Colombo-Vavuniyaa train service stops with Madawachchi

[TamilNet, Saturday, 14 March 2009, 14:13 GMT]
Vavuniyaa bound Yaazh Theavi (Yarl Devi) train service from Colombo has been curtailed up to Madawachchi due to 'security reasons' with effect from Thursday until further notice, media reports said. Railway Department, however, has not given the reason for the suspension of service, according to media reports.
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50,000 families affected by floods in 'safe zone'

[TamilNet, Thursday, 12 March 2009, 13:07 GMT]
Health officials in Vanni said Wednesday that civilians inside the 'safe zone', urgently need at least 50,000 temporary shelters and temporary toilets as they live under worn out tarpaulin tents. There is a severe shortage of food and medicines. Scarcity of drinking water and sanitation facilities add to the woes of the people, health officials said. The makeshift hospital in Puthumaaththa'lan was struggling to accommodate patients under its roof. Many patients were earlier staying outside the building. The ICRC ship, which uses to transport the seriously wounded did not come due to the bad weather conditions, the officials further said.
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Menon wants civilians issue and war ending in Colombo’s favour

[TamilNet, Thursday, 12 March 2009, 10:32 GMT]
The Indian Foreign Secretary Shiv Shankar Menon, has said in Washington that “civilians caught in the war should be safely moved to government-controlled areas”, PTI reported Thursday. Wrapping up his four days US visit and briefing that both India and the US have similar approaches to address the issue in Sri Lanka, he envisaged rehabilitation, reconstruction and building up normal economic life of people “once these areas are cleared or under the government control.” He also said on the need “to bring in the kind of the political steps including devolution”, according to the PTI report. Whatever Menon said in Washington doesn’t significantly differ from the verbal stance adopted by Mahinda Rajapaksa government, aiming for victory and subjugation of Tamils, said political observers in Colombo.
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Jaffna food produces to be sent to South

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 11 March 2009, 18:10 GMT]
Jaffna Government Agent (GA) informed Wednesday that 9 lorries will take a consignment of local food produces including dried fish, onions, beetroot and prawns to South Sri Lanka Thursday through A9 land route. Fisheries society sources expressed concern that this arrangement will raise the price of fish that is in heavy demand in the peninsula, affecting the consumers. The GA, however, said that this measure is being taken to increase marketing opportunities for the local products.
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Relief supplies reach Jaffna through A9 road

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 10 March 2009, 21:47 GMT]
Despite announcement made by Commissioner of Essential Services that relief supplies to Jaffna would be sent from Vavuniyaa in 40 lorries only 22 of them arrived in Jaffna Tuesday around 7:30 p.m at Naavatku’li Government Stores, sources in Jaffna said. Jaffna Government Agent (GA) and other key government officers in Jaffna, on directives by the government, had waited at Naavatku’li to receive the convoy of lorries that were bringing goods along A9 land route for the first time after a long period, but had to cancel their program and get back to Jaffna as the lorries were late in arriving at their destination, sources in Jaffna said.
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Flood affected refugees in internment camps refuse temporary re-location

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 10 March 2009, 06:48 GMT]
Tamil refugees from Vanni, detained at schools in Vavuniyaa, were affected by heavy downpour of rain Monday, but refused temporary relocation, officials in Vavuniyaa said. The refugees turned down the offer in fear of getting separated from each other, the sources added.
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SLA cut downs use of A9 route to Jaffna due to security risks

[TamilNet, Monday, 09 March 2009, 15:56 GMT]
Sri Lanka Army (SLA) which had earlier announced the opening of A9 land route to Jaffna has now limited its turns of transporting soldiers to 3 days in a week due to clashes breaking along the road and security risks, SLA sources in Jaffna said. Information on the days of transport is not disclosed and the convoy of busses takes the soldiers on vacation from Palaali to Vavuniyaa and back on unannounced days, three times a week.
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SLA arrests 12 youths in Vavuniyaa

[TamilNet, Sunday, 08 March 2009, 11:10 GMT]
Sri Lanka Army (SLA) soldiers arrested 12 youths Sunday morning in a search operation conducted in Cheddiku’lam and Poovarasangku’lam in Vavuniyaa district. The fate of seven of the arrested youths is not known as only five of them are detained in Vavuniyaa police station, the relatives of the youths said.
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Paramilitary, intelligence personnel arrested for abduction, ransom

[TamilNet, Saturday, 07 March 2009, 06:22 GMT]
Vavuniyaa police in mufti arrested Wednesday three paramilitary persons and three Sri Lanka military intelligence personnel for the abduction of the Assistant Manager of the Bank of Ceylon Vavuniyaa branch and a security officer Tuesday, demanding millions of rupees from the Bank as ransom, sources in Vavuniyaa said. The abductors later demanded the family members of the two abducted officers to pay a ransom of 900,000 rupees as Bank of Ceylon authorities refused to pay the sum originally demanded.
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SLN arrested Vanni civilians held back in Point Pedro

