Fonseka, Gotabhaya entangle in US legal net

[TamilNet, Monday, 02 November 2009, 00:54 GMT]
United States appears to be slowly moving to corral Major General Sarath Fonseka, an aspiring US citizen, and Gotabhaya Rajapakse, a US citizen with property and family living in the U.S., into the US Justice system to investigate the two Sri Lanka officials for criminal culpability for allegedly issuing commands to the Sri Lanka Army (SLA) to fire heavy weapons towards the SLA demarcated No Fire Zone (NFZ) in the final stages of war killing more than 20,000 Tamil civilians. Colombo dailies report that Gen. Fonseka, currently on a private visit to the US, has been asked by the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) to have a "voluntary meeting" to discuss matters related to the recently released war-crimes report, and if he would be willing to testify against Sri Lanka's Defence Secretary.
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US legal noose tightening around Fonseka

[TamilNet, Saturday, 31 October 2009, 22:02 GMT]
The audacious visit to the United States by Major General Sarath Fonseka soon after an incriminating US State Department report over war crimes, appears to have landed the Major in a legal bind with US Department of Homeland Security (DHS), according to a report in the Sunday Times. While the DHS has requested a "voluntary meeting," Fonseka's legal counsels are yet to determine if US has the authority to trump Fonseka's assumed diplomatic immunity and can force him to testify, or if Fonseka's immunity would grant him the option to refuse to testify and return to Sri Lanka.
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US rescinds invitation to Fonseka to attend Hawaii event

[TamilNet, Sunday, 25 October 2009, 03:39 GMT]
The US government has withdrawn the invitation earlier extended to Major General Sarath Fonseka, former Commander of the Sri Lanka Army and currently holding the post of Chief of Defence Staff, to attend a farewill event to US Pacific Command (PACOM) Commander Admiral Timothy J.Keating at PACOM headquarters in Hawaii, Colombo’s English weekly, the Sunday Times reported in its political column quoting diplomatic sources.
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Sarath Fonseka’s stand on relations with Tamils, Muslims should be made public – Mano Ganeshan

[TamilNet, Saturday, 24 October 2009, 18:32 GMT]
“The persons who try to bring in former Sri Lanka Army (SLA) Commander, Sarath Fonseka as a prospective presidential candidate should first publicize his stand on his relations with the Tamils and Muslims of the country,” Mano Gnaeshan, Colombo district parliamentarian and the leader of Democratic Peoples’ Front (DPF) told media in Colombo after a discussion held with Ranil Wickremasinghe, the leader of the opposition and United National Party Friday evening, sources in Colombo said.. “We will not write ‘blank cheques’ in favour of any major political party candidate in the Presidential election,” he said. “We do not have any personal hard feelings either towards President Mahinda Rajapakse or Sarath Fonseka; whatever difference of opinion that exists is purely political,” he further said.
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Sri Lanka releases arrested pro-JVP newspaper editor

[TamilNet, Saturday, 17 October 2009, 15:11 GMT]
The Criminal Investigation Department (CID) of the Sri Lanka Police Saturday evening arrested Mr. Chandana Sirimalwatte, the editor of “Lanka,” a Sinhala language weekly newspaper, over a news item regarding the alleged rift between the Sri Lanka's President Mahinda Rajapakse and the Chief of Defence Staff (CDS) Major General Sarath Fonseka. Latest reports from Colombo say that the editor was released around 11:00 p.m. Saturday after nearly five hours of interrogation.
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Fonseka reporting triggers TID raid on JVP paper

[TamilNet, Friday, 16 October 2009, 20:16 GMT]
Terrorist Investigation Department (TID) of the Sri Lankan Police raided Janatha Vimukthi Peramuna's (JVP) newspaper office "Lanka" Friday around 9:30 p.m. following an article by the paper on alleged rift between Rajapaksa administration and General Sarath Fonseka.
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Fonseka's legal perils

[TamilNet, Sunday, 11 October 2009, 04:50 GMT]
As Major General Sarath Fonseka's military and political stars in Sri Lanka show signs of decline, the General may have to soon decide whether to stay in Sri Lanka and suffer ignominy under the Rajapakse brothers, or to use the lottery-won US Green Card, and seek safety with his children in the US. But safety in US may spell judicial danger. Without the cover of sovereign immunity, which had protected Fonseka's alleged war-crimes until now, the General will be exposed to answer charges, in the US Federal Courts, against his conduct of war in Sri Lanka's north. Both criminal and civil actions against Maj.Gen. Fonseka are likely in the US, and Colombo's resources, including legal help from US lobby-firms under Sri Lanka's payroll, will unlikely be available to him, legal sources in Washington said.
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US Group opposes GSP+ extension

