Mahinda Rajapaksa’s family members are following his example. The all powerful Defence Secretary visited Sudan recently and pledged military assistance to that country. This is a country whose president has been indicted by the International Criminal Court for crimes committed against his own people. We are reminded of the personal and cordial relations this regime had with Muamar Gaddafi the dictator of Libya and the military junta of Myanmar.

There is no deeper irony than the fact that with Gaddafi’s ouster and Myanmar’s slow but steady transition from military rule to democracy Sri Lanka’s Rajapaksa regime has distanced themselves from these countries. The writing, as they say, is on the wall.

Sri Lanka has a new foreign policy. It will seek out and befriend despots. It will learn lessons from these autocracies. Lessons in stifling dissent, cowing a citizenry and shattering democratic institutions. In these Rajapaksa “friendly” countries, wealth is accumulated among a small coterie of loyalists while a great majority of the people suffer in poverty, governing regimes rule without any regard for democracy or the rule of law. Dynastic succession is preferred over free elections. Mostly dynastic succession is the norm rather than free elections. Free societies and civil liberties are denigrated as ideals and norms propagated by the neo-imperialist ‘West’. Is it surprising that it is in such countries that the Rajapaksa ruling family is finding new friends?

Having officially invited High Commissioner Pillay to Sri Lanka, not once but several times in the past few years, the Rajapaksa Administration has sought to vilify and embarrass her on the one hand and portray her to be a pro-LTTE invader into Sri Lanka’s domestic affairs on the other. Extremist allies of this regime have not balked at marking out Ms. Pillay’s ethnic credentials and using dangerous racial undertones that have become so common in post-war Sri Lanka to disqualify her from studying the injustices against the Tamil people of Sri Lanka on account of her being a Tamil by ethnicity. Apart from the pettiness and rank racism in these much publicised comments by Government coalition partners, it is clear that the ruling regime does not even possess a smidgen of the hospitality Sri Lankans are world famous for, that would call upon it to refrain from insulting a visiting international diplomat, much respected rights activist and former judge of the International Criminal Court while she is on Lankan soil. And despite all of the eyewash the Government is engaged in attempting to showcase progress in terms of investigating alleged human rights abuses during the war and implementing the recommendations of the LLRC, it is clear that the Rajapaksas are a long way away from changing their spots. On the eve of Ms Pillay’s visit, the home of a senior Journalists Mandana Abeywickrema was attacked and robbed by a group of men who claimed they were on a contract. What the police have tried to portray as a common robbery, media activists view as a more sinister move to dissuade Abeywickrema’s media activism and silence her expression. Two days before Ms. Pillay’s visit, a hitherto unknown authority blocked the independent website Colombo Telegraph, making it inaccessible to most Sri Lankans across virtually every network. The Colombo Telegraph blockade cannot be passed off as an attempt to censor scurrilous reporting on the web, simply because it is a well respected, widely read, ethical publication, that provides space for eclectic viewpoints. The Colombo Telegraph engages in truly investigative journalism and in depth reportage of issues that are often overlooked in the mainstream media and honours the right of reply and other principles of ethical reporting. For its commitment to the process of truthful journalism, Colombo Telegraph has won the distinction of becoming the only Sri Lankan website on the Guardian Select list of ethical, independent websites handpicked by the Guardian UK editorial board. That the Rajapaksa brethren have chosen to censor such a publication in Sri Lanka, days before the visit of the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights and three months before the Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting, speaks volumes about its true contempt for the international community and the ideals of democracy.