Solid resistance gives hopes towards resolving fishermen’s problems: Noor Alam

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 29 November 2016, 22:16 GMT]
Tamil-speaking fishermen in the Northern province have been expressing their sharp opposition against the destructive methods of bottom-trawling and large-scale intrusion by Indian fishermen in the seas off Northern province. Recently, the local fishermen in Musali division of Mannaar district have also been firm in resisting high-level attempts from Colombo that was aiming to create a permanent colony for fishermen from South (Sinhalese) at Kaayaa-kuzhi. Noor Alam Mohammed, the leader of Fisheries Societies in Mannaar said the Tamil-speaking fishermen’s uncompromising stance on fundamental issues have forced the SL fisheries ministry and its counterpart in New Delhi to agree to the demands that have been put forward by the struggling fishermen.
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Self-mobilised people pay homage to Eezham Tamil Heroes

[TamilNet, Sunday, 27 November 2016, 14:23 GMT]
The families and relatives of Tamil Eelam war heroes spontaneously mobilised themselves in collectively remembering their loved ones on the Heroes Day on Sunday in Vanni. The self-mobilisation, without any political force behind them, was highly emotional at Muzhangkaavil and Kanakapuram Maaveerar Thuyilum Illams (Heroes Cemeteries) in Ki'linochchi district, at Vanni-vi'laangku'lam in Mullaiththeevu, and at Pa'ndi-virichchaan and Aa'ndaang-ku'lam in Mannaar district, political observers in Vanni said. The people decorated the destroyed memorial stones with red and yellow pieces of clothes. Apart from the collective remembrance at the Heroes Cemeteries that were razed to the ground by the occupying Sinhala military, Eezham Tamils remembered their heroes by lighting flames of sacrifice at school grounds and by tolling temple bells across the occupied country of Eezham Tamils.
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Fidel Castro passes away at 90

[TamilNet, Saturday, 26 November 2016, 19:52 GMT]
The Cuban revolutionary leader, who became a legacy in human history by proving that the world order of the USA could be defied to its very face at its own doorstep, passed away on Friday at the age of 90. The legacy has to be saluted and remembered as inspiration by Eezham Tamils in the context of their own struggle needing defiance shown to any imperialism-imposed paradigm. The struggle of the nation of Eezham Tamils fundamentally defying British-created and US-continued ‘Sri Lankan State,’ was unfortunately not grasped well even by Cuba, Vietnam etc. that succumbed to the deceptions of Colombo diplomacy and to the misleads of Colombo-centric Left in the island. Nor did Tamils ever explicitly express to the world the larger dimensions of their struggle. Castro legacy would tell them that success comes by identifying larger perspectives to place defiance.
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University of Jaffna commemorates Tamil Eelam Heroes

[TamilNet, Friday, 25 November 2016, 22:47 GMT]
Delivering a sharp message against the threats coming from armed Sinhala policemen of genocidal Sri Lanka, who stormed the hostel premises in the early hours of Wednesday and warned the students not to mark Tamil Eelam Heroes Day, the entire University on Friday confluenced at Kailaasapathy Hall commemorating Tamil Eelam Heroes Day. Academics and students, including Muslim and Sinhala students, took part in the memorial event lighting candles in front of the symbol of Kaarthikaip-poo, the flower declared by the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam as the national flower of Tamil Eelam. Photos celebrating the life of LTTE Leader Veluppillai Pirapaharan and posters paying tribute to fallen Tamil Eelam Heroes were put up at several places. The move, planned in total silence, was quickly mobilised as the students wanted to mark it before the weekend this year.
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Mannaar Magistrate issues interim order against Sinhala colony in Musali

