JHU breaks away from Rajapaksa's ruling UPFA

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 18 November 2014, 09:27 GMT]
Jathika Hela Urumaya (JHU), a Sinhala extremist Buddhist monks political party on Tuesday decided to leave SL President Mahinda Rajapaksa's ruling United Peoples Freedom Alliance (UPFA) and decided to function as an ‘independent’ political party in the SL parliament, news sources in Colombo said.
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UPFA victory in Badulla based on manipulations: Upcountry Tamils

[TamilNet, Sunday, 21 September 2014, 08:51 GMT]
More than 50,000 Up Country Tamils from Badulla and Moneregala districts in Uva Provice were not able to cast their votes in the Provincial Council elections held on Saturday, say Upcountry Tamil activists in Badulla. The narrow victory of UPFA in Badulla district is a manipulated victory, they said. The ruling UPFA of Mahinda Rajapaksa has won the elections in Badulla district polling 11,000 votes more than the opposition UNP.
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Occupying SL military demolishes mosque in Trincomalee

[TamilNet, Sunday, 17 August 2014, 23:38 GMT]
The occupying Sri Lankan military has demolished a mosque situated at Karumalai-oottu in Trincomalee Town and Gravets division within the past 2 days, Muslim fishermen from Trincomalee said. The mosque, established in 1926 and registered as a Jumma Mosque in 1947, has been seized by the SL military, which demarcated the area as ‘High Security Zone’ in 2009. The land where the mosque is situated comes under the 1200 acres of lands from Prima flourmill to Karumalai-oottu, including Ve’l’lai-ma’nal and Clappenburg Bay, which are being given to China under a ‘defence related development’ project by Colombo.
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146,000 acres of lands appropriated through militarisation of Batticaloa in 5 years: Tamil MP

[TamilNet, Friday, 02 May 2014, 23:42 GMT]
Colombo has established 54 new military camps in Batticaloa district. 650 acres of lands have been appropriated for the occupying SL military, said Tamil National Alliance (TNA) Parliamentarian P. Ariyanethiran addressing May day rally in Batticaloa. Within the last 5 years alone, 145,885 acres of lands belonging to Tamil workers have been seized, Mr Ariyanethiran further said. The major land appropriation has taken place through the SL ministry of tourism seizing 122,063 acres through gazette notification within the last 5 years, the parliamentarian from Batticaloa said.
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Sinhala military operates US-trained ‘counterinsurgency’ in Jaffna

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 29 April 2014, 22:21 GMT]
The commander of the genocidal Sri Lankan military in the Jaffna peninsula, Maj. Gen. Udaya Perera, who was trained and awarded in the US Army War College in 2012, after his role as director of SL Army operations in the genocidal onslaught in 2009 followed by counter-insurgency foreign service targeting Tamil diaspora from Malaysia, is deploying new tactics for furthering the structural genocide against Eezham Tamils in his position as the commander of SL military occupying the peninsula. The SL commander has launched a deceptive programme to woo Tamil youth into subservient jobs to SL military by promising good payment through a secret agent known as ‘Tamil CNN Kannan’ who has come from the UK. As the direct campaign to enlist Tamils into the genocidal military has failed, the SL military has chosen to trap Tamil youth through business and media agents.
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Genocidal military twists statistics on uprooted Eezham Tamils

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 23 April 2014, 23:31 GMT]
Genocidal Sri Lanka has instructed its government agents in the 8 districts of North and East not to release any statistical figures without consulting the authorities in Colombo, informed sources told TamilNet Wednesday. Sri Lankan authorities have fully abandoned the figures of the resettled people residing outside the so-called welfare camps. The EPDP collaborators in the UPFA have also been instructed to play in sync with Colombo on the statistics of displaced people and resettled people in these two districts, Tamil civil sources in Jaffna said pointing out the controversies that surfaced at the District Development Committee (DDC) meetings of Jaffna and Ki’linochchi held this week.
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JMC workers protest demanding permanent jobs

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 22 April 2014, 12:45 GMT]
A section of Jaffna Municipality Council (JMC) workers, who have been employed at the JMC for several years, protested on Monday demanding permanent employment as promised by the JMC and the colonial SL governor of North. The protesters gathered in front of the secretariat of the colonial governor Major Genral (retd) GA Chandrasiri as SL minister Douglas Devananda of the EPDP had recently threatened to deploy SL soldiers to take over their work if they continued to protest demanding permanent jobs at the JMC.
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SLAF steps up militarisation of Ve'l'lai-ma'nal coast in Trincomalee

