Winning the war…at a price

It was bitter irony that at the very moment that the Sri Lankan armed forces were achieving their greatest feat in the war against the LTTE – the opening of the long-closed highway to Jaffna – armed assassins were striking in Colombo, and effectively slamming shut the door to media freedom in the country. On 8 January 2009, at a crowded intersection, armed men on four motorcycles surrounded Lasantha Wickrematunge, the outspoken editor of the Sunday Leader newspaper, and proceeded to shoot him dead, all in a high-security zone next to an Air Force camp. The timing of the assassination has since proven so counterproductive for the Colombo government that President Mahinda Rajapakse has been led to speak of a conspiracy, even an international one, aimed at discrediting his government and diverting attention from its military triumphs.

Providing a rather different perspective in the Parliament, meanwhile, the leader of the opposition, Ranil Wickremesinghe, pointed the finger for the assassination (and other crimes) at a team within the military-intelligence wing, albeit one operating independently of government control. "Today it is the opposition and the media who are the targets," he said in the immediate aftermath of the attack on Wickrematunge. "But a similar fate can befall the government and the cabinet tomorrow. I am talking on behalf of the entire House now." He furthermore called for "this motorbike squad" to be placed under the supervision of a deputy inspector-general of police. Government spokespeople, meanwhile, have claimed the attack to be the work of anti-government elements – possibly even the LTTE, which is deemed to be capable of anything, especially if it is destructive.