By Michael Roberts –
Michael Roberts
In the course of my researches into the emergence of Ceylonese nationalism in the British period, I delved in considerable detail into an event that was referred to then as “the 1915 riots” – the term “riots” in South Asia being a mechanical reproduction of the terminology of the British legal lexicon to describe affrays of all sorts. In 1915 this short-hand phrase referred to the assaults on the Mohammedan Moors (as they were called then) in the south-western quadrant by elements of the Sinhalese population (Roberts 1981). Amidst the complex processes that promoted this outbreak let me isolate a particular factor: a critical force inspiring the attacks was the incitement by those whom I have referred to as “stirrers” (Kannangara 1984; Roberts 1981; 1994a).
The outbreak of the July 1983 pogrom against Tamils living in the south-western and central regions of Lanka encouraged scholars to redefine such events as “pogroms.” On this occasion too, anecdotal testimony from friends and the article by Valli Kanapathypillai (1990) indicate that incitement by a diverse body of chauvinist stirrers was one factor behind a campaign that legitimised the terror wrought by depicting these activities as acts that would “teach Tamils a lesson.”
Dwelling on some anecdotal tales I was motivated in the 1990s to pen a literary essay of protest against the horrendous acts of July 1983: “The Agony and Ecstasy of a Pogrom: Southern Lanka, July 1983,” This article was written during a lonely sojourn in Charlottesville, Virginia where my isolation promoted reflexivity. Central to this intervention was the deployment of two horrifying photographs extracted from the Tamil Times. In subsequent years I discovered that these images had been captured by a brave cameraman, Chandragupta Amarasinghe, who supplied me with better copies and clarified details about the mayhem around Borella Junction that 24th/25th night in July (Roberts 1994b, 2003).
These engagements with ethnic extremism and zealotry encouraged me to seek comparative material on race riots in USA and pogroms in eastern Europe; while a Research Fellowship at Teen Murthi enabled me to spend four months in Delhi in 1995 delving into “communal violence” in India – mostly attacks on the Muslims by Hindus, but also the attacks on Sikhs in 1984 after Indira Gandhi was assassinated (Roberts 2010a).
Weiss has a reputation of being an idealist and his moral passion may suggest that he is not the type of person who would crop a photograph. However, his campaign against human rights abuses directed at both parties in the conflict has not been even-handed. There are several moments where his representations let the LTTE off the hook. A separate essay is called for if one is to evaluate the degree of partiality and integrity displayed in recent years by Gordon Weiss.
During this work I dwelt on the possibility of creating composite picture of a typical riot-pattern, a constellation which I would set out in order to provoke readers and governments into reflective counter-action. Central to such a purpose was the deployment of photographic imagery of the type Amarasinghe, namely, pictures that horrify and reveal man’s inhumanity towards man. My reasoning was that it is far more difficult for people to transfer horrendous images into the nether regions of the mind in contrast with prose reports on violence.
Thus motivated, I even approached a German NGO in Colombo with this idea. I got nowhere and confess that my efforts in this direction were not sustained. However weak my endeavours, it would seem that the NGO world of the 1990s did not possess the type of interest we have seen in recent times.
From this experience I find it ironic that visual imagery, whether You Tube videos, still photographs or documentaries, have been so powerful in the moral storm about “war crimes” (a controversial concept as it is) in both Sri Lanka and elsewhere. The controversial apotheosis of this power of imagery has been the Channel 4 video presented by Jon Snow which bears the title “Killing Fields.”
Killing Fields cannot, however, be comprehended without attentiveness to one of the principal forces behind some of the terrifying footage deployed within it, namely, the LTTE and its many arms abroad. Such investigative work must begin with awareness of the degree to which the Tiger leadership invested in pictorial modalities in their propaganda and training programmes from very early on.
The LTTE set up two-person video teams within a department that has been called “The Truth Tigers” to film specific operations (Journeyman Pictures 2002). Their video work supplemented the LTTE investments in street theatre, radio, newspapers et cetera. The innovative character of the LTTE’s diverse means of presenting their liberation struggle has to be grasped by anyone reviewing the present propaganda war. In their heyday the LTTE’s use of pandals, buntings, poster art, billboards et cetera was quite phenomenal. The most pronounced moment in such endeavours occurred in the week leading up to Māveerar Nāl at 6.05 pm on 27th November every year (Roberts 2005) – a process of grieving, celebration and dedication that occurred in all the major cities in the West beside the terrain embraced by the de facto state of Thamilīlam from 1990 to 2007.
Pictorial imagery was a major dimension of the reportage and propaganda in such LTTE web sites as Tamilnet.com and TamilCanadian.com. I was taken in once by a Tamil supporter who sent me a photograph of the corpses produced by the suicide bomb attack that killed Janaka Perera in Anuradhapura as proof of killings caused by shelling in the Vanni pocket in 2009 (see my illustrative entry in Senaratne 2011). One must therefore attend to the possibility that some video footage of alleged government atrocities was manufactured in 2008 as the LTTE realised that it was on the backfoot. Grapevine information indicates that Channel 4 was working secretly in LTTE territory from 2007 or 2008 and that Nick Paton Walsh entered Sri Lanka to complete the final phase of this cooperation; but was deemed suspect and unceremoniously turfed out by the Sri Lankan government in May 2009 – a humiliating outcome which added revenge to the other motivations promoting Channel 4s commitment to the Tiger cause and its targeting of the Sri Lankan government for a public hanging.
In early 2009, as we know, the Sri Lankan government was subject to pressure from some Western governments, UN agencies and INGOs demanding that they resort to a unilateral ceasefire in order to reduce the s civilian death toll. As Simon Jenkins indicated in his strictures on David Miliband’s grandstanding on several fronts in that period: “in Sri Lanka a rudimentary study of the past three months of fighting would have told Miliband that a ceasefire would be pro-Tamil, not just “pro-humanitarian” (2009). This was precisely the position I pressed then in criticising Hilary Clinton and other world leaders for their simpleton approach, one that encouraged the LTTE to use the impending general elections in mid-May in India as well as human rights vocabulary as a foundation for their Machiavellian policy of using the Tamil population of Thamililam as a buffer and bargaining chip to gain some bolt-hole (also see Tekwani 2011).
Since then, after the demise of the LTTE military regime, the campaign to crucify the Sri Lankan state has been promoted by processes that I do not have the expertise to decipher, but which can be treated as an alliance of sorts between five categories of actors. These are
- The LTTE’s various international arms — bolstered now by new recruits among Tamil migrants stirred by the emotional heat of 2009.
- UN, INGO and NGO agencies directed for the most part by human rights discourse and the either/or epistemology that governs the currents of secular fundamentalism that are so vibrant now in Western countries.
