logo
episode-header-image
Dec 2019
28m 16s

Sri Lanka: The New Climate of Fear

Bbc Radio 4
About this episode

There’s a new climate of fear in Sri Lanka. This time it’s the Muslim community who are fearful of the future. The Easter bomb attacks in Sri Lanka - targeting churches and international hotels - horrified the island. It’s suffered civil war - between the majority Sinhalese and the minority Tamils - but never known jihadi violence. But the attacks also intensified a creeping campaign by the Sinhala Buddhist majority against the Muslim community - with Muslims murdered, their businesses burned or boycotted. Jill McGivering investigates the growing climate of fear now driving many Muslims to emigrate and casting a shadow over those left behind. Caroline Finnigan producing.

Up next
Sep 29
Nepal: In the shadow of a glacier
As Nepal deals with the aftermath of devastating floods, there have been renewed warnings about the impact of climate change on the Himalayas. As temperatures have risen, glaciers across the region have shrunk and the landscape has become more unstable. Antonia Bolingbroke-Kent r ... Show More
28m 50s
Sep 22
Has Poland fallen out of love with Ukraine?
Why has anti-Ukrainian feeling been growing in Poland? In 2022, when President Putin launched the full-scale invasion of Ukraine, Poland opened its doors and the Poles their hearts to Ukrainian refugees. Millions of Ukrainians passed through Poland, getting all kinds of help from ... Show More
32m 19s
Sep 15
Turkey on Trial: Can Courts Control a Nation?
Political analysts and human rights organisations say Turkey's courts are increasingly being used to silence political dissent and to shape a more socially conservative society. The most prominent defendant is Ekrem İmamoğlu, the mayor of Istanbul, and the opposition figure opini ... Show More
29m 55s
Recommended Episodes
Apr 2019
Worrying new threat: tragedy in Sri Lanka
After co-ordinated bomb attacks that killed hundreds, Sri Lanka is reeling. But if the government was so consumed by internal struggles as to miss warnings, how can it respond to the devastation? We take a look at global efforts to contain corruption, drawing lessons from Brazil’ ... Show More
22m 35s
Apr 2019
Understanding the Sri Lankan attacks
Ever since Sri Lanka was hit by eight coordinated bomb blasts, there have been questions about who could be behind an act of terrorism that targeted churches and hotels and left more than 320 people dead. And while a local group was initially blamed, ISIS is now claiming responsi ... Show More
20m 56s
May 2019
Sri Lanka
In light of the Easter Sunday attacks on Churches and hotels in Sri Lanka, Ernie Rea explores the religious landscape of Sri Lanka with Jonathan Spencer, Regius Professor of South Asian Language, Culture and Society at the University of Edinburgh; Dr Farah Mihlar, Lecturer in Con ... Show More
27m 41s
Apr 2019
The Terrorist Attacks in Sri Lanka
<p>A series of highly coordinated bombings in Sri Lanka has left more than 350 people dead. How did a small, obscure and underfinanced local group carry out one of the deadliest terrorist attacks since 9/11? Guest: Jeffrey Gettleman, the South Asia bureau chief for The New York T ... Show More
19m 50s
Jul 2024
Neena Mahadev, "Karma and Grace: Religious Difference in Millennial Sri Lanka" (Columbia UP, 2023)
Around the turn of the millennium, Pentecostal churches began to pepper majority-Buddhist Sri Lanka, setting off a sense of alarm among Buddhists who saw Christianity as a neocolonial threat to the nation. Rumors of foul play in the death of a Buddhist monk, as well as allegation ... Show More
1h 24m