SLA assaults Thenmaradchchi fishermen

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 03 December 2003, 14:47 GMT]
The Kachchai fisheries society in Thenmaradchchi in Jaffna district Wednesday made a complaint to the authorities concerned that its three members had been assaulted by soldiers of the Sri Lanka Army located in the coastal sentry point when they were returning to shore after fishing in Kachchai lagoon thirty minutes behind the scheduled time, civil groups said.
Full story >>

LTTE, SLA commanders meet at no-man zone in Muttur

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 03 December 2003, 14:42 GMT]
A delegation of the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam, led by Trincomalee district regional commander Colonel Pathuma, and Sri Lanka Army's General Officer Commanding in Trincomalee district, Major General Sunil Tennekoon, held discussions at the no-man zone in Kattaiparichchan in the Muttur division Wednesday evening, Sri Lanka Monitoring Mission sources said.
Full story >>

Stateless Tamils register for citizenship in Sri Lanka

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 03 December 2003, 09:28 GMT]
More than 6,000 Tamils of Indian origin registered themselves as Sri Lankan citizens last weekend as part of a 10-day programme by the Ceylon Workers Congress to enable them to gain citizenship. The programme was supported by United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR).
Full story >>

Vavuniya Courts hears case of missing youth

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 02 December 2003, 11:33 GMT]
Ariyathas Puvaneswary, mother of Ariyathas Vijayakumar, who went missing after 15 August 2000 when he was arrested by the Sri Lanka Army (SLA) soldiers from the Vavuniya 211 Brigade, gave evidence at the Vavuniya courts when the case was taken up for hearing under District Judge M.Ilancheliyan, legal sources in Vavuniya said.
Full story >>

SLA hands back part of Jaffna suburb

[TamilNet, Monday, 01 December 2003, 12:22 GMT]
The Sri Lanka army Monday handed back part of a densely populated coastal suburb of Jaffna it had been occupying since 1996. “We are vacating this area on the instructions of Maj. Gen. Sarath Fonseka”, Sri Lankan military sources in the northern town said. More than four hundred homes that were inside the garrisoned part of Navaanthurai are all damaged, according to residents.
Full story >>

Organized self-help lifts Vanni villages

[TamilNet, Monday, 01 December 2003, 00:11 GMT]
"Under 'Village Upliftment Project' economically worst hit villages in Vanni are identified and efforts are channelled to improve social and economic well-being of the residents through self-help. Tamil Rehabilitation Organization (TRO), local NGOs and Tamil expatriates are also financially helping us to carryout this project," Administrative Head, Anbarasan, told TamilNet during a recent visit to the interior villages of the Vanni.
Full story >>

Inquiry into Vadamarachchy SLA assaults begins

[TamilNet, Sunday, 30 November 2003, 16:52 GMT]
A team from the 52 Brigade Head quarters of the Sri Lanka Army (SLA) located at Varani in Vadamarachchi division in Jaffna district Sunday afternoon went to the Point Pedro base hospital and questioned the two injured Tamil civilians warded there in critical condition following the media reports that a group of soldiers had attacked them Saturday afternoon, medical sources said.


Full story >>

Parents of Jaffna missing plan another protest

[TamilNet, Sunday, 30 November 2003, 13:20 GMT]
“The Sri Lankan government has duped us for long by giving false promises and not investigating the fate of our missing children. We intend to stage a sit in protest in front of the National Human Rights Commission offices in Jaffna and Colombo on 10 December”, said the President of the Missing Persons Guardian Association of Jaffna, Mr. E. Selvarajah, addressing a press meet in the northern town Sunday.


Full story >>

Kinniya Tamil families seek refuge at welfare center

[TamilNet, Sunday, 30 November 2003, 00:01 GMT]
More than one hundred Tamil families in the Kinniya division in the Trincomalee district have sought refuge in the Eechantivu welfare center when a group of Muslim youths blocked the Kinniya co-operative society from distributing relief as ordered by the Trincomalee district Government Agent, civil group sources said.
Full story >>

SLA soldiers assault Tamil civilians in Vadamarachchi

[TamilNet, Saturday, 29 November 2003, 16:33 GMT]
A group of soldiers of the Sri Lanka Army, located in the historic Vallipuram Alvar Temple area in Vadamarachchi division in Jaffna district, is alleged to have mercilessly assaulted and fired at a group of Tamil civilians who had gone for hare hunting Saturday evening, injuring several of them. Later the SLA soldiers arrested seven of the Tamil group and released them after questioning, civil sources said.
Full story >>

Jaffna Great Heroes day celebrations draw large crowd

[TamilNet, Friday, 28 November 2003, 11:03 GMT]
Despite heavy down pour and interference by Sri Lanka Government security forces in the Jaffna district people in large numbers attended the events at the Heroes' cemetaries (Maveerar Thuyilum Illam) Thursday evening on the Great Heroes Day and paid their homage to the martyrs of the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam who sacrificed their lives in the armed Tamil freedom struggle, sources in Jaffna said.


