Paramilitary group unleashes violence in Batticaloa, Ampaa'rai against TNA

[TamilNet, Friday, 31 August 2012, 22:43 GMT]
Paramilitary operatives of Pillaiyaan group, contesting the forthcoming election to the Eastern Provincial Council on the ticket of Colombo's ruling United Peoples Freedom Alliance (UPFA) have been attacking the candidates and supporters of the Tamil National Alliance. The poll to elect 35 councilors to the EPC is to take place on September 8.
Full story >>

Basil Rajapaksa dispatches 1000-member squad to Trincomalee to ensure UPFA polling in PC elections

[TamilNet, Friday, 31 August 2012, 21:37 GMT]
More than one thousand persons have arrived in Trincomalee district under the instruction of SL presidential sibling and Economic Development Minister Basil Rajapaksa to manipulate the polling in the forthcoming provincial elections in the East in favour of the ruling United Peoples Freedom Alliance (UPFA), informed sources in Trincomalee told TamilNet Friday.
Full story >>

Colombo expands diplomatic missions in India

[TamilNet, Friday, 31 August 2012, 20:14 GMT]
The cabinet of Rajapaksa regime has taken decisions to open a new Consulate General Office in Kolkata, appoint Honorary Consuls in Hyderabad, Lucknow and Thiruvanandapuram, and to expand the existing missions in New Delhi, Chennai and Mumbai. The new mission in Kolkata will have consular jurisdiction over West Bengal, Orissa, Jharkhand and the 7 Northeast states. While the High Commission in New Delhi and the Consulate General office in Mumbai will get additional staff to deal with economic and commercial matters, the Deputy High Commission in Chennai will be posted with two additional Tamil-speaking officers, the PTI said Friday.
Full story >>

Worsening SL economy drives Sinhalese, Muslims to take boats to Australia

[TamilNet, Thursday, 30 August 2012, 20:24 GMT]
While Tamil families, especially the former members of the LTTE, subjected to harassments and genocidal sexual abuse by the occupying SL military choose to flee the island seeking security in Australia with their families on board the fishing vessels, Muslims from Katpiddi and Sinhalese from Negombo have also chosen to flee the island in recent days due to worsening economic conditions in the island, news sources in Jaffna told TamilNet Thursday. The SL Navy found Muslims from Katpiddi of the North Western Province among the 61 persons who were arrested in the seas off Chu'ndikku'lam in Vadamaraadchi East, Jaffna, in the early hours of Wednesday. In the meantime, media sources in Colombo said that four Sinhala SL Navy personnel were among those who had sought asylum in Australia in recent days.
Full story >>

Double standard in clearing UXOs endangers resettlement in Mullaiththeevu

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 29 August 2012, 23:03 GMT]
Leftover unexploded cluster munitions keep exploding every day in the suburbs of PTK, where the resettling people have embarked upon the dangerous exercise of clearing their lands. In a propaganda drive to close down the Menik Farm camp in Cheddiku'lam, Vavuniyaa, Sri Lanka military operated de-mining officers have given green signal for resettlement in selected suburbs of Puthukkudiyiruppu (PTK) of Mullaiththeevu district, while the lands appropriated by the occupying SL military for militarization and Sinhalicisation in the same area have been carefully de-mined with external aid. At least four cases of big explosions have been reported in Vanni and Jaffna this week with two people seriously injured.
Full story >>

Second annual Ki'liththaddu tournament attracts hundreds in Canada

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 29 August 2012, 06:10 GMT]
Tamil youth teams from across Canada assembled in Toronto on Sunday to play in the second annual Ki'liththaddu tournament organized by TYO-Canada. Over 20 teams competed for a chance to win the Tamil Eelam Heritage Trophy. Originating from the agricultural roots of Eezham Tamils, the game has gained popularity and was organized to promote and preserve Eezham Tamil identity, tournament organizers said. Community organizers concluded the event highlighting the importance of upholding Eezham Tamil identity and national symbols in resisting the genocidal scheme against Eezham Tamils.
Full story >>