[TamilNet, Thursday, 24 November 2016, 19:01 GMT]
Mannaar Magistrate A G Alex Raja on Thursday issued interim order against the infrastructure work at Kaayaa-kuzhi, where Colombo's Director General of Department of Fisheries & Aquatic Resources was silently engaged in creating a permanent coastal Sinhala colony for 83 Sinhalese from South. Tamil and Muslim fishermen jointly protested against the move on 09 November. On the following day, the Tamil-speaking fishermen protested when Sinhala fishermen who had come from Negombo were putting up fishing huts (vaadis) at the locality. The Senior Superintend of SL Police was attempting negotiate a deal between the Tamil-speaking fishermen and the intruding Sinhala colonists. As the local fishermen were not prepared for any compromise on the structural genocide against them, the police was forced to bring the case to the Magistrate’s Court in Mannaar.
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Colombo's military, police threaten grassroots not to mark Tamil Eelam Heroes’ Day

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 23 November 2016, 16:06 GMT]
The occupying Special Task Force (STF) commandos, trained once by the British and who are complicit in the crime of genocide, crime against humanity and war-crimes have been threatening the public in Batticaloa, particularly in villages situated between Aaraip-pattai (Aaraiyam-pathi) and Ka'luvaagnchik-kudi, that there was a ban of gathering in force between November 20 and November 30. In the meantime, SL Minister Rajitha Senaratne went on record stating that the SL military ‘would be dealing with’ those marking Tamil Heroes Day on November 27. The SL ministers have been instructed by SL Commander-in-Chief and President Maithiripala Sirisena to propagate a message that honouring war-dead LTTE members was harmful to ‘reconciliation’.
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Muslim, Tamil politicians not bold enough to confront Buddhist cultural intrusions in East

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 22 November 2016, 21:51 GMT]
A Sinhala minister of genocidal Sri Lanka, Daya Gamage, who hails from Ampaa’rai district, has gone on record threatening his own regime stating that he would resign his ministerial portfolio in protest if the statue of Buddha, erected by intruding monks at the village hilltop of Maayak-kalli-malai in I’rakkaamam division of Ampaa’rai district, was to be removed from the locality. Observing a systematic acceleration of cultural intrusions by Buddhist monks into Muslim and Tamil dominated areas in East, veteran Muslim journalist Kalapooshanam A.L.M. Saleem, who is based in Kalmunai of Ampaa’rai district, asks why none of the politicians among the Muslims and Tamils are firm in opposing the controversial erection of Buddha statue with a similar resolve to the extent of risking their ministerial or parliamentary portfolios.
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Colombo should revert Gazette notifications, return lands seized in Mannaar: DDC Meeting

[TamilNet, Monday, 21 November 2016, 23:20 GMT]
Monthly District Development Committee meeting, co-chaired by Northern Provincial Council Chief Minister Justice C.V. Wigneswaran, SL Minister of Industry and Commerce Mr Rishad Bathiudeen, who is elected from Vanni electorate, four Tamil and Muslim Vanni District parliamentarians and four NPC Councillors, on Monday unanimously resolved to demand the Colombo regime to revert the Gazetted appropriations or takeovers of lands by its forest and wildlife departments in the recent years. While people remained uprooted from their native villages that have been subjected to military occupation, large tracts of residential and agricultural lands have become jungles. These lands have been systematically taken over by Colombo’s jungle and wildlife authorities. These lands should be released back to people, the meeting held at Mannaar Kachcheari has resolved.
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Secular Tamil nationalist aspirations weakened by global and regional religious paradigms

[TamilNet, Sunday, 20 November 2016, 23:49 GMT]
Failure of secular forces and Marxists in India and Dravidian movements in Tamil Nadu in delivering justice to the genocide-affected nation of Eezham Tamils, who have based their national question on secular foundations coming through millennia of Tamil language heritage, results in further meddling through globally and regionally simulated religious conflicts. The forces that work behind the fundamentalism of different religions in the island are one and the same. There is a master plan for the conquest of Tamil Nadu that is now ruled by the Dravidian movements for more than half a century. The coastlines between Tamil Nadu and the country of Eezham Tamils in the island share similar religious demography and there is a sinister move to create conflicts among these groups to weaken the language-based nationalism of all Tamils, commented Eezham Tamil and Tamil Nadu political observers.
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Jaffna city targeted by occupying Sinhala military and police