[TamilNet, Monday, 28 September 2009, 03:59 GMT]
In a submission to the Chairperson of Human Rights Subcommission of the European Union (EU), Ms. Heidi Hautala, US-based pressure group Tamils Against Genocide (TAG) said that the EU should terminate GSP+ privileges to Sri Lanka especially after the "failure of the UN system to uphold international human rights and humanitarian laws," and the "abdication of moral and diplomatic leadership by the UN Secretary General." The Subcommission is scheduled to meet on 1st October, and the decision on the status of the GSP+ to Sri Lanka is to be made on 15th October, according to sources in UK.
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Lopsided sovereignty sentences Tissainayagam - journalist

[TamilNet, Monday, 31 August 2009, 19:50 GMT]
If Tissainayagam is sentenced to 20 years imprisonment for 'inciting communal feelings' by editing, printing or distributing North Eastern Herald Monthly, what should be the punishment to Sarath Fonseka, who as commander of the armed forces publicly said Sri Lanka belongs to the Sinhalese, mutilating the constitution and inciting genocide in the island, asks a senior journalist in Colombo. Unfortunately there are governments and diplomats who deceive humanity by projecting Sri Lanka as a ‘democratically elected government', besides multi national corporations, who don’t care freedom of people but grabbing opportunities in the island and there are also media such as The Hindu in India and a host of others in the international community praising Colombo on its ‘successes’ in ethnic totalitarianism, the journalist said.
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Boyle debunks Kohona's war-crimes braggadocio

[TamilNet, Sunday, 23 August 2009, 03:17 GMT]
Debunking Sri Lanka's Foreign Secretary, Palitha Kohona's statement that "no winner of a war has been tried [for war crimes] before a Tribunal," Francis Boyle, Professor of International Law at the Illinois College of Law, said, as legal counsel for the Mothers of Srebrenica and Podrinja, he had convinced the Honorable Carla Del Ponte, the Prosecutor for the International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia (ICTY), to indict Yugoslav President Slobodan Milosevic for every crime in the ICTY Statute, including genocide, war crimes and crimes against humanity.
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Sri Lanka to train Pakistan army in Tamil land

[TamilNet, Friday, 21 August 2009, 07:20 GMT]
“We received a request from Pakistan to train their officers on our small team operations, so we have decided to open several new training schools in Mullaitivu, Kilinochchi and Vavuniya to train local and foreign military officers,” said Colombo’s new Army Chief Jagath Jayasuriya, reported, Daily Mirror, Friday. The newspaper further quoted the military chief saying that there was a big demand from foreign countries to have their forces trained by Sri Lanka. But Political observers said that it was a ploy of Colombo, Pakistan and probably some others too, to check the current presence of Indians in Vanni.
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General Fonseka says more troops needed to ensure peace in Vanni

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 19 August 2009, 05:44 GMT]
General Sarath Fonseka, Chief of Defence Staff, said that resettlement of internally displaced people from Vanni now housed in temporary camps in Vavuniyaa will not be carried out haphazardly as dictated by some interested parties. He said so when he called on the prelate of Malwatte Most Venerable Tibbotuwawe Sri Siddhartha Sumangala Thera and on the prelate of Asgiriya Most Ven. Udugama Sri Buddharakkitha Thera Monday to mark the third month of ‘liberating’ the country from LTTE.
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Congressman urges Holder to review Gotabaya, Fonseka genocide indictment

[TamilNet, Sunday, 02 August 2009, 15:01 GMT]
United States Congressman G.K. Butterfield, who represents North Caronlina's first district, in a letter addressed to the U.S. Attorney General (AG), Eric Holder, referred to the model indictment submitted by the US-activist group, Tamils Against Genocide (TAG), charging Sri Lanka's Defense Secretary Gotabaya Rajapakse and former Sri Lanka Army Commander Lt.Gen. Fonseka of crimes against humanity, and urged the AG to "investigate the charges of violations of the Genocide Accountability Act of 2007 and the War Crimes Act related to atrocities against the Tamils in northern Sri Lanka." The indictment details allegations of the efforts to destroy the Tamil people of northern Sri Lanka through atrocities and genocide, and chronicles more than 3,750 extrajudicial killings, approximately 30,000 Tamils suffering serious bodily injury and more than 1.3 million civilian displacements.
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Notorious commander appointed Governor of Northern Province

