Sinhala political faction opposing military rule over Tamils attacked in Jaffna

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 15 January 2013, 20:52 GMT]
Members of Front Line Socialist Party (FLSP), a breakaway faction of the JVP of the Sinhala South, who were seeking end of SL military rule over Tamils, land grab and abductions, as well as release of all political prisoners and Jaffna University student leaders were attacked publicly in the heart of Jaffna city, allegedly by SL military intelligence squads on Tuesday. The political faction from the South, under the banner, Sama Urimai Iyakkam in Tamil (Movement for Equal Rights) was engaged in a signature campaign among the Tamil public when motorbike squads attacked them and threw crude oil on to them in the typical way the SL military intelligence used to carry out attacks on Tamil activists in Jaffna.
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Peace activist grilled by terrorism department in Jaffna

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 09 January 2013, 10:24 GMT]
Sri Lanka’s Terrorist Investigation Department (TID) grilled Rev. Fr. Praveen OMI, Director of the Centre for Peace and Reconciliation (CPR) in Jaffna, for 7 hours on Tuesday, news sources in Jaffna said. TID personnel who went to the office of the centre at No 8, Grousseault Road in Jaffna by 8.30 am, subjected the priest to intense investigation until 3.30 pm. The entire office was searched and files and documents were scrutinized. In addition, Fr. Praveen has been ordered to go to the ‘Fourth Floor’ (CID headquarters) for further investigations on Friday. The CPR, an organization affiliated to the Catholic Church in Jaffna was actively involved in dealing with cases of abductions and disappearances of people in Jaffna.
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‘Australia’s foreign policy on Sri Lanka greatest sell-out in its history’: Trevor Grant

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 09 January 2013, 00:38 GMT]
“The Gillard Labor Government has decided to dance cheek-to-cheek with a war criminal because it wants to stop Tamil refugees fleeing to Australia before this year's election,” veteran journalist Trevor Grant told TamilNet, dubbing Australian’s current foreign policy on Sri Lanka as “one of the greatest sell-outs by government in Australian history.” Responding to questions sent via mail, Mr. Grant, former chief sports writer at The Age with over 40 years of experience in journalism, further criticised Australia’s, particularly Foreign Minister Bob Carr’s support for the CHOGM conference in Sri Lanka. “I find it astounding that Australia is going to help Sri Lanka set up CHOGM,” he said, adding that Australia should be leading the boycott of CHOGM to be held in Sri Lanka. Criticising the LLRC as “Rajapaksa eyewash”, he opined Australia should help prosecute war criminals in Sri Lanka.
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Systemic disappearances qualify as crimes against humanity in ICC, says Boyle

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 26 December 2012, 22:46 GMT]
The enforced disappearances of human beings that are widespread and systematic, such as the abductions of Tamils in the NorthEast including the midnight abduction of 28-year-old Mrs Soundararajan Sivamalar in Uduvil, Jaffna, on Christmas eve by Sri Lanka's Terrorism Division, are a Crime against Humanity under the Rome Statute for the International Criminal Court (ICC), Professor Boyle of the University of Illinois College of Law said. "So if Gotobhaya travels to an ICC Member State, it might be possible to get him prosecuted in the visiting country under its domestic implementing legislation for the Rome Statute," Boyle said.
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Sri Lanka’s terror abductions, arrests, summons mark Christmas Eve in Jaffna

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 25 December 2012, 22:43 GMT]
28-year-old Mrs Soundararajan Sivamalar, wife of an LTTE member killed in the war, and presently working at SL government’s Uduvil divisional secretariat, was abducted at midnight at her house recently. Sri Lanka’s Terrorist Investigation Department (TID) now informally acknowledged to the SL Human Rights Commission office in Jaffna that the ‘arrest’ was their act. Complaints of such abductions and ‘arrests’ of around 45 people have been registered in recent days at the SL human rights office in Jaffna, officials acknowledged on Monday. Many more abductions and arrests in the north have gone unregistered as the family members have been sternly warned by the occupying SL forces, not to register complaints at the SL human rights office. Meanwhile, many girl students of the Jaffna University have been ‘summoned’ over telephone by the TID in Vavuniyaa.
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SL military intimidates Tamil villagers for revealing information to UN agencies

