allowed to present their demands to the President, Tamil journalists were stopped from doing so.

Journalists representing all the districts in the country were in Colombo to participate in a discussion with the President on Tuesday (6).

Some Tamil journalists and media while expressing their strong opposition to this and boycotted the meeting while coming out with their ‘genuine reasoning’.

However, many journalists from the North and East participated in the discussion accepting the request by the organizers. 

Despite participating in the meeting, when the Tamil journalists tried to hand over an important demand seeking action and justice for those journalists who were abducted and went missing, they were stopped by the President’s security saying such a letter or petition can’t be handed over to him. 

Apart from being stopped from handing over a ‘genuine petition’ to the President, none of the journalists from the North were even allowed to voice their views, while many Sinhala journos were permitted to do so. 

Similarly, while Sinhala scribes were permitted to hand over their demands to the President, Tamil journalists were particularly stopped from handing over their letter seeking affirmative action into their demands. A tense situation prevailed as the President’s security team stopped Tamil media persons. 

Journalists from the war-affected Tamil areas in the North say they felt ‘blatantly discriminated’ when they were obstructed under the guise of security. They say their demand was just for accountability for journalists who were either killed or made to disappear. 

In their letter addressed to the President the North and East Journalists they have called for a special accountability mechanism to render justice for those killed or disappeared journalists.

“We believe that the appropriate move to deliver justice denied for two decades is to establish a special tribunal with judicial powers that includes international monitoring.”

They also reminded the President he is aware of the number of journalists killed, abducted or forcefully disappeared.

“On International Human Rights Day 2015, the Journalists Forums handed over to you – the prime minister of Good Governance (Yahapalanaya) at the time – a list of journalists who were victims of assassinations and enforced disappearances between 2004 and 2010. You informed the audience that the list contains details of 44 journalists.”

Most of the journalists on that list were Tamils. Tamil journalists say without accountability and justice for their fellow journalists’ media freedom cannot be ensured in the country. 

Local language journalists were also not allowed to cover the visit of President Ranil Wickremesinghe when he visited the Northern Province recently. All the media handouts were released by the President’s Media Division. Tamil journalists say they feel quite marginalized and humiliated even while discharging their regular day-to-day newsgathering duties. 

Apart from being what they call being discriminated against in the North was followed by being snubbed in Colombo after being invited to participate in a discussion with the President. 

However, the Tamil journalists while expressing their resentment at not being allowed to hand over their demand to the President, handed the letter to his security staff suggesting the President should reply to them and make it public before he files his nomination papers for the ensuing Presidential election.

In the letter containing their demands to the president the journalists from North and East have pointed out that stifling Tamil journalists is aimed at electoral advantage.

“We believe that your invitation, as the head of a government that obstructed local journalists from covering your recent visits to the north last week and the end of May, is aimed at influencing the election campaign.”

Tamil journalists were invited to meet the President but obstructed and stopped from handing over their demands to him, pointed out the continuing media oppression in the traditional Tamil homeland in the country.

“We take this opportunity to once again remind your excellency of a specific burning issue that is key to muffling media freedom in the north and east, which consecutive governments in the past couple of decades have failed to address.”