JM Exclusive

COLOMBO, Sri Lanka — Sri Lanka’s National Authority on Tobacco and Alcohol (NATA) has formally presented the country’s Health Minister with a concept paper proposing that all citizens born after 2010 be permanently prohibited from purchasing tobacco products — a sweeping generational policy that would align Sri Lanka with a growing global movement gaining legislative momentum from London to the Maldives. The proposal was presented to Health Minister Dr. Nalinda Jayatissa by NATA Chairman Dr. An

JAFFNA, Sri Lanka — A Tamil fisherman from Jaffna was severely beaten after being detained at sea by a group of Indian fishermen, according to Sri Lankan fishing associations, Indian police accounts and widely circulated video footage, in an episode that has once again exposed the volatile maritime tensions of the Palk Strait. The fisherman, a 29-year-old man from Vallai in Sri Lanka’s Jaffna District, is being treated at Nagapattinam Government Medical College Hospital in Tamil Nadu, where doc

JAFFNA, Sri Lanka — R. Kumaran, a veteran physics teacher from Jaffna who has taught generations of students in northern Sri Lanka, has publicly questioned the political maturity of young Sri Lankan Tamils supporting actor-turned-politician Vijay and his Tamilaga Vettri Kazhagam (TVK) movement in neighboring Tamil Nadu. In a video widely circulated online, reportedly from a Zoom session with his advanced-level students, Mr. Kumaran — widely regarded in Jaffna as one of the region’s most influen

CHENNAI, India — A.G. Perarivalan, who spent 31 years in prison in connection with the assassination of former Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi before being released by India’s Supreme Court in 2022, has enrolled as a lawyer, returning to the legal system where he once fought for his freedom. Mr. Perarivalan, 54, was registered as an advocate with the Bar Council of Tamil Nadu and Puducherry at the Madras High Court complex this week, according to officials. The enrollment marks a notable turn in a

JAFFNA, Sri Lanka — Ramanathan Archchuna, a controversial Jaffna District M.P., was arrested on Monday after he was accused of brandishing a firearm during a land dispute in Periyavilaan, the police said. The arrest follows the circulation of video footage, reviewed by Jaffna Monitor, that appears to show Mr. Archchuna pointing a handgun during a confrontation with a group of residents, including women. Police said one of the women involved in the dispute was also arrested and remanded by cour

Colombo — Shortly after 10 p.m. on a Saturday in late April, a Thai AirAsia jet from Bangkok touched down at Bandaranaike International Airport. Among the passengers, twenty-two young men in saffron robes filed quietly toward the arrivals hall, the way Buddhist monks in transit have moved through this airport for decades — without much notice, and almost without question. They did not get that far. By dawn on Sunday, officers of the Police Narcotics Bureau had laid out the contents of their su

Delivering the S.J.V. Chelvanayakam Memorial Oration at Jaffna Central College, the legal scholar and former minister traced decades of missed opportunities for political accommodation. The full text of his address is published below. JAFFNA, Sri Lanka — On the forty-ninth anniversary of the death of S. J. V. Chelvanayakam — the lawyer who founded the Federal Party and gave the Tamil demand for self-rule its modern political form — G. L. Peiris on Sunday delivered the S.J.V. Chelvanayakam Memor