[TamilNet, Monday, 24 December 2012, 20:56 GMT]
Tension prevails in the Tamil villages of Trincomalee district following intelligence operatives of the occupying Sri Lankan military have threatened the kith and kin of the disappeared persons not to divulge information to the foreign agencies, especially to UN agencies. A team of Sri Lanka Army (SLA) intelligence operatives, who visited Thampalakaamam in the district in a SLA vehicle three days ago, summoned the family members of the abducted and disappeared persons to a meeting and intimidated them not to pass any information to foreign sources about their missing family members.
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100,000 remain internally displaced, says UNHCR

[TamilNet, Sunday, 23 December 2012, 18:46 GMT]
In a report on the international protection needs of asylum seekers from Sri Lanka, UNHCR identifies several risk profiles including persons suspected of links with the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE), journalists, human rights activists, witnesses to rights violations, and vulnerable children and women, and notes while "there is an ethnic dimension to their vulnerability," in each of these risk groups, "members of the minority Tamil and, to a lesser extent, Muslim communities are reportedly more often subjected to arbitrary detention, abductions or enforced disappearances." Tamil activists including the New Zealand Tamil Action Front was consistently canvassing for this and there was a response in this regard from the Australian representative of the UNHCR in a regional meeting held at Auckland on 19 November.
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40 ex-LTTE members abducted within one week, IOM, UN blamed for silence

[TamilNet, Monday, 17 December 2012, 18:07 GMT]
Sri Lankan ‘Terrorist’ Investigation Department (TID) squads roaming around in Vanni and Jaffna peninsula have detained more than forty former LTTE members after abducting them from their residences and on the streets within the last one week alone, legal sources in Jaffna told TamilNet on Monday. Former LTTE members are also being summoned to the SLA camps and questioned over their contacts and friends. Relatives, friends and even employers of those who were summoned to the SL military camps live in fear. While every civil and social freedom of the ‘released’ former members of the LTTE is severely deprived by the occupying Sinhala military, the IOM and the UN that ‘certified’ their rehabilitation and release keep silent.
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TID interrogators fabricate accusation against 14 students in Jaffna

[TamilNet, Sunday, 09 December 2012, 01:28 GMT]
The ‘Terrorist’ Investigation Department operated by the Sri Lankan Defence Ministry is engaged in fabricating a false accusation against 13 students of the University of Jaffna and a few other students in the peninsula, informed sources close to paramilitary circles in Vavuniyaa said. The TID interrogators were working on a false accusation that ‘instructions’ and ‘money’ were provided by the Tamil diaspora in the West to observe Heroes Day in the homeland. Already, nine students of the University of Jaffna are illegally detained by TID interrogators at Vavuniyaa. According to news sources in Jaffna, two student leaders chose to seek humanitarian protection with the SL Human Rights Commission office in Jaffna on Friday. Two more students from the ‘wanted list’ of the TID are yet to seek protection, news sources in Jaffna said.
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London demonstrators urge UK, India to act through Commonwealth

[TamilNet, Monday, 23 July 2012, 23:49 GMT]
Gathering at 10 Downing Street in front of the residence of the British Prime Minister on Monday, Eezham Tamils in the UK remembered the 29th anniversary of the Black July massacre, urging for the expulsion of Sri Lanka from the Commonwealth and for Britain to boycott the CHOGM meeting scheduled to take place in the island next year. “During the 1983 pogrom, the Eezham Tamils could flee to the North as a sanctuary. Now, the extensive land grabs and militarization of the Tamil homeland has made it unsafe for them even in their home. The International Community and especially India should take responsibility for their calculated silence that has allowed this to happen,” Ravi Kumar from the British Tamils Forum (BTF) told TamilNet.
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Emerging logistics blueprint of Sri Lanka's White Van operations

