Kokupadaiyan villagers flee fearing air-strike

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 03 January 2007, 20:06 GMT]
The entire population of Kokupadaiyan village in Musali divisional secretariat division in Mannar district Wednesday sought refuge in adjacent villages due to fear following the aerial strike on Padahuthurai in Ilupakadaivai by the Sri Lanka Air Force (SLAF) on Tuesday, sources in Mannar said. Kokupadaiyan village is located in the area controlled by the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE). Ilupakadaivai fishing village is also located in the LTTE area.
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Battle for Vaharai

[TamilNet, Monday, 01 January 2007, 11:35 GMT]
Vaharai, a large backwater on Sri Lanka’s east coast, is an area with large fertile fields, lagoons and virgin forests in the northern part of the Batticaloa district. More than 15,000 residents and IDPs are now trapped in Vaharai as the Sri Lanka Army (SLA) conducts its brutal campaign to evict Tamils from the region, closing A-15 the main access road to the town, and imposing economic embargo, while Sri Lanka Air Force (SLAF) kfirs fly bombing raids terrorizing the civilians to flee. "They [LTTE] won't be able to keep the civilians for long. Food and medicine is in short supply," Brigadier Prasad Samarasinghe, the top military spokesman, told Reuters in a interview Friday.
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SLAF Kfir jets bomb Vaharai

[TamilNet, Saturday, 30 December 2006, 21:16 GMT]
Sri Lanka Air Force (SLAF) kfir jets flew four bombing sorties over Puliyankandalady in Vaharai in the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) held territory, Saturday around 9:00 a.m, forcing the civilians who had sought safety in the Vaharai hospital to flee in panic, seeking safety inside bunkers, sources from Vaharai said.


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Two SLA troopers injured by LTTE fire in Vaharai

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 27 December 2006, 11:25 GMT]
Two Sri Lanka Army (SLA) troopers from the Kadjuwathe SLA camp were seriously injured when the Liberation Tigers retaliated to the intensive mortar and artillery barrage launched by the SLA from its camps at Mankerny, Kadjuwathe and Valaichenai Paper Factory on Vaharai area in the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) held territory, Wednesday from 7:30 a.m until 11:00 a.m, sources from Vaharai said.


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Three pronged artillery barrage on Vaharai villages

[TamilNet, Saturday, 23 December 2006, 09:35 GMT]
Sri Lanka Army, with massive firepower, launched artillery barrage simultaneously from three directions, Kallaru SLA camp, north of Vaharai, Karadikkulam, in the west and from Mankerni SLA camp in the south towards Kathiraveli, Kandalady, Palchenai, Vammiveduvan, Vellayadimadu and Uriyankattu villages in the Vahara region. The artillery barrage, launched around 6:30 a.m. Saturday, continued for more than 8 hours. Vaharai hospital sources reported artillery explosions 200 meters close to Vaharai hospital. Casualty details were not available.
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SLAF kfirs drop eight bombs on civilian settlements in Batticaloa

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 12 December 2006, 09:12 GMT]
Sri Lanka Air Force (SLAF) kfir jets dropped eight bombs in four sorties Tuesday around 10:00 a.m on the civilian villages of Kattumrivu, Kathiraveli and Palchenai in the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) held territory in Batticaloa district, sources in Batticaloa said. No casualties were reported though four houses of civilians were badly damaged.


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Two SLA soldiers killed in Murunkan claymore attack

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 12 December 2006, 06:38 GMT]
Two soldiers of the Sri Lanka Army were killed and one soldier and an elderly woman were injured when a claymore mine was detonated targeting SLA soldiers Tuesday around 10:00 a.m. at Sirukandal in Murunkan area in Mannar district.
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19 more Tamil refugees killed, new SLA offensive south of Vaharai

[TamilNet, Sunday, 10 December 2006, 06:16 GMT]
19 Internally displaced people, who fled artillery bombing in Palchenai and Vammivedduvan in Vahrai region to Kandalady Government School, were killed and more than 25 wounded when Sri Lanka Army fired artillery shells hit the school Sunday morning, according to LTTE's Military Spokesman Irasiah Ilanthirayan. Sri Lanka Navy gunboats were also engaged in firing shells towards densely populated refugee camps as Sri Lankan forces opened a new front towards Panichchankerni Sunday morning. Meanwhile, a Tamil Rehabilitation Organisation official in Vaharai told TamilNet all the five refugee camps in Vaharai were being targeted by artillery shelling forcing all civilians to flee.
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Canadian opposition MPs condemn Vakarai bombing, MP slaying

[TamilNet, Saturday, 11 November 2006, 05:40 GMT]
Canadian Parliamentarians, Albina Guarnieri, P.C., M.P., Member of Parliament, Mississauga East Cooksville, Dan McTeague, P.C., M.P. for Pickering-Ajax-Uxbridge, and Omar Alghabra, Liberal Party Member of Parliament for Mississauga— Erindale, have written letters to the Minister of Foreign Affairs and issued press releases condemning the killings in Sri Lanka.
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Assassination attempts on two civilians fail in Mannar

[TamilNet, Thursday, 09 November 2006, 08:25 GMT]
Unidentified armed men following a Tamil trader and a youth in the Nanattan division in Mannar fired at them missing hitting the intended victims in two separate incidents , Sunday sources in Mannar said.


