People of all walks of life victims in ‘chosen island’ of geopolitics, religious extremism

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 23 April 2019, 23:12 GMT]
The families and the relatives of the victims of the serial terror attacks on Easter Sunday mourned their dead with mass burials and an island-wide day of mourning with three minutes of silence on Tuesday. At least 45 of those killed were children, according to the figures gathered by the United Nations. As the death toll from the bombings rose to 321, the Syria-based Islamic State group, which had lost all its territorial control in Syria and Iraq, claimed that it stood behind the serial terror attacks, publishing photos and a video of the attackers. In the meantime, reports also said that the US Indo-Pacific Command had wrapped up a joint naval training, four days earlier than it was scheduled to conclude in Hambantota.
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Sinhala colonisation escalated in Vavuniyaa North with a multitude of players backing infrastructure

[TamilNet, Thursday, 18 April 2019, 21:24 GMT]
Elected civic members of Vavuniyaa North Divisional Council (PS) complain that the Sinhala colonisation is relentlessly targeting the eastern side of their division. The occupying Sinhala Army and its home-guards paramilitary act as the guardians of the colony while the extremist Buddhist monks coordinate the systematic expansion. Various SL ministries provide the infrastructure. Besides, a host of actors from a leading socio-economic NGO with Buddhist philosophy to a local extremist group known as ‘Sinhala Power in the North‘ (‘Uture Hela Balaya’ or ‘Utura Rakina Raṭa Surakina Jātika Balaya - Vanni’) facilitate it through different approaches. Also, sections of expatriate Sinhalese, including a retired professor from Australia, have funded the housing projects of the scheme. The Sinhala settlers are being radicalised without any provocation or hostility from the Tamils.
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ITAK must act to revoke Gazette notifications, transfer Land Commissioner in East

[TamilNet, Saturday, 30 March 2019, 20:21 GMT]
SL President Maithiripala Sirisena has only revoked one of the Gazette notifications that had been issued by his predecessor Mahinda Rajapaksa who had seized the lands of Tamils in Champoor. After the revocation of Gazette notification of transferring lands to SL Board of Investment under the Urban Development Act (UDA), the people resettled. However, a previous Gazette notification, which was made by Mr Rajapaksa who acquired the lands of the people under an urgency clause of the Land Acquisition Act (LAA), remains in force. Although repeated requests were made by Moothoor Divisional Secretary to re-issue necessary land permits to the people who had owned these lands for decades, Provincial Land Commissioner of the Eastern Province D.D. Anura Dharmadhasa has been blocking the move citing the initial Gazette notification, say Tamil-speaking Muslim officials at Moothoor DS.
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Acid test for Tamil Nadu: DMK politician tricked into geopolitics of genocidal Sri Lanka

[TamilNet, Sunday, 24 March 2019, 23:29 GMT]
Within a few days after getting over with the ‘mere formality’ at the UN Human Rights Council in Geneva, SL Prime Minister Ranil Wickramsinghe is moving ahead with upholding the very same ‘development’ paradigm of the former SL President Mahinda Rajapaksa through securing USD one billion loan from China to link the centre of the island to the Chinese-built seaport Hambantota, which Mr Wickramasinghe leased out to China for 99 years in 2017. The SL Prime Minister has also tricked the family-owned business of Tamil Nadu's DMK politician Samikannu Jagathratchagan to invest 70% of USD 3.85 billion to build an oil refinery and cement factory in Mirijjawila in Hambantota district. The investment, made along with Oman's Oil Co (30%), is the largest foreign direct investment in the island, according to media reports in Colombo.
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Sinhala monks deploy different tactics to make inroad into Batticaloa

[TamilNet, Saturday, 23 March 2019, 21:18 GMT]
Trincomalee and Ampaa'rai, two of the three districts in the East, are long subjected to systematic Sinhala-Buddhicisation. Although the district of Batticaloa is facing structural occupation across the interior villages that border with Polonnaruwa and Ampaa'rai districts, the supremacist Sinhala Theravada Buddhist establishment and the unitary state system were unable to make headway for Sinhalicisation agenda in the urban areas of the district. However, two Sinhala monks have been experimenting with different tactics to achieve that agenda in the city and its suburbs after the end of the genocidal war in Vanni in 2009. The latest experiment seeks to deceive Tamils through accommodating two Hindu temples within the Sinhala Buddhist monastery establishment which is being expanded with a Vihara at “Jayanthi-pura,” 5 km northeast of the city where no Sinhala people reside.
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Colombo sabotaging mass grave investigations and Tamils learning lessons on ‘hybrid’ paradigm