[TamilNet, Saturday, 19 November 2016, 23:08 GMT]
The occupying SL military and Police of genocidal Sri Lanka are systematically advancing their plan of permanent occupation of strategic frontier and interior lands where they have been ‘temporarily’ stationed during and after the genocidal war. Using the provisions in the so-called Constitution of the SL unitary State that has no democratic mandate of the nation of Eezham Tamils and deploying indirect intimidation citing former ‘LTTE connections’, the occupying military and police are moving towards ‘legally’ transferring the lands to themselves. The geo strategic military outlook of Colombo is ultimately conceived against the interests of the Indian State in the long run, commented the while the New Delhi Establishment is pre-occupied with ‘military-to-military’ relationship and joint training sessions with the genocidal Sinhala military, commented informed civil sources in Jaffna.
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SL military base hinders resettlement at Ka'napathipuram, Ampaa'rai

[TamilNet, Thursday, 17 November 2016, 20:03 GMT]
24 Divison of the occupying Army of genocidal Sri Lanka, stationed in the public and private lands at the Tamil settlement of Ka'napathi-puram have no plans of releasing the lands it has seized. Notorious commandos of Special Task Force (STF), a full-fledged military force administratively organised under the SL Police, had chased out the Tamil families during the war. The SLA deployed in large numbers after the war are occupying the lands belonging to 43 Tamil families. Ka'napathi-puram is located 9 km west of Chammaa'thu'rai town.
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Demographic genocide escalates in Vanni, plans afoot to expand Sinhalicised Weli-Oya

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 15 November 2016, 23:01 GMT]
The Weli-oya division in the Mullaith-theevu district of the Northern Province, created for the exclusive purpose of Sinhalicisation of a strategic piece of Tamil Land in order to wedge the North from the East, is silently being further extended into Vavuniyaa North division by Maithiripala Sirisena's regime, informed civil officials in Vavuniyaa told TamilNet on Tuesday. Sampanthan-led Tamil National Alliance and Wigneswaran-led Northern Provincial Council have completely failed to address the major demographic change taking place at border between the Northern, Eastern and North-Western provinces, the Tamil officials in Vavuniyaa commented. UNP and SLFP politicians are jointly working in colonising the Tamil land, they further said.
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Colombo's militarization of Pa'n'na-vedduvaan deprives Tamil villagers of livelihood

[TamilNet, Monday, 14 November 2016, 22:43 GMT]
The occupying Sinhala military, stationed at Pa’n’na-vedduvaan sandwiched between Mannaar - Mathavaachchi Road and Aruvi-Aa'ru (Malwathu Oya) in Madu division of Mannaar district, has seized several acres of agricultural lands. In addition, a cable ferry which was put up by the Dutch relief organisation ZOA for the villagers to cross Aruvi Aa'ru and access their agricultural lands has been dismantled by the SL military in 2008. Today, the villagers are unable to engage in agriculture in more than 200 acres of lands during the rainy season. Clean water is a big problem and some children have been admitted to hospital after drinking tap water in recent times, the villagers complain. On top of this, the SL military has been exploiting the resources by scooping the soil and running a business making red-bricks and doing agriculture in the occupied village.
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Sirisena's demographic genocide deprives Tamils of livelihood in strategic coastal village of Vanni

[TamilNet, Sunday, 13 November 2016, 23:41 GMT]
Sinhala colonists in Ma'nal-aa'ru have robbed more than 200 cattle that belong to resettled Eezham Tamils in Kokkuththoduvaay, a strategically situated coastal village in Karai-thu'raip-pattu division of Mullaiththeevu district within the past two months, according to civil sources in Karai-thu'raip-pattu division. SL President Maithiripala Sirisena's ‘Mahaweli’ Ministry has been backing the Sinhala colonists at various locations in the belt of the Ma’nal- aa’ru stream at the tri-junction of North, North Central and Eastern Provinces. The motive of Colombo is to demographically de-link the contiguity of the Northern and Eastern Provinces. ‘System L’ of Mahaweli project targets the fertile areas in Mullaiththeevu while ‘System B’, the largest of the current projects under the Mahaweli scheme, aims to seize the resourceful interior lands of Batticaloa district.
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Genocidal plunderers auction vehicles seized from Tamils, millions of rupees with no transparency

