PM to visit India tomorrow

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 26 February 2003, 16:08 GMT]
Sri Lankan Prime Minister Ranil Wickremasinghe will make an official visit to India tomorrow, Sri Lankan foreign ministry officials said. Mr. Wickremasinghe will stay in India for three days and meet with Indian Prime Minister, B. Vajpayee, Foreign Affairs minister, Jaswant Sinha and Deputy Prime Minister, L.K. Advani.
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SIHRN meeting to be held in Killinochchi

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 26 February 2003, 12:09 GMT]
The meeting of the Sub Committee on Immediate Humanitanarian Rehabilitation Needs (SIHRN) scheduled to be held in Trincomalee on Thursday and Friday has been shifted to Killinochchi. The meeting of SIHRN will be held at the Killinochchi secretariat on the due dates, said Mr.M. Selvin Irenuess, Director of the SIHRN Wednesday.


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Public demands urgent reconstruction of Kiran Road

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 25 February 2003, 15:28 GMT]
The road connecting Kiran in Batticaloa district to the Pulipainthakal to the west has become non-motorable and so badly dilapidated that even bicycles cannot be used on the road, the residents of the area said, and demanded that the government should take immediate steps to reconstruct the road.
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Religious leaders meet in Nallur Kandaswamy Temple

[TamilNet, Monday, 24 February 2003, 17:08 GMT]
"It is the duty of the southern religious leaders to organize the masses in the south to thwart all attempts by the Sinhala hard-line Janata Vimukthi Peramuna (JVP) and other forces from derailing the peace process," said Mr.C.V.K.Sivagnanam, former commissioner of the Jaffna Municipal Council and the President of the Confederation of Jaffna People's Organizations. He was speaking at a prayer meeting in Jaffna in which many inter-religious leaders from South of the island and from the peninsula participated.
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Sweden to help business, industrial development in NE

[TamilNet, Sunday, 23 February 2003, 19:40 GMT]
The Charge d'Affairs of the Swedish Embassy in Sri Lanka Ms Ann Marie Fallenius Sunday said in Trincomalee that the Chambers of Commerce in districts of Jaffna, Vavuniya, Trincomalee, Batticaloa and Ampara in the northeast province would be given a boost to expand their institutional capacity and professional competence building program under an agreement the Federation Chamber of Commerce and Industries (FCCISL) signed recently in Colombo with the Swedish International Co-operation Agency (SIDA) and the Chamber of Commerce and Industry of Southern Sweden (CCISS), sources said.


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SLN frequently intrudes LTTE areas in Trinco north- Tilak

[TamilNet, Sunday, 23 February 2003, 18:51 GMT]
The Sri Lanka Monitoring Mission (SLMM) in Trincomalee Sunday intervened to diffuse the tension between the Sri Lanka Navy (SLN) and the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) following an attempt by the SLN personnel to arrest cadres of the LTTE at Kallampathai, a LTTE held area, about forty km north of Trincomalee town, sources said.


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TNA members meet LTTE in Kilinochchi

[TamilNet, Sunday, 23 February 2003, 16:31 GMT]
Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) and the Tamil National Alliance (TNA) today discussed modalities to be effective in raising their voices together on issues related to bringing normalcy to lives of the war affected people of North East and to promote the urgent need for rehabilitation and development activities, during a meeting between the TNA parliamentarians and officials of the LTTE that took place in Kilinochichi, sources close to the TNA said.


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Hunger strike in Jaffna against inadequate CFA implementation

[TamilNet, Sunday, 23 February 2003, 12:27 GMT]
A five-hour token hunger campaign was conducted in front of the historic Nallur Kandasamy Temple in Jaffna Sunday to express dissatisfaction of Tamils to the government's failure to implement the ceasefire agreement fully, sources in Nallur, Jaffna, said.


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SLA, SLN uniforms, weapons recovered from Jaffna EPDA office

[TamilNet, Sunday, 23 February 2003, 12:20 GMT]
Police and Sri Lanka Army (SLA) soldiers Sunday morning forcibly opened the abandoned office of the Eelam People Democratic Alliance (EPDA), a breakaway group of the Eelam Peoples Democratic Party (EPDP) at Vembadi area in the heart of Jaffna town and recovered weapons and uniforms belonging to State armed forces, police sources said.
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World Bank helps Vavuniya families to resettle

[TamilNet, Saturday, 22 February 2003, 21:03 GMT]
As the first phase of World Bank's Unified Assistance program for helping displaced families resettle in their own villages, World Bank's resident representative in Sri Lanka, Peter Harold, presented checks of Rs.25,000 (US $250) to forty families, in a meeting held at the Vavuniya Tamil Maha Vidyalayam, Saturday, sources in Vanni said.
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SIHRN branch opens in Vavuniya

[TamilNet, Saturday, 22 February 2003, 18:58 GMT]
A branch of the Sub-Committee on Immediate Humanitarian and Rehabilitation Needs in the North and East (SIHRN) was officially inaugurated at the Vavuniya Secretariat (Kachcheri) by SIHRN's director Selvin Irenuess, Saturday, sources in Vavuniya said.


