Land mine kills Buddhist monk

[TamilNet, Sunday, 18 November 2001, 12:14 GMT]
A senior Buddhist monk was killed and three others, including two clerics were wounded when the jeep in which they were travelling was hit by a land mine blast at Konamariyawa around 9.30 a.m. Sunday, police said.
Full story >>

Three SLA wounded in grenade attack

[TamilNet, Sunday, 18 November 2001, 09:23 GMT]
Three Sri Lanka army soldiers were wounded when a grenade was lobbed at a military truck in Batticaloa town around 1 p.m. Sunday, Police sources in the east said. The Thaandanvanveli sector of the town was cordoned and searched by the Police and the Special Task Force (STF) following the attack.
Full story >>

Sampanthan canvasses in LTTE held region

[TamilNet, Friday, 16 November 2001, 19:09 GMT]
Mr. R. Sampanthan, the secretary general of the Tamil United Liberation Front (TULF) returned to Trincomalee Friday after two days of campaigning for the Tamil National Alliance in the villages of Mutur south which are held by the Liberation Tigers. He said that he had obtained due permission from the Sri Lanka army's 22 Division in Trincomalee to visit and hold propaganda meetings in the hinterland of Mutur which is under the control of the LTTE. "The electioneering in the LTTE held areas was very satisfactory and a large number of people came for our propaganda meetings with much interest," the secretary general of the TULF said. Mr. Sampanthan is the first Tamil parliamentarian to visit an LTTE held area in the northern or eastern part of the island with the SLA's permission.
Full story >>

SLA soldier killed in claymore blast

[TamilNet, Friday, 16 November 2001, 12:48 GMT]
A Sri Lanka Army (SLA) soldier was killed and two others were wounded in a claymore mine attack by the Liberation Tigers in the Kalmadhu region in Vavuniya, around 9.20 a.m. Friday, security sources said.
Full story >>

Army intelligence operatives killed in explosion

[TamilNet, Thursday, 15 November 2001, 10:14 GMT]
Three members of the Sri Lanka Army’s military intelligence unit in Batticaloa were killed in an explosion in the high security zone of the eastern town around 10.15 a.m. Thursday. A senior member of the group ‘Vinobha’ (Thambi) was seriously wounded. A cashew nut seller was killed and eight civilians were wounded near Munai Street where the suicide bomb exploded. Shops and schools were closed in the town following the explosion.
Full story >>

Sri Lanka rules out lifting LTTE ban

[TamilNet, Thursday, 15 November 2001, 02:47 GMT]
Sri Lanka’s President Chandrika Kumaratunga Tuesday categorically ruled out the possibility of lifting her government’s ban on the Liberation Tigers. Speaking at the presentation of her ruling People’s Alliance (PA) manifesto at her official residence, President Kumaratunga ruled out any truck with the Tamil National Alliance (TNA), the Island newspaper reported Wednesday. Commenting on reports of eroding support for the PA amongst the Tamil community, President Kumaratunga said the people of Jaffna were with her and the people under LTTE control were supporting the main opposition United National Party (UNP). "As for the Tamils in Colombo they are really not part of the Tamil community as a whole. They promote what is best for business," she said in derision, the Island reported.
Full story >>

'Colombo's largesse stained with Tamil blood' -Selvam

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 14 November 2001, 21:35 GMT]
"Every rupee that the Sri Lankan government gives you through its quisling to buy your vote is stained with the blood of our people who were killed in places of refuge and worship, the tears of our women who were gang raped here in Mannar and in every part of the north and east. The Chandrika regime is liberally spending money through its Tamil lackey to bribe our people, to pacify them and thereby show the world that our struggle for justice is a terrorist problem. The people of Mannar have always been patriotic.
Full story >>

Security tightened as violence increases

[TamilNet, Monday, 12 November 2001, 21:12 GMT]
The Inspector General of Police Monday instructed all officers-in-charge of police stations through out the island to tighten security in their areas to curb election violence. The I.G.P.'s instruction has come in the wake of increasing incidence of election violence, police sources said. Meanwhile fifty-one complaints of election violence have been reported during the last twenty fours, the Police Election Secretariat said Monday.
Full story >>

