President Mahinda Rajapaska has pardoned a journalist sentenced to 20 years in prison after being convicted of supporting terrorism. Tyssainayagam, then editor of North-Eastern Monthly magazine, was first arrested in March 2008. He was accused of conspiring to cause ethnic violence through his articles. The Tamil journalist, who wrote about the effects of the separatist conflict on the ethnic Tamil minority, was convicted in August 2009. The government’s pardon announcement was timed to coincide with World Press Freedom Day on 3 May.