DMK billionaire downplays record investment near Chinese port in Hambantota

[TamilNet, Sunday, 31 March 2019, 23:04 GMT]
DMK Politician S. Jagathrakshakan is trying to downplay the move for record-high investment in constructing an oil refinery and a cement plant by his family-owned business in Hambantota. The step, partnering with genocidal Sri Lanka and the Sultanate of Oman, which is having China as its biggest trade partner, “could see several more investors once the details were worked out”, the former Union minister has reportedly told media in India on Sunday. Eezham Tamils have severely criticised the move as being contradictory to the policy of his party and the legislature of Tamil Nadu, which has called for international investigations against Tamil genocide in the island as well as for an economic embargo.
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Senior TELO leader urges DMK to withdraw Hambantota investment

[TamilNet, Friday, 29 March 2019, 22:04 GMT]
M.K. Shivajilingam, the senior political leader of the Tamil Eelam Liberation Organisation (TELO) and former TNA parliamentarian, has urged DMK politician Samikannu Jagathratchagan in Tamil Nadu to reconsider the decision of his family to invest in the big business of building an oil refinery and cement factory in Hambantota in the South. “I urge Mr Jagathratchagan to reconsider his decision [...] Eezham Tamils have not yet gained justice to the genocide committed against them. A political solution is still far away [..] At this juncture, the investment move is also contradictory to the unanimous position of Tamil Nadu State Assembly which had called for economic sanctions on Sri Lanka until these issues are resolved,” Shivajligam told TamilNet on Friday.
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Religious leaders in Mannaar lack statesmanship

[TamilNet, Thursday, 28 March 2019, 23:21 GMT]
The forces seeking to escalate religious disharmony among Eezham Tamils in Mannaar have been both influencing and criticising the religious establishments of the Tamil Catholics and the Tamil Saivites in the district, trapping the two communities further into a prolonged conflict this week. The board of trustees of Thirukkeatheesvaram Saiva temple organised a protest on Thursday, a day before the SL Magistrate’s Court in Mannaar is set to hear the religious skirmish that took place in Thirukkeatheesvaram on 03 March. The protest drew four thousand participants from across the district bringing the traffic in the city to a standstill for two hours. In the meantime, SL Minister of Power, Energy and Business ‘Development’, Ravi Karunanayake, a Sinhala Catholic from Colombo, rushed to Madu shrine in Mannaar to discuss ‘development’ of the shrine.
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Interior village faces imminent Sinhalicisation in Batticaloa

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 27 March 2019, 17:22 GMT]
The occupying Sinhala military chased away the residents of four villages in Kudumpi-malai GS division, which is also known as Thoppik-kal and Baron’s Cap, during the times of war in 2007. The villages are located close to Polonnaruwa border. Although the uprooted Eezham Tamils were allowed to resettle back in 2013, the fertile highlands at Periya Miyaang-kal village, owned by Tamil settlers since 1969 were being retained by the occupying Sinhala military occupation. Even though the SL Army relocated its 11th Regiment troops from the location two years ago in 2017, the Tamil landowners are not being allowed to enter their lands. Now, the SL authorities have started to claim that the grounds have become ‘state property’ says Nagarasa Nagathamby, who was living there since 1969. The Buddha statue and the structures are intact, and the Tamils fear a Sinhala colony at the locality.
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Colombo ‘reminds’ Eezham Tamils on significance of theorising war historiography

[TamilNet, Monday, 25 March 2019, 19:47 GMT]
Occupying Colombo's Terrorist Investigation Division (TID) has filed a ‘B Report’ requesting the Magistrates’ Court in Jaffna to demand the editor of Colombo-based Thamizhth-thanthi weekly to reveal the author and the source of an article, which was published in May 2018. The article was about the late Brigadier Balraj, a highly esteemed military commander of the LTTE, who played the key role in the Tiger victory of the Elephant Pass garrison in 2000. The TID has approached the SL Court in January 2019, eight months after the article, titled “Balraj, the unparalleled war hero of the 21st century”, appeared. The SL State wants to suppress the media freedom of Eezham Tamil writers to file articles under pen names. It wants the editors to impose self-censorship and not to protect the identity of the authors. Colombo wants to make an example through this case, journalists in Jaffna said.
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Acid test for Tamil Nadu: DMK politician tricked into geopolitics of genocidal Sri Lanka