- The hidden agendas (and double standards) of several Western states as well as the UN agencies in their pockets.
- The sensationalist tendencies of several media outlets in the West who thrive on “churnalism,” encouraged as they are by a principled hostility to the intimidation of their colleagues in Sri Lanka during the period 2006-09.
- The activities of several Sri Lankan journalists and cameramen who were forced to flee their land in 2007-09 as a result of the assassinations and threats that surrounded those with liberal or Left inclinations. On a priori grounds one can say that ideology, motives of vengeance and occasionally that of profit combined to encourage such individuals to supply Channel 4 and other Western media outlets with some of the wherewithal to cane the government. In some ways this could be seen as poetic justice; but the issue remains whether some of the lynching evidence is fabricated and thus contrary to the moral norms of others in the alliance as well as the concept of justice via truth.
II
When Channel Four chose the title of “Killing Fields” for its documentary of 2011, it cleverly deployed a metaphor from the Pol Pot era as a sensational sales pitch to support its highly weighted and partisan reading of the last stages of Eelam War IV, when the LTTE and its Tamil hostages and supporters were caged into what can be called the “Vanni Pocket.” It used the visual power of film juxtaposed with interviews in a blitzkrieg compilation that reverberated throughout the Western world and persuaded many non-partisan viewers — from Michael Atherton to Peter Roebuck — that something awful happened in the north eastern corners of the Vanni. That such individuals were persuaded is proof of visual power when it is cleverly compiled – though in my view it is also indicative of some measure of credulity and some unfamiliarity with the details of the context among those so swayed.
During this work I dwelt on the possibility of creating composite picture of a typical riot-pattern, a constellation which I would set out in order to provoke readers and governments into reflective counter-action. Central to such a purpose was the deployment of photographic imagery of the type Amarasinghe, namely, pictures that horrify and reveal man’s inhumanity towards man. My reasoning was that it is far more difficult for people to transfer horrendous images into the nether regions of the mind in contrast with prose reports on violence.
The shortcomings of a great deal of the Channel 4 film footage have now been outlined in several productions. The most revealing is the visual power-point documentary assembled by a Canadian collective associated with the Sri Lankan government who incorporated Siri Hewavitharana’s visual decoding analysis (2011a, 2011b) within their product. The most thorough textual criticism is that presented by a media outfit marshalled by the Ministry of Defence: “Appalling Journalism. Jon Snow and Channel 4 News on Sri Lanka.”
Both sources above may immediately be viewed as tainted by those hostile to the Sri Lankan state. However, Godfrey Gunatilleka’s recent summary of the findings of a Marga team supports their thrusts in providing a measured, yet severe, set of strictures on the yardsticks directing both Ban Ki-Moon’s Darusman Panel and the Channel 4 documentary. There are also useful insights in the remarks of such independent analysts as Shyam Tekwani (2011) and Kalana Senaratne (2011).
Because I was familiar with the LTTE’s capacities in using pictorial and video material, I surveyed the first airing of the open-air execution scenes by Channel 4 in August 2009 with suspicion. These doubts became conviction when I read Siri Hewavitharana’s forensic analysis in article form in the Asian Tribune and local newspapers immediately afterwards (see Rajasingham 2010 for a subsequent overview). I reached this conclusion because Hewavitharana’s decoding report seemed to be the work of a technologist rather than a literary giant – a technologist who knew his onions. The time discrepancy between the audio and visual moments in one execution scene highlighted by Hewavitharana, and his insistence that this was video footage rather than the work of a mobile phone (as a claimed by Channel 4), seemed clinching arguments. This incisive work has now, in 2011, been incorporated in power-point documents.
When this execution scene was subsequently incorporated within Killing Fields in mid-2011, my suspicions increased — the more so because Killing Fields moved on in rapid blitzkrieg fashion to depict other gory scenes including one series where the video-documentary depicted a terrified man tied to a tree and subject to torture, with the coup de grace for the message being an image of his bloodied corpse at the conclusion of this segment.
This latter series of images aroused my scepticism immediately. The doubts did not arise from any faith in the goodness of the SL Army. Anyone with experience of war, whether vicariously or in real time, knows that frontline soldiers sometimes execute captured adversaries. It is well-known that during the last months of World War Two Allied troops killed soldiers of the Wehrmacht (German army) who had killed some of their comrades in the course of continued resistance that everyone knew to be futile. The Sri Lankan wars of the last 30 years have been littered with atrocities from both sides. The atrocities in the Eastern Province in 1990 were particularly extensive. After the LTTE executed over 600 policemen Sinhalese and Muslim who had surrendered in June 1990 [Tamil policemen being spared], the SL army indulged in massacres at Kokkadichcholai and other places in 1990-91. If one wanted “Srebenica” moments, it is here that the best examples can be located.
However, the Channel 4 footage simply smelled “fake” because it purported to convey events occurring in the last stages of Eelam War IV in 2008-09. During that phase the SL armed forces were not only well kitted, but were in command of the situation and had taken control of many buildings in the northern Vanni, especially in the town of Kilinochchi, which had been abandoned by the LTTE once Paranthan fell in late December 2008. SL army torturing would, in my speculative reasoning, have occurred within closed doors. On this ground I thought then that this set of images indicated a killing of a dissident or deserter by the LTTE, acts which were frequent in Thamililam from 1990 through to 2009 and which have been documented over the years by the UTHR collective; and which are even stressed by Gordon Weiss himself in The Cage (2011: 69, 141-42).
The doubts were subsequently supported by the insights offered by the Tamil dissident, Noel Nadesan: “I was told by sources in the Vanni that this was an LTTE operation and [that these] pictures were taken for propaganda purposes by LTTE. Have a close look and you will find among the so-called soldiers a man in slippers. Sri Lankan soldiers never go about in slippers when they go out on operations.” Nadesan is referring to operations in the late 2000s and told me that his sources are former LTTE functionaries associated with its propaganda wings. He is not free to name them, so this evidence is open to sceptical responses from those who believe the Channel 4 version of this visual story.
Nevertheless, I insist that there is reasonable ground to conjecture that this segment of Killing Fields is a LTTE production developed as part of its propaganda operations in late 2008. The three reasons for this verdict are (a) the resort to open-air torture and execution with the use of a tree as a stanchion; (b) the presence of a soldier wearing slippers; and (c) information garnered by Nadesan from well-placed sources within the LTTE camp. Such threads do not, of course, enable a definitive verdict; but they are strongly indicative. At the very least they indicate that the jury should remain out on any conclusion about the perpetrators of this atrocity.
It is therefore of some significance that one photograph from this set of concoctions by the LTTE should turn up in the marquee images fronting – yes fronting — the web site maintained by Gordon Weiss with the caption: “Torturing a Victim, Northern Sri Lanka, 2009.”
