(RSF/IFEX) – In a letter to Sri Lankan Interior Minister John Amaratunga, RSF expressed its indignation further to the assassination attempt on Dharmaratnam Sivaram, editor of the Tamilnet news website. RSF asked that the minister do everything in his power to identify and punish the authors of this cowardly attack. “Whereas the option of a […]
(RSF/IFEX) – In a letter to Sri Lankan Interior Minister John Amaratunga, RSF expressed its indignation further to the assassination attempt on Dharmaratnam Sivaram, editor of the Tamilnet news website. RSF asked that the minister do everything in his power to identify and punish the authors of this cowardly attack. “Whereas the option of a truce is gaining ground in your country, Tamil journalists should also be able to carry out their work in complete security,” stated Robert Ménard, the organisation’s secretary-general. RSF noted that the previous government is partly responsible for the incident, as the public press had accused Sivaram of being a Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) “spy” in June 2001. At the time, RSF adamantly protested and expressed its concern over the accusations that seriously endangered the journalist’s life.
According to information gathered by RSF, on the evening of 26 December, unidentified men stabbed and beat up Sivaram, editor of the Tamilnet news site, and another journalist named Wijetharan, who works for the independent Tamil-language daily “Thinakathir” (The Light of Day) in Batticaloa (eastern Sri Lanka). Sivaram was writing his last article for the next edition of Tamilnet when five men armed with clubs and knives stormed the “Thinakathir” offices. The attackers charged towards the journalist and began beating him on the head. Before leaving the premises, they also attacked Wijetharan and ransacked the newspaper’s offices. The police arrived a few minutes after the assailants’ escape. Sivaram was transferred to a city hospital. The injury to his head required six stitches. A few hours later, the police announced that they had arrested three suspects, but revealed neither their identity nor the motives behind the attack.
Tamilnet is the best-known news site dealing with the political and military situation and human rights issues in areas devastated by the war between the army and the LTTE.
On 17 June, the Tamil-language daily “Thinakaran”, the Sinhalese-language daily “Divaina” and the English-language “Daily News” (published by the government-owned press group Lake House) reported that Sivaram and Vasantharaja were cited in the online magazine “The Global Spy Magazine” as LTTE spies or sympathisers. A front page article in “Thinakaran”, which also bore Sivaram’s photograph, alleged that the editor was behind the murder of two men whom the LTTE accused of treason. The following day, two men who appeared to be armed reportedly attempted to break into Sivaram’s Colombo home, where the editor rarely stays, as he fears for his safety. The journalist moved to Batticaloa (a city with a majority Tamil population) in late June.
In October 2000, Nimalarajan, a Jaffna-based Tamil journalist and British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) contributor, was assassinated in his home. One month later, a government minister and the president of a Tamil party justified the murder by claiming that the journalist had links to the LTTE. Fourteen months after the journalist’s murder, no one has been arrested in connection with the case (see IFEX alerts of 19 October, 19 and 6 April 2001, 10 November and 20 October 2000).