[TamilNet, Sunday, 24 March 2019, 23:29 GMT]
Within a few days after getting over with the ‘mere formality’ at the UN Human Rights Council in Geneva, SL Prime Minister Ranil Wickramsinghe is moving ahead with upholding the very same ‘development’ paradigm of the former SL President Mahinda Rajapaksa through securing USD one billion loan from China to link the centre of the island to the Chinese-built seaport Hambantota, which Mr Wickramasinghe leased out to China for 99 years in 2017. The SL Prime Minister has also tricked the family-owned business of Tamil Nadu's DMK politician Samikannu Jagathratchagan to invest 70% of USD 3.85 billion to build an oil refinery and cement factory in Mirijjawila in Hambantota district. The investment, made along with Oman's Oil Co (30%), is the largest foreign direct investment in the island, according to media reports in Colombo.
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UNHRC ‘Sri Lanka’ roadmap premeditated not to deliver genocide justice to Eezham Tamils

[TamilNet, Friday, 22 March 2019, 15:28 GMT]
The successive UN Human Rights High Commissioners starting from the Canadian jurist Louise Arbour (2004–2008), South African Tamil jurist Navaneetham Pillay (2008-2014), Jordanian diplomat Prince Zeid Ra’ad al-Hussein (2014-2018) and the incumbent Chilean politician Michelle Bachelet, have all been following the same roadmap, laid out during the times of Ms Arbour at height of the genocidal war. That approach was based on the paradigm of avoiding looking into the crime of genocide, equating the GoSL and the LTTE and only concentrating on the war crimes and crimes against humanity that occurred during the last phase of the war in 2009. The roadmap came to light, straight from the horse's mouth in 2010 when Ms Arbour was the head of the ‘International Crisis Group’ (ICG). The paradigm was also a part of the larger ‘intended’ failure on the part of the UN system.
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Happiness dwindles for residents of genocidal Sri Lanka in 2019

[TamilNet, Thursday, 21 March 2019, 11:17 GMT]
The unitary state of genocidal Sri Lanka is being welcomed and provided with extended escape routes for its protracted genocide against Eezham Tamils at the UN Human Rights Council (UNHRC) in Geneva. “The judiciary and independent commissions, including the Human Rights Commission, continue to play a vital role in strengthening reforms and cementing good governance in Sri Lanka,” was the certificate UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, Michelle Bachelet, was extending in her report presented at the fortieth session in Geneva. However, the happiness of the people in the island is deteriorating, slipping by 14 ranks and dropping from 116th position to 130th position in the World Happiness Index. The Index produced by the Sustainable Development Solutions Network (SDSN), which is also operating under the auspices of the UN Secretary-General.
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Students mobilise big march in Jaffna, demand justice to Tamil genocide

[TamilNet, Saturday, 16 March 2019, 17:34 GMT]
The community of Jaffna University, comprising students across all faculties, marched with the families of enforced-disappeared persons, relatives of political prisoners and the uprooted families, demanding international justice to the protracted genocide against Eezham Tamils on Saturday. The protesters marched from Jaffna University to the old municipal square, walking a 4 km distance without causing any hindrance to the public life in the city. The march drew participation from across the society sending a strong message to the international community not to provide anymore extended escape-routes to the SL State at the UN Human Rights Council in Geneva.
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TNA hierarchy backs controversial Sinhala extremist project at Jaffna entrance

[TamilNet, Friday, 15 March 2019, 21:02 GMT]
The unitary state of genocidal Sri Lanka, which constitutionally accords ‘foremost place’ to Buddhism, has stepped up the hurried erection of a large Buddhist stupa at the entrance to Jaffna city in Naavatkuzhi. The ruling UNP has exerted pressure on the elected Divisional Council (PS) of Chaavakach-cheari to silently withdraw the case against the controversial project through its TNA collaborator M.A. Sumanthiran, civil servants who were forced to withdraw the case told TamilNet. The vihara was not to be built without the permission from the democratically elected civic council, the Magistrate of Chaavakach-cheari had previously ruled. After getting the TNA to withdraw its objection, SL Minister of Megapolis & Western Development ‘Patali’ Champika Ranawaka, a Sinhala extremist, visited Naavatkuzhi on 22 February to accelerate the ‘development’ of the hostile project in Jaffna.
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Tamil parties failing to single-mindedly demand genocide justice, more dangerous than ITAK

