‘We applaud the Sri Lankan Government’s devotion to human rights and their devotion to democratic pluralism,’ Abbott said flatly, after touching down in Sri Lanka. Just days before, the BBC had released the culmination of four years of research: an hour-long report on the human rights nightmare that was the final push of the Sri Lankan Civil War. As a result, even close allies felt compelled to condemn Sri Lanka’s human rights record. That is, except for us.

If you follow the A9 road long enough, you will end up in former Tamil Tiger territory. I say ‘former,’ because the Tamil Tigers were soundly defeated by the Sri Lankan military in 2009. As many know, the Tigers maintained a de facto state in the North with its own military, police force, political infrastructure and even postal service. The Tamil Tiger state, however, now lies in ruins.

Listening to 3RRR’s Aural text on Wednesday, I heard alicia sometimes mention the four-week residency opportunity in Sri Lanka that Writers Victoria is currently promoting. ‘Why not take a month off to write?’ is how it’s being sold. We hear a lot about Sri Lanka, the island slightly smaller in landmass than Tasmania that sits to the west of Malaysia, though mostly what we hear is that it’s a source of The Boats.

There is a problem of ethnic persecution in Sri Lanka. The civil war, which began in 1983, was forged by the persecution of Tamil communities, and when the civil war ended in 2010, it was terminated in violent acts that targeted the ethnic Tamil minority.