COI Report March 2012 - UK Border Agency - Home Office

SRI LANKA 7 MARCH 2012
―There appeared to be some limited government restrictions on access to the Internet,
including government blocking of Web sites it deemed pornographic. There were
suspicions that the government was behind the blocking of Internet access to several
Tamil news Web sites, including the pro-LTTE TamilNet.
―High-speed Internet was available in major cities and towns, including Jaffna, with
more widespread use among younger and urban populations. Cell-phone use, including
text messaging, was high across a broad spectrum of society without government
restriction. The Ministry of Defense attempted to impose regulations requiring the
registration of all SIM card purchases, but there appeared to be sizable gaps in the
implementation and enforcement of these regulations.
―According to International Telecommunication Union statistics for 2009, approximately
8.8 percent of the country's inhabitants used the Internet.‖
14.20 The Reporters sans Frontières Internet Enemies 2011: Countries under surveillance -
Sri Lanka, 11 March 2011 267 , reported:
―Online journalists and media continue to be targeted for violence. Impunity persists,
and the regime does not hesitate to use censorship when its efforts to induce selfcensorship
no longer suffice.
―Some independent news websites - LankaeNews, LankaNewsWeb, InfoLanka and Sri
Lanka Guardian - were blocked in January 2010 a few hours before the presidential
election results were announced. Since then, they have all been unblocked with the
exception of LankaNewsWeb, which the country‘s main access provider, Sri Lanka
Telecom, has rendered inaccessible since 11 July 2009. TamilNet is still blocked, even
after the government‘s military victory over the Tamil Tiger rebels.
―An arson destroyed offices of the online news website LankaeNews in the night of 30
to 31 January 2011 in Malabe, a Colombo suburb. The main building which housed the
online newspaper‘s library and computers was gutted, putting the website out of
business. The site is known for being critical of the authorities. The arson method
indicates that it had been prepared well in advance. The fire erupted a few days after
the publication of an article challenging the testimony given by Gotabaya Rajapakse,
the Secretary of Defence and President‘s brother, during the trial of the former Sri
Lankan Army commander, Sarath Fonseka.
―A suspect was apprehended in the evening of 31 January [2011]. The police reported
that he is a member of a gang which works on contract. A second suspect managed to
escape while being arrested. Dozens of Sri Lankan journalists paraded through
Colombo‘s streets in support of LankaeNews, and to protest the latest attacks on press
freedom, which occur far too often in the country.
266 US State Department 2010 Human Rights Report: Sri Lanka (USSD 2010), released on 8 April 2011,
http://www.state.gov/g/drl/rls/hrrpt/2010/sca/154486.htm , date accessed 11 May 2011, Section 2a
267 Reporters sans Frontières Internet Enemies 2011: Countries under surveillance - Sri Lanka, 11 March
2011, http://en.rsf.org/surveillance-sri-lanka,39720.html date accessed 2 June 2011
114 The main text of this COI Report contains the most up to date publicly available information as at 3 February 2012.
Further brief information on recent events and reports has been provided in the Latest News section
to 2 March 2012.