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 13 March 2019, 14:11 GMT]
The Eezham Tamils need to objectively and scientifically distinguish the competing discourses of the collaborative politics of the ITAK and the actors claiming to counter the wrong narrative of the ITAK. While the ITAK is lost to ‘quisling politics’, there is a danger that the emerging alternative actors also succumbing to a rather dangerous ‘diplopia politics’, which is a double-option trap. The bedrock of both the deceptions is the overt orientation of relying upon the Geneva-based UN Human Rights Council (UNHRC) and the Office of the High Commissioner of Human Rights (OHCHR), tasked to promote and protect the human rights and function also as the secretariat of the UNHRC. It is important that Tamils should engage and interact with UN bodies. However, limiting the demands to the inside-the-box thinking of that system is more disastrous than the ITAK advocating quisling politics.
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Colombo schemes Sinhala Buddhicisation of 40 more locations in Mullaiththeevu

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 12 March 2019, 17:28 GMT]
The anti-Tamil Archaeology Department of the unitary state of genocidal Sri Lanka has approached the SL Survey Department to survey 40 more locations in Mullaith-theevu district alone with the intention of permanently declaring the places as heritage monuments of Sinhala Theravada Buddhism, informed civil officials had alerted the TNA Parliamentarian Shanthy Sriskandarajah. It is not known whether these are the places identified in a controversial Gazette declaration made already in 2013 or if these places are additional locations based on a new list, the civil officials who alerted the TNA parliamentarian explained to the journalists who were seeking to verify the information. The Eezham Tamils in Vanni should rapidly form heritage vigilance groups to confront the widespread surveying activities being schemed by the SL Archaeology Department, commented grassroots activists in Vanni.
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Colombo sabotaging mass grave investigations and Tamils learning lessons on ‘hybrid’ paradigm

[TamilNet, Sunday, 10 March 2019, 18:34 GMT]
The radiocarbon tests carried out on bone samples, which the SL authorities had dispatched to a US laboratory, as dating 377 to 615 years back has disappointed many people, who have valid reasons to believe that the recently exhumed mass graves in Mannaar are from the 1990s. The results obtained from Florida-based Beta Analytic (BETA) are being prematurely released by Colombo to imply that the period of the mass grave predates the genocidal war in the island by centuries. BETA has not issued an overall interpretation of all the samples or passed any judgement on the supplied samples as being adequate to conclude the core issue. Besides, there are several unanswered questions, most of them concerning the trustworthiness of the SL State-operated institutions handling the submission, as well as other artefacts revealing 1990s as the time of the crime.
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Manipulations at work to nullify NPC-evolved identity to Eezham Tamils food court

[TamilNet, Saturday, 09 March 2019, 17:11 GMT]
The forces opposed to the concept of allowing Eezham Tamils to articulate a collective identity to their traditional food court have pressurised the elected divisional council (Piratheasa chapai) of Vavuniyaa North to deviate from the unilaterally democratic decision adopted by the council a month ago to name the latest restaurant as ‘Ammaachchi’. The council was manipulated to change the name to "Vanni A'ru-chuvai-akam" before inviting former SL President Chandrika Bandaranaike Kumaratunga who is leading Colombo's Office of National Unity and Reconciliation (ONUR) to inaugurate the restaurant on Thursday.
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Occupying Colombo set to grab 227 acres of private lands in Vali North in Jaffna

[TamilNet, Friday, 08 March 2019, 20:24 GMT]
At least 163 acres of private lands of Eezham Tamils in a triangle area along the coast in Kaangkeasan-thu'rai (KKS) between the Cement Factory, the old hospital and Keerimalai are to be officially seized by the SL State for the use of the occupying Sinhala Navy in KKS Centre (J/234) GS Division. In the meantime, another area of 64 acres is being appropriated in the vicinity of the historically famous Keerimalai Nakuleasvaram temple in Keerimalai GS Division (J/226). The ‘Tourist Development Authority’ of genocidal Sri Lanka (SLTDA) is set to receive this land. Two acres of these lands are also going to be transferred to the SL Navy, Tamil officials at Jaffna District Secretariat said.
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Intelligence establishments poised to escalate religious fundamentalism in Mannaar

