It has been learnt that President Mahinda Rajapaksa has signed papers for the release of jailed former Army Commander Sarath Fonseka.
The papers are expected to be sent to the Ministry of Justice on Monday.

If I name him my three children could lose their father - Arun Thambimuttu

Political activist from Batticaloa, Arun Thambimuttu has been threatened, abused and called as a ‘traitor’ by pro-LTTE lobbyists in the UK after he spoke at the Frontline Club debate on Sri Lanka last week.

While BBC Hardtalk host Stephen Sackur chaired the debate, journalist, filmmaker and director of both Sri Lanka’s Killing Fields and Sri Lanka’s Killing Fields: War Crimes Unpunished, Callum Macrae, spokesperson for Tamils Aginst Genocide (TAG), Jan Jananayagam, Amnesty International’s Sri Lanka researcher, Yolanda Foster and adviser to the President on Reconciliation Professor, Rajiv Wijesinha MP were amongst the speakers.

Reacting to Global Tamil Forum (GTF) and Transnational Government of Tamil Eelam (TGTE) combining forces against the GoSL, Sri Lanka’s war time External Affairs Minister, Rohitha Bogollagama emphasized that none of those shedding crocodile tears for Tamil civilians caught in the cross-fire dared to pressure the LTTE over despicable use of human shields on the Vanni East front.

Those involved in the GTF, TGTE et al remained silent as long as they felt the LTTE could halt the multi-pronged army advance and launch a counter-offensive of its own, Bogollagama told The Sunday Island in a brief interview yesterday.

Can happen later this week according to rumours

There was intense speculation yesterday that General Sarath Fonseka, the former Army Commander now serving a term of imprisonment, may be released in the next few days but there was no official confirmation that this would in fact be so.

"There had been indications that Fonseka whose bail application to the Supreme Court will be taken up later this month may be released as early as this week," one well informed source said.

However, observers and analysts said that such speculation had previously occurred several times in recent months – during the November anniversary of the President’s election, January 1, the Sinhala and Hindu New Year period and Wesak.

Fonseka is currently under treatment at the Nawaloka Hospital for a lung condition having won a court order that this facility should be made available to him.

In terms of his sentence, his term of imprisonment runs till July 2013.