“Charge or release freelance Tamil journalist”
Sri Lankan authorities should either charge or release a freelance Tamil journalist detained for nearly a week, the Committee to Protect Journalists said today.
Parameswaree Maunasámi, who wrote for the Sinhala-language weekly Mawbima, was arrested at her home south of Colombo on November 24 along with another Tamil woman, according to the local media advocacy group Free Media Movement (FMM).
She is being held under anti-terrorist legislation that allows for prolonged detention without charge. The authorities gave no reason for her arrest. Mawbima has distinguished itself among Sinhala-language newspapers for an editorial line that is critical of both the Sri Lankan military and the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam rebels, FMM spokesman Sunanda Deshapriya said.
Maunasámi’s colleagues said they believed she might have been arrested for her work at the paper covering the separatist conflict.
“We call on the authorities to clarify why they have detained Parameswaree Maunasámi,” said CPJ Executive Director Joel Simon. “Tamil journalists have too often been harassed because of their political affiliation, their ethnicity, or their reporting. Such actions harm the ability of all Sri Lankan journalists to cover this period of escalating violence.”
Fighting between government and rebel forces has escalated in recent months, and on Monday LTTE leader Velupillai Prabhakaran called a 2002 ceasefire “defunct.”
Source: CPJ
Picture: Courtesy of LankaeNews
Statement by Free Media Movement [Full Text]:
Press release/ 26.November, 2006
Tamil female journalist arrested, remanded on a detention order
A freelance female journalist, Parameswaree was arrested on Friday the 24th November 2006 and has been remanded on a detention order. When contacted police officer attached to the Terrorist Investigation Division ( TID) confirmed that she is under detention order.
Once detention order by the secretary of defence is served a suspect can be remanded for period of 90days without producing in a court.
She along side an another Tamil female suspect was arrested by Special Police Task Force at her bordering place in Wellawatta, south of Colombo and handed over to Terrorist Investigation Division.
Parameswaree was a freelance journalist of Mawbima, a Sinhala language weekly, news paper officials of Mawbima told FMM.
Free Media Movement requests the authorities to follow the due legal process and release journalist Parameswaree if there is no legal case against her.