[TamilNet, Saturday, 12 November 2016, 22:21 GMT]
The occupying military of genocidal Sri Lanka has conducted a series of auctions in Vanni to sell vehicles seized from the Tamil people and their fighters during the genocidal onslaught on Eezham Tamils in 2009. One of the latest ‘secret’ auctions has taken place within the last 6 months and the transactions involve multi-million rupees, civil sources at Mullaiththeevu District Secretariat told TamilNet this week. There was no transparency on how the auction was conducted and the transactions involved in it, they said. While more than 900 Tamil vehicle owners, who were uprooted several times during the onslaught and who were incarcerated in barbed-wire camps in Menik Farm are blatantly refused any insurance coverage, the occupying military of genocidal Sri Lanka is still cashing in on auctioning seized vehicles even after 7 years.
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CID instructed to determine forensic expertise on Mannaar mass graves in unison with victims

[TamilNet, Thursday, 10 November 2016, 22:12 GMT]
Mannaar Magistrate A G Alex Raja has instructed the Sri Lankan Criminal Investigation Department (CID) to come to a conclusion without further delay on the external institution that should be conducting the scientific investigations on more than 80 human skeletons from the alleged mass graves at Thirukkeatheesvaram in Mannaar exhumed since December 2013. The decision on external scientific institution should be taken in unison with the lawyers, who represent the families of enforced-disappeared in Mannaar, the Magistrate has instructed the CID.
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Tamil, Muslim fishermen protest against Colombo's Sinhalicisation of Musali in Mannaar

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 09 November 2016, 23:50 GMT]
The Director General of Department of Fisheries & Aquatic Resources (DFAR), which functions under the purview of the Fisheries Ministry of occupying Colombo, has recently instructed the Divisional Secretary of Musali Division in Mannaar district and the Assistant Director of Fisheries Department in Mannaar to put up a colony with fishing huts, necessary housing and other infrastructural arrangements, informed civil sources in the district said. A list of more than 83 persons has been sent from Colombo. All the persons in the list were Sinhalese fishermen from Gampaha district. The Federation of Fishing Societies in Musali division, comprising of Tamil and Muslim fishermen across 10 villages, took to the streets on Wednesday demanding immediate end to the fishing colony. The protesting Tamil-speaking fishermen blamed Colombo for instigating ethnic tension in Musali division.
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Colombo silently schemes fresh Sinhala settlements in Musali division

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 08 November 2016, 22:54 GMT]
Followed by the recent aggression by the occupying Navy of genocidal Sri Lanka at Arippu and Chilaavaththu'rai, there are also fresh reports of Colombo attempting to settle Sinhala colonists in Musali division. While thousands of Tamil-speaking native people are denied of resettlement and access to their lands, there are various schemes being silently implemented by Colombo's ministries and departments. The Tamil villagers of Mu'l'lik-ku'lam and the Tamil-speaking Muslims from Ma'richchukkaddi will jointly protest against the Sinhalicisation, which is now targeting Musali division, Mannaar Fisheries Society representative and SLMC Vanni member Noor Mohammed Alam told TamilNet in a video interview to TamilNet this week in Jaffna. The division has become a strategic area of occupation to Colombo, which aims to Sinhalicise and colonise the land and the historic waters of Eezham Tamils.
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Occupying Colombo stages ‘PTA abductions’ in Jaffna citing criminal gangs