[TamilNet, Sunday, 10 March 2019, 18:34 GMT]
The radiocarbon tests carried out on bone samples, which the SL authorities had dispatched to a US laboratory, as dating 377 to 615 years back has disappointed many people, who have valid reasons to believe that the recently exhumed mass graves in Mannaar are from the 1990s. The results obtained from Florida-based Beta Analytic (BETA) are being prematurely released by Colombo to imply that the period of the mass grave predates the genocidal war in the island by centuries. BETA has not issued an overall interpretation of all the samples or passed any judgement on the supplied samples as being adequate to conclude the core issue. Besides, there are several unanswered questions, most of them concerning the trustworthiness of the SL State-operated institutions handling the submission, as well as other artefacts revealing 1990s as the time of the crime.
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Occupying Colombo set to grab 227 acres of private lands in Vali North in Jaffna

[TamilNet, Friday, 08 March 2019, 20:24 GMT]
At least 163 acres of private lands of Eezham Tamils in a triangle area along the coast in Kaangkeasan-thu'rai (KKS) between the Cement Factory, the old hospital and Keerimalai are to be officially seized by the SL State for the use of the occupying Sinhala Navy in KKS Centre (J/234) GS Division. In the meantime, another area of 64 acres is being appropriated in the vicinity of the historically famous Keerimalai Nakuleasvaram temple in Keerimalai GS Division (J/226). The ‘Tourist Development Authority’ of genocidal Sri Lanka (SLTDA) is set to receive this land. Two acres of these lands are also going to be transferred to the SL Navy, Tamil officials at Jaffna District Secretariat said.
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Sinhala ‘emperor’ monk wants Muslims expelled from Arisi-malai in Trincomalee

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 06 March 2019, 17:29 GMT]
An extremist Sinhala-Buddhist monk in Pulmoaddai division of Trincomalee has vowed to expel all the Muslims from Arisi-malai area, which he considered as ‘Buddha Pooja Boomi’ of an allegedly fictive ‘ancient heritage’. The monk, Panamure Thilakawansa, was attending the SL courts earlier this year carrying a placard which said ‘I am Chakravarthy’ (emperor). L.H.M. Halid, one of the six families that filed a case against their lands being appropriated, said the latest dispute was about six of forty-six acres of lands in extent.
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Sinhala monk wages anti-TNA propaganda among flood-affected Tamils

[TamilNet, Saturday, 05 January 2019, 22:10 GMT]
The Tamil people in Vanni should thank the SL military as their saviours as it protected them from the recent floods and the Tamil people should not demand its withdrawal from the North, said Sinhala extremist politician in saffron robes, Battaramulla Seelarathana thero, who was visiting Ki'linochchi and Mullaiththeevu this weekend in an apparent propaganda move. The TNA politicians, who demand de-militarisation were flying in helicopters while the SL military was helping the flood-affected Tamils on the ground, the extremist monk told the people. Apart from the drive to promote military psyops, his visit was aimed at strengthening Sinhala settlers (not affected by the floods) who have encroached Karai-thu'raip-pattu division in Mullaiththeevu district seizing the strategic link between the North and East to wedge the contiguity of the traditional Tamil homeland permanently.
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Tamil dairy farmers face two-frontal attacks in interior Batticaloa

[TamilNet, Friday, 04 January 2019, 17:11 GMT]
Ex-paramilitary Karuna Group, which is aligned with former SL President Mahinda Rajapaksa has been gunning down the cattle belonging to dairy farmers at the pasturelands of Paalai-vaddavaan (Paalai-madu) in Paduvaan-karai, the interior northwestern part of Batticaloa district which was protected by the LTTE before 2007 from Sinhala colonisation coming from Polonnaruwa, the home district of Mr Sirisena. In the meantime, Sinhala encroacher ‘home guards’ paramilitary men have stolen eight calves within the last 20 days. The SL police are taking the side of the encroachers and demands the Tamil dairy farmers to identify the ‘thieves’ to register a complaint. The calve thefts have taken place at Mayilaththa-madu pasture land, which is located within two kilometres from the Paalai-madu tank, where the former paramilitary men who have been firing at the cows.
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SL military erects giant Buddha statue at controversial heritage site in Mullaiththeevu