New Delhi’s insistence on training Sri Lanka military highly deplorable: CPI

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 28 August 2012, 14:31 GMT]
The National Secretary of the Communist Party of India, Mr. D. Raja on Monday condemned Indian Minister of State for Defence, Mr MM Pallam Raju’s insistence on training Sri Lanka’s military in India as “highly deplorable.” The junior minister for defence, responding to Tamil Nadu Chief Minister’s opposition to the training, had said that India would continue to train Sri Lankan defence personnel at its establishments. "The statement is highly deplorable and this position has to be reviewed. The Chief Minister of the state [Tamil Nadu] has raised the issue, but the Government continues with the training in the name of bilateral ties," the CPI Secretary was cited by Outlook India.
Full story >>

Genocidal Sri Lanka ‘examines’ Tamil students on ‘terrorism’

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 28 August 2012, 11:13 GMT]
A question paper set for High School students of Jaffna by Sri Lanka’s education department not only intimidates Tamil and Muslim children to denounce their conscience, but also sends a warning to the free peoples all over the world on the dangers of allowing decadent establishments to set international paradigms that engineer against humanity’s freedom of independent thought. A ‘multiple choice’ question, found in the GCE Advanced Level (Grade 13) preparatory examination paper set by the field unit of Sri Lanka’s Jaffna education department in March 2012 goes as follows: Who among the following is inappropriate to the word terrorism: 1. Bin Laden, 2. Pirapaharan, 3. Saddam Hussein, 4. Colonel Gaddafi, 5. Mao Zedong
Full story >>

Another brutal attack sends Tamil political prisoner to coma

[TamilNet, Monday, 27 August 2012, 06:51 GMT]
Following the attack on the Eezham Tamil prisoners in Vauniyaa resulting in the death of two and injury of many, details of the case of a new attack in the Galle prison last week, leaving a prisoner in coma status and others suspectedly injured, have started trickling out now. The Tamil prisoner in coma is identified as 34-year-old Sundaram Satheeskumar, father of a 10-year-old child. The victim was arrested at his residence in Kodikaamam in 2008 by the occupying SL military, handed over to the SL police and was kept in the New Magazine prison in Colombo without any charges filed against him. Last week, on 21 August, he was transferred to the Galle prison.
Full story >>

New Delhi plays mischief with Tamil Nadu: Jayalalithaa

[TamilNet, Saturday, 25 August 2012, 22:34 GMT]
In a strongly worded letter to Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, Chief Minister of Tamil Nadu State J. Jayalalithaa on Saturday sought the Indian PM to give instructions to the Indian Ministry of Defence to immediately halt the training being given to the Sri Lankan defence personnel at the Defence Services Staff College, Wellington, and arrange to send them back to Sri Lanka immediately. “It is very clear that this fact of ongoing training since May, 2012, has been mischievously concealed from my Government, showing scant regard for the views of my Government as well as for the sentiments of the people of Tamil Nadu,” Ms. Jayalalithaa has written to the Indian PM.
Full story >>

Resettlement showcase brings in further miseries to uprooted Tamils

[TamilNet, Friday, 24 August 2012, 20:29 GMT]
250 families recently brought to Chivanakar village in Puthukkudiyiruppu (PTK) division of Mullaiththeevu district complain that they have been let down by the SL authorities that rush to vacate the Menik Farm in Cheddiku'lam, Vavuniyaa. Promising the uprooted proper resettlement to the uprooted Tamils in their own village, 141 families were brought from Menik Farm to Chivanakar. Another 101 families who were residing with their kith and kin elsewhere also joined them when their village was announced opened for resettlement. Now, these families are struggling in their own village without any shelter and have sought refuge under the trees. There are no basic facilities. Most of these families, who are below the poverty line, demand at least temporary huts and basic facilities before the rainy season begins in a few weeks from now.
Full story >>

US Court of Appeals to hear Rajapakse war-crimes case

[TamilNet, Friday, 24 August 2012, 03:59 GMT]
United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit issued the briefing schedule Monday for the appeal against the dismissal of the war-crimes case against Sri Lanka's President Mahinda Rajapakse. The appeal was filed by three Tamil plaintiffs/ appellants against Rajapakse for complicity in extrajudicial killings of plaintiffs relatives in violation of the Torture Victims Protection Act (TVPA). The case, first filed at the lower court, was dismissed in February 2012 by Judge Kotelly after the U.S. State Department intervened to assert that, as a sitting head of state, Rajapakse was immune from litigation.
Full story >>