'Colombo lacks consistency, commitment'- TNA manifesto

[TamilNet, Monday, 12 November 2001, 15:29 GMT]
The Tamil National Alliance (TNA) Monday said that the Sri Lankan State lacks comprehension and consistency in its "purported efforts to evolve a just solutionî to the Tamil national question. The Alliance released its manifesto in Colombo Monday evening. "The commitment of the Sri Lankan State (to peace) has been called into serious question," the Tamil alliance manifesto states. The manifesto reiterated that the ban on the Liberation Tigers should be lifted in Sri Lanka and that Colombo should stop the war and begin negotiations with Norwegian mediation.
Full story >>

Five soldiers killed in Mutur attacks

[TamilNet, Saturday, 10 November 2001, 12:04 GMT]
At least five Sri Lanka army soldiers were killed Saturday afternoon in two attacks by the Liberation Tigers in Mutur, security sources said. Four soldiers were killed in a claymore blast and one was killed in an ambush in the general area of Mallikaithivu, on the coastal road from Mutur to Batticaloa
Full story >>

Jaffna missing persons' parents continue protest

[TamilNet, Saturday, 10 November 2001, 08:14 GMT]
"Arrests, deaths and destruction will continue in our land until our struggle succeeds. To put an end to such tragedies we have to succeed in our people's struggle. If we speak out for our nation then we shall win our struggle for which blood is being spilled," said Rev. Fr. T. Jeyakumar, the head of the Human Development Centre (HUDEC), addressing a demonstration and protest sit in near the Muniappar temple in Jaffna town Saturday by more than 200 parents and relatives of persons who went missing after being arrested by the Sri Lanka army in 1996-97 in the northern peninsula. The protest was organised by the Missing Persons' Guardian Association (MPGA) and the Jaffna Mothers' Front. "We will continue the protest tomorrow as well," the secretary of the MPGA told Tamilnet.
Full story >>

SLA arrests Jaffna university student

[TamilNet, Saturday, 10 November 2001, 04:16 GMT]
The Sri Lanka army arrested an undergraduate of the Jaffna University in Tinnevely Saturday morning around 8.30 a.m. Arumugam Sutharsan, a second year student who is following a course in management was arrested by the SLA at the house near the campus where he was boarded.
Full story >>

Eight fishermen remanded in Mannar

[TamilNet, Saturday, 10 November 2001, 04:07 GMT]
Eight fishermen were arrested by the Sri Lanka Navy in the sea off Pesalai in the Mannar Island Thursday. Meanwhile in Jaffna, three Sri Lanka Army soldiers were wounded in a grenade attack in Allaarai in the Thenmaradchi division Thursday night. A woman soldier at the SLA’s Nagar Kovil garrison in Jaffna committed suicide Thursday by taking an overdose of sleeping pills, military sources in the north said. The soldier had been depressed, they added.
Full story >>

Kumaratunga places anti-LTTE record as poll case

[TamilNet, Friday, 09 November 2001, 02:49 GMT]
(News Feature) Sri Lanka's President Kumaratunga Thursday placed her government's hardline approach towards fighting the Liberation Tigers and defending the unity of the country as the central plank of the ruling People's Alliance (PA) election strategy for the forthcoming polls in December. In a lengthy interview in Sinhala to state-owned media on Thursday, translated into English by the official Daily News newspaper on Friday, Kumaratunga also reiterated her accusations that the main opposition United National Party (UNP) was in collusion with the Tamils and the LTTE to dismember the country and vowed to prevent this at any cost. The President slammed critics of her governance as "barking dogs," defectors from her party as "rats," and insisted Sri Lanka's economy was healthy, citing as evidence figures that showed more taxis were on the roads since 1994 and that people were eating more chicken now.
Full story >>

