Viral fever sweeps Jaffna, northeast

[TamilNet, Monday, 27 November 2006, 01:16 GMT]
Viral fever, suspected to be Chikungunya, is spreading rapidly amongst people in Jaffna, medical experts said Sunday. “In Jaffna, this viral fever which has the symptoms of Chikungunya is spreading very fast. I find that more than 5,000 people have been infected," Dr. A. Ketheeswaran, director of provincial health services there, told Reuters. The disease has been confirmed spreading rapidly in Kalmunai, Mannar, Batticaloa, Puttalam and parts of Colombo.
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Tree planting encouraged in Mullaithivu on Pirapaharan's birthday

[TamilNet, Sunday, 26 November 2006, 18:52 GMT]
Business Union in Mullaithivu, on Sunday, organised an event to celebrate the 52nd birth day of LTTE leader V.Pirapaharan. Sea Tiger Special Commander Col. Soosai took part in the event where tree saplings were gifted, encouraging the local community to plant trees along the coast, ravaged by the Boxing Day tsunami in 2004.
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Heroes Day celebrations held across Jaffna as jubilation triumphs fear

[TamilNet, Sunday, 26 November 2006, 12:22 GMT]
Sri Lanka Army (SLA) troopers remained inside their camps in the villages in Vadamaradchy, Valikamam, Thenmaradchi sectors and the outskirts of Jaffna city following posters that warned soldiers to stay inside their camps Sunday. Villages that have remained gripped with fear due to forced disappearances and killings for many weeks, were decorated with red and yellow flags, and youths wearing tiger-striped uniforms were seen in many places in Vadamaradchy, residents said. Meanwhile, SLA soldiers in Jaffna town and the surroundings of University of Jaffna and Parameswara Junction on Palay Road conducted search operations.
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India wants Northeast merger to stand - report

[TamilNet, Sunday, 26 November 2006, 07:43 GMT]
India has again called upon Sri Lankan President Mahinda Rajapakse to honour the Indo-Sri Lanka Agreement and give legal force to the Northeast merger, The Sunday Leader newspaper reported this week. Even before the Supreme Court’s ruling in October that the merger of the North and East in 1987 was ‘null, void and illegal’, Delhi had already expressed its opposition to the move, a view echoed by the Co-Chairs – US, EU, Japan and Norway – last week.
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Two Police constables injured in Vavuniya claymore attack

[TamilNet, Saturday, 25 November 2006, 12:00 GMT]
Two Sri Lanka Police constables were injured, one of them seriously, when unknown assailants triggered a claymore mine targetted at a Police road patrol in Poovarasankulam along Vavuniya-Mannar road at 7:40 a.m. Saturday, Vavuniya Police said.
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SLA demands cutting down trees lining Jaffna roads

[TamilNet, Saturday, 25 November 2006, 04:05 GMT]
Sri Lanka Army (SLA) in Jaffna is forcing civilians to cut down the trees and shrubs along Jaffna-Palaly road and along roads leading to SLA camps in the Peninsula citing security reasons, civil society sources in Jaffna said Friday. The SLA had ordered all trees along the Jaffna- Kankesanthurai road cut down two months earlier in a similar operation.
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Heroes day celebrations continue amid SLA sabotage

[TamilNet, Friday, 24 November 2006, 16:17 GMT]
Sri Lanka Army (SLA) soldiers have desecrated Heroes cemetaries located in Kopay, Ellankulam in Udupiddy and in Kodikamam as part of a wide spread attempt at sabotaging the Heroes day celebrations and muzzling the emotional support of the residents of Jaffna district in paying homage to those who died in the Tamil national struggle, civil society sources in Jaffna said.
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SLA soldier arrested on Farm school killings

[TamilNet, Friday, 24 November 2006, 15:23 GMT]
Police Officers from Criminal Investigation Department (CID) arrested a Sri Lanka Army (SLA) soldier Friday on suspicion of involvement in the killing of five students of School of Agriculture in Thandikulam, Vavuniya last Saturday and detained him. The soldier, together with the police officer arrested earlier on Wednesday for alleged involvement in the massacre, are to be produced before Vavuniya district judge Mr Manickavasagar, Ilancheliyan on 5 December for an identification parade.
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SLA shoots dead 5 youths in Vavuniya, 1 dies in grenade explosion

[TamilNet, Friday, 24 November 2006, 11:47 GMT]
Sri Lanka Army (SLA) Friday handed over 5 bullet-sprayed dead bodies and an exploded body to Police, claiming that the youths were killed when SLA troopers retaliated to gunfire Thursday night. The sixth youth had killed himself, Friday early morning, detonating a hand grenade, according to the SLA that claimed that the youths were LTTE cadres waiting to penetrate into SLA area. The killings have taken place at Parayanalankulam 30 km west of Vavuniya town along Vauniya Mannar Road.
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Jaffna fishermen face economic ruin, starvation

[TamilNet, Friday, 24 November 2006, 01:01 GMT]
Comprehensive ban on fishing imposed by Sri Lanka Security forces across the shores of Jaffna Peninsula and islets has driven fisher families into economic ruin and forced many families near starvation, Fisheries Society sources said. Fishing ban is active in Vadamaradchy shores for the last six months, and ban was introduced in the rest of the peninsula after fighting brokeout between Liberation Tigers and Sri Lanka military on 11 August.
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Police officer detained on killings at Vavuniya Farm school

