SL President Rajapakse addresses APC, Expert panel

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 11 July 2006, 09:59 GMT]
Sri Lanka President Mahinda Rajapakse, Tuesday morning addressed All Party Representative Committee on Constitutional Reforms and the Panel of Experts at the Presidential Secretariat in Colombo, parliamentary sources in Colombo said. Without spellingout specifics Mr Rajapakse laid a broad framework for the APC to begin work, saying, "The international community, notably India and the Co-Chairs have endorsed our approach - a solution to the national problem must exclude any division of the country," and wished the committee success in "formulating a political and constitutional framework for the resolution of the national question."


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Tsunami housing construction in Trincomalee delayed

[TamilNet, Sunday, 09 July 2006, 16:44 GMT]
The construction of permanent houses for tsunami affected families within the fifty meter buffer zone in the Trincomalee district is being delayed due to the unsettled ground situation now prevailing in the district. Donor agencies which have signed Memorandum of Understanding with the district civil authority to construct 5893 permanent houses within fifty meter buffer zone so far have completed 589 houses and handed over only about 297 to beneficiaries, district secretariat sources said.
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Acting Army commander takes over

[TamilNet, Saturday, 08 July 2006, 21:49 GMT]
Major General Nanda Mallawaratchchi has been appointed as acting Commander of the Sri Lanka Army (SLA), taking over the responsibilities of Lt. Gen. Sarath Fonseka, who was seriously wounded by suicide bomber on April 24, the Sunday Times reported.
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Build coalition to support serious peace, Schaffer tells Colombo

[TamilNet, Saturday, 08 July 2006, 11:10 GMT]
"The most fundamental challenge for the Sri Lankan government is to maintain, or perhaps establish, a political coalition that will support a serious peace process. To get the LTTE to the table, it will need to persuade the LTTE that eventual peace talks would be worthwhile," said Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS), a Washington-based think tank, in a report released Wednesday. Former Ambassador to Sri Lanka, Teresita Schaffer, is the Director of South Asia programs at CSIS.
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9 Jaffna youths, feared disappeared, found held in Southern Jails

[TamilNet, Saturday, 08 July 2006, 01:04 GMT]
Nine of the several young men and women from Jaffna, feared disappeared within the last six months, have been located in jails in the South of Sri Lanka, civil society sources in Colombo said. The youths have been held in detention without being produced in court after being arrested by Sri Lanka security forces, according to sources. The information came to light after officials of the Sri Lanka Human Rights Commission directly conducted investigations into the disappearances of Jaffna youth, rights officials said.
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Paramilitaries abduct 35 children in Batticaloa

[TamilNet, Friday, 07 July 2006, 12:07 GMT]
Paramilitary cadres, Thursday abducted more than 35 underage youths from the villages of Thivuchenai, Karuppalai, Sorivil and Sevanapitty in Batticaloa district, residents said. Parents of the abducted children, gripped by fear and insecurity, are afraid to make complaints to the police or human rights watchdogs, a Grama Sevaka official said. Tension prevails in the interior villages of Batticaloa district.
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Emergency extended for another month

[TamilNet, Thursday, 06 July 2006, 17:22 GMT]
Sri Lanka's parliament Thursday extended the State of Emergency for another month with a majority of 85 votes. 102 parliamentarians of the ruling United Peoples Freedom Alliance (UNP), Sinhala Marxist Janatha Vimukthi Peramuna (JVP and all monks party Jathika Hela Urumaya (JHU) voted for the motion seeking the extension of the State of Emergency.
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Canadian diplomat visits Mannar

[TamilNet, Thursday, 06 July 2006, 16:54 GMT]
The Counsellor for Political Affairs in Canadian Embassy in Colombo, Christina Prefontaine, Thursday morning paid an official visit to Mannar and held talks with V.Visuvalingam, the Government Agent at the district secretariat. Mrs. Christina Prefontaine, obtained first hand information in regard to the ground situation prevailing in the district, district secretariat officials said.
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24 devotees injured as vehicle overturns in Batticaloa

[TamilNet, Thursday, 06 July 2006, 10:38 GMT]
Twenty four devotees, returning home after an overnight Hindu festival at Kothiyapuram Nagathampiran temple in Ilupaiyadichchenai in Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) controlled Batticaloa, were injured when their over speeding vehicle overturned Thursday at 6:30 a.m. on the Kanchirankuda Road.


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Assassinated Journalist knew perpetrators in Avissawella killings - MP

[TamilNet, Thursday, 06 July 2006, 10:28 GMT]
Sinhala journalist Lakmal Sampath was murdered because knew the suspects in the murder of five youths believed to be Tamils whose mutilated headless bodies were found in Avissawella area in the South on 27 April, alleged the Colombo District parliamentarian of the Upcountry Peoples' Front (UPF), V. Radhakrishnan, during the debate on the extension of the State of Emergency in the Sri Lanka's Parliament Thursday, parliamentary sources in Colombo said.
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LTTE accuses Rajapakse of political duplicity