UN exposes use of cluster munitions in Vanni War

[TamilNet, Thursday, 23 August 2012, 23:51 GMT]
The United Nations Mine Action Team, which coordinates the UN agencies engaged in humanitarian de-mining throughout the world, has documented the use of cluster munitions in the Vanni war, informed sources in Mullaiththeevu told TamilNet.
Full story >>

Building defying SL governor inauguration receives crude oil attack in Jaffna

[TamilNet, Thursday, 23 August 2012, 01:27 GMT]
The colonial military administration of Colombo on Wednesday allegedly deployed its ‘white van squad’ to pour crude oil on the new building of Valikaamam South (Chunnaakam) civic body before it was scheduled to be declared opened by the Tamil National Alliance (TNA). The colonial military governor of North, Maj Gen (retd.) G.A. Chanadrasiri has been demanding that it should be he who should decide on the inauguration of the building. However, the building was declared opened as scheduled by T. Prakash, the head of the civic body of Valikaamam South. The grassroots politician of the TNA also declared that the office would start to function from Thursday in the new premises.
Full story >>

Sri Lanka Human Rights Commission distorts figures of missing persons

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 22 August 2012, 22:48 GMT]
The ‘Sri Lanka Human Rights Commission’, run by the Sri Lankan State in Colombo, has begun to conceal and twist the figures of complaints registered by its regional offices in the North and East. While announcing that a ‘high level’ delegation from Colombo is scheduled to visit Jaffna in the coming days to ‘investigate’ the registered complaints of missing persons since the year 2006, Mr. S. Kanagaraj, an official at the Jaffna office told media Wednesday that only 472 people were reported missing after the year 2006. However, informed human rights activists in Jaffna said that the office had registered 1,500 to 2,000 cases since 2006. There were at least 599 cases registered by the office in the year 2006 alone, they further said.
Full story >>

SL Navy steps up attacks on Tamil Nadu fishermen

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 21 August 2012, 23:45 GMT]
A Tamil Nadu fisherman was seriously injured after he was beaten up by the Sri Lanka Navy that had surrounded three boats near Kachchatheevu and took 16 fishermen to Neduntheevu on Monday. All the fishermen had been assaulted by the SL Navy and released on Tuesday. In the meantime, at another attack by the SL Navy on 6 fishermen from Ma'ndapam, one sustained head injuries, Press Trust of India reported on Tuesday.
Full story >>

SL military blocks resettlement in suburb of PTK

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 21 August 2012, 22:16 GMT]
Landmine clearing unit of the occupying Sri Lankan military has instructed forty Tamil families who resettled recently at 9th ward of Mallikaith-theevu village in Puthukkudiyiruppu (PTK) division in Mullaiththeevu district, to vacate from their lands after the SL authorities had allowed the families to resettle earlier this month. The families were among 96 families that were hurriedly brought down to Mullaiththeevu from Menik Farm camp in Cheddi-ku'lam in Vavuniyaa, promising resettlement in Mallikaith-theevu, Puthukkudiyiruppu West and Puthukkudiyiruppu East. On the one hand Colombo is rushing to showcase that it is closing down the Menik Farm camp. But, on the other hand the occupying military of Colombo is blocking resettlement in the land of Vanni genocide. The SL military still considers the area as its High Security Zone (HSZ), relocated civilians said.
Full story >>

Land appropriation by Colombo in Trincomalee district goes unabated

[TamilNet, Monday, 20 August 2012, 04:34 GMT]
In the latest land appropriation of the Colombo government to change the demography of the Trincomalee district, 94 Tamil families are forced to lose their properties that are located 9 km off north from Trincomalee city at Iluppaik-ku'lam GS division. The affected families have made representations to the Divisional Secretary who promised that the matter would be brought up to the notice of the SL Government Agent (SLGA) who is a Sinhalese. The SLGA is a retired Major General who is behind the planned appropriation of lands of Tamils in the district to settle down Sinhalese from the South.
Full story >>

Vanni ‘development’ meeting held without elected representatives

[TamilNet, Saturday, 18 August 2012, 19:26 GMT]
Vanni district Tamil National Alliance (TNA) parliamentarians were not invited for the Vanni District Development Committee which was chaired by Sri Lankan President Mahinda Rajapaksa and held on Friday at Vavuniyaa District Secretariat.
Full story >>