EPDP threats hassle Jaffna candidates

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 07 November 2001, 17:16 GMT]
The chief candidate of the United National Party in Jaffna, Mr. T. Maheswaran wrote to the Commissioner of Elections Wednesday that polling booths in the islands of Karainagar, Kayts, Nainathivu and Delft should be located in the peninsula because the serious threat posed by the EPDP. He said that heavily armed cadres of the EPDP are intimidating and preventing candidates of other parties from entering the islands. Meanwhile, Mr. Anandasangari, the chief candidate in Jaffna for the Tamil National Alliance said that he was threatened by armed members of the Eelam People’s Democratic Party (EPDP) in Nelliyadi where he went to open a campaign office Wednesday.
Full story >>

SLA arrests eight in Batticaloa

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 07 November 2001, 13:49 GMT]
The Sri Lanka army arrested five persons Tuesday in the outer suburbs of Batticaloa town. They were taken into custody by the military intelligence unit of the SLA in Batticaloa, Police sources said. Three persons were arrested on 3 November by the SLA from two villages close to the eastern town. The eight have been detained by the Special Investigation Unit (SIU) of the Police for further inquiries, sources said.
Full story >>

Two SLA killed in blast

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 06 November 2001, 09:00 GMT]
Two Sri Lanka army soldiers were killed in a claymore mine blast by the Liberation Tigers around 6.30 a.m. Tuesday in Nochchikulam, 15 kilometres north of Vavuniya, in the Omanthai Forward Defence Sector. The soldiers were on a road patrol in the area when the mine was triggered, military sources said. Meanwhile the Tigers fired 120 mm mortars on the forward defences of the Special Task Force in Kattukkarai in the Mannar district around 7.30 a.m. Tuesday morning.
Full story >>

Jaffna missing persons’ parents, relatives protest

[TamilNet, Monday, 05 November 2001, 07:21 GMT]
More than a hundred parents and family members of the persons who were arrested by the Sri Lankan security forces and went missing in Jaffna began a demonstration in front of the Jaffna District Secretariat from 7 a.m. Monday. The families of the missing allege that the Sri Lankan government has deliberately shelved investigations. Policemen who arrived at the secretariat later in the morning abused the demonstrators who were seated across the entrance of the Secretariat holding placards and attempted to disperse them. The protestors, however, refused to move and vowed to continue with their sit in demonstration until 3 p.m. this afternoon. More than 600 persons, mostly young men and women were arrested by the SLA in the northern peninsula in 1996-97. All are believed murdered.
Full story >>

Lies, fronts and ruins

[TamilNet, Friday, 02 November 2001, 11:24 GMT]
((News Feature) Sri Lanka’s President Chandrika Kumaratunga Tuesday accused Human Rights Watch, which has criticised excesses by the Sri Lankan security forces, of “telling lies” and dismissed the largest human rights organization based in the United States as a front for the Liberation Tigers. President Kumaratunga however praised the University Teachers for Human Rights (Jaffna) as “totally independent” and whom she said were “very appreciative” of her government. Kumaratunga’s comments were made in an interview to CNN conducted by Zain Verjee during which the President continued her bitter attack on her main opposition, denied she had conducted a ‘war for peace’ (“we called it a battle for peace. we wanted peace through peace”), and denied there was an economic embargo on Tamil areas – even though Verjee didn’t actually raise the matter.
Full story >>

Tough time on Hard Talk

[TamilNet, Thursday, 01 November 2001, 15:06 GMT]
(News Feature) Sri Lankan President Chandrika Kumaratunga's public relations blitz in the Western media unexpectedly ran into difficulties Tuesday on the BBC's Hard Talk program hosted by Tim Sebastian. Faced with several embarrassing questions about the human rights situation in the island and the lack of progress in the peace process, President Kumaratunga, struggling to respond, became increasingly defensive and irritated. During the course of the half-hour interview, Kumaratunga said the US State Department's 2001 report on human rights contained "lies," claimed there had been "only one rape in Jaffna" since she came to power, flatly denied there was an economic embargo on Tamil areas ("that is nonsense!"), and blamed rights violations on "mad" policemen. Amid Sebastian's, trademark rapid-fire questions, some exchanges with the President bordered on the farcical.
Full story >>