This same image, cropped even tighter, is reproduced in his The Cage with the following description: “One of a series of photos, video, and testimony from Sinhalese soldiers that gradually emerged after the war. This one shows a man thought to be a captured Tamil Tiger fighter being tortured. Other photos in the sequence show him being bludgeoned to death.” In the credits for his illustrations inserted at the head of the book we are told that this image is from the “author’s own collection.”
From The Cage
We are not told where Weiss derived this particular selection from the video sequence. But BEWARE. This image has been cropped by someone, presumably by whoever delivered the photograph to Weiss. But study the same image reproduced by Rajiva Wijesinha after he received it from ABC when he challenged them about their reportage on the war in May 2011. This is presumably a replication extracted from the Channel Four documentary.
Take careful note: here we see at least one soldier with slippers, an indication, albeit not definitively, that the torturers and killers were probably Tiger personnel if we can rely on Nadesan’s sources. Thus, someone has cropped the tell-tale giveaway out of the public’s vision when circulating the still image as single frame for the benefit of those waiting in the wings to accept charges of governmental war crimes. Weiss appears to have been an “innocent” taken in by this particular footage [though one should also attend to the ‘minor’ narrowing of frame in his book version of the image in comparison with that on his web-page].
Weiss has a reputation of being an idealist and his moral passion may suggest that he is not the type of person who would crop a photograph. However, his campaign against human rights abuses directed at both parties in the conflict has not been even-handed. There are several moments where his representations let the LTTE off the hook. A separate essay is called for if one is to evaluate the degree of partiality and integrity displayed in recent years by Gordon Weiss.
Tekwani has already indicated that “Weiss’ studied conclusion” in The Cage to the effect that the war was justified “is at variance with his narrative style and choice of words, which draw heavily on his moral repugnance of the Rajapaksa victory.” From my location in Australia what demands emphasis is the cumulative impact of developments arising from the composition and publication of The Cage by Picador for Macmillan Australia. Note that in a deliberate move the book was launched in Sydney on 19th May 2011, a day of grieving in the Tamil nationalist firmament.
In participating actively in the marketing of this book, it would seem that, from late 2010 if not earlier, Gordon Weiss has been drawn increasingly closer to the networks of the Tamil Australian lobby associated with the LTTE in the past and with the politics of the Global Tamil Forum’s radical arms today. The importance which Weiss himself has attached to the photograph under scrutiny indicates that he accepts the presentation of this visual evidence as a case of government soldiers’ torturing Tamils. Even if his hand has not carried out the excision of tell-tale evidence undermining such a verdict, his ability to evaluate data is called into question. At the very least he has been sucked into distortion by others in his circuit, others working mala fide.
ADDENDUM
I have had two long conversations with Siri Hewavitharana in Sydney early in January. As far as I could judge from these chats, Hewavitharana is not a Sinhala ultra of the type associated with SPUR in Australia. Quite incidentally his reference to visits to Adelaide to buy wine from one particular shop indicated a background of affluence – a comforting thought in the sense that he does not require big bucks from any state agency. However, the most central impression that I gathered was that this is a man with phenomenal technical knowledge.
I insisted on receiving his c. v. and this document supports what was self-evident in the course of our conversation. Siri Hewavitharana is a professional broadcasting engineer in broadcast and satellite display, cable design and operations, content platforms DRM and STB’s, video broadcasting and IPTV. He seems to be at the cutting edge in this field and since September 2008 has held the post of Executive Director, IPTV Systems, after a career history of senior positions with Huawei Technology, IPTV, Cisco, Optus Vision et cetera. He founded the company Applied Video System in 1984 in UK, but his millionaire status burst with the financial bubble of 1987 and he was eventually enticed to Australia by Kerry Packer as Head of Visual Communication for OTC Research and Development in 1989.
By an act of the gods this original video footage contained metadata which gave the game away and indicated, for one, that it was not generated by a mobile phone -- it is for this reason that Channel 4 has never made its video footage public.
His professional status was such that in 2009 the US Defence Department sent him a copy of the first video deployed by Channel 4 that year. By an act of the gods this original video footage contained metadata which gave the game away and indicated, for one, that it was not generated by a mobile phone — it is for this reason that Channel 4 has never made its video footage public. He immediately approached Prabath Sahabandu, Editor of The Island, with his conclusions. That is how his report eventually ended up as a semi-official rebuttal of Channel 4 in the public realm.
He warned the government representatives that the defects in this video version would be covered up once his report was out. It so transpired. New improved versions of the open-air execution segment appeared in 2011, one reaching the UN via Journalists for Democracy and the other, with additional footage, being incorporated within Killing Fields. These versions too have been analysed to reveal defects. The availability of the original video with meta-data has been of critical importance in these acts of revelation. Killing Fields also contains frames that are still-images stitched together in clever fashion, inclusive of one segment that is “totally fake” in Hewavitharana’s words.
His “Technical Analysis of Channel 4 killing fields documentary” is now included in power-point presentations that are within the public realm (Lankaweb 2011 and Technical Analysis 2011) and should be essential viewing for everyone who is reviewing this topic. This report is indirectly supported in a separate study by Professor Yfantis, Professor of Computer Science at the University of Nevada, who was commissioned by the LLRC. His “mathematical analysis” of blood in the 3GPvideos revealed that “it was not real blood,” but either “water with red dye” or “digitally constructed … video blood.” This directed Yfantis to the overall view that killing Fields is “a very deliberate and orchestrated video” (LLRC, 2011, chap. 4: 372).
What these findings say of the morality guiding Channel Four and Jon Snow is beyond words. There is even some suggestion that elements of the British Foreign Office had a role in this ‘handiwork’ because Channel 4 had sought governmental aid in a situation of financial crisis in 2008/09; but this must be treated as unverified gossip unless wikileaks or other material provides evidence in this direction.
If people wish to dismiss the opinions expressed by Hewavitharana and Yfantis simply because they have been expressed through agencies associated with the Sri Lankan government, they should attend to Shyam Tekwani’s depiction (2011) of Killing Fields as “an effort to sensationalise and shock with carefully selected and edited footage,” and his further lobservations to the effect that, (a) for this reason, “the documentary weakens its case and invites an investigation into its own credibility and accountability to journalistic norms”; and that (b) “the volume of testimony it uses as evidence is not enormous and most of it is derived from leading questions.”
BIBLIOGRAPHY
Al-Jazeera 2011 “Sri Lanka responds to ‘war crimes’ claims,” [Rajiva Wijesinha faces challenging American newscaster in Doha] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sdrCR-X4iH0&feature=player_embedded#at=75
Aranze, Janith 2011 “Sri Lanka’s Srebenica Moment. Q and A with Gordon Weiss,” Sunday Leader, 1 May 2011.
