43rd Anniversary Of the Black July 1983 Anti-Tamil Pogrom — One Of the Defining Acts Of Genocide Committed by the Sri Lankan State Against the Tamil People
NCCT sends an urgent call to Canada and the international community on this day
Today, July 23, 2026, marks the 43rd anniversary of the Black July 1983 Anti-Tamil Pogrom, one of the defining acts of genocide committed by the Sri Lankan state against the Tamil people in the island of Sri Lanka.
On this solemn occasion, Tamil people in Canada, in Tamil Eelam — the historical, traditional, and ancestral homeland of the Eelam Tamil people in the island of Sri Lanka and across the global Tamil diaspora, together with allies and supporters, unite to honour and remember the Tamil people who lost their lives during the Black July 1983 Anti-Tamil pogrom. We also honour the incredible strength and enduring resilience of the Tamil people — a resilience that will never be extinguished — while standing in unwavering solidarity with the victims, survivors, and their descendants.
On July 23, 1983, 43 years ago, the Sri Lankan state orchestrated a brutal and deliberate campaign Of coordinated Anti-Tamil pogroms against the Tamil people. These genocidal pogroms were carried out by state-sponsored Sinhala mobs, Sinhala parliamentarians, and Sri Lankan security forces. As a result, an estimated 200,000 Tamil people were displaced and rendered refugees, around 3,000 innocent Tamil people were killed, approximately 500 Tamil women were subjected to sexual violence, and nearly 8,000 Tamil homes and 5,000 Tamil-owned businesses were destroyed.
43 years later, none of the perpetrators responsible for the Black July 1983 Anti-Tamil pogrom have been held accountable.
July 2026 also marks 28 years since the Chemmani Mass Grave — another defining act of genocide committed by the Sri Lankan state against the Tamil people. This site first came to international attention in July 1998, when a Sri Lankan soldier testified before the High Court that hundreds of forcibly disappeared Tamil people had been detained, killed, and secretly buried at the site by Sri Lankan security forces.
The Chemmani Mass Grave is the largest mass grave uncovered anywhere on the island of Sri Lanka. It is one of numerous mass grave sites discovered across the Tamil homeland, including the Mannar Sathosa Mass Grave, where excavations in 2018 uncovered 346 human skeletons, including the remains of 29 children.
The continuing discoveries at the Chemmani Mass Grave have drawn growing international attention. It has been more than one year since United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights Volker Türk visited the site on June 25, 2025. More recently, on July 22, 2026, a high-level European Union delegation led by European Union Ambassador to Sri Lanka Carmen Moreno, together with the Ambassadors Of Italy, Germany, France, and the Netherlands, visited the Chemmani Mass Grave.
However, these visits have yet to result in concrete international measures to advance the full truth, international accountability, or meaningful remedial justice for the Tamil people.
As the court-supervised excavation continues, additional human skeletal remains of Tamil infants, children, and adults, together with personal belongings, continue to be recovered. Among the artifacts recovered are a baby's milk bottle, a child's squeaky toy, toddlers' dresses, a doll, children's socks and footwear, tiny bead bangles, a baby powder tray, and a blue school bag found beside the remains of a Tamil girl estimated to have been between four and six years old.
These personal belongings bear silent witness to the lives stolen from Tamil children whose remains continue to be uncovered at the Chemmani Mass Grave.
As of today, more than 471 sets of human skeletal remains have been identified, of which more than 455 sets have been fully exhumed.
Yet, despite these continuing discoveries and growing international attention, while the truth continues to emerge, 28 years later justice continues to be denied.
Furthermore, the continuing actions of the Sri Lankan state and its institutions demonstrate that, even under the current government, it continues to criminalize, repress, and systematically target the Tamil people's identity; their right to cultural, literary, artistic, and political expression; Tamil advocacy; the work Of Tamil activists, artists, and writers; the Tamil people's right to remember and honour their loved ones; and their pursuit of truth, accountability, justice, self-determination, and the realization of their collective rights through the continued use of the Prevention of Terrorism Act (PTA) and other repressive laws.
These continuing actions are further evidence that the Sri Lankan state's continued criminalization of the Tamil people constitutes one of the means through which it continues to carry out the ongoing genocide against the Tamil people. The
Black July 1983 Anti-Tamil Pogrom, the Chemmani Mass Grave, and the continuing criminalization, repression, and systematic targeting of the Tamil people did not occur in isolation. Rather, they form part of a broader pattern of deliberate and systematic ongoing acts through which the Sri Lankan state continues to carry out the ongoing genocide against the Tamil people.
Today, the ongoing genocide against the Tamil people continues to be carried out through numerous genocidal acts, including Sri Lankan state-sponsored surveillance, intimidation, harassment, arbitrary arrests, violence, torture, enforced disappearances, militarization, Sinhalisation, Buddhisization, state-sponsored colonization, systematic land grabs, and other measures intended to systematically subjugate the Tamil people on the island of Sri Lanka and threaten their identity, safety, security, political aspirations, and continued existence as a nation in their homeland.
For more than seven and a half decades, including 43 years since the Black July 1983 Anti- Tamil Pogrom and 28 years since the Chemmani Mass Grave first came to international attention, the Tamil Genocide has persisted without accountability. None of the perpetrators have been brought to justice, and Sri Lanka's state-owned domestic mechanisms have consistently failed to deliver any meaningful remedial justice for Tamil Genocide.
The continued absence of accountability and meaningful remedial justice for Tamil Genocide reflects Sri Lanka's deeply entrenched culture of impunity and leaves no credible prospect of accountability or meaningful remedial justice through Sri Lanka's state-owned domestic mechanisms.
Therefore, it is unmistakably clear that only a fully internationally-owned credible, international, independent, investigative and prosecutorial mechanism — one that has the trust and confidence of victims, survivors, and their descendants of the Tamil Genocide — can uncover the truth, hold perpetrators accountable, and deliver meaningful remedial justice.
Therefore, on this solemn day, the National Council of Canadian Tamils (NCCT) urgently calls upon Canada and the international community to take the following actions — both unilaterally and multilaterally:
Ensure that the Chemmani Mass Grave and all suspected mass grave sites across the Tamil homeland are investigated under independent international oversight and the direction of independent international forensic experts, in accordance with international law and internationally accepted forensic standards with independent international investigators and observers participating throughout the process; that victims are identified; and that all evidence recovered is preserved under independent international custody for future international criminal investigations, prosecutions, and accountability.
Take concrete steps to secure the immediate and unconditional release of all Tamil political prisoners and detainees held under the prevention of Terrorism Act (PTA), and to ensure the immediate repeal of Sri Lanka's draconian prevention of Terrorism Act (PTA).
Take urgent, strengthened, and coordinated action to establish a fully internationally- owned, credible, International, independent, investigative and prosecutorial mechanism that has the trust and confidence of the victims, survivors, and their descendants of the Tamil Genocide, to investigate the genocide committed against the Tamil people, identify and prosecute those responsible, and deliver meaningful international accountability and remedial justice for Tamil Genocide.
As we commemorate and memorialize the 43rd anniversary of Black July 1983 Anti-Tamil pogrom, let us reaffirm our commitment to advocating to achieve international recognition of Tamil Genocide, international accountability, and meaningful remedial justice for Tamil Genocide.
Let us also recommit ourselves to advocating for a permanent political solution grounded in the Tamil people's inalienable right to self-determination that delivers a just and lasting resolution, meaningfully addresses the legitimate political aspirations of the Tamil people in their historical, traditional, and ancestral homeland, and contributes to lasting peace and stability in the Indo-pacific region.