http://www.island.lk/index.php?page_cat=article-details&page=article-details&code_title=53320

Tamil Diaspora exploiting ICT advances - Sumanthiran

May 31, 2012, 10:32 pm


By Maheesha Mudugamuwa

The Tamil Diaspora, sympathetic to the LTTE, has begun to exploit the advances in Information and Communication Technology (ICT), Tamil National Alliance national list MP and Lawyer M. A. Sumanthiran said.


Addressing a panel discussion, at the Renuka Hotel yesterday (31), organized by the Women and Media Collective, he said that the Diaspora used ICT as a tool to destroy or manipulate information to suit their own purpose.


He said that almost every new technology developed had brought great benefits, attached with some risks. But, whatever the risks were, the progress just continued and new methods were found to tackle the risks.


He added that ICT had also greatly facilitated cultural invasions, resulting in real or imagined resentments and revulsions, which was one of the causes of international terrorism.


Women and Media Collective said that women’s engagement, with different forms of new media, in the Sri Lankan context, focused particularly on those women located on the margins of the political process, knowledge creation, access to ICT language and discourse, as well as mainstream development processes.


WMC also stressed that there was no significant increase in nominations from women candidates or in the number of women elected to local government.