Colvin, Mark 2011 “Sri Lankan war crimes remain untold story of South Asia: former UN worker,” 16 May 2011, http://www.abc.net.au/pm/content/2011/s3218357.htm
Gunatilleke, Godfrey 2011 “Truth and Accountability –The Last Stages of the War in Sri Lanka,” http://colombotelegraph.com/2011/12/24/truth-and-accountability-the-last-stages-of-the-war-in-sri-lanka/
Gunasekera, Mahinda 2011 “Just a fake – New Channel 4 Video Alleging Extra-Judicial Killings in Sri Lanka,” http://www.island.lk/index.php?page_cat=article-details&page=article-details&code_title=27557
Hewavitharana, Siri 2011a “Channel-4 video a ‘fake’, concludes video forensic analyst,” http://www.globalpeacesupport.com/globalpeacesupport.com/post/2011/06/13/Channel-4-video-a-fake-concludes-video-forensic-analyst.aspx.
Hewavitharana, Siri 2011b “Channel 4 Video is Fake, Edited and Video taken by Video Camera,” http://www.asiantribune.com/news/2011/06/05/channel-4-video-fake-edited-and-video-taken-video-camera
Jenkins, Simon 2011 “Simon Jenkins pulverized Miliband’s assinine foreign interventions in 2009,” http://www.aspensrental.com/simon-jenkins-pulverized-milibands-assinine-foreign-interventions-in-2009/
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Jupp, James 2011 “Troubled Legacy of Civil War,” The Australian Literary Review, 6 July 2011, p. 13.
Kanapathipillai, Valli 1990 “July 1983: The Survivor’s Experience,” in Veena Das (ed.). Mirrors of Violence. Communities, Riots and Survivors in South Asia, Delhi: Oxford University Press, pp. 321-44.
Kannangara, A. P. 1984 “The Riots of 1915 in Sri Lanka: A Study of the Roots of Communal Violence,” Past and Present, No. 102: 130-65.
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LLRC 2011 Report of the Commission of Inquiry into Lessons Learnt and Reconciliation.
Nadesan, Noel 2011 “Media and the Suffering of the Tamil People,” 14 July 2011, http://noelnadesan.wordpress.com/2011/07/14/media-and-the-suffering-of-the-tamil-people/
Padraig Colman 2011 “Channel 4 News and Sri Lankan War Crimes,” http://pcolman.wordpress.com/2011/08/12/channel-4-news-and-sri-lankan-war-crimes/
Padraig Colman 2011 “Evaluating the ‘Churnalism’ from Channel 4 and the Moon Panel,” 17 August 2011, http://thuppahi.wordpress.com/2011/08/17/a-credible-evaluation-of-%e2%80%9cchurnalism%e2%80%9d-from-channel-4-and-the-moon-panel/
Rajasingham, K. T. 2010 “Video footage fake: Media expert Siri Hewa picks up holes in UN Rapporteur’s findings,” http://www.asiantribune.com/news/2010/06/04/video-footage-fake-media-expert-siri-hewa-picks-holes-un-rapporteur’s-findings.
Reddy, B. Muralidhar 2009 “An Escape from Hellhole,” http://www.hindu.com/ 2009/04/25/stories/2009042558390100.html
Roberts, Michael 1981 “Hobgoblins, Low-Country Sinhalese Plotters or Local Elite Chauvinists?: Directions and Patterns in the 1915 Communal Riots”, Sri Lanka Journal of the Social Sciences, 4: 83-126.
Roberts, Michael 1994a “Mentalities: Ideologues, Assailants, Historians and the Pogrom against the Moors in 1915,” in Roberts, Exploring Confrontation, Reading: Harwood Academic Publishers, pp. 183-212.
Roberts, Michael 1994b “The Agony and Ecstasy of a Pogrom: Southern Lanka, July 1983,” in Roberts, Exploring Confrontation, Reading: Harwood Academic Publishers, pp. 317-30.
Roberts, Michael 2003a “The Agony and Ecstasy of a Pogrom: Southern Lanka, July 1983,” Nēthra, April-Sept 2003, 6: 199-213.
Roberts, Michael 2009b “Realities of War,” Frontline, vol. 26/10, 9 May 2009 http://www.frontlineonnet.com/fl2610/stories/20090522261001600.htm [reprinted in Roberts, Fire & Storm, Colombo: Vijitha Yapa Publications, 2010, pp. 289-302].
Roberts, Michael 2009c “The Rajapaksa Regime and the Fourth Estate,” 9 December 2009, http://www.groundviews.org/2009/12/08/the-rajapakse-regime-and-the-fourth-estate/
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Roberts, Michael 2010 “Self Annihilation for Political Cause: Cultural Premises in Tamil Tiger Selflessness,” in Roberts, Fire and Storm. Essays in Sri Lankan Politics, Colombo: Vijitha Yapa Publications, pp. 161-201.
Roberts, Michael 2011a “People of Righteousness target Sri Lanka,” http://thuppahi. wordpress.com /2011/06/27/people-of-righteousness-target-sri-lanka/
Roberts, Michael 2011b “Visual Evidence I: Vitality, Value and Pitfall – Borella Junction, 24/25 July 1983,” 29 October 20111, http://thuppahi.wordpress.com/2011/10/29/visual-evidence-i-vitality-value-and-pitfall-%E2%80%93-borella-junction-2425-july-1983/
Roberts, Michael 2011c “Amnesty International reveals its Flawed Tunnel-Vision on Sri Lanka in 2009,” http://thuppahi.wordpress.com/2011/08/10/amnesty-international-reveals-its-flawed-tunnel-vision-on-sri-lanka-in-2009/
Senaratne, Kalana 2011 “Killing Fields: Problems and Prospects, “The Island, 24 June 2011 [also in http://thuppahi.wordpress.com/2011/06/24/killing-fields%E2%80%99-problems-and-prospects/].
Sri Lanka Media Watch 2011 “Appalling Journalism. Jon Snow and Channel 4 News on Sri Lanka,” November 2011, http://www.defence.lk/news/pdf/Appalling%20Journalism.pdf.
Technical Analysis 2011 “Technical Analysis of Channel 4 killing fields documentary,”
http://www.slideshare.net/abcbefair/technical-analysis-of-channel-4-killing-fields-documentary.
Tekwani, Shyam 2011 “The long afterlife of war in teardrop isle,” 29 August 2011, http://tehelka.com/story_main50.asp?filename=Ws290811long.asp.
UTHR 2009 Let Them Speak: Truth about Sri Lanka’s Victims of War, Special Bulletin Report No. 34.
You Tube Power Point 2011a “Technical Analysis of Channel 4 Killing Fields,” http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RRrGDPKVJh0
You Tube Power Point 2011b “British Channel 4 TV Allegations manipulating the Medium,” http://www.globalpeacesupport.com/globalpeacesupport.com/post/ 2011/06/13/Channel-4-video-a-fake-concludes-video-forensic-analyst.aspx.
