Selected Writings
Dr. Rajan K. Sriskandarajah
USA
Dr. Rajan
Sriskandarajah is a Fellow of the American College of Obstetricians and
Gynecologists and of the Royal College of Obstetricians and Gynecology (UK).
He is also a member of the American Medical Association, New York State
Medical Association, and the Dutchess County Medical Society. He earned his
Bachelor’s degree in Medicine and Surgery from the University of Ceylon,
Colombo, Sri Lanka in 1969, and his Master’s degree in Public Health from
New York Medical College in 1993. He has been a
Clinical Assistant Professor at the New York Medical College since 1992.
Dr.Sriskandarajah edited the Ilankai Thamil Sangam news letter Tamil Voice
for several years. He also served on the Editorial Board of the Tamil Nation
fortnightly from its inception in 1990 to 1993. He was the founding Editor
of the
Sangam.org website and served in that capacity for more than six years
until 2004.
|
29 December 2006 |
No More Tears, Sister - A Film Review |
6
August 2006 |
Aaland
- An example to Sri Lanka? - A Response to Prof. Bertram
Bastiampillai |
8
April 2006 |
Sri Lanka: State of the country before the CFA: Essential Social,
Economic and Political Factors Leading to the Cessation of Violent
Hostility |
10
December 2005 |
Sri Lanka Elections
and Tamil Participation - Why the Boycott?
"..The bottom line is Tamils didn’t vote
because they didn’t want to, and not because they were forced.
The choices offered in this election are not something an
average Tamil voter could get enthused about. One candidate was
totally anti-everything for Tamils. He had denied the existence
of a Tamil homeland and the right of the Tamil people to have a
control over their own affairs. The second candidate signed a
ceasefire agreement that benefited mainly the Sinhalese and did
nothing to improve the devastated lives of the Tamil people. He
reneged on an agreed mechanism (SIHRN) for rehabilitation of the
Tamil victims and went globe-trotting to build international
support against the Tamil leadership. What choices did the
Tamils have? Choose the lesser of two evils? Tamils, tired of
having to choose between two evils all this time, gave up
playing this wicked game. Whoever they chose in the past didn’t
bring any satisfaction. So, this time they decided not to choose
any. What is wrong with that?..
|
5 June 2005 |
Eulogy to Sivaram at
Memorial Meeting |
27
July 1984 |
Remembering July 1983
"The most irksome aspect of
July 1983 is that there is no guilt or repentance – then or
now. No official inquiry, no compensation and no genuine
apology. The then president Jayewardene blamed it on the
communists and left it at that. The current president
Kumaratunga is using it as a cudgel to beat her opponents with.
Those in between didn’t behave any differently. Al Qaeda, which
is steadfast in its mission against the US, is not elected by
anyone and is not answerable to any mass of people. The
government of Sri Lanka, which is persistent in their goal of
enslaving the Tamils, is democratically elected by the Sinhala
people. The Germans, who once democratically elected the Third
Reich, have jettisoned Nazism in favor of a civilized
government. In Sri Lanka the goals are still the same – only the
methods have changed.Tamils will never forget July 1983.NEVER
AGAIN" more
|
2
September 2002 |
Reflections on Caste |
3
June 2001 |
Letter
to Ariya Rubasinghe, Director of Government Information, Sri
Lanka
"..Thank you for your Press Release (# 475) of
26th May 2001, which your embassy was kind enough to send to
me...I am impressed by the thoughtfulness of your embassy staff
for taking the trouble to send this to someone who has long
relinquished the citizenship of your country. Certainly Doctor
Goebbels, whose tasks were similar to yours in Nazi Germany,
would never have sent something like this to a Jewish person
living in Germany or elsewhere..."
|
5
May 2001 |
Re: US Department of State Report on Terrorism - Letter to US Secretary of
State, Colin L.Powell
"I was disappointed, and also deeply offended,
by the report titled 'Patterns of Global Terrorism -2000',
released by the US State Department on 27th April 2001.Firstly,
the statement that 'Tamils
historically have served as drug couriers', is insulting to
the Tamil people. I am a Tamil (one of 70 million worldwide),
and the vast majority of us are decent, law-abiding citizens
in our
respective countries of residence/citizenship. Secondly, the
inclusion of 'narcotics
smuggling' in the context of the LTTE (background
information on designated terrorist groups) implies that the
LTTE and/or its supporters are engaged in this activity. There
is no data to substantiate this accusation... The Sri Lankan
government has been, for some time, at pains to depict the
Tamil
liberation movement and the
Tamil
Diaspora
in a bad light, and the accusation of 'drug trafficking' is
one element in this disinformation exercise. The uncritical
inclusion of this 'rumor' in the US State Department Report
seriously undermines the credibility of the US State
Department..."
|
29
April 2001 |
Human Rights in Sri Lanka - Power Point Presentation |
10
December 2000 |
Universal Declaration of Human Rights & Sri Lanka
The tenth day of December 1948 was a historic
day. It was a day of one of the greatest achievements, indeed a landmark, in
human history. This was the day the General Assembly of the United Nations
adopted the
Universal
Declaration of Human Rights.
