“Terror’s Lawfare” by Fathima Cader (The New Inquiry)

Reading Canada’s and Sri Lanka’s anti-terror acts reveals the need for comparative and cross-jurisdictional resistance to globally self-justifying discourses of “terror”

LAST fall, when drafts first leaked of Sri Lanka’s new and draconian Counter Terrorism Act (CTA), the uproar was swift, but mostly contained to experts on the island. This should not have surprised me. Sri Lanka’s homegrown war on terror has only skimmed the surface of national security political commentary in the West. And yet, having recently returned from Sri Lanka to Canada, I was struck by the CTA’s similarities with Canada’s own new Anti-Terrorism Act (ATA). Across the two countries, the outcry from local activists resounded with echoes: both pointed out the many ways that the new laws dramatically extended and confused already nebulous state definitions of terrorism, casting dragnets over broad forms of dissent. These laws were unconstrained by borders; if we are to survive this era of war without end, our solidarities will need to be no less transnational.”

to read more see : https://thenewinquiry.com/terrors-lawfare/

“Continuing Detention of Tamil Women and a Girl Child under the Prevention of Terrorism Act” by Womens Action Network

In 2009 the government announced that the LTTE has been wiped out from the country with the end of the armed conflict. However, in the past few weeks there have been a number of arrests, including of women under the Prevention of Terrorism Act (PTA) supposedly to investigate and counter a renaissance of the LTTE. Most of these arrests were in connection to the search for a man called Gopi who according to media reports quoting military and police spokespersons was killed along with his two associates on 11 April 2014 and that they been buried at state expenses on 12 April in Anuradhapura. Those arrested in connection to these men are still being kept at Boosa camp, in Colombo’s the 2nd and 4th floor of the Terrorism Investigation branch, and in the Vavuniya Terrorism Investigation Division (TID). In these TID and military joint operations men, women, the elderly and children have been arrested.

Via http://groundviews.org/2014/04/13/continuing-detention-of-tamil-women-and-a-girl-child-under-the-prevention-of-terrorism-act/