Weiss, Gordon 2011 “Sri Lanka faces its ‘Srebrenica moment’,” The Australian, 23 April 2011, http://www.theaustralian.com.au/news/world/sri-lanka-faces-its-srebrenica-moment/story-e6frg6ux-1226043466322.
Weiss, Gordon 2011b The Cage, Sydney: Picador.
Bodinayaka / January 7, 2012
Colombotelegraph Is also in Journalism business right?. stupid me . Why I ask the question when I know the answer?
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Vasu / January 16, 2012
So naive, definitely not the propaganda ministry of Goebels or MR or other dictators. Don´t you have an opportunity to widen your horizon in France, Italy etc.,even if you live in ratholes. Don´t forget to take Casie Chetty with you
Enjoy the social help, western asylum rights and humanitarian laws.
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LOL / January 7, 2012
the arguments in this text is on the level of a 2 year old. The slipper argument might have been taken seriously if the video was shoot in northern Siberia, where slippers presumably are a rare sight, but this is Sri Lanka. There must be at least 60 million slippers in Sri Lanka and there are many many possible explanations to why a SLA soldier wear slippers on this particular day. The arguments for the continues support for the “independent video experts” is starting to be borderline insanity, “Quite incidentally his reference to visits to Adelaide to buy wine from one particular shop indicated a background of affluence – a comforting thought in the sense that he does not require big bucks from any state agency.” If one wants argue that a person is independent due to his/her wealth, one bottle of wine is ridiculously weak evidence. Why let an insane toddler publish this piece of trash article!!!
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billy / January 7, 2012
i think u must be one of the two year old when u seems to be unable to comprehend the argument of the writer where govt soldiers would not wear rubber slippers during operations, which most of these pictures seems to be depicting and given the fact slippers are sort of default part of ur ltte outfit, the argument seems quite credible.
Also with regard to hewawitharanas findings, even if he was not neutral that is not an excuse to throw his arguments away given the fact of his expertise and i am yet to see any countering of his findings so far by any terrorist bootlickers and their western bandwagon.
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billy / January 7, 2012
i think any body who understands the context within the C4 video supposed to have happened, would realize that it was a utter fake but the sad fact is there seems to be no one from the govt side who is capable enough to articulate the enough facts available to prove this is a fake in the global scale.
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LOL / January 7, 2012
to Billy. I’m still not convinced that a SLA soldier can never and under no circumstances wear slippers. If there was a picture of a SLA soldier marching through the jungle in slippers I would agreed it would be suspicious. The “operation” is certainly not a normal operation. Maybe the atrocity happened during a time when the soldiers were not moving aboutsince they had just taken some prisoners, after night of party or he was drying his boots. Who knows why he wore slippers? But the thing is, one can not convincingly rule out that a SLA soldier ever wore slippers. To build a whole argument on the assumption that SLA soldiers never and under no circumstances wears slippers is indeed ridiculous.
Let me raise another point regarding your argument. Is SLA army uniform also LTTE default outfit ? Or are we to believe that the the LTTE went through the trouble of staging the whole scene, using stolen or self made SLA uniform’s but forgot to give boots to one of them ?
We will not know for sure why the soldier wore slippers until he is identified, which he at some point will be. The truth will come out, maybe not this year or next year or during the next five years, but it will come out and then people like yourself will have to think long and hard how you hid behind ridiculous argument just because you refused to see the reality of things.
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billy / January 8, 2012
again its about the context of the argument. if these pictures depict army then it surely must be under an operational conditions which any body who have any common seance would understand that they wouldnt have wear slippers. in the other hand if it was ur terror buddies trying to imitate army then there is quite good chance they being unaware of such small details like footwear in their act in the final days ow war. therefor it is quite obvious for an objective mind that give some suspicion over the whole thing within other doubt mentioned by the writer about whole saga, then again critical and objective thinking is not something associated with any terrorist lovers!
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Rohan / January 7, 2012
RUBBER SLIPPER argument:
“Take careful note: here we see at least one soldier with slippers, an indication, albeit not definitively, that the torturers and killers were probably Tiger personnel”, says Roberts.
“govt soldiers would not wear rubber slippers during operations, which most of these pictures seems to be depicting and given the fact slippers are sort of default part of ur ltte outfit, the argument seems quite credible”, says Billy.
But, look at the attached link. One would find a number of soldiers barefeet! And, yes, they are in the middle of a serious operation. Watching a torure game in rubber slippers sound ‘very LTTE-like’ for some?
http://www.aftab1.com/2009/05/velupillai-prabhakaran-dead-body.html
http://www.nowpublic.com/world/identification-prabhakarans-body-complete
It is not surprising that Roberts conveniently overlooked the story of Ramesh, who was shown alive first with the soldiers and was found dead later.
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billy / January 8, 2012
again another silly argument, even in the links given one would only see a bear foot and not any one with rubber slippers (most probably some body who has removed his shoes in the given circumstances).
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LOL / January 7, 2012
http://www.defence.lk/new.asp?fname=20110619_01Up28
Please Billy look at the Ministry of Defense website, look at the picture to the far right, under the heading “Government Forces assisted aged people, pregnant women and people with disabilities:” its a soldier walking barefoot with a pair of black rubber slippers in his hand. Do you still stand by your argument ?
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cass / January 8, 2012
please LOL look at the MOD picture again. Are they in full uniform LOL? now go back to to the torture picture lol. see how they are in full uniform. what was the need to be in full uniform for a recreational sport like torture lol? and that’s why the slippers stick out in that pic lol. If the you were in the ltte propaganda unit directing a torture film(for real) what would you do? put your men in full army uniform complete with boots to serve as an easy marker/identification device or put them in relaxed gear to make the film more realistic/authentic? You would put them in full uniform for easy, unmistakable branding. but in that case why was that single man allowed to wear slippers? I do not know lol. Slips creep into the best productions. Remember that famous Hollywood period movie which is marred by the shadow of an airborne plane?
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Anonymous / January 7, 2012
The Experts (with their CV too) Report to the the UN Special Rapporteurs for Extra Judicial Killings has not be touched upon by the Writer in his exhaustive analysis, which alone makes one jump to conclusion that he is
acting similar to the late Marga Institue writings about the UN Panel Report at the behest of the Regime.
The question of the clips being Mobile Format or Video Format is not an issue, as they both can be
transferred to one another and traced back in todays technology.
The matter of slippers reminds one of the MOD version that Army does not wear White Banians as one
photo revealed to prove it fake, when another one was shown with Soldiers briefing MR, wearing such outfits!
