SLA closes Achchuveali-Tho'ndaimaanaa'ru road again

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 31 August 2010, 05:32 GMT]
Sri Lanka Army (SLA) occupying Jaffna Friday closed Achchuveali-Tho'ndaimaanaa'ru road located at the outskirt of SLA High Security Zone (HSZ) in Valikaamam North for public use causing people to travel long distance spending more time to reach their destinations, sources in Jaffna said. The said road which had been closed fifteen years ago by SLA had been recently opened for public use with the beginning of the annual festivals of Chellach Channithi Murukan temple located on the shores of Tho'ndaimaanaa'ru lagoon.
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'Anti-Tamil ideology, international meddling make reconciliation impossible'

[TamilNet, Monday, 30 August 2010, 14:42 GMT]
In a recent paper titled "Why National Reconciliation in Sri Lanka Is Not Possible," Brian Senewiratne, a renowned physician and an Australia based Sinhala expatriate, says although he had realized that ‘national reconciliation’ in Sri Lanka was ‘totally unrealistic’, after witnessing the major human rights violations inflicted upon the Tamil people, what has made the reconciliation really ‘impossible’ was the most serious recent slaughter of Tamils with features of genocide. In addition, what makes reconciliation ‘most unlikely’ is ‘international meddling’ and ‘power play’, he argues. The 78-year-old member of the Bandaranaike family, who is a long-time defender of the Eezham Tamil cause, also argues in his paper that even the real development of the Sinhala areas is not possible if the ‘developmental power’ is left in the hands of those in Colombo.
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Resettlement of Vadamaraadchi North uprooted families postponed indefinitely

[TamilNet, Sunday, 29 August 2010, 06:52 GMT]
Jaffna Sri Lanka Army (SLA) Commander Major Gen. Mahinda Kathurusinghe and Jaffna Government Agent Ms. Imelda Sukumar, who met Friday in Palaali SLA head office to discuss the resettlement of the uprooted families of Vadamaraadchi North evacuated by SLA , did not come to any decision but announced that 'speedy action' will be taken, sources in Jaffna said. The announcement has caused resentment and anger among the various organizations in Jaffna peninsula which had been requesting the resettlement of uprooted families.
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Batticaloa Tamils mourn disappearance of 48 Tamils two decades ago

[TamilNet, Sunday, 29 August 2010, 06:26 GMT]
Tamils of several villages in Batticaloa district Friday observed the twenty years’ death anniversary of 48 Tamil people who were reported disappeared after being arrested by the Sri Lanka Army (SLA) on 27th August 1990, with silent procession from Siththaa'ndi Kaa'li Koayil to Siththaa'ndi Murukan Koayil from 9:00 a.m till 11:00 a.m. Relatives of the disappeared participated in the procession with tears. Special prayer was also held in Siththaa'ndi Murukan Temple in remembrance of those “disappeared”.
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No Tamil doctors in Vaakarai government hospital

[TamilNet, Sunday, 29 August 2010, 06:23 GMT]
Residents of Vaakarai, a traditional Tamil village in Batticaloa district, find difficult to explain their illness and obtain treatment as medical officers who can converse in Tamil language are not posted to Vaakarai government hospital. All medical officers posted to this hospital are Sinhala, the residents said.
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Rajapaksa instructs UPFA MPs not to leave island for 2 weeks

[TamilNet, Saturday, 28 August 2010, 13:19 GMT]
The Sri Lanka Freedom Party (SLFP), main constituent of the ruling United Peoples Freedom Alliance (UPFA) led by Sri Lanka’s President Mahinda Rajapakse has instructed its parliamentarians not to go abroad till September 15. The leaders of the constituent parties also have been instructed by SL president Mahinda Rajapaksa to ensure the presence of their parliamentarians in Colombo during the period.
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Politicising religious reformation

[TamilNet, Saturday, 28 August 2010, 09:02 GMT]
Around 300 goats and countless chickens were sacrificed in a folk ritual on Wednesday at the Kaa’li temple in Munneasvaram, Chilaapam (Chilaw), in the Puththa’lam district of the North Western Province. A group of Buddhist monks marched in protest and when prevented, the angry monks sat on the road and refused to move until the ritual was over. Tension developed in Chilaapam, media reports from Colombo said. The demography of the region is largely made of Sinhalicised Tamils and some surviving pockets of Tamils. A considerable number of Sinhala Buddhists also took part in the folk ritual, Wednesday, and academics wrote on Buddha’s denouncement of animal sacrifice and rituals of Vedic Brahmins. When around 40,000 Tamils were slaughtered in Vanni last year, the Buddhist establishments in the island were either silent or encouraged it.
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SLMC to support Rajapakse from opposition bench