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 04 March 2009, 16:08 GMT]
Only five of the 92 civilians fleeing war in Vanni and arrested Tuesday by Sri Lanka Navy (SLN) on the seas of Point Pedro have been handed over to the Sri Lanka Army (SLA) detention camp in Kodikaamam Government Tamil Mixed School (GTMS) while the fate of the rest 87 civilians remains unknown, Kodikaamam sources said. None of the arrested civilians has been produced in Point Pedro Magistrate Court either until Wednesday evening. Independent sources in Jaffna said that civilians fleeing war from Liberation Tigers held areas coming into Vavuniyaa and Jaffna peninsula and arrested are subjected to intensive screening by the SLA and that many of them have disappeared without any trace, a trend that continues.
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Charred body with gunshot wounds recovered in Vavuniyaa

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 03 March 2009, 12:15 GMT]
The charred body of a youth with gunshot injuries in his head was recovered Monday morning in Maha Irrambaiku'lam area in Vavuniyaa police division. He was blindfolded and hands were tied from behind, media sources said.
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SLA uses A9 route to Jaffna after 18 years

[TamilNet, Monday, 02 March 2009, 22:51 GMT]
A detachment of around 600 Sri Lanka Army (SLA) soldiers arrived in a convoy of buses Monday evening in Jaffna town along the A9 Jaffna-Kandy land route from Vavuniyaa town after a period of nearly eighteen years, sources in Jaffna said.
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IDP shelters gutted by fire in Vavuniyaa

[TamilNet, Sunday, 01 March 2009, 18:34 GMT]
Eight temporary shelters in the welfare centre for Internally Displaced Persons (IDPs) located in Unit 11 in Poonthoaddam, Vavuniyaa were completely gutted by fire Saturday noon, sources in Vavuniyaa said.
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Eastern University suspends lectures, examinations

[TamilNet, Saturday, 28 February 2009, 14:39 GMT]
Eastern University administration informed Saturday that lectures and examinations in all its faculties are being suspended until further notice. The death of a first year student of the Faculty of Arts and Culture in the women hostel of the university causing tension among the girl students is said to be the reason for the suspension, sources in Batticaloa said.
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TNA MP's secretary abducted in Vavuniyaa

[TamilNet, Saturday, 28 February 2009, 12:20 GMT]
A group of 10 armed men, including a female, who arrived in a white van abducted Sellathurai Sabanathan, a 50-year-old secretary of Tamil National Alliance parliamentarian Kanagaratnam Sathasivam. The abduction has taken place Saturday around 3:30 p.m. at the residence of the victim at Vairavappu'liyangku'lam.
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UN nods ‘fight to the finish’

[TamilNet, Saturday, 28 February 2009, 04:04 GMT]
The position taken by UN Security Council Friday indicating no go beyond ‘hearing’, and the considerate briefing of John Holmes largely endorsing and trusting Colombo’s agenda and assurances for civilians, are read between the lines by international political observers as a ‘knowing wink’ at Colombo to pursue its offensive. Alternatively, the UN stance either paves way for intervention by interested powers outside of the UN or perhaps reveals an actuality that the UN can be shaken not when people face genocide, but only when ground realities endanger the Sri Lankan state, observers said.
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Jaffna University student union appeals to government

[TamilNet, Friday, 27 February 2009, 17:39 GMT]
Jaffna University Students Union (JUSU) extended an appeal to the government of Sri Lanka to enable Jaffna University students from Vanni held in the detention camps in Government controlled areas to continue their studies in Jaffna University, in a press report Friday. JUSU also said that though it has been said in the media that a group of Vanni students held in the detention camps had been flown to Jaffna to continue studies so far none of them had come to Jaffna University.
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Slave camp suspected in Ki'linochchi hospital building

[TamilNet, Friday, 27 February 2009, 17:34 GMT]
A slave camp consisting male and female members 'chosen' from the fleeing civilians by the Sri Lanka Army (SLA) is reportedly setup in the abandoned Ki'lnochchi hospital building, reported TamilNet correspondent in Vanni, citing unverified information reaching Mullaiththeevu from males who escaped from the camp. According to the sources, men are kept at the downstairs for forced labour and women kept in the upstairs for abuse by the SLA soldiers who are on temporary leave.
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Revise policies on Tamil struggle: Karen Parker tells U.S. Senate

[TamilNet, Thursday, 26 February 2009, 00:55 GMT]
The twenty-six year old armed conflict between the armed forces of the government of Sri Lanka and the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam has reached a phase that can only be called genocide-like and catastrophic for the Tamil people in the north and east of the island, said human rights expert Karen Parker, Wednesday to the subcommittee of the US Senate, hearing on the situation in the island of Sri Lanka. Describing the war waged by Colombo as illegal military operations, using illegal weapons or legal weapons in an illegal manner without any international monitoring, she urged the US government to call for an immediate ceasefire and address it most forcefully to the Rajapaksa administration.
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Tamil youth shot dead in Vavuniyaa

[TamilNet, Monday, 23 February 2009, 18:18 GMT]
Unidentified armed persons shot dead a Tamil youth Saturday night around 7:30 p.m while he was returning home which is located in Sivapuram in Vavuniyaa police division. The victim had been identified as Kantharooban Pirapaharan, 19.
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