The Writer should have interviewed Mr. Ramawickrema – the embedded cameraman of SLA for a more
correct assessment or seen the MOD Video archives. These will be presented at the ICC someday..
THIS IS WHY AN INDEPENDENT INTERNATIONAL INQUIRY IS NEEDED, as there are many Players in this
Game todate ,
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Bewildered / January 7, 2012
The Professor seems to be relishing on writing about the Sri Lankan ethnic war. For some reason he is all out supporting the Sri Lankan government. Perhaps he plans to live his retired life with his wife in beautiful Sri Lanka, and may require the government support, Otherwise there is no reason for him to spend his valuable time, writing imaginative analysis, rather than working on useful research.
Bewildered
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wine fan / January 7, 2012
@ LOL,
Pls. check your facts before you open your mouth… Mr Hewawitharana lives in Sydney and for him to travel to vineyards in South Australia, it takes one hour from plane and those some vineyards are catered for exclusive customers and those wine cannot be bought in ay where other than Baroassa valley exclusive wine boutiques…
BTW, affluence does come to it if you know what it is all about and some one buying cheap wine from down the road (LOL) and some one goes thousand of km to buy wines make it quite unique issue if you follow the logic.
It is not about wine shops and your ignorant is quite obvious or shall I say say stupid ? Learn about Australia before you say anything stupid.
http://www.barossa.com/wine/default.aspx
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Rohan / January 8, 2012
Wine Fan: “Pls. check your facts before you open your mouth… Mr Hewawitharana lives in Sydney and for him to travel to vineyards in South Australia, it takes one hour from plane and those some vineyards are catered for exclusive customers and those wine cannot be bought in ay where other than Baroassa valley exclusive wine boutiques”
Roberts: “As far as I could judge from these chats, Hewavitharana is not a Sinhala ultra of the type associated with SPUR in Australia. Quite incidentally his reference to visits to Adelaide to buy wine from one particular shop indicated a background of affluence – a comforting thought in the sense that he does not require big bucks from any state agency.”
Is it fair to think that he DOES require big bucks from state agencies and other mony plants to keep him going with his expensive taste?
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Rohan / January 8, 2012
Roberts: “…..not a Sinhala ultra of the type associated with SPUR in Australia. “
WOW – Roberts calls SPUR an ultra Sinhala organisation. But, SPUR claims that, “The Society for Peace, Unity and Human Rights stands for all the objectives stated in its name. However, in a welter of claims and counter claims, myths and facts, illusions and realities, it is rather difficult for peace-seekers to make statements of their own without being accused of bias. Primary objective of this page is to present authentic and authoritative voices advancing the cause of peace, unity and human rights in Sri Lanka”.
Some of us are familiar with the love-hate relationship between SPUR and Roberts. Keep going, Roberts.
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LOL / January 8, 2012
@ Cass. my point is that you can not conclusively dismiss the video or pictures of soldiers because of speculations regarding the presence of slippers on the persons in the video or picture. Both the SLA and the tigers sometimes use slippers. Do you agree to that or do you claim that the picture on the MOD website is fake ? Also, please look at the picture of the torture, one of the persons has a dark blue t-shirt, not uniform.
@ Wine Fan. It does seem like the trip to Adelaide from Sydney can be rather expensive. I still maintain that as an argument for him being independent due to little need for more funds it is very very weak. Its only an indication on expenses, what is important is the balance between income and expenses. The wine trips is indicating that he have one rather expensive hobby. Many people on a normal income can afford one expensive hobby if one forsake other things in life. It can also be that the wine interest is one amongst many expensive habits, in such case he might need a very very high income to cover all his expenses. In conclusion, an indication on one large expense can indicate both a high need for further income or can indicated a small need for further income.
I also think its worth mentioning that even if we make an unverified assumption that he indeed is rather wealthy. The funds available for an wealthy individual compared to the funds available for a Government is very much in favour of the government. Even an indebted government like the Rajapaksa government can raise funds enough to offer even a multimillionaire a high enough sum of money to make any deal interesting. This is of course also true for the other experts, like the one in US. The US government, also indebted, could have given him more then he could count in a life time. The only persons a government cant bribe are people like Bill Gates. The australian experts travel to Adelaide is rather irrelevant, one has to look at other factors to determine the experts independence. For example, one should think of how much a fake opinion from an expert would hurt his/her future possibilities to make a living in his/her profession.
Its clear that both the argument re the wine and the slippers are not really meant to be conclusive evidence. If there was conclusive evidence that the video is fake, would we really have a speculative discussion on slippers ? The objective of the writer is instead to sow a seed of doubt in the authenticity of the C4 video. We all want the video to be fake, we dont want these terrible things to be true and therefore we, some more then others, are susceptible to any little tiny tiny bit of unsubstantiated argument suggesting the video is a fabrication. If one bravely face the available facts one will undoubtedly come to the sad conclusion that the video is authentic.
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cass / January 8, 2012
LoL please sometimes analysis is best left to those who are good at it. Not everyone of us is meant to be analytical giants.
1) In all wars extra judicial tortures/executions happen
2) In wars, specially when it comes to tigers propaganda productions also happen
Now these are the potentialities we have to deal with. So now when something like the ch4 comes out it screams one word to anyone who knows their wars.
That word is not AUTHENTIC LoL that word is CAUTION. Gordon is a nice bloke. But IQ wise he does not impress a lot of people. In his book there is a sentence to the effect that (not word for word) to anyone who knows about wars the ch4 shouts authentic….why? because in wars executions/torture happen; totally ignoring the other potentiality that staged/manipulated footage also happen (remember that scene where the laughing tigress camera-person videos the civilians under fire?) Now what do you think of the reasoning/deductive powers of someone who writes something like that in a book?
Get your act together before we think the same of you. Don’t be such a war virgin man/woman (whichever u are)
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LOL / January 8, 2012
To Cass. Nice to see that my arguments re the wine and slipper issues seem to be valid, as you did not respond to any of them.
I’m well aware that extra judicial killings and torture do happen in many wars and I’m also aware of the fact that the LTTE was very advanced in their propaganda. The problem is to determine which is which, that is indeed the topic of this discussion.
To determine if this specific video is propaganda or not a number of tests have been carried out and each frame has been looked at to find things that would not be consistent with a authentic execution. So far all objective tests carried out have concluded that the video has not been technically tampered with and the events in the video is consistent with a real execution.
There are few tests that have shown the opposite, that the video is tampered with and that the events shown have signs that show that it is staged, all these tests are made either by people who are directly under the control of the rajapaksa government or in other ways not objective. Then there are a lot of people making up arguments about rubber slippers, wine and moving arms etc, these arguments are then meet with logic and dismissed, as happened in this discussion.
Until there is objective evidence of the video not being authentic, the logical conclusion is to consider the video to be authentic. This is quite simple.