Full story >>

HDU to start demining in Batticaloa

[TamilNet, Thursday, 27 November 2003, 00:01 GMT]
The Humanitarian Demining Unit (HDU) has announced that it will start demining in the Batticaloa district on November 29, and the HDU has already begun initial preparations and surveys to concentrate on demining the Palaiyadivaddai village for mines and booby traps in the first stage, sources said.
Full story >>

Ten SLA soldiers buried alive in muddy soil in Thenmaradchi

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 26 November 2003, 17:37 GMT]
Ten soldiers of the Sri Lanka Army were buried alive in the muddy land between Eluthumadduval and Nagarkovil coastal area in Thenmaradchi division in Jaffna district while undergoing training on Wednesday at about 6 p.m., police said.
Full story >>

SLA, LTTE meet again over Jaffna Heroes’ Day

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 25 November 2003, 09:43 GMT]
The Liberation Tigers and the Sri Lanka army met again Tuesday to resolve persisting friction over the Great Heroes’ Day observations in Jaffna. Speaking to the press after the meeting, Maj. Gen. Sarath Fonseka, the Sri Lankan security forces commander for Jaffna, said his troops won’t interfere in the Great Heroes’ Day arrangements in the peninsula. Responding to a question from TamilNet, he said the SLA won’t allow the Tiger flag to be flown in Sri Lankan government buildings and public places.
Full story >>

Sinhala nationalists burn EU commissioner’s effigy

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 25 November 2003, 06:19 GMT]
Sinhala nationalist protestors burnt an effigy of European’s Union Commissioner for External Affairs, Mr. Chris Patten in the busy business hub of downtown Colombo Tuesday moring. Mr. Patten arrived in Sri Lanka’s capital Tuesday for meetings with Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe, President Kumaratunga and the leader of the Liberation Tigers, Mr. Veluppillai Pirapaharan.
Full story >>

NECORD provides new life to Varothaya Nagar School

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 25 November 2003, 01:43 GMT]
The Varothaya Nagar Barathi Vidiyalayam in the suburb of Trincomalee town, which has a history of being occupied by both the Indian Peace Keeping Force (IPKF) and thereafter by the Sri Lanka Army and Sri Lanka Police, till the signing of the ceasefire agreement by the Government of Sri Lanka and Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam, has now got a new two storied building at a cost of nearly 4 .6 million rupees under the North East Community Restoration and Development Project (NECORD). The building was declared open Monday.
Full story >>

“Defense and ceasefire must flow from single authority”-TNA

[TamilNet, Monday, 24 November 2003, 18:00 GMT]
“It is the considered view of the Tamil people and of the fifteen Members of Parliament of the Tamil National Alliance (TNA) that the responsibility on the part of the government to sustain the ceasefire, and to continue with the peace process, must flow from one single authority," said the TNA parliamentary group leader, Mr.R.Sampanthan, speaking in the budget debate in parliament Monday.
Full story >>

Angry crowd, SLA face-off defused in Mannar

[TamilNet, Monday, 24 November 2003, 17:13 GMT]
A showdown between Sri Lanka army and a large crowd of angry people was averted in Mannar Monday night after the Sri Lanka Monitoring Mission persuaded troops garrisoned at the local co-operative society building to return a Heroes’ Day memorial depiction the soldiers had removed from the town centre. The angry crowd, demanding that the SLA return the memorial depiction, stopped buses from Mannar town to Colombo and other long distance destinations Monday night.
Full story >>

Eluvaithivu survives in the grip of Sri Lanka’s Navy

[TamilNet, Monday, 24 November 2003, 13:24 GMT]
The Sri Lanka Navy has a tight grip on Eluvaithivu and its residents. It is a small island in the sea off the Jaffna peninsula. The SLN recently stepped up checking at the island’s small jetty. Locals say the Navy fears they might smuggle into the island posters to mark the LTTE’s Great Heroes’ Day. Thirteen years ago, on 4 November, twenty-three men from Eluvaithivu were massacred by the Sri Lanka Navy at mid sea.
Full story >>

LTTE honors parents of martyrs in Vavuniya

[TamilNet, Monday, 24 November 2003, 04:30 GMT]
The practice of honoring fighters who sacrifice their lives for their homeland even during periods of war, and honoring the parents of the fighters on-going now in the NorthEast, is not seen in other parts of the world and is unique to the Tamil homeland, said Mr. S. Ezhilan, the political head of the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) in Vavuniya, speaking at an event held at Sastrikoolankulam in the Vavuniya district to honor parents of LTTE martyrs Saturday, sources in Vavuniya said.
Full story >>