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SLAF Kfir jets bomb LTTE held villages in Batticaloa

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 01 November 2006, 10:47 GMT]
Sri Lanka Air Force (SLAF) Kfir bombers bombed civilian settlements nine times Wednesday around 7:15 a.m in the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) held areas of Kattumurivu in Kathiraveli in Batticaloa district. Casualties in this bombing are not yet known but 12 houses of civilians are said to be badly damaged.
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Sri Lanka in "interminable and intractable crisis"- UN

[TamilNet, Monday, 23 October 2006, 01:56 GMT]
Prof. Philip Alston, United Nation's Special Rapporteur on extrajudicial, summary or arbitrary executions, speaking to the United Nations General Assembly, Third Committee, 20 October 2006, said that the "dramatic attacks in recent days and spiraling number of extrajudicial executions" indicate that "Sri Lanka is not so much on the brink of a new crisis but, instead, only in the midst of an interminable and intractable crisis that has already exhausted its fair share of international attention," and called upon the United Nations Secretariat to "establish a full-fledged international human rights monitoring mission in Sri Lanka."
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3 abducted Tamils found shot to death in Colombo

[TamilNet, Friday, 20 October 2006, 21:33 GMT]
Three Tamil residents in Colombo, abducted by unidentified persons driving a white van on Thursday, were found shot to death in Piliyandala and Ragama areas, Police sources said. People Vigilance Committee (PVC), a Committee comprising a number of political parties and civil right organizations in Colombo, in press release issued Friday said, nine Tamils have been killed and thirty-three have disappeared in the last few weeks in Colombo. The release added that nine persons have been released after paying ransom.
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IPU assistance sought to forge consensus between SLFP, UNP

[TamilNet, Sunday, 01 October 2006, 12:10 GMT]
The Inter-Parliamentary Union (IPU), a worldwide organization of parliamentarians working for peace and co-operation with its Secretariat based in Geneva, has been invited to assist in forging a consensus among political parties in the south, especially between the Sri Lanka Freedom Party (SLFP), main constituent of the United Peoples Freedom Alliance (UPFA) government and the main opposition United National Party (UNP), said Mr.Mahinda Samarasinghe, Disaster Manager Minister to the press in Colombo Sunday.
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SLAF resumes air raids on Vaharai

[TamilNet, Friday, 29 September 2006, 13:32 GMT]
Sri Lanka Air Force Kfir jets bombed Kandalady village in Vaharai Friday around 10:00 a.m. No casualties were reported although the bombers targeted an area where displaced families from Trincomalee had taken refuge, sources in Vaharai said.
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SLA arrests two Tamil youths in Mannar

[TamilNet, Monday, 18 September 2006, 07:23 GMT]
Sri Lanka Army (SLA) arrested two Tamil youths Sunday afternoon at Mavilankerni in Mannar district. They have been identified as Mariyathas, 25 and Gnanaseelan Thavaseelan, 23 of Puthirakandal in Murunkan police division, civil sources said.
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Education of 20,000 displaced students in east affected - TNA

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 12 September 2006, 02:55 GMT]
"The education of at least 20 thousand displaced Tamil students, temporarily staying in the LTTE controlled area in the districts of Batticaloa and Trincomalee, has been affected very badly. These students had fled from their homes with their parents in the aftermath of indiscriminate aerial bombings and artillery fire by the Sri Lankan Forces”, said P.Ariyaneththiran, the Tamil National Alliance Member of Parliament for Batticaloa District Monday.


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Humanitarian crisis precipitated by twin-track strategy

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 05 September 2006, 22:03 GMT]
An estimated 60,000 Tamils displaced by Sri Lankan military attacks in the eastern province are caught in a humanitarian crisis which aid workers say is being deliberately deepened by the Colombo government. The most recent displacements in the east join tens of thousands of people forced to flee their homes by military attacks in Wanni and the northern Jaffna.
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Youth remanded in Mannar

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 05 September 2006, 11:08 GMT]
Mannar acting Magistrate M.P.Farook Monday ordered remand for a twenty three year old youth A.Jeyaseelan till September 13 on a report by Murunkan Police that the youth was alleged had been arrested by the Sri Lanka Army (SLA) soldiers at Parapankandal, legal sources said.
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SLA fresh offensive thwarted - LTTE

[TamilNet, Friday, 18 August 2006, 14:29 GMT]
Sri Lanka Army (SLA) troopers on Friday launched an offensive through Kandalkadu area, located between Nagarkovil Forward Defence Line (FDL) and Muhamalai FDL, inside the Liberaton Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) controlled territory, LTTE military spokesman Irasiah Ilanthirayan told media in Kilinochchi.
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