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cass / January 8, 2012
This may come as a surprise dear but the burden is not to prove the video is not authentic but to prove that it constitutes credible allegations. Already ch4’s authenticity is shot to bits. Chris Heynes antics and credentials are iffy or have you not read those news reports? Meanwhile what do you have against Sri Hewa and Professor Yfantis?
Proving things cannot be done be incantation you know. “ch4 is authentic. the experts who say it’s good are the good guys. those who say different are the bad guys” write this line a million times in a million forums and perhaps who knows you might get lucky. or go to your nearest place of religious worship and generate rhythmic sonic vibrations by chanting this.
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LOL / January 8, 2012
Sri Hewa is not even an expert in the correct field! He is: “professional broadcasting engineer in broadcast and satellite display, cable design and operations, content platforms DRM and STB’s, video broadcasting and IPTV.” Sunday Observer says: “Internationally renowned expert in broadcast video systems” The MOD website says: “…is one of the world’s leading experts on digital video systems and former head of Cisco’s Global Broadcast and Digital Video Practice division. Mr. Hewavitharana is presently the Executive Director of IPTV Systems in Sydney, Australia.” Neither of this make him an expert in analysing a video in a scientific way. He might be very good at what he is doing, but he is not an expert in he required field.
Professor Yfantis is a Computer Scientists, not a video expert. He is also a Associate Editor of International Journal on Artificial Intelligence Tools (IJAIT) which I’m sure is very prestigious, but not very useful for video analysis.
The experts that have concluded that the video is real are: one forensic pathologist, one forensic video analyst, one fire arms evidence expert and one forensic video expert. This is the expertise one need to analyse a execution caught on a video, not expertise in Artificial Intelligence! If I were to put a bet on a game of cricket, I would bet on the cricket player not a tennis player, even if he is a good tennis player.
I’m glad you mention how it works with evidence in a court of law (I’m not a lawyer, but I assume they have the same rule in the Hague as in Colombo), its the prosecution who should prove the accusations etc etc. I will be very happy to see Rajapaksa brothers defend themselves in the International Criminal Court (ICC)
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wine fan / January 9, 2012
@LOL, What is this ? “Sri Hewa is not even an expert in the correct field”
You can’t even get his name right any way lets get back to your statement . Are you a retard or illiterate ? You are making a fool of your self again.
Broadcast engineering is the cream of Video audio and Cinema technology and Siri is a expert in all global video standard and compression standard and also sat on DVB ( Digital video Broadcast) committee in late 80’s to get todays word digital video standards in TV, Satellite and Cable transmission.
BTW this means these guys know the signal of whole the video and how signal stay on top of Transmission stream (TS).. So LOL where did get this idea that Siri is not a expert in correct field ? He sits on top 10 world experts in this field. US Strategic Surveillance Network (SSN) also his baby.
Re. your statement about cricket and tennis, you are most likely want to play test cricket with tennis balls since you have no balls to face the real world or the truth. Dream on…
Siri also a expert in DSP and DSP is the heart of the video technology today and Prof. Yfantis analysis match exactly what Siri said. Siri isolated the pixel map that was from the (suppose to be) blood soaked picture and said whole blood scene is a fake and red colour come from a digital pain brush. Now let me give you some insight to Siri’s analysis. His UK company AVS/Tekniche produced these DVE ( Digital Video Effects) machines that cost half a million pounds and as a Head of the Research and Development of that company he designed these machine and know how the video manipulation and paint brush work.
Re. the video authenticity he used Non Linear Editor which cost US$ 300,000 to analyse the video and guess what ? He also the designer of these NLE’s in AVS.
Almost all the present top broadcast companies came from AVS group which later broke into several companies. He never talk about these but industry people know him well and respect him and his work. He also adviser to Sony Broadcast R&D group and continuously travel to Atsugi, Japan.
Non of the UN experts use these tools and nearest to the real work was last test at UN, Grant used Avid and found that video is edited and got Optical zoom… BTW in forensic video first is about authentication , meaning, Is this the original video and if so is it authenticated using NLE’s. Video failed miserably to pass both as Siri pointed out. You cannot go to the subjective visual side since it can be staged and Siri stay out of the subjective analysis even though he is well qualified for that part.
I used to work for him and most kind hearted person that I know and he said he wanted to pass his 30 yrs expertise to the younger generation. He work with Big guns, and he worked for Billionaires like Kerry Packer (Australia’s Richest man) and Rupert Murdock and Hong Kong Billionaire Li Ka-shing. He also created Cisco Video BU and ran it and also open Cisco China R&D which he was the director.
Some how Ch4 pick a fight with the Sri Lanka’s most gifted Son in the video field and they lost and UN got ridiculed since they never knew what hit them re. Siri’s analysis.
LOL, Don’t play the man , play the ball if you are man enough.
@JAMES CHANCE , why are you brown nosing LOL ? Nice name for a ltte sympathiser .
re, your comments, “LOL wins the argument hands down” Really ? Quite amazing parasite terrorist coming out of the wood work.. Re. Hands down, it may be LOL is playing with him selves.. LOL
SL did not have war, SL army got rid of parasitic infestation and some how some Green or Red shirts don’t like it… Well Tough Fu… luck.
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James Chance / January 8, 2012
LOL wins the argument hands down – esp. with the photo of the bare-footed soldier standing next to Prabha’s body. Michael Roberts is a smart man, who has done much good academic work, but when he gets on his anti-war-crimes-allegations hobby horse, his standards fall to appalling levels – the slippers and the wine-buying bits of evidence are laughable. Get back to what you are good at, Prof. Michael!
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LOL / January 9, 2012
I have never suggested that Siri Hewa is not a good CEO, innovator or entrepreneur. He is however not a forensic video expert. As I understand it, this is the first time he has given an expert opinion on a video of an execution. We have therefore nothing to compare to, he has no track-record in this particular field. Secondly, if his expert opinion turns out to be substandard he dont loose anything, his reputation as a good CEO, innovator or entrepreneur will be intact. Whereas, if the UN expert opinions turn out to be substandard the experts will have a hard time continuing in their respective professions. This difference is very important to recognise. This makes the value of Siri Hewa expert opinion very small. That he then is said to be hired by the MOD, the accused party, brings the added value down to nothing.
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wine fan / January 10, 2012
@LOL, Be objective and have proper logical mind… Not sure how old you are since you are rambling with out proper knowledge or facts..
To move into 2nd phase of the video to be check by forensic experts, FIRST it has to be technically authenticated by experts in this field and Siri has done it and UN cast doubt on that too… So there will be no 2nd phase if the video is fake… Do I have to say more?
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wine fan / January 10, 2012
BTW MOD never hire Siri or Siri never got paid in any kind… You need to read the good Professors article again to see how all these come about..