[TamilNet, Friday, 27 August 2010, 23:00 GMT]
Sri Lanka's predominant Muslim party, the Sri Lanka Muslim Congress (SLMC) led by Rauff Hakeem, today decided to support the Sri Lanka government’s decision to make constitutional amenedments which will also remove the two term restriction on the presidency, political sources in Colombo said. SLMC Leader Rauff Hakeem told the media in Colombo, his party has decided to support the government by helping it attain a two third majority in parliament which will held change the country’s constitution.
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Woman injured in explosion in Jaffna

[TamilNet, Friday, 27 August 2010, 19:09 GMT]
A woman was seriously injured Friday in an explosion when her daughter put an object into the hearth at which the mother was cooking in her house in Koddadi in Jaffna, sources in Jaffna said. The daughter, a girl studying in one of the schools in the Pa'n'ai area in the outskirts of Jaffna town, had picked up the object lying along the road while returning home from school. The device is suspected to be one of the landmines Sri Lanka Army (SLA) has sown around its newly constructed base in Pa'n'nai area. SLA authorities in Jaffna had earlier assured that Jaffna town and surroundings had been cleared of landmines.
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Guard at Jaffna women's home stabbed to death

[TamilNet, Friday, 27 August 2010, 19:05 GMT]
An unidentified person who tried to sneak into a home for destitute and war-affected women in Maruthanaamadam - Uduvil area Thursday night stabbed to death the watcher of the home who tried to catch him, sources in Jaffna said. Uduvil is an area in Jaffna where Sri Lanka Army (SLA) soldiers are always present and the intrusion into the women's home during Thursday night cannot have taken place without the knowledge of the soldiers, the resident of the area said.
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Colombo "deliberately shelled civilians," accuses UN's departing Holmes

[TamilNet, Friday, 27 August 2010, 11:18 GMT]
United Nation's Human Rights Co-ordinator, John Holmes, in a parting shot at Colombo the end of his 3-year tenure at the UN, defended his department's funding of the Sri Lanka government's internment camps where more than 350,000 held for several months while admitting the Sri Lanka government may have “deliberately shelled” civilians and hospitals, Inner City Press reported.
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Sri Lanka's presumptive war-criminal to take UN job in New York

[TamilNet, Friday, 27 August 2010, 00:02 GMT]
Sri Lanka's Deputy Permanent Representative (DPR) to the United Nation's post in New York, vacant following the recall of previous DPR, Bandula Jayasekera, after an alleged sexual harassment scandal, is reported to be filled by Major General Shavendra Silva, former 58th Division commander, who has been accused of committing war crimes by his former General Sarath Fonseka, Inner City Press reported. Professor Francis Boyle, an expert in International Law, commenting on this reported UN job said, "the Government of Sri Lanka (GOSL) is trying to sanitize and immunize their genocidaires/war criminals and thus regularize it all."
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Resettled families in Vanni left to suffer in downpour

[TamilNet, Thursday, 26 August 2010, 06:43 GMT]
Rains have been pouring down in Vanni for the last four days with the break of North East Monsoon in Sri Lanka and the resettled families sheltered under makeshift huts without proper roofing are left without any assistance to face the onslaught of the monsoon that will last until the end of December, Non-government Organization (NGO) representatives who visited Vanni said. Promises of constructing houses for the resettled families in Vanni by the Indian government and World Bank are yet to be fulfilled.
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Indian Foreign Affairs minister to visit Sri Lanka in September

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 25 August 2010, 13:45 GMT]
In response to the accusations raised by All India Anna Dravidia Munnetra Kazhagam (AIADMK) parliamentarians against the Indian Government for having not given any help to the uprooted Tamils in Sri Lanka held in Sri Lanka Army (SLA) detention camps or any assistance to the resettled Tamils in Vanni in Indian Parliament Wednesday, Indian Foreign Affairs minister, S. M. Krishna, told the parliament he will be visiting Sri Lanka late September to hold talks with Sri Lanka President Mahinda Rajapaksa again on the issues raised.
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Cultural and psychological attack on Tamils in Jaffna