People affected by mini-cyclone in Batticaloa seek humanitarian assistance

[TamilNet, Saturday, 18 August 2012, 17:57 GMT]
War-displaced and ‘resettled’ people of three villages in Poaratheevup-pattu division of Batticaloa district complain that they have not received proper assistance after they were struck by a mini-cyclone four days ago on 14 August. 73 houses were affected. Of these 21 houses were fully destroyed. Totally 256 people belonging to 73 families have been affected, according to Mr. Vilvaratnam, the divisional secretary of Poaratheevup-pattu.
Full story >>

SL military grabs disabled people's land in Ki'linochchi

[TamilNet, Saturday, 18 August 2012, 17:29 GMT]
The occupying Sri Lanka Army (SLA) in Ki'linochchi district has instructed the Sri Lankan Government Agent (SLGA) of the district to permanently hand over 6 acres of lands already encroached by the 65-2 division of the SLA at Aanaivizhunthaan-ku'lam GS area of Karaichchi division. The land, which is owned by a rehabilitation organisation for disabled persons, is located 10 km southwest of Ki'linochchi town.
Full story >>

Tamil trader narrowly escapes murder in Vanni

[TamilNet, Friday, 17 August 2012, 23:16 GMT]
A 44-year-old Tamil trader narrowly escaped from a killer squad that came in motorbikes and fired at him after calling him to come out of his residence at Tha'n'neer-oottu in Mu'l'liyava'lai Thursday around 9:30 p.m. The attackers escaped through the military checkposts manned by the occupying Sri Lanka Army soldiers as the people from the area gathered at the site after hearing the shouting of the victim.
Full story >>

Colombo's immigration arrests 53 Tamil Nadu Tamils in Jaffna

[TamilNet, Thursday, 16 August 2012, 23:54 GMT]
Sri Lankan police in SL military occupied Jaffna on Wednesday and Thursday arrested 53 Indian citizens, most of them Tamils from Tamil Nadu, for overstay in the peninsula without informing the Indian mission in Jaffna while hundreds of Chinese workers, including sex workers, are allowed to stay in the island with no regards to visa regulations. The occupying colonial State, which functions as an agent state for the International Community of Establishments (ICE) including the establishment of New Delhi, has become increasingly paranoid about the grassroots business links and people to people interactions between the South Indians and the Eezham Tamils, informed sources close to SL Police in Jaffna told TamilNet.
Full story >>

Internecine clashes erupt in East between Muslim parties of UPFA alliance

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 15 August 2012, 20:38 GMT]
Supporters of Muslim constituent parties in the ruling United Peoples Freedom Alliance (UPFA) government of Mahinda Rajapakse clashed in East over election dispute on Monday evening. Hundreds of supporters of SLMC attacked the election office of the former Provincial Minister who is also contesting the EPC election on the UPFA ticket Mr. M.S.Uthumalebbe and set fire to his office. Two vehicles stationed at the site were also set on fire. Thereafter Akkaraipaththu Police with the Sri Lanka Army arrived at the scene and opened tear gas on the unruly crowd to bring the situation under control.
Full story >>

Buddhist monk forcibly removes Pi'l'laiyaar statue from Saiva temple in Ampaa'rai

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 14 August 2012, 22:55 GMT]
A gang led by a Buddhist monk, on 06 August forcibly removed the eight decade old statue of the main deity (Pi'l'laiyaar) from Sri Chiththi-vinaayakar Koayil, which is located at Paanama junction along Kalmunai-Paanama coastal road in the Ampaa'rai district. More than two hundred Saiva families in the area use to visit the temple to perform their rituals and to attend pooja. Two months ago, a Pi'l'laiyaar statue from a Saiva temple in Polonnaruwa district was forcibly removed from the ‘Moolasthanam’. Likewise, another Pi'l'laiyaar statue from a Vinaayakar temple located in the border village Punaanai in Batticaloa district along Colombo-Batticaloa highway was also forcibly taken over by a Buddhist monk.
Full story >>