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'Peoples' commitment needed to achieve peace'- Westborg

[TamilNet, Saturday, 22 February 2003, 18:04 GMT]
Sri Lanka's Norwegian ambassador Mr.Jon Westborg Saturday appealed to all citizens to continue their commitment to overcome the obstacles in the path of achieving permanent peace, while addressing a meeting Saturday held at the Colombo Town Hall to mark the one-year completion of the ceasefire agreement signed by the United National Front (UNF)government and the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE).


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SLA tightens security at Muhamalai, Uyilankulam checkpoints

[TamilNet, Saturday, 22 February 2003, 17:59 GMT]
Sri Lanka Army (SLA) soldiers manning Muhamalai check point have tightened their checks and interrogation after the Manipay incident in which LTTE women cadres, civilians and journalists were assaulted by the SLA soldiers and police, sources said.
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Protest shutdown in Batticaloa, Amparai on CFA anniversary

[TamilNet, Saturday, 22 February 2003, 08:53 GMT]
Shops and businesses were closed and roads were deserted in the Batticaloa district Saturday in protest against Colombo's failure to -'satisfactorily honour' the Cease Fire Agreement (CFA) with the Liberation Tigers. The LTTE and the Government of Sri Lanka (GOSL) signed the CFA on one year ago, on 22 Feb. 2002.
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'Letter from the east gave Pirapaharan confidence' – author

[TamilNet, Saturday, 22 February 2003, 00:03 GMT]
"On August 4, 1987 our leader asked the large gathering on the Suthumalai grounds in Jaffna whether the Liberation Tigers should hand over their weapons to the Indian army. He was deeply distressed when many cheered him to do so. But it was a letter from this soil that convinced him not to surrender the arms," said Manalaaru Vijayan, the author of a book on massacres of Tamils in the Batticaloa-Amparai Districts by the Sri Lankan armed forces, released Friday.
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Implementation of Cease-fire Agreement not adequate- Sivajilingam

[TamilNet, Friday, 21 February 2003, 23:52 GMT]
Tamil National Alliance parliamentarian (TNA) Mr.M.K.Sivajilingam said Friday addressing a conference held at the Jaffna district secretariat that the Cease-fire Agreement (CFA) has not been implemented in a way to alleviate the sufferings of the displaced people who are still languishing in refugee camps and welfare centres.
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Protest against GOSL failure to implement ceasefire agreement

[TamilNet, Friday, 21 February 2003, 21:12 GMT]
The Jaffna District People's Forum (JPDF) Friday called for a token hunger campaign in front of the Nallur Kandasamy Temple on Sunday to highlight that cease-fire agreement (CFA) signed by the United National Front (UNF) government and the Liberation Tigers (LTTE) has not benefited Tamils in the northeast province. The Government of Sri Lanka (GOSL) has failed to implement the agreement fully, the campaign organizers said. The Consortium of NGOs in Jaffna district Friday called for a 'hartal' (general shut down) Saturday for the same reason till 10 in the morning, sources said.
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Pandemonium in parliament following JVP sit-in-protest

[TamilNet, Friday, 21 February 2003, 12:11 GMT]
Pandemonium reigned in the Sri Lankan parliament Friday as MPs from the Sinhala nationalist Janata Vimukthi Peramuna (JVP) held a sit in protest holding placards and shouting slogans against the United National Front (UNF) government and the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam. The parliamentarians were protesting against the police who dispersed their earlier demonstration Thursday.
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Police ban protest march in Trincomalee

[TamilNet, Thursday, 20 February 2003, 19:48 GMT]
The Trincomalee Police Thursday banned the black band protest march of the Tamils Women's Front in the eastern port town from St.Joseph's College to the office of the Sri Lanka Monitoring Mission (SLMM), which is located at the Inner Harbour Road.
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JVP in massive protest march against ceasefire agreement

[TamilNet, Thursday, 20 February 2003, 16:25 GMT]
Sri Lankan Police used tear gas and water cannon to disperse thousands of antigovernment demonstrators in Colombo Thursday afternoon. The protest was organised by the Sinhala nationalist party, Janata Vimukthi Peramuna, against the ceasefire agreement signed between with the Liberation Tigers and the Government of Sri Lanka.
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