[TamilNet, Monday, 07 November 2016, 21:06 GMT]
The ‘Terrorist’ Investigation Division (TID) of genocidal Sri Lanka has staged at least 8 abduction-styled arrests in Jaffna within the past three days. The arrests have been carried out under the ‘Prevention of Terrorism Act’, according to the SL Police. The explanation given by the TID, especially when questioned by the families of arrested persons, was that the persons were being targeted for alleged involvement in criminal gangs. The ‘arrests’ come after a period of heightened propaganda in South that there was a gang named ‘Avva’ operating in Jaffna beyond the control of SL Police and military. One of the arrested is said to be a law student and an active supporter of Tamil National Peoples’ Front, who was engaged in democratic mobilization, especially during the Ezhuka Thamizh uprising in Jaffna.
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Fishing societies federation in Jaffna insists on NPC participation in New Delhi talks

[TamilNet, Sunday, 06 November 2016, 17:46 GMT]
“We have serious questions on why Northern Provincial Council was excluded in the talks held in New Delhi to resolve the conflict on Indian fishing trawlers entering the territorial waters in the North. At the same time, we are also highly critical to SL Navy taking part in these meetings,” V. Thavachelvan, the chairman of the Federation of Fishing Societies in Jaffna told TamilNet on Sunday. “Further, our federation was not properly constructed on the formation of the delegation to take part in the talks at New Delhi,” he further said. “While a delegation representing Tamil Nadu government was at the talks, the representation of the government of Northern Provincial Council was excluded,” he said accusing Colombo government for trying to form the delegation to fit its designs.
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New Delhi, Colombo neglect NPC participation in resolving fisheries dispute in Historical Waters

[TamilNet, Saturday, 05 November 2016, 22:53 GMT]
The Fisheries Ministry of occupying Sri Lanka was exerting pressure on representatives of fisheries societies in North, when they were taken to New Delhi for a ‘high level’ meeting on 02 November. The fishermen representatives from North were told to cooperate with the suggestion from New Delhi of allowing Indian fishermen entry to the seas off Northern province for three consecutive years. The fishing society members were also asked to sign on a document, which they have declined. In the meantime, Colombo's ministers were discussing the issue with their counterparts at a ‘ministerial-level’ meeting in New Delhi on Saturday. In both the meetings, the Northern Provincial Council, which has a specific ministry for Fisheries, has been completely sidelined, according to the fishermen’s representatives who took part in the meeting at New Delhi on 02 November.
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SL Navy ‘revenge’ against Tamil fishermen continues in Mannaar

[TamilNet, Friday, 04 November 2016, 21:20 GMT]
The occupying navy of genocidal Sri Lanka has been harassing the fishermen from Mannaar island in the early hours of Friday. The latest Sinhala navy aggression was an act of ‘revenge’ against Tamil fishermen in Mannaar as the SL Navy commander of Chilaavaththu’rai proclaimed it on 18 October, when the fishermen Arippu village situated far away in the mainland in Musali division, confronted two criminal Navy personnel, who had been committing a series of violent thefts in the village. On Friday, SL Navy at Periya-kadai jetty near the main bridge in Mannaar city, was harassing more than 1,000 Tamil fishermen, embarking on fishing from the jetty from three GS divisions of Mannaar island. The fishermen were asked to show ‘pass documents’ documenting every item they were having on board in their fishing vessel.
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Sirisena deploys ‘pass restrictions’ to block Tamil farmers from entering pasturelands

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 02 November 2016, 17:13 GMT]
SL Forest Department officials in Batticaloa district, under the instructions from the SL Ministry of ‘Mahaweli Development’, have instructed Sinhala forest guards to demand a pass document from the Tamil cattle-farmers in order to enter the pasturelands used by them for decades. SL President Maithiripala Sirisena, who is also the minister in charge of Mahaweli Ministry, has been promoting the demographic genocide against Eezham Tamils by deploying Sinhalese from his Polonnaruwa district to grab lands of Eezham Tamils in Trincomalee and Batticaloa districts. Now, he is trying to limit the claim of Eezham Tamils through introducing a rigid pass system, the Tamil farmers complained.
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