Siri’s said video is fake and published his results since metadata layer is intact with all the data.. BTW he never gave his opinion and all he did was to publish technical data which is on the video.
Better go to the MOD site and see the editors( NLE’s) screen grab to show video got two layers and audio is not in sync with any of the video… That is the final as far as video authentication and by any court of law… Now what do you say ?
Siri said,
Image authentication must not be confused with the requirement to authenticate evidence as a precondition to admissibility in a Court of Law.
Likewise, authenticity differs significantly from integrity. Integrity ensures that the information presented is complete and unaltered from the time of acquisition until its final disposition. For example, the use of a hash function can verify that a copy of a digital image file is identical to the file from which it was copied, but it cannot demonstrate the veracity of the scene depicted in the image.
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LOL / January 11, 2012
Re Siri being hired by the Government I refer to an article in Sunday Leader, http://www.thesundayleader.lk/2011/06/19/the-rule-of-law-in-war/ Its your word against them.
This is quote from Prof Alston’s reports: “The following day, the Ministry of Defence published a statement by one of the Government’s experts, Mr Siri Hewawitharana…” seems consistent with what the professor writes: “Sri Lankan government who incorporated Siri Hewavitharana’s visual decoding analysis (2011a, 2011b) within their product.”
Siri IS indeed the GoSL’s expert and Daniel Spitz, a forensic pathologist, Jeff Spivack, a forensic video analyst, Peter Diaczuk, a firearms expert, Grant Fredericks, a forensic video analyst, arguably also the two persons, Lenny Rudin, PhD, forensic imaging scientist at Cognitech, Inc. and Alex Dziemieszko, a LEVA Certified Forensic Video Technician, doing peer review of Jeff Spivacks results, are the UN experts.
re the audio layers etc etc, read the independent reports where they discuss this issue. Stop reading the crap on the MOD website, do you claim that the MOD is objective on this issue ?
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wine fan / January 11, 2012
SL Defence is country’s defence and its due to their effort that you can sleep peacefully with out getting blown by idiots and terrorists… No one cares if you disrespect them since it also show how immature you are… Either you are a terrorist or bad looser from red shirts or green shirt brigade.
Siri gave the data to SL govt and govt is proud that some one in his calibre can take on paid terrorist apologists and local traitors who are hell bent on destroying the country. He is happy to give his services to the country free of charge with out any hand outs since he does not need it.
MOD report is from Siri and he challenged UN to to a rebuttal and UN guys never use NLE that Siri used. Do you know why ? Because non of them are experts in this field and did not even know NLE exist..
Case closed.
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LOL / January 12, 2012
a quick search in the UN reports shows that NLE is mentioned in Heynes report, so I think its wrong to say they experts don’t know what it is. NLE also seems to be a quite old thing, first being introduced in 1971, so that they are completely unaware seems rather unrealistic to think. I guess there are many versions etc etc, I think you should clarify which type of NLE you are talking about.
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wine fan / January 12, 2012
No mate, re. 1971 you are referring to LE and not NLE.. First proto type of NLE was released in 1992 and it took about 7 yrs to get it right with proper processing power and right software. NLE is fully digital.
Siri said first group of experts hired by UN did not know any thing in this area and used domestic computers and software but used non real time analysis which is not accepted in video Broadcast area.
Siri is on record re. why ch4 did not use AVID (NLE) which they have access to ?
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LOL / January 13, 2012
Nope, I’m not referring to LE, I’m referring to NLE, from wikipedia, “The first truly non-linear editor, the CMX 600, was introduced in 1971 by CMX Systems, a joint venture between CBS and Memorex.” Did they get the the year wrong ?
Another quick search show that Grant Fredricks listed AVID in the tools he used. “Tools Used: Avid Media Composer 5.03.”
I think you need to come to terms with the fact that the UN did a good job in their analysis. That Siri randomly throws around abbreviations of computer programs in inflammatory articles on Asiantribune and the MOD website will not alter that fact.
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wine fan / January 13, 2012
reply section is not working?
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wine fan / January 13, 2012
wiki and it says
“Non-linear editing is a video editing method which enables direct access to any video frame in a digital video clip, without needing to play or scrub/shuttle through adjacent footage to reach it, as was necessary with historical video tape linear editing systems.”
It says about truly nle as CMX but on analog domain and not in digital domain… Industry never use the term NLE for analog editors and only for digital systems since advent of hard disk.
So do you get it now.
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wine fan / January 13, 2012
Ch4 video is digital and based on H264 which came few yrs ago and in 1971 there were no LNE and only LE since it was editing Pal and NTSC which area analog video… So your ignorance is pretty obvious.
Siri mention that 2nd batch of UN guy used Avid after he criticise the first batch of not using the Avid. It shows how good or (bad) the UN guys are.. Since using Avid, Grant found out the discrepancies that Siri mention in his first report. QED.
I asked about what you said and Siri was having a laugh for few minutes.. He told me to educate you about your ignorance and also about wiki article since he thinks you are not mature to even read a wiki..
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LOL / January 16, 2012
I have never claimed to be an expert on this, far from it. That I’m not an expert only makes my argument stronger. With just reading a few wiki articles and searching the documents I manage to disprove your arguments. Imagine what an expert could do to your arguments!!!!
We dont know why the first set of experts did not use AVID, I still dont think its probable that they never heard of NLE or AVID. What we do know is that Fredricks did use AVID and he says that the video is not manipulated.
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wine fan / January 17, 2012
Try harder with your argument and read the whole Grant’s report… He said it is edited ( not acceptable in court of law) and use Optical zooms ( mobiles got this after sept 2009-expensive phones) and original date is June 2009 and that is after two months of the war conclusion.
Your immaturity or shall I say dishonesty is so obvious and trying to use selective parts will not help your case… Of course requesting asylum and running bogus discrimination is your guys trade mark so nothing surprise to us.
Good luck with ripping those who are supporting you and this is my last comments here.
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LOL / January 19, 2012
but please try to be honest here! Fredricks does NOT say its edited in a way that would not make it acceptable in court. To say that is a plain lie. He says that the different segments have been put together, but that NOTHING inside the segments, each up to a few minutes long, have been edited.
Yes, Fredrick writes in his report: “The zoom appears to be an optical zoom, since digital zoom artifacts are not
present.” and GoSL says that optical zoom is not a feature in the Nokia 6600 series. It should be noted that Fredricks writes that its “probably a Nokia 6600”. This is the only argument that so far has any resemblance to a valid argument. It will be interesting to see how this develops, this is how research works.
The issue with the date is acknowledged and openly discussed in all reports. Knowing how easy it is to change date and how often your phone force you to re-set the date etc this is in NO way at all conclusive evidence for the video being fake.
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