Sunila - A Tribute to an indefatigable defender of human dignity

"What does it mean to call a country democratic when government critics are exiled and branded terrorists? Who decides what is patriotic and what is not? Whose voices are actually being heard? Whose rights are really being protected?"

BY N. SHANMUGARATNAM-

23 SEPTEMBER 2013

-- Sunila Abeysekera, interviewed by Kiri Westby, Huff Post World, 10/22/2012

The last time I saw Sunila was on October 2, 2012, when she visited the Norwegian University of Life Sciences to speak on Women’s situation and human rights under militarisation of society: the case of Sri Lanka and personal experience as a ‘Scholar at Risk (SAT)’. She had sent me a mail about her visit to Norway although I already knew about it from university sources, and was looking forward to seeing her on the campus at Aas. She was a guest of the ‘Norway Section of SAT’, which is a network of several universities and university colleges in Norway. At the time, Sunila was based at the Institute of Social Studies in The Hague, of which she was an alumna. We had not met for some years and it was nice to see Sunila in her cheerful self during a chat before her talk. After the talk, while having lunch in the university’s main cafeteria, she did tell me and a couple of colleagues about her illness. We had hoped it was treatable.

Sunila - A Tribute to an Indefatigable Defender of Human Dignity by nelvely