Uprooted Tamils in Ampaa'rai question SL Minister's statement on resettlement

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 14 August 2012, 20:27 GMT]
Tamil people have been systematically evicted from forty villages in fifteen different DS divisions in Ampaa'rai district, Tamil civil officials in the district say. Since 13 April 1967 to date, at least 3,500 Tamil families have been uprooted from these villages. Recently, Rauf Hakim, the leader of the Sri Lanka Muslim Congress (SLMC) who holds the portfolio of Minister of Justice in Mahinda Rajapakse regime has told a foreign envoy in Colombo that steps would be taken to return the lands and properties lost by people in the past decades. Tamil civil officials questioned whether the Tamil people who were systematically uprooted from their traditional villages could get their lands appropriated by Sinhalese and Muslims during the conflict.
Full story >>

HSBC apologises for Lion flag display, hunger striker welcomes community action in UK

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 14 August 2012, 10:02 GMT]
Eezham Tamil activist Sivanthan who waged a hunger strike in London for 22 days during the Olympics, has welcomed the action by the local Tamil community of New Malden, Surrey, after reading the news report, which appeared in the local news paper Your Local Guardian on Sunday with the title “New Malden bank sorry for displaying ‘genocide’ flag.” The Bank had removed the offending flag on 03 August, a few hours after the local community reacted against the display and the wider attention it acquired through a headline story. After removing the Sri Lankan flag, the HSBC branch had also extended apologies to the members of the community. In the meantime, the recovering hunger striker has appealed the London based Tamil electronic media to refrain from running commercials displaying ‘Sri Lanka’ flag and businesses to stop using the same.
Full story >>

Youth Activist Sivanthan concludes 22 day hunger strike

[TamilNet, Monday, 13 August 2012, 07:27 GMT]
Gobi Sivanthan, UK based Eezham Tamil youth activist, concluded his 22 day hunger strike coinciding with the final day of the London 2012 Olympics, on Sunday. Eezham Tamils from across the UK gathered at the spot where Sivanthan was fasting at Stratford, to convey solidarity with his protest as he broke his fast at 4 PM. Sivanthan had undertaken the hunger strike with five demands, including calling for an immediate halt to the “ongoing genocidal land grabs”. After the end of the fast, Tamils took a procession to Aspen way, along the route of the closing ceremony of the Olympics, and staged a three hour demonstration calling for a free Tamil Eelam and an end to the genocide of the Eezham Tamils.
Full story >>

Tamils should protest against UN, demand referendum: May 17 Movement

[TamilNet, Sunday, 12 August 2012, 04:07 GMT]
Criticizing the UN for collaborating with vested interests of world powers in denying a just political solution for the Eezham Tamils, Thirumurugan Gandhi from the May 17th Movement said that Tamils should direct their protests against the UN asking for an internationally monitored referendum to resolve the national question of the genocide affected Eezham Tamils at a demonstration held at Valluvar Kottam, Chennai on Saturday. Speaking to TamilNet, Mr. Gandhi said “The single point common demand of Tamils world over should be to demand for a referendum for Tamil Eelam,” adding that talks about rehabilitation and ‘step by step approach’ without addressing the fundamental demand for political freedom was useless, only giving legitimacy to genocidal Sri Lanka.
Full story >>

Women’s conference in Tamil Nadu terms oppression of Eezham Tamils as genocide

[TamilNet, Saturday, 11 August 2012, 06:49 GMT]
Asserting that “Systematic sexual violence against Tamil women by the Sri Lankan military forces, police, paramilitaries during the war on the Tamil people constitute an act of genocide” and that “The question of systematic oppression of Tamil women is directly connected to the national question of the Tamils in the North-East of the island of Sri Lanka”, the 19th conference of the National Federation of Indian Women (NFIW) held at Chennai on Thursday passed resolutions calling for an independent international investigation into the war crimes of the Sri Lankan state and a just political solution for the Eezham Tamils through a referendum. The conference, presided over by Magsaysay award winner, NFIW president and prominent civil rights activist Aruna Roy, further urged India and the IC to take measures to end militarization and colonization of the Tamil homeland.
Full story >>