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 05 July 2006, 11:37 GMT]
The Liberation Tigers Political Head, S.P. Thamilchlevan ruled out negotiations on devolution of powers based on the Sri Lankan unitary constitution, Wednesday and charged Mahinda Rajapakse, the Sri Lankan president, for adopting a duplicitous approach, when asked to comment Colombo's move on setting up a committee to examine devolution of powers. "Colombo's call for talks based on Sri Lankan constitution, rejected by Tamils decades ago, is a deliberate act of deceivig the International Community while failing to implement practical steps to implement the fundamental terms of Cease Fire Agreement (CFA) as agreed in Geneva I."
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Independent report verifies SLN complicity in Pesalai violence

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 04 July 2006, 15:44 GMT]
In a report filed by a fact finding mission from two Colombo-based NGOs to look at the Pesalai violence of 17 June 2006, the investigators said, "Although in the initial days following the attack the government laid the responsibility for the attacks at the door of the LTTE, the strong report compiled and widely disseminated by the Bishop of Mannar pointed directly to Navy involvement. None of the many we met had the slightest doubt on this issue." The report also details the background to the prevailing ground situation in Mannar, urgent efforts required to prevent escalation of tensions, and provide security to the poor fisher families in Mannar.
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LTTE proscription, a huge mistake by EU, says Martin McGuinness

[TamilNet, Monday, 03 July 2006, 10:21 GMT]
Martin McGuinness, Chief Negotiator of Sinn Féin, the Political Wing of the Irish Republican Army (IRA) from Northern Ireland, talking to reporters from Kilinochchi Monday said it was a "huge mistake for the EU leaders to demonize the LTTE and the political leaders of the Tamil people." The Sinn Féin negotiator visited Kilinochchi Monday and discussed the current situation in the NorthEast with the Political Head of the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) S. P. Thamilchelvan at LTTE's Peace Secretariat in Kilinochchi.
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Seven killed, 13 injured in Trinco claymore explosion

[TamilNet, Monday, 03 July 2006, 07:33 GMT]
One soldier of the Sri Lanka Army (SLA), one woman home guard, two police constables, a police seargeant and a civilian were killed when a claymore mine exploded at Anuradhapura junction, about three km off the east port city Monday around 11.55 a.m. At least fourteen others were injured, Trincomalee police sources said. Another woman police constable, seriously injured in the explosion, died on her way to the hospital. Conditions of two others are serious, medical sources said.


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TRO worker abducted in Valaichchenai

[TamilNet, Sunday, 02 July 2006, 08:05 GMT]
Krishnapillai Kamalanathan, an official of the Tamil Rehabilitation Organization (TRO) was abducted by members of the Karuna paramilitary group at Valaichchenai, about 30 km. north of Batticaloa, around 10.30 a.m., Sunday. Krishnapillai has been working as a child protection officer of the TRO, Vakarai division.
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Sinhala journalist shot dead in Colombo

[TamilNet, Sunday, 02 July 2006, 04:44 GMT]
An unidentified person has shot and killed Lakmal Sampath, a former defence correspondent at the Sinhala newspaper Sathdina, Sunday morning in Dehiwela, Police said. Lakmal Sampath was a popular columnist who revealed details about the Sri Lankan Military Intelligence, corruption at various levels of the Sri Lankan defence establishment, and underworld activities in Colombo, according to Sinhala media sources in Colombo.
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Police registration made mandatory to Hill Country, Colombo Tamils

[TamilNet, Friday, 30 June 2006, 13:59 GMT]
Sri Lanka Government announced that Tamils living in Colombo and suburbs, and in hill country will be required to register with Sri Lanka Police nearest to their residences, in a Press conference held in Colombo district Administrative Secretariat, sources in Colombo said. Deputy Inspector General of Police, Pujitha Jeyasundera, detailed the procedures to be followed by Tamil residents in fulfilling this new requirement.
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US paper advocates "loose Confederation" for Sri Lanka

[TamilNet, Thursday, 29 June 2006, 10:45 GMT]
"The international community should press the Sri Lankan government and the Tigers alike to come to the negotiating table in Oslo and work out a loose confederation that retains Sri Lanka's unity, grants the Tamil northeast self-governing autonomy, and puts an end to the island's long agony," said Boston Globe in an editorial that appeared in its Thursday edition.
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Rationale for LTTE olive branch missed - paper

[TamilNet, Thursday, 29 June 2006, 10:07 GMT]
The Liberation Tigers’ extension of an olive branch to India has, amid the ensuing media frenzy, been widely misunderstood, the Tamil Guardian newspaper said in its editorial this week. Pointing out that amid rising violence against Tamil civilians, “twenty years [after first doing so], India is again intervening to protect the Tamils from the Sri Lankan state,” the paper said: “securing the island’s Tamils and ensuring their rights are restored and safeguarded is a goal behind which both the LTTE and India are separately, but simultaneously, once again aligned.”
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USAID project to revitalize harbors in Southern towns

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 28 June 2006, 11:38 GMT]
As part of the Sri Lanka Tsunami Reconstruction Program (SLTRP) of the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID), the US inaugurated an initial phase of a project costing Rs 21m to revitalize fishing harbor in Southern town of Hikkaduwa, as well as at harbors in Mirissa and Puranawella, a press release issued by the US embassy in Colombo said Wednesday.


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