[TamilNet, Thursday, 07 March 2019, 21:10 GMT]
A group of Saiva Tamil activists, attempting to renovate a decoration-arch placed four years ago on the road to Thirukkeatheeswaram temple in Mannaar, were opposed by a section of Tamil Catholic people on Sunday. The Catholics alleged that the presence of the galvanised arch was a disturbance to Our Lady of Lourdes Church at the locality. The Lourdes church, which was a minor place of worship, had also been expanded into a big temple four years ago in Maanthai parish. The parish priest of nearby Vangkaalai was opposing the ‘renovation’ of the arch blaming that the Saivites were scheming a permanent concrete structure. The Saivites, in their turn, were arguing that they were only consolidating the damaged parts of the existing galvanised arch on the occasion of Maha Shivaratri which was to be observed on Monday. The dispute was blown out of proportion by the parties with vested interest.
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Ranil's ‘development’ of North-East is divide-and-rule imposed on Tamils

[TamilNet, Monday, 04 March 2019, 14:18 GMT]
Grassroots activists in Moothoor East in the Trincomalee district have blamed the SL Prime Minister Ranil Wickramasinghe for imposing a so-called development agenda of his design, which deploys divide-and-rule tactics in the occupied North-East. The short-term aim of the programme is designed to gain electoral and political mileage to the UNP party by diminishing the role of the Tamil politicians including that of the collaborating TNA. The hidden, much more sophisticated and the long-term agenda of the hostile ‘development’ and ‘rehabilitation’ programme is Sinhala-Buddhicisation of the North-East, they said.
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Protest continues beyond two years at Keappaa-pulavu in Mullaith-theevu

[TamilNet, Sunday, 03 March 2019, 18:05 GMT]
The uprooted Eezham Tamils from Keappaa-pulavu village, located along the Nanthik-kadal lagoon in Mullaiththeevu, launched their continuous protest demanding the release of their lands two years ago on 01 March 2017. One hundred and thirty-eight families are still waging their continuous protest demanding 432 acres of their private lands and public properties such as schools, temple, church and a public hall to be released. The protesting people require de-militarisation of their village to resume their livelihood of fishing as well as agriculture in their fertile lands. The younger generation of Keappaa-pulavu Tamils demands the occupying Sinhala military to go home. They describe the presence of SL forces as illegal.
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Colombo wants to mark ancient villages in East as ‘Sinhala Buddhist’ villages

[TamilNet, Friday, 01 March 2019, 21:52 GMT]
SL Minister of Internal Home Affairs, Provincial Council and Local Government Mr Wajira Abeywardhana has instructed the district secretariats in the three districts of the Eastern Province to declare each village having at least one Sinhala Buddhist family as a Buddhist village, highly placed civil sources at the Trincomalee District Secretariat told TamilNet on Friday. Mr Abeywardhana is a UNP politician, who hails from the Galle District in the South. The UNP is following the footsteps of notorious Cyril Mathew (1912 - 1989), an outright racist UNP politician who was the SL Minister of Industry and Scientific Affairs (1977 - 1986) under J.R. Jayewardene, commented the civil sources at Trincomalee District Secretariat.
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Tamil refugees returned from India languish for seven years along border village of Vavuniyaa

[TamilNet, Sunday, 13 January 2019, 19:13 GMT]
Thirty-seven Tamil families that have returned from the refugee camps in Tamil Nadu in India to their native village of Maruthoadai of Naavaladi in Vavuniyaa North after three-decades of exile are struggling without gaining access to their lands located along the border of Northern Province in Vavuniyaa North. The SL Forest Department is not allowing the people to set foot into their properties at Maruthoadai since 2010 when it gazetted their village as a forest conservation area. The intention is to block resettlement of Eezham Tamils and absorb the village into the expanding Sinhala colonisation programme, the uprooted families complain. They urge human right groups as well as the community organisations of Tamils to focus on their plight.
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