Sri Lanka is uncovering mass graves but not the grisly truth of its civil war
History suggests the island-country’s latest effort to heal its terrible war wounds will fail
AS DARK CLOUDS of economic crisis, political chaos and mass protest loomed over Sri Lanka a year ago, optimists saw one silver lining. So incompetent and corrupt was the soon-to-collapse government of President Gotabaya Rajapaksa, it had united the country in anger, crossing the ethnic divide that had blighted its post-independence history. But hopes that this might lead to a lasting rapprochement between the island’s Tamil, and largely Hindu, minority and its Sinhalese Buddhist majority have proved to be short-lived.
This article appeared in the Asia section of the print edition under the headline “If the dead could only speak”
From the July 8th 2023 edition
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