[TamilNet, Sunday, 20 April 2014, 19:02 GMT]
The occupying Sri Lanka Air Force (SLAF) in Trincomalee city has seized more than 4,000 acres of coastal land in Ve'l'lai-ma'nal, located between Marble Beach and Karumalai-yoottu within the administrative DS division of Trincomalee Town and Gravets. The SL military has completed surveying the public lands and has fenced off the coastal stretch barring the people from accessing the coast, civil sources told TamilNet. After the end of war in the East, the SL military has put up two major camps, one for SLAF and another for Sri Lanka Army (SLA), in the division. The SLAF has also transformed Marble beach into a military-run corporate outfit by launching a tourist resort.
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Genocidal military deceives Tamil students in Jaffna, Vanni

[TamilNet, Saturday, 12 April 2014, 13:47 GMT]
The occupying Sri Lankan military is waging a targeted campaign in Jaffna and Vanni to deceive and recruit Tamil youth between 18 and 22 years to substandard assignments within the genocidal military. The SL military has been collecting the lists of students who didn’t succeed in their GCE (O/L) exams and is engaged in a targeted campaign, promising driver and data-entry jobs for 30,000 rupees a month. At some places Tamil schoolteachers are being forced to ‘encourage’ the students to enlist themselves in the military. The SL military officers coming from Palaali military base have been allowed into schools in uniform to conduct propaganda meetings.
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Badurdeen squad threatens Tamil newspaper editor in Mannaar

[TamilNet, Thursday, 10 April 2014, 23:15 GMT]
A squad led by UPFA provincial councillor from Mannaar Rifghan Badurdeen, who is the brother of controversial SL minister Rishard Badurdeen, entered the office of the ‘Puthiyavan’ newspaper in Mannaar on Thursday and issued death threat to its editor SV Sivakaran, who is also the leader of the youth wing of the Ilankai Thamizh Arasuk Kadchi (ITAK). The squad, led by Rifghan Badurdeen also threatened to curb the distribution of the newspaper and to set fire to the office, which is situated at Chinnak-kadai on Mannaar main road, the editor of the paper said.
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Namal Rajapaksa’s Mullaiththeevu operative detained on human trafficking allegation

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 09 April 2014, 21:47 GMT]
A key operative of Sri Lankan President Mahinda Rajapaksa’s ruling UPFA and two of his close associates have been arrested in Mullaiththeevu by the SL police on 05 April following reports from Australia that they were operating a human trafficking agency. The UPFA operative, who is a close confidante of Namal Rajapaksa, was identified as 45-year-old Arul Jenyberd, who lost in the NPC elections on UPFA ticket. In the meantime, the Terrorist Investigation Division (TID) has arrested a group of fishermen on the following day at Polika’ndi in Point Pedro on allegations that they had bought a boat from money obtained from overseas, in an attempt to project them as having ‘LTTE’ connections. More than 50 people have been arrested within the last 5 weeks on various allegations by the TID.
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Cut-out of Rajapaksa burnt in Jaffna

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 20 November 2013, 23:35 GMT]
A large cut-out of SL president Mahinda Rajapaksa, has been burnt down in Jaffna city in the early hours of Wednesday. Coinciding with this incident, the SL military has beefed up the presence of armed soldiers in the streets of Jaffna. The cut-out was put up in connection with Mahinda Rajpaksa’s widespread campaign of the deceptive Vadakkin Vasantham ‘development’ campaign.
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EPC opposes affiliation of Trinco campus with universities in South

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 16 October 2013, 10:22 GMT]
The Eastern Provincial Council (EPC) has unanimously adopted a motion against the proposed affiliation of the Trincomalee campus of the Eastern University with the Rajarata University of Anuradhapura or with the Jayewardanapura University in Colombo. The motion was moved at EPC's September session by the Leader of the Opposition Mr C.Thandayuthapani, the group leader of the Tamil National Alliance (TNA) in the council. Mr R.Thurairatnam, TNA’s Batticaloa district councillor seconded the motion.
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Colombo plans District ‘Development’ Ministers to undermine NPC

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 15 October 2013, 23:33 GMT]
In a move to sideline the Northern Provincial Council, the occupying Colombo is to appoint new ‘district-level development ministers’ under its central command by SL presidential sibling and ‘Economic Development’ Minister Basil Rajapaksa, informed circles in Colombo said. Colombo plans to offer the portfolio to a Tamil parliamentarian of UNP who has recently joined the UPFA, although the SL minister Douglas Devananda was promised the ministry earlier, the sources further said. A paramilitary operative, Uthayarasa, of the so-called Sri-TELO is seeking the portfolio in Vavuniyaa where the paramilitary served Colombo earlier. A Sinhala person would be appointed to Mullaiththeevu and a Muslim minister in UPFA is vying for the portfolio in Mannaar, the sources said.
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TNA should learn from history: Poonkuzhali Nedumaran

