2010

New York, January 11, 2010 — The Committee to Protect Journalists welcomes the release on bail of Sri Lankan journalist J.S. Tissainayagam on Monday in Colombo, but calls on President Mahinda Rajapaksa to use his constitutional power to extend a full pardon and erase the 20 year sentence of “rigorous imprisonment” that was handed down…

Even by Sri Lanka’s standards, January 2009 was a brutal month for journalists. On January 6, on a quiet road on the outskirts of Colombo, the country’s main independently owned TV station, Sirasa TV, was raided at 2:05 a.m. by 15 to 20 masked armed men working with military precision. At 2:35:31 they detonated an…