News & events
CAMPACC OPPOSES THE SUPPRESSION OF DEMOCRATIC FREEDOMS AND THE CONTINUED WAR ON TAMILS IN SRI LANKA
On July 8th, the General Secretary of Ceylon Teachers Union (CTU), Joseph Stalin, was arrested by the police along with 31 other trade union and student activists including the Secretary of the CTU, and the Conveners of Inter University Students' Federation & Unemployed Graduates Association near Sri Lanka's parliament complex. The arrested trade unionists and students were protesting against the government's plan to pass a controversial bill (General Sir John Kotelawala National Defence University Bill), which seeks to militarise higher education by allowing the Ministry of Defence to intervene in university administrative affairs. The CTU is one of the oldest and largest independent unions in Sri Lanka's education sector, which has played a key role in defending the right to free education, while continuously campaigning against privatisation, racism and ongoing militarisation.
Notwithstanding the orders of the Additional Magistrate Kanchana De Silva to release the protestors on bail, the police forced sixteen activists including the CTU leader J. Stalin, three female activists and two Buddhist monks onto a bus and took them away, supposedly for 'quarantine' but in fact to the Air Force Camp in Mullaithivu, located over 300km away from the capital Colombo.
Mullaithivu was the site of the aerial bombings and army operations against Tamils in 2009 when the Sri Lankan government declared decisive “victory” over the Tamils and detained thousands of Tamils in military camps where they were abused and tortured. The arrest of trade unionists and students demonstrates the continued suppression of democratic freedoms to protest as well as the continuing war on the Tamils.
CAMPACC DEMANDS THE RELEASE OF ALL TRADE UNIONISTS AND STUDENT PROTESTORS ARRESTED ON 08 JULY 2021.
CAMPACC DEMANDS END TO SUPPRESSION OF DEMOCRATIC RIGHTS OF SRI LANKAN CITIZENS INCLUDING FREEDOM OF ASSEMBLY, FREE SPEECH AND RIGHT TO PROTEST.
CAMPACC CALLS UPON PEOPLE IN THE UK , EUROPE AND OTHER COUNTRIES TO DEMAND THE END OF CONTINUED OCCUPATION OF TAMIL TERRITORIES AND AN END TO STATE REPRESSION OF DEMOCRATIC FREEDOMS IN SRI LANKA.
CAMPACC STANDS IN SOLIDARITY WITH THE STRUGGLES OF THE SRI LANKAN PEOPLE FOR FREEDOM AND JUSTICE AND CALLS UPON EVERYONE TO DO THE SAME.
12 July 2021
Campaign Against Criminalising Communities (CAMPACC): http://campacc.org.uk
E-mail: estella@gn.apc.org