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 24 August 2010, 22:19 GMT]
A Tamil diaspora visitor who recently went to see the archaeological site at Kantharoadai in the heart of Jaffna peninsula found all signboards in the site in Sinhalicized Sinhala. Further, he was asked to remove shoes to walk the site, indicating that this important heritage site of the people of Jaffna is fast becoming a cult centre of contemporary Sinhala-Budhhism to culturally and psychologically alienate the people of Jaffna from their land. Ancient remains of Buddhism in Tamil land are not a cultural property of today’s genocidal Sinhala-Buddhism. What is happening in Jaffna is perhaps the ‘reconciliation’, meant by the ‘culture and development’ pundits, commented an academic in Jaffna.
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Sri Lanka ambassador's refugee claims absurd, says US Academic

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 24 August 2010, 10:23 GMT]
Robert Oberst, professor of political science, Nebraska Wesleyan University, and an expert on Sri Lanka commenting on Sri Lanka's High Commissioner to Canada, Chitranganee Wagiswara's remark that Tamil boat refugees were a "human smuggling operation with links to the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam," said Wagiswara's claims "would be offensive, if they were not so absurd," and added that if Wagiswara wanted to silence critics, "she would be better served to persuade her government to allow outside independent observers into the Tamil areas to report on the conditions rather than to slander and attack those who question her government," Rediff.com reported.
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Chellach Channithi Temple Chariot festival held

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 24 August 2010, 07:35 GMT]
Thousands of devotees from all parts of Sri Lanka took part in the annual Thear (Chariot) festival Monday of the historic Tho'ndaimaanaa'ru Chellach Channithi Murukan temple located to west of Sri Lanka Army (SLA) High Security Zone in Valikaamam North. During war SLA soldiers had set fire to the properties of the temple worth millions of rupees. The temple had been restored to its original state recently, sources in Jaffna said
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Sacked SL Deputy Minister Mervin Silva visits North

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 24 August 2010, 07:16 GMT]
Mervin Silva, the Sri Lanka Deputy Minister sacked from his post by President Mahinda Rajapaksa for tying an officer of Samurdhi Bank to a tree, paid an unexpected visit to Jaffna and Vanni Sunday and Monday, sources in Vanni said. Mervin Silva, who spent most of his time in the North visiting important Sri Lanka Army (SLA) bases in Vanni meeting key officers, was given top security protection befitting a cabinet minister, sources in Vanni said. Mervin Silva, said to be a close friend of President Mahinda Rajapaksa, is expected to be offered a high position in the Rehabilitation Ministry for the North, political observers in Jaffna said.
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Gangs of thieves from South invade Jaffna

[TamilNet, Monday, 23 August 2010, 15:45 GMT]
Jaffna district Superintendent of Police (SP), Neville Pathmadeva, said that gangs of thieves and robbers had infiltrated into Jaffna peninsula from the Southern parts of Sri Lanka with the motive of stealing and robing during the Hindu temple annual festival season which has begun in Jaffna peninsula according to information received by him, in a press meet he held in Jaffna town Sunday. Meanwhile, local NGOs circles said that deserters from Sri Lanka Army (SLA) are the key persons in these gangs who befriend the SLA soldiers located in Jaffna peninsula to get information and particulars from them to rob houses in the peninsula.
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TamilNet launches Palaka'ni

[TamilNet, Monday, 23 August 2010, 10:56 GMT]
TamilNet plans to launch shortly a weekly video programme Palaka’ni, fulfilling repeated requests from its readership to extend services in Tamil. The programme will have panel discussions on current affairs in Tamil. Even though constraints faced by TamilNet are manifold, we go forward in this venture considering the needs of the times. TamilNet appeals for continued support and cooperation of its readership, which has been the sole provider of support to the functioning of TamilNet until now. TamilNet reiterates its independent and democratic support to the national cause of Eezham Tamils. As an alternative media TamilNet may have to continue functioning in alternative ways to maintain its freedom, independence and commitment to the cause. Our request to the media world is not to view us in conventional terms but to help us in this experiment of information liberation.
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