[TamilNet, Thursday, 03 October 2013, 23:38 GMT]
The Tamil National Alliance (TNA) should learn from history, and from the experience of their predecessors, on what should NOT be done, writes Tamil Nadu political activist Poonkuzhali Nedumaran in a feature sent to TamilNet this week. She cited the history of TNA’s predecessor TULF failing in upholding the responsibility it was vested with by the people in 1977, compromising with District Councils and how that triggered the Tamil youth to lose confidence in parliamentary methods. The NPC election results mean communication of a will than participation in governance. With the Eezham Tamils rejecting the polity and rule of the State in Colombo, the TNA must understand the responsibility vested with them by the people, she further said.
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SL military expands military cantonment in VVT, Jaffna

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 01 October 2013, 23:49 GMT]
Colombo’s ruling UPFA alliance, during the recent election campaign promised the people of Valveddith-thu’rai (VVT) in Jaffna that the SL military would be vacating from more than 50 houses at VVT junction, which have been occupied since 1996. But, on Sunday, the occupying Sri Lanka Navy (SLN) has expanded the occupation, seizing more lands to the north of VVT junction and up to the sea, says former parliamentarian and TELO politician K. Sivajilingam. The SL military even attacked the fishermen, who had entered the 1 km long coastal stretch, Mr Sivajilingam further said.
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New Delhi mission in Jaffna launches war crimes defender’s poetry projection

[TamilNet, Thursday, 26 September 2013, 13:14 GMT]
New Delhi’s Deputy High Commission in Jaffna will be launching on Monday an anthology of poetry, “Mirrored Images”, compiled by Prof Rajiva Wijesinha, said a press note from the diplomatic mission on Wednesday. Prof Rajiva Wijesinha has gone on record on several occasions in internationally defending the Rajapaksa regime from war crimes accusations. He was often seen coming out with blatant denials of the war crimes committed by the Sri Lankan State. The National Book Trust of India entrusted the editorship of the book to Prof Wijesinha and according to him, the anthology “contributes to the development of a common Sri Lankan identity.” The anthology was first released by New Delhi’s External affairs Minister Salman Khurshid, followed by Colombo’s missions in Canada.
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SL operatives step up psy-ops war on Tamil political activists in North

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 24 September 2013, 20:27 GMT]
Following the defeat of Colombo's UPFA in the Northern Provincial Council election, Sri Lankan military intelligence and paramilitary operatives have stepped up a systematic campaign of harassments through threatening telephone calls, diverted and intercepted phone calls and various other forms of harassments on the supporters of Tamil National Alliance, news sources in Jaffna and Vanni said. Reports of similar threats were also on the rise in the Jaffna peninsula on Monday and Tuesday.
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SLFP, EPDP operatives threaten TNA candidates, voters

[TamilNet, Sunday, 22 September 2013, 23:41 GMT]
A group of operatives affiliated with a Sri Lankan minister, attempted to assault Doctor G Gunaseelan, who is an elected member of the new Northern Provincial Council, representing Tamil National Alliance in Mannaar. The attack took place on Sunday evening around 5:00 p.m. A clash ensued between his supporters and Colombo’s UPFA ‘supporters’ while they crossed the main road to reach their village of Thoaddave’li after visiting Thaazhvup-paadu villagers. Meanwhile, there were widespread reports in the islets off Jaffna that EPDP operatives, visiting village to village, were harassing the TNA supporters.
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Preferential votes for Jaffna district released

[TamilNet, Sunday, 22 September 2013, 12:10 GMT]
Tamil National Alliance (TNA) chief minister candidate Mr CV Wigneswaran polled 132,255 preferential votes. Ms Ananthi Sasitharan topped among the other candidates polling 87,870 preferential votes. Next to them were Mr Tharmalingam Sitharthan (39,715 votes), Mr Arnold Emmanuel (26,780) and Mr CVK Sivagnanam (26,747). TNA's Parliamentary Group leader R. Sampanthan told media in Jaffna that the provincial government, which would be convened under the leadership of Mr Wigneswaran would soon announce its future plans. On UPFA side, EPDPs Jaffna district organiser Kamalendran Kandasami has polled 13,632 and SLFP district organiser Ankayan Ramanathan received 10,034 votes.
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