Fifty-two
years on, on the 10th of December 2000, it is well for Sri Lankans to look back
and reflect on what their government has done for human rights. What have they
achieved?
The most significant is that Sri Lanka has
achieved the ignoble distinction of being ranked number two among countries with
the
worst human rights
record, next only to Iraq. As a matter of fact, Sri Lanka being such a small
country, on a per capita basis, it should have been ranked number one.
Over ninety thousand deaths,
mass graves and
disappearances,
rapes and
torture,,
massive
displacement of people and
flagrant
deprivations of basic human needs – all in the name of a war for
ethnic
and religious superiority. How did they get to be this way?
|
Winter 1996 |
The State
of Sri Lankan propaganda
"Truth, they say, is the first casualty in
war. In Sri Lanka, however, truth was a casualty long before the
war. Falsehoods and Propaganda about the Tamils justified
oppression. The world was told that the problem in Sri Lanka was
Tamil terrorism. The story about the dysfunctional political
system, which procured power to the one who could inflict the
most damage to Tamils, was cleverly disguised..."
|
Fall 1996 |
Sinhala vs Tamil Government |
Spring 1996 |
Bait and Switch
Bait and switch is a well-worn sales tactic.
Supermarkets use it with bargain-priced items to attract
customers. Unscrupulous sidewalk vendors use it, showing one
item and then palm off another when the sale is clinched.
Fishmongers do it with a display of fresh fish to sell rotten
ones. And now a Sinhala President of Sri Lanka is trying to do
it to the Timils. The package President Kumaratunga tendered on
August 31, 1995, after guilefully ousting the LTTE from the
political theater, has been swapped. With an apparently
innocuous change in the title - from "Proposals for Devolution'
to "Legal Formulations for Devolution" - the first of many bait
and switch swaps to come has been accomplished. ..
|
15
November 1995 |
The Failed Peace Process - the Reasons
The lack of sincerity in its negotiations
with the LTTE was manifest at a number of levels, and the
following is a partial list.
- The government's efforts to have a
dialogue with the LTTE have been perfunctory at best. The
government negotiating team consisted of individuals with no
official status, and the composition of the team changed
repeatedly. A Political columnist in Sri Lanka wrote,
- "The President had two senior ministers
beside her in her discussions with the Tamil groups who were
voting with her in Parliament, (whereas) she sent as
delegates to negotiate an end to a war that has cost 30,000
lives, her architect, her banker and her clerk. The only
person she forgot to send was her cook!"
- The teams flew into Jaffna once in two
months or so, and that too in the mornings for a few hours
of talks with the LTTE, and returned before sundown; an
effort that one would hardly consider as serious. Mr.
M.Vasantha Raja, ex-chairman of the Sri Lanka Broadcasting
Corporation, said,
- "If the government was seriously trying
to establish trust and avoid misunderstandings there were
many measures it could have taken. For example as a part of
a formal cease-fire, a "video link" between the LTTE
headquarters and the Presidential secretariat facilitating
regular talks, would have been of enormous value...
- ...In my estimation, the Sri Lankan
government betrayed the sincere intentions of the Sinhala
people who put them in power - people who pleaded for, and
deserved, a wholly genuine peace effort. "
|
Fall 1995 |
The Tamil Resolve - a New
Zenith
"The brutality of the Sinhala army and their
blatant disregard for Tamil lives and limbs has reached a new
level. The deliberate recklessness with which refugees in
churches, patients in hospitals and children in school-yards are
savagely attacked and killed under Chandrika's presidency is a
new peak. The defiance of the people of Thamileelam, in the face
of such cruelty, is also a new zenith. Well over six hundred
thousand people fleeing an army, that they were told was coming
to rescue them from these awful Tigers, is unprecedented;
something that did not happen even during the brutal occupation
of Jaffna by the Indian army! "
|
October 1995 |
Navali and the Tamil Minister
"Aiyo", cried a mother whose child was wounded in the
air-raid. "Please take my child to the hospital" she begged a cyclist, who
looked around first, and then decided to help. "She was alive just a few
minutes ago," cried a man cradling the dead body of his pretty young wife.
"She just came to help the refugees, and now she is dead," cried a brother.
Wails and cries such as these were heard (and recorded on video) on July
9th, soon after the Sinhala Airforce decided to drop, not one but nine
bombs, on the Navaly St. Peter's Church, housing refugees in Tamil Eelam.
Only a few hours earlier, the Sinhala Airforce had dropped
leaflets asking civilians to take shelter in churches and temples. The poor,
unsuspecting Tamil civilians had complied. This was preceded by a massive
propaganda effort initiated in Colombo, to justify the newest Sinhala army
offensive on Tamil Eelam, code-named "Operation Leap Forward." Proclamations
were made that this was a sacrificial effort made by the Sinhala people, to
"liberate the Tamils from the clutches of the LTTE."
more
|
May
1993 |
In
Sri Lanka, Partition Can Stop the Violence |