Eezham Tamil politicians not issued with Indian visa until Thursday

[TamilNet, Friday, 10 August 2012, 04:38 GMT]
Just one working day left for the commencement of the TESO conference convened by the DMK chief Mr. M. Karunanidhi in Tamil Nadu, the Eezham Tamil political leaders of the TNA and TNPF were yet to be given with visa by the Indian High Commission in Colombo, news sources in the island said. Mr. Sampanthan and Mr. Maavai Senadhiraja told news sources that the DMK chief had personally talked to them over the phone in extending invitation and they had agreed to go. However, sources close to them said that besides not getting the visa, the TNA leaders are heavily pressurized to stay away. TNPF leaders said that they would go if the visa is issued. Mr. Mano Ganeshan cancelled the visit after not getting the visa. Dr. Vikramabahu Karunaratne’s visa was rejected, but he was later told to resubmit the passport. Visa is yet to be decided for him.
Full story >>

Mentally ill Tamil to spend life in Australian detention, says ABC

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 08 August 2012, 10:47 GMT]
A Tamil man, whose name is being withheld, currently under detention in Christmas island, has been deemed to be a security risk by the Australian Security Intelligence Organization (ASIO) and his refugee status is in limbo, reports ABC in its The World Today program. The man was arrested by the Sri Lankan Army (SLA) in about 2004 and was tortured for a considerable length of time during which the man received brain injury, according to psychiatrist, Neil Philips. While there is a pending challenge to ASIO's assessment in the Australian Courts, ABC says, in the current circumstances where Australians are sensitive of the flood of refugees arriving in Australia, the man will likely spend his life in detention.
Full story >>

Mysterious killings target SLA-collaborators from Vanni

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 08 August 2012, 10:04 GMT]
Three men from Vanni, who were allegedly collaborating with the occupying Sri Lankan military in harassing Tamil women for sexual exploitation by the Sinhala soldiers, have been found slain, simultaneously on Sunday night, in Visuvamadu in Vanni and in Oorezhu in Jaffna, according to news reports from Vanni and Jaffna. All those killed were from Vaddakkaachi and Visuvamadu which are located close to each other. Another striking similarity was that the killers have tried to burn down the dead bodies together with the houses of those slain, possibly to conceal the cause of their deaths, police sources said. In the meantime, the occupying Sri Lanka Army has stepped up its presence and checking in recent days.
Full story >>

SLA constructs military cantonment in lands of Eezham Tamils in Ampaa'rai

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 07 August 2012, 22:02 GMT]
The occupying Sri Lanka Army in Ampaa'rai district is constructing a military cantonment in the land of sixty acres extent at Ka'napathipuram, situated in Chammaanthu'rai DS division of Ampaa'rai district. The lands belong to 350 Tamil families from the lower echelons of the society, who remain uprooted for 22 years now, according to Tamil civil officials in the district.
Full story >>

SL military backs plunder of scrap iron, vehicles, in land of genocide

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 07 August 2012, 19:41 GMT]
While the international system bails out genocidal Sri Lanka by indecisiveness on international investigations, the occupying Sinhala military is engaged in erasing all remaining traces as well as in earning money by systematically backing plunder and trade of vehicles and scrap-iron left in the land of genocide. While citing land mines the public and local people are not allowed to return to Mu’l’livaaykkaal and Maaththa’lan, large gangs of Muslim traders brought from the South, and equipped with oxygen cylinder cutting tools, are openly engaged in removing vehicle parts and scrap iron. The SL military and some high officials earn huge amount of money in the lucrative trade. Meanwhile, 21 local families of Mu’l’livaaykkaal, who were recently allowed to come back in a showcase resettlement, languish without even drinking water and they are treated like slaves by the occupying military.
Full story >>

Jaffna Chamber of Commerce exposes farce of development

[TamilNet, Monday, 06 August 2012, 22:02 GMT]
Citing unwillingness of Colombo in actually putting into action the much talked about re-activation of the Achchuveali Industrial Zone in the Jaffna Peninsula, the Chamber of Commerce in Jaffna said that development is only in the lip service to show account to the outside world, but it is carefully designed to stop only at certain ‘infrastructure development’ calculatedly aimed at converting Jaffna into a market for the South and to suck and transfer the capital in Jaffna to the South. All the banks mushroomed in Jaffna serve only this agenda of transferring capital and they don’t invest or provide loans to any substantial economic activity based on the land of Tamils, accused the local chamber members who were unsuccessful in their initiations and applications.
Full story >>