[TamilNet, Sunday, 12 July 2009, 17:05 GMT]
Sri Lankan President Mahinda Rajapaksa has appointed Chief-of-Staff of the Sri Lanka Army (SLA) Maj. Gen. G.A. Chandrasiri as the new Governor of the Northern Province. Maj. Gen. Chandrasiri was the former chief of the SLA in Jaffna, under whose command Jaffna witnessed hundreds of forced disappearances, extra-judicial killings and other human rights violations in the period from 2006 to 2008. Tamil political circles in Colombo commented that Mr. Rajpaksa, who claims to have crushed the de-facto state of Tamil Eelam, has appointed his military men in key posts in the occupied Tamil homeland to head civil services with a 'colonial mindset'. Earlier, in April, Rajapaksa appointed Chandrasiri as the Competent Authority Officer in charge of resettlement of Tamils from Vanni in alleged barbed-wire 'internment camps' in Vavuniyaa.
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AG to file response to FR petition on “internment “camps

[TamilNet, Saturday, 11 July 2009, 22:01 GMT]
Three member Bench of the Sri Lanka’s Supreme Court Friday directed the Attorney General (AG) to file objections within two weeks in respect of granting leave to proceed, and interim relief to the Petitioners, in a Fundament Rights (FR) Violation petition against the detention of nearly three hundred thousand Vanni IDPs in State controlled "welfare centres" which have been described by human rights activists and organizations as "internment camps," legal sources in Colombo said.
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CPA’s FR petition regarding IDPs fixed for further inquiry

[TamilNet, Friday, 19 June 2009, 11:25 GMT]
The Fundamental Rights petition filed by the Centre for Policy Alternatives (CPA) in the Supreme Court of Sri Lanka challenging the curtailment of internally displaced persons (IDPs) interned in the camps located in Vavuniyaa was listed for further inquiry on July 10 following the application made by the State Counsel that he needed more time to obtain instruction from the Attorney General. The FR petition came up for inquiry Thursday before a three member Bench of the Supreme Court, legal sources said.
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Avoid witch hunt, HRW tells Colombo

[TamilNet, Thursday, 04 June 2009, 03:34 GMT]
Noting that "Disappearances" of ethnic Tamils in the north and east and in the capital, Colombo, allegedly by members of the security forces or Tamil armed groups remain a serious problem, New York based Human Rights Watch (HRW), in a press release issued today said, "[t]he Sri Lankan government needs to ensure that the abuses that occurred when LTTE strongholds fell in the past don't recur," and that Sri Lankan Government "should ensure that military defeat of the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam does not result in new "disappearances," unlawful killings or the jailing of government critics."
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Evidence points to Colombo culpability to Tamil massacre - Washington Post

[TamilNet, Saturday, 30 May 2009, 13:24 GMT]
Adding to the increasing international media coverage of Government of Sri Lanka's culpability to the massacre of more than 20,000 Tamil civilians in Mullaitheevu, Emily Wax of Washington Post in a Saturday story said, the beach "shows clear signs of heavy artillery shelling, according to a helicopter inspection of the site by independent journalists, interviews with eyewitnesses, and specialists who have studied high-resolution satellite imagery from the war zone." The paper notes Rights advocates view that "any government could defeat terrorism if it ignored the 1949 Geneva convention that aims to protect civilians caught in war zones," and adds that U.S. Justice Department is considering whether to seek criminal charges against Colombo officials based on information filed by Attorney Bruce Fein.
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Sri Lanka hunting media’s Tamil sources - RSF

[TamilNet, Friday, 29 May 2009, 23:47 GMT]
Apart from threatening to prosecute journalists who attempt to visit the northern areas captured from the Liberation Tigers, Sri Lanka’s military is trying to identify Tamil civilians who provided information to the foreign press by infiltrating paramilitaries into their military-run refugee camps, RSF (Reporters Without Borders) said Friday. While the Army general appointed in charge of resettling refugees says “all foreign journalists are working against his homeland,” the country’s police chief claims that several journalists, “mostly Sinhalese”, were on the payroll of the LTTE and were involved in the insurgency.
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Vanni civilians held back in Ki’linochchi in thousands

[TamilNet, Saturday, 23 May 2009, 10:04 GMT]
Sri Lanka Army (SLA) continues to detain thousands of civilians in its internment camps in Ki’linochchi without sending them on to the camps in Vavuniyaa, sources in Vavuniyaa said. SLA, in its final assault on Mu’l’livaaikkaal, has herded thousands of persons including non-combatants who had been working in the political and judicial wings of Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam, in vast overcrowded camps which lack basic facilities, the sources added.
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