[TamilNet, Monday, 23 July 2012, 01:58 GMT]
Tamils Against Genocide (TAG), a non-profit litigation and advocacy group based in the U.S., has pieced together an operational blueprint of Sri Lanka's White Van abductions, and the complicity of State Institutions. The blueprint is based on affidavits from surviving abductees, a video deposition from an ex-member of Liberation Tigers who was spared execution at the last moment, information revealed from recent capture of white van abductors in the South, and other circumstantial evidence including open death threats issued by Sri Lanka's Defense Secretary, Gotabhaya Rajapakse. TAG concludes that the white van phenomenon is not a random occurrence of isolated events, but a systemic well-organized criminal enterprise carried out by independently operating cells consisting of criminal gangs and military personnel and activated by directives from high level State officials.
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SLA appropriates more lands for militarisation of Jaffna city

[TamilNet, Sunday, 15 July 2012, 12:54 GMT]
While the occupying Sri Lanka Army in the city of Jaffna claims on one hand that it is shifting the military base of 512 Division to Koappaay, more lands are being appropriated for military use in the city. The Sri Lankan colonial military governor in Jaffna, Maj Gen (retd) GA Chandrasiri has instructed the Secretary of Education of Jaffna Province, S. Sathiyaseelan to hand over the lands belonging to Sinhala MV, situated in the environs of St. Mary's School, Our Lady of Refuge (OLR) and within a residential area boxed by 4th Cross Street, Hospital Road, Veampadi Road and Martin Road, to the commander of Sri Lankan forces in Jaffna Maj Gen Mahinda Hathursinghe for the construction of a military base in the city.
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British Court finds Sri Lanka torture allegations credible, stays deportation

[TamilNet, Thursday, 31 May 2012, 23:29 GMT]
British High Court of Justice, Administrative Court Judge, Mr Justice Eady, noting "[t]he recent Human Rights Watch report, dated 29.05.2012 suggests that there may be new evidence relevant to the risk of ill treatment," overturned the removal order on about 40 failed Tamil asylum seekers, in a dramatic last-minute order hailed by rights groups and attorneys representing to-be-deportees as a landmark decision in UK. "Judicial attitudes have changed," and "previously hard-line judges are granting stays, mostly on grounds of risk upon return," said Barristor Paramjothy from a London-based legal institution.
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Child abductions on rise in Jaffna

[TamilNet, Monday, 28 May 2012, 17:51 GMT]
Local human rights watchdogs in Jaffna have blamed media for failing to cover the abductions that are on the rise in Jaffna peninsula this weekend as a father from Valveddith-thu'rai (VVT) managed to chase a vehicle that abducted his son, securing his release in Ki'linochchi and a media worker at the Indian Deputy High Commission in Jaffna found his abducted son returning from Ki'linochchi the following day after the abductors finding him the son of an officer in the Indian mission in Jaffna. As the abductees are being taken to hide-outs in Ki'linochchi, human rights activists in Jaffna allege that the occupying Sri Lankan military is involved in the abductions.
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Ex-LTTE female cadre harassed by SLA commits suicide in ‘resettlement’ camp

[TamilNet, Saturday, 05 May 2012, 09:35 GMT]
A senior female ex-cadre of the LTTE, ‘rehabilitated’ and ‘released’ recently by the genocidal SL military has self-immolated herself Thursday night in Polika'ndi in Vadmaraadchi inside a closed room at the camp for resettlement-seeking people. The deceased, 38-year-old Suganthy Sivalingam, had been a member of the LTTE for more than 15 years and was serving in the LTTE medics after she sustained serious injury in a combat operation in 1999. She was engaged in medical services during the final days of the war in Vanni. Suganthy, who was mentally strong, was seen depressed and physically ill on the day of the suicide, the family said. Informed sources further said that the SL military had subjected the victim to severe mental torture in their 'rehabilitation' detention.
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Tamil student abducted, killed near SL military zone in Jaffna

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 18 April 2012, 17:33 GMT]
18-year-old Sivalingam Sivakumaran, a student from Kerudaavil village in Vadamaraadchi North of Jaffna district, was found slain inside a bush, 2 km away from his house on Wednesday. The Tamil student was abducted five days ago, on 13 April after 6:00 p.m., when he had left his house towards the historic Chelvach-channithi temple, according to the family of the victim. The Kerudaavil village is situated along the eastern border of the Valikaamam ‘High Security Zone’ of the occupying SL military. The student has been tortured and killed, the villagers who witnessed the recovery of the dead body told media. In the meantime, Indian parliamentarians were taken to Jaffna Wednesday evening, after being taken on a ‘guided’ tour, which was fully packed with ceremonial events, carefully avoiding interactions with civil representatives in Mullaiththeevu.
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SL military's draconian ‘civil’ rule hardens further in Vanni

[TamilNet, Sunday, 15 April 2012, 17:58 GMT]
The village level Rural Development Societies (RDS), which have started functioning again, especially in the agricultural areas of Vanni mainland, have been subjected to harassments by the occupying SL military in recent days. On the one hand, the Sri Lankan authorities have gone on record as if they were encouraging the re-emerging RDS societies, and on the other hand, the SL military is curbing the activities of the rural development organisations. The SL military has instructed the RDS societies not to conduct any meeting without securing permission in advance from the nearby military camps. In the meantime, female members of the families of former LTTE cadres and even the temple deities face sadistic treatment from the occupying Sinhala military, say civil sources in Ki'linochchi district.
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Rajapaksa's blithe contempt for world opinion: Paper

[TamilNet, Friday, 13 April 2012, 21:48 GMT]
Pointing out that in Sri Lanka "[t]he rule of law continues to be set aside. A huge military machine is yet to be stood down. Glaring war crimes remain to be investigated. Tamils are treated as a subjugated people. Emergency security measures continue, turned against Rajapaksa's critics even among the Sinhala majority," Sydney Morning Herald (SMH) wondered that, "if Sinhala majority are not protected by law, what hope do Tamils have?"
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Pakistan paper compares White-Van squad to Black Prados

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 28 March 2012, 11:52 GMT]
Reporting a conference titled ‘Different Worlds, Similar Threats’, jointly organized at the University of California by four media organizations and participated by journalists from different parts of the world, The News, the largest English newspaper of Pakistan, on Wednesday said: “If the black Prado is a sign of fear for Pakistani journalists for its frequent use in state-sponsored abduction, the word ‘white van’ is nightmarish for Sri Lankan journalists as they are used by intelligence agencies for abducting journalists and human right activists.” Iqbal Athas, the former defense columnist of Sunday Times, exiled in 2009, took part in the conference giving a presentation.
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Centre for Peace and Reconciliation attacked in Jaffna

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 20 March 2012, 10:30 GMT]
Four armed personnel, allegedly from the occupying Sri Lankan military's Intelligence, on Saturday attacked Tamil civilians who had gathered at the Centre for Peace and Reconciliation (CPR) at Grousseault Road in Jaffna City to receive free legal assistance in their effort to locate their kith and kin whose whereabouts are not known following the undeclared arrests, abductions during the mass incarceration and white-van abductions in Jaffna peninsula and Vanni. The CPR, which is run by the Church, regularly conducts free legal aid for victims of human rights violations. The attackers beat the victims and threw dirt on them forcing them to flee the Centre. Meanwhle, SL military intelligence operatives were questioning the whereabouts of a priest of the CPR alleging that he had gone to attend the Human Rights Council sessions taking place in Geneva.
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