3,500 Tamil families remain uprooted from 40 villages in Ampaa'rai

[TamilNet, Sunday, 05 August 2012, 23:48 GMT]
More than 3,500 Tamil families still remain uprooted from fifteen DS divisions in Ampaa'rai, civil officials in the district said. 6,500 acres of paddy fields, 3,500 acres of coconut lands and about 2,000 acres of lands, used for sugar cane cultivation, have also been appropriated from the Tamils since 13 April 1967. Since 2007, new Buddhist stupas have mushroomed with the backing of the occupying Sri Lankan Special Task Force (STF) commandos, the sources further said adding that more than 20 Saiva shrines have been destroyed. Tamil people who fled from their traditional villages in Ampaa'rai district now ask whether they would also get their lands according to the assurances given by the SL Minister Rauf Hakeem, the civil sources said.
Full story >>

TNPF launches Tamil bimonthly

[TamilNet, Sunday, 05 August 2012, 20:41 GMT]
The Tamil National Peoples Front (TNPF) led by Gajendrakumar Ponnambalam launched a bimonthly party paper named Nam Theasam (Our Nation) Sunday at the office of the TNPF in Jaffna. University Student representatives, civil society representatives, journalists, and representatives of the newspapers published in Jaffna took part in the event. "The path chosen by the TNPF is a people-oriented approach to politics, contrary to politics that centers around elections and positions," says the lead article, quoting Mr. Gajendrakumar Ponnambalam from a recent interview.
Full story >>

Tamils de-facto state chronicled in new book

[TamilNet, Saturday, 04 August 2012, 21:43 GMT]
While the global powers of all persuasions—the USA, Russia, China and India—each driven by their own realpolitik concerns and self- interests continue to dismiss Tamil liberation cause and struggle, a new book written by a Diaspora Tamil engaged in human rights work in the Tamil-controlled area of Vanni until the Sri Lanka's "Crime of the Century" at Mu'l'livaaykkaal, provides a compelling insider’s look at the motivations, issues and complexities of this internationally abetted genocide; the entire text is based on first hand observation and includes sociological insights based on these first hand observations, says the publisher, Clarity Press in the US.
Full story >>

US Law allowing legal challenge to LTTE terror listing remains vacuous

[TamilNet, Thursday, 02 August 2012, 11:21 GMT]
"The LTTE's military wing does not exist, and as such, there is no rational basis to continue to proscribe the LTTE as terrorist. However, the State Department continues the ban on the safe presumption that the ban is essentially immune to challenge, an immunity fortified by the threat of material support charges for an individual purporting to represent the LTTE in American jurisdiction," said legal sources in Washington, pointing out that statute [1189] that allows legal challenge to continued "terrorist" designation is toothless and vacuous when confronting anti-terror statute [2339b] that threatens criminal prosecution on any one who is willing to mount a legal challenge.
Full story >>

New Zealanders call for international investigation, back right to self-determination

[TamilNet, Thursday, 02 August 2012, 06:51 GMT]
“We support your demand for self-determination,” said New Zealand’s parliamentary leader of the Green Party, Metiria Turei MP, speaking at an event in Auckland on Sunday, convened to remember Black July 1983. Her view was echoed by John Minto, a respected human rights activist saying, “I know you have been consistently airing your right to self determination and we support your demand because you cannot live in a country that does not recognise and respect your rights.” Labour MP and shadow foreign minister Phil Goff who spoke at the event as well as the other two guest speakers called for an international investigation on the war crimes. The Green leader announced that her party is determined to work with Australian Greens in expelling the war-crimes-accused SL High Commissioner for Australia.
Full story >>

Italian academics, activists, political groups endorse TSC declaration

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 01 August 2012, 18:04 GMT]
Concluding that the only way for Eezham Tamils to live with freedom and peace is in a sovereign Tamil Eelam, a range of Italian academics, left parties, antiracist groups, civil society activists, immigration groups and NGOs endorsed the Tamil Sovereignty Cognition declaration at a conference titled “Tamil, l’identita negate” (Tamil, a denied identity) organized in Palermo, Sicily on 28th July. Speaking at the event, academics from the University of Palermo argued that what happened in the island of Sri Lanka was genocide against the Tamil nation, besides pushing for an independent international investigation into war crimes committed by the Sri Lankan state. "In the diaspora, the youth organizations should work with solidarity groups, political groups, and NGOs using this historic declaration as an action plan," Stefano Edward Puvanendrarajah from Giovani Tamil told TamilNet.
Full story >>