[TamilNet, Thursday, 23 November 2006, 14:08 GMT]
Criminal Investigation Department (CID) officers in Vavuniya have arrested and brought before Vavuniya Judge, a police officer Wednesday on alleged suspicion of involvement in the massacre of five Farm School students and indiscriminate fire on students inside the school premises last Saturday. The police officer, attached to a Police post in Thirunavatkulam, 250 meters west of the Farm School, was alleged to have rushed to the school and joined the Sri Lanka Army troopers from a nearby checkpost, when they fired indiscriminately at the students inside the school premises, legal sources in Vavuniya said.
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Colombo intensifies aerial bombardment

[TamilNet, Thursday, 23 November 2006, 11:23 GMT]
Sri Lanka Air Force (SLAF) bombers intensified aerial bombardment on LTTE controlled areas for the third day on Thursday. 2 Kfir bombers dropped bombs near a civilian settlment in Oddusuddan around 9:30 a.m. and on Mullaithivu around 1:30 p.m.
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Sri Lanka Army launches tank offensive on Vaharai

[TamilNet, Thursday, 23 November 2006, 03:43 GMT]
Heavy fighting broke out between the Sri Lanka Army and the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam, at the southern border of Vaharai region in Batticaloa district Thursday as SLA troopers from Kajuwatte and Mankerni SLA camps, launched a ground troop movement backed by heavy mortar, artillery and Multi-Barrel Rocket fire, into the LTTE territory Thursday around 8:30 a.m. The fresh SLA operation comes following Sri Lankan defence spokesman Keheliya Rambukwela's interpretation on Wednesday that the outcome of a crucial meeting by the Co-Chairs was not hard as Colombo had feared. Mr. Rambukwela had said Sri Lanka's "national security" had a higher priority than upholding the ceasefire.
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Foreign envoys meet IDPs, medical, fisheries officials in Jaffna

[TamilNet, Thursday, 23 November 2006, 01:13 GMT]
Dr. C. Kathiravetpillai, Medical Officer at the Manthikai Base Hospital in Point. Pedro, Vadamaradchi raised the current acute shortage of essential food provisions, medical supplies and the malnutrition and starvation in the Jaffna peninsula caused by the closure A9 land route, with the Foreign envoys of Switzerland, Australia and United Kingdom when they visited the hospital Wednesday, sources in Point Pedro said.
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One SLA trooper dead, three injured in claymore attack in Jaffna

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 22 November 2006, 19:48 GMT]
Unidentified persons triggered a claymore device Tuesday around 4:00 p.m at Gnaniyar Valavu area in Varani Thenmaradchi, killing one Sri Lanka Army (SLA) trooper and injuring three of the SLA road patrol unit on its way to Apoothy SLA camp from the 52nd SLA Division, military officials said. The claymore device was attached to a bicycle left along the road on the deserted boundary area between Vadamaradchi and Thenmaradchi of the Jaffna peninsula.
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Body exhumed in Kondavil, 10 youths surrender to HRC

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 22 November 2006, 12:27 GMT]
A body believed to be belonging to a Tamil youth was recovered buried near a desolated house in Nanthavil area in Kondavil, 5km north of Jaffna town, in the presence of Jaffna Assistant Magistrate Mr M. Thirunavukarasu, source in Jaffna said. Chunnakam Police receiving a trip, obtained legal permission from Jaffna Magistrate to exhume the remains, legal sources said.
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Sri Lanka rejects Co-Chairs’ condemnation, continues attacks

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 22 November 2006, 12:25 GMT]
Unfazed by strong condemnation by international donors of rights abuses and truce violations by its military, Sri Lanka’s government Wednesday continued air strikes and bombardment against the Liberation Tigers. Saying the donors had been “mislead” by international truce monitors and a UN envoy, government defense spokesman Keheliya Rambukwella insisted that national security took precedence over the ceasefire and that the international community recognised this.
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Two Tamil civilians shot dead in Trincomalee

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 22 November 2006, 09:06 GMT]
Unidentified armed men who came in a motorbike shot dead two Tamil civilians when they were riding in a motorbike Wednesday morning around 7:30 a.m., to report for work in a cement factory located in the Chinabay police division. The killings took place when the victims had been riding along the rail track in Palaiyootu village, Police said.
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Opening A9 imperative to avoid humanitarian crisis, Bishop tells Envoys

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 21 November 2006, 17:04 GMT]
Bishop of Jaffna, Rt. Rev. Dr. Thomas Savundaranayagam stressed on the immediate opening of the A9 route as the only remedy for the humanitarian disaster prevailing in the Jaffna peninsula when Australian High Commissioner Greg French, Switzerland Ambassador Ruth Flint and the British Deputy High Commissioner Lesley Craig met the bishop Tuesday around 3:00 p.m at Bishop's House in Jaffna, sources in Jaffna said.
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SLAF bombs Kilinochchi suburbs

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 21 November 2006, 09:24 GMT]
Kfir bombers of Sri Lanka Air Force bombed the suburbs of Kilinochchi and a jungle area in the district Tuesday between 9:15 and 9:45 a.m. Students and children fled school premises as the bombers flew at a lower altitude and the impact of the explosions was felt in the buildings in the town.
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