Land Commissioner in East threatens Tamil farmers of Thennai-maravadi

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 21 October 2014, 22:33 GMT]
The Provincial Land Commissioner (PLC) of Eastern Province, Sirimewan Dharmasena, a Sinhalese, has been threatening the Tamil farmers of the ancient Tamil village of Thennai-maravadi in Kuchchcave’li division of Trincomalee district to share their lands with Sinhalese colonisers or face security threats at the hands of the Sinhala ‘home guards’ paramilitary. The threat comes after a series of meetings with the PLC on 12th, 24th and 30th of September 2014, the Tamil farmers from Kuchchave’li said. Thennai-maravadi is situated on the border of Trincomalee district and Mullaith-theevu district.
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NESoHR releases collated reports 2005-2009

[TamilNet, Monday, 20 October 2014, 21:23 GMT]
North East Secretariat on Human Rights (NESoHR), which was formed during the internationally mediated peace process as the Human Rights body of the Tamil Nation and functioned in the Tamil homeland from July 2004 till January 2009, has released its human rights reports from 2005 till January 2009. Given the current climate of investigation by the OHCHR on Sri Lanka these old NESoHR reports are published in a large single file with continuous page numbers and content pages for easy access, according to Attorney K. Sivapalan and Dr Malathy of NESoHR. Majority of the atrocities covered in these reports falls within the period currently being investigated by the OHCHR. “It is well known that the UN and other international agencies ignored these atrocities when they were taking place. NESoHR team hopes that the OISL investigators will pay due attention to these reports,” they further said.
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SL military turns back UN official at Oamanthai check-post on World Food Day

[TamilNet, Saturday, 18 October 2014, 09:51 GMT]
The occupying military of genocidal Sri Lanka on Thursday turned back the country representative for United Nations Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) at Oamanthai military check post in Vavuniyaa citing the lack of SL Defence Ministry pass to travel to North, civil sources in Vavuniyaa said. Ms Beth Crawford, the FAO representative for Maldives and Sri Lanka, invited as Special Guest to attend the World Food Day event organised by the Multi-Purpose Cooperative Society (MPCS) in Ki’linochchi, was unable to attend the event. Colombo has imposed a new restriction on foreigners traveling to North without Defence Ministry permission since last Friday.
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ECJ implies non-requirement of evidence in ‘terrorist’ classification: Tamil legal activist

[TamilNet, Friday, 17 October 2014, 14:30 GMT]
What the European Court of Justice (ECJ) proves implicitly is that under European Law, you do not need evidence to classify a group as a ‘terrorist’ organisation, commented US-based Eezham Tamil legal activist, Mr Rajeev Sreetharan, who was one of the initiators of the LTTE vs EU case adjudged by the ECJ on Thursday. However, he added that the ECJ ruling, although tainted by questionable post 9/11 interpretations of international humanitarian law, in essence vindicates assumptions in deciding to challenge the EU ban of the LTTE in a court of law, rather than the halls of government. Rajeev was hopeful that the lifting of the ‘terrorism’ ban helps to begin reshape the European climate for Tamil politics.
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European Court annuls EU restrictions on LTTE

[TamilNet, Thursday, 16 October 2014, 08:40 GMT]
In a landmark victory for the legal initiatives of Eezham Tamils, the Court of Justice of the European Union has ordered the Council of European Union on Thursday to annul the restrictive measures taken against the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE). The case has been won by the LTTE on procedural grounds, said the lawyers representing the LTTE. Commenting on the judgement, Mr Lathan Suntharalingam, one of the initiators of the legal move against EU ban on LTTE said: “More than 40 countries in the world directly and indirectly abetted the Sri Lankan State in its genocidal onslaught on Eezham Tamils. The US paradigm of ‘War Against Terror’ was used to crush the LTTE-defended State of Eezham Tamils. The ECJ verdict on Thursday is a milestone achievement for Eezham Tamils in demanding global justice against the Tamil genocide.”
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Genocidal Sri Lanka bans ‘foreigners’ visiting occupied Tamil Eelam

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 15 October 2014, 17:26 GMT]
Colombo has banned ‘foreigners’ from visiting the island’s former war zone without permission