Black July 1983 a Genocide against Tamil in the Sri Lankan capital, Colombo

Black July Quotes by different people & Media

"I am not worried about the opinion of the Jaffna people... now we cannot think of them, not about their lives or their opinion... the more you put pressure in the north, the happier the Sinhala people will be here... Really if I starve the Tamils out, the Sinhala people will be happy."

- President J.R.Jayawardene, Daily Telegraph, July 1983 
(https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-23402727)

Tamil businesses are left in ruins

"Mobs of Sinhala youth rampaged through the streets, ransacking homes, shops and offices, looting them and setting them ablaze, as they sought out members of the Tamil ethnic minority."

- London Daily Telegraph 26 July 1983

Rioters loot and destroy Tamil property

"... a mob attacked a Tamil cyclist riding near Colombo's eye hospital, a few hundred yards from the home of Junius Jayawardene, the nation's 76 year old President. The cyclist was hauled from his bike, drenched with petrol and set alight. As he ran screaming down the street, the mob set on him and hacked him down with jungle knives..."
- London Daily Telegraph; 26 July 1983

Tamil businesses are left in ruins

''A tourist told yesterday how she watched in horror as a Sinhala mob deliberately burned alive a bus load of Tamils... 'A mini bus full of Tamils were forced to stop in front of us in Colombo' she [Mrs.Eli Skarstein] said. A Sinhalese mob poured petrol over the bus and set it on fire. They blocked the car door and prevented the Tamils from leaving the vehicle. 'Hundreds of spectators watched as about 20 Tamils were burned to death'.
- London Daily Express, 29th August 1983

A Tamil boy stripped naked and later beaten to death by Sinhala youth

"The violence was vicious and bloody. But what distinguished it from many other communal Asian riots was the way that the mob singled out specific business premises…groups of rioters hit only at shops and factories, as well as homes owned by Tamils. Their careful selectivity is apparent now…Troops and police (almost exclusively Sinhalese) either joined the rioters or stood idly by. The events were so well organised no one doubts that there was a master list of targets."
- Financial Times, 12 August 1983

Rioters stop cars searching for Tamils

"The rioters seeking out Tamil homes and burning them had a particularly detailed knowledge of who lived where and who owned what.''
- London Times, 8 August 1983

A Sinhala mob looting a Tamil shop, with uniformed policemen looking on

" The evidence points clearly to the conclusion that the violence of the Sinhala rioters on the Tamils amounted to Acts of Genocide."
- The Review, International Commission of Jurists, December 1983

Buildings on fire; cars overturned; looters walk away with goodies

"Clearly this was not a spontaneous upsurge of communal hatred among the Sinhala people - nor was it as has been suggested in some quarters, a popular response to the killing of 13 soldiers... It was a series of deliberate acts, executed in accordance with a concerted plan, conceived and organised well in advance."
- Paul Sieghart; 'Sri Lanka: A mounting tragedy of errors'; International Commission of Jurists Report, March 1984

Tamil property goes up in flames

"Motorists were dragged from their cars to be stoned and beaten with sticks... Others were cut down with knives and axes."
- London Daily Telegraph 26 July 1983

Tamil businesses are singled out and burnt to the ground

''Foreign aid for the relief of Tamils is failing to reach the refugee camps where it was needed. Instead foreign aid and essential medical supplies are being stored in government depots. The government stores are full but the food is not being distributed.''
- London Observer, 7 August 1983

A car after it and it's passengers are set alight

''The shells of (Tamil owned) businesses line Galle Road, the main waterfront thoroughfare advertising the names that marked them for destruction. Lakshmi Mahal, pawnbroker, or Ram Gram stores and florist.. Damage estimates are uncertain and incomplete, but the total economic loss has been placed at $300 million.''
- New York Times, August 1983

Thousands of Tamils are made refugees overnight

Tamil businesses are left in ruins

''About 100 industrial plants were severely damaged or destroyed, including 20 garment factories. The cost of industrial reconstruction was estimated at 2,000 million rupees (£55 million). This did not include damaged shops.''
- The Guardian, 9 August 1983

Tamil businesses are left in ruins

"Smoke from hundreds of shops, offices, warehouses and homes blew idly over Colombo yesterday. Any business, any house belonging to or occupied by a Tamil has been attacked by gangs of goondas and the resulting destruction looks like London after a heavy night's attention from the Luftwaffe. The sharp smell of destruction fills the nostrils and the roads beneath the feet crunch with broken glass. Cars and lorries lie at ungainly angles across the footways. In Pettah, the old commercial heart of the city, row after row of sari boutiques, electronic dealers, rice sellers, car parts stores, lie shattered and scarred... government officials yesterday estimated that 20,000 businesses had been attacked in the city."
- The Guardian, 28 July 1983

Vehicles owned by Tamil were burnt

''All over the city by mid-morning lorries jammed with young men shouting anti Tamil slogans, were moving into Tamil areas and into shopping centres picking out Tamil shops... Petrol was siphoned from cars into buckets and plastic bowls to speed the work of arson.. By noon Colombo resembled a city after a bombing raid. Smoke obscured the sun, main roads were blocked by burnt out vehicles.. The rioting surged into the heart of the city. In area after area Sinhalese rioters systematically picked out Tamil homes and shops, whether occupied or empty, and looted and destroyed them...''
- Guardian, 26 July 1983

Riots burning the vehicles of Tamils

Tamil house burnt

'A most distressing aspect of the vandalism was the burning and the destruction of the houses and dispensaries of eminent Tamil doctors - some with over a quarter of a century of service in Sinhala areas...''
- Eye witness account, Sri Lanka: Racism and the Authoritarian State - Race and Class, Volume XXVI, A.Sivanandan and Hazel Waters, Institute of Race Relations

Tamil Textile shop burnt

“Some 6000 Tamils have been killed altogether in the last few years… These events are not accidental. It can be seen that they are the result of a deliberate policy on the part of the Sri Lankan government… Democracy in Sri Lanka does not exist in any real sense"
- Senator A.L.Missen, Chairman, Australian Parliamentary Group of Amnesty International, expressed his growing concern in March 1986:

Video Reports

Legacy of Black July pt1

Legacy of Black July

References

1. https://ta.wikipedia.org/. If the link not available (click here)
2. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Black_July If link not available (click here )
3. http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/south_asia/3090111.stm, if link not available (click here)
4. https://www.colombotelegraph.com/index.php/black-july-haunting-memories/, if link not available (click here)
5. Remembering Sri Lanka's Black July - BBC.com on July 23,2013. If link not available (click here)
6. Some Brief Notes On 1983 Violence Against The Tamils. - colombotelegraph.com on 2019. If link not available (click here)

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