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 12 December 2018, 21:45 GMT]
The occupying Sinhala military in Mullaith-theevu installed a small Buddha statue, which was covered with glass at the disputed heritage site of Neeraaviyadi-eattam in Chemmalai in November. The SL military has now hurriedly replaced it with a huge Buddha statue disregarding the interim order and the protests of Tamil residents. The move comes after a delegation from the SL Archaeology Department in Colombo visited the SL military prompting it to accomplish the mission, civil sources in Mullaiththeevu District Secretariat told TamilNet. An extremist Buddhist monk, Kolamba Medhalankara Thera, staying with the SL Army's 593rd Brigade at Naayaa'ru is operating with the thinking that once the giant statue has been successfully erected, Tamil protests, as well as the interim orders, would lose their impact as the SL Constitution accords ‘foremost place to Buddhism’, the sources further said.
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Washington set to downgrade ‘human rights politics’ to association level in Indo-Pacific

[TamilNet, Friday, 07 December 2018, 19:26 GMT]
A new US Senate bill named as “Asia Reassurance Initiative Act of 2018” (ARIA) has been passed with an amendment by unanimous consent on 04 December 2018. The Trump Administration that has fully withdrawn from the UN Human Rights Council in Geneva will be downscaling the scope of its human rights agenda er to a regional intergovernmental association level (ASEAN) if ARIA becomes a law. Republican Senator Cory Gardner from Colorado, who proposed the bill in April has urged the US House of Representatives to quickly send the legislation to the desk of President Donald Trump for him to sign it into law.
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SL State becomes prime reference for ‘debt trap diplomacy’ of China in US rhetorics

[TamilNet, Monday, 03 December 2018, 19:03 GMT]
The unitary state of genocidal Sri Lanka has become the de-facto reference case for Chinese debt-trap diplomacy, which is being increasingly referred in the US political, military and financial discussions. USINDOPACOM Commander Admiral Philip S. Davidson made a reference to ‘Sri Lanka’ when he faced a question on what he found as the most problematic with the Belt and Road initiative on 30 November. In the meantime, Roland de Marcellus, the acting deputy assistant secretary for international finance and development within the Bureau of Economic and Business Affairs, testifying at a US Senate subcommittee hearing on “multilateral economic institutions in foreign policy,” on 27 November said ‘Sri Lanka’ had become “a campaign issue in many elections around the world where opposition groups are criticizing the volume of Chinese lending and the terms and all of the other drawbacks”.
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Genocidal Sri Lanka's maritime and naval greed expose attitudes of powers

[TamilNet, Sunday, 18 November 2018, 11:29 GMT]
Maithiripala Sirisena, the incumbent SL President and Ranil Wickramasinghe, the now disputed SL Prime Minister, increased military-to-military maritime training with the USA, India and Japan between 2015 and 2017 while seeking to exploit the China-tilt ‘achievements’ of the Rajapaksa government. The SL Navy was receiving naval vessels as gifts from all the powers after the 2015 regime change. However, the SL State wanted more and more, believing that the geopolitical paradigm experimented through the genocide on Eezham Tamils would bring it fortunes. The naval ambitions went to the extent of wanting 25 powerful naval vessels from different actors to create a powerful naval fleet. At the same time, SL State's maritime economic ambitions were aimed at making Colombo the financial hub in the Indian Ocean.
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US House Democrats, blind on genocide, express escapist concerns on SL 'reforms'

[TamilNet, Monday, 12 November 2018, 11:07 GMT]
Dina Titus, the co-chair of the Sri Lanka Caucus in the US House of Representatives, has stated along with fellow Democrat Representatives, David Price and Eliot L. Engel on Friday, urging the SL President Maithiripala Sirisena to uphold the commitment of his government to democratic governance and reopen the SL Parliament. In a letter to Mr Sirisena, the US Democratic members expressed deep concern that the suspension of Sri Lanka’s Parliament circumvents the country’s constitution and democratic process.
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Germany promotes trade with genocidal Sri Lanka

[TamilNet, Sunday, 11 November 2018, 12:25 GMT]
The Federal Republic of Germany, which is the 4th largest economy in the world and the biggest economy within the European Union, has been accelerating trade moves to create business opportunities for ‘Sri Lankan’ and German companies between March and October 2018. Germany is also home to a large number of genocide-affected Eezham Tamils. Tamil grassroots activists in Jaffna have urged increased awareness among the Tamil diaspora at the wake of a call to conceive a Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) campaign against genocidal Sri Lanka as the SL President Maithiripala Sirisena installed Mahinda Rajapaksa as the Prime Minister. In the meantime, a report by the leading German media house Deutsche Welle said: “German companies have so far invested around one billion dollars in Sri Lanka. Compared to China’s investment since 2005, that figure is modest.”
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Obama,Clinton, Power accountable for protracted genocide haunting Tamils

[TamilNet, Saturday, 10 November 2018, 21:24 GMT]
From Hillary Clinton to Samantha Power, the principal actors of Barak Obama's administration knowingly abetted the Sri Lankan State, which was committing genocide and paved the way for the post-2009 paradigm of structural genocide by swapping international investigations with incompatible transitional justice for the sake of their geopolitical access. Particularly after 2015, the Obama administration promoted the cosmetic changes to the unitary constitution of genocidal Sri Lanka and wanted Tamils to adopt collaboration politics with Sinhala rulers, which is interpreted as Quisling Politics by the grassroots of Eezham Tamils. Samantha Power, who was the U.S. Permanent Representative to the United Nations (August 2013 – January 2017), is now escaping with soft Tweets while Clinton is silent.
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Sirisena dissolves SL parliament as Rajapaksa fails on numbers game

[TamilNet, Friday, 09 November 2018, 23:06 GMT]
Maithiripala Sirisena, the executive president of the unitary state of genocidal Sri Lanka, dissolved the SL Parliament on Friday. Mr Sirisena was citing a mixture of constitutional clauses to justify his decision. The move comes as the newly appointed SL Prime Minister Mahinda Rajapaksa reportedly failed to secure the majority needed to justify his appointment. There were widespread allegations that the Rajapaksa brothers were investing ‘Chinese money’ to buy over the parliamentarians. However, such buy-overs have not taken place to the alleged extent. Tamil political observers, not aligned to any of the geopolitical camps, believe that both the USA and China, who are the leading global actors as well as India which has emerged as the main ally of the Trump administration in the Indian Ocean Region, seem to be at a wait-and-see mode at the moment.
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Military coercion takes upper-hand in Indo-Pacific, soft power era is over

[TamilNet, Thursday, 08 November 2018, 23:36 GMT]
“I think in 15 years — it’s not inevitable — but it is a very strong likelihood that we will be at war with China,” said United States Army Europe (USAREUR) former Commander Lt. General Ben Hodges while addressing Warsaw Security Forum on 24 October in Poland. Hodges was making a point to his European partners that the USA would not be able to deter both Russia and China at the same time at the event of a global confrontation in the future. In his drive to convince the US allies in Europe to take a larger share in their preparedness to deter Russia, the former US Commander was implying that the priorities have changed and the military assets of the USA were going to be concentrated in the Indo-Pacific in the long run. The unitary state of genocidal Sri Lanka is deeply caught up in the geopolitical disputes, on which it has sustained its anti-Tamil political space so far.
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Rajapaksa pondering of revising Wickramasinghe's 99-year port-lease to China

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 06 November 2018, 22:22 GMT]
Mahinda Rajapaksa has spoken to Chinese officials about ‘revising the terms’ of the Hambantota port lease, a report by the Associated Press said on Monday. The AP was citing Kehaliya Rambukwella, the spokesman of Rajapaksa-led SL government in Colombo. Mr Rajapkasa lost his executive presidency in January 2015, three months after a Chinese warship and a submarine docked Colombo in October 2014. Now, Wickramasinghe has learnt the same lesson after the infamous 99-year port lease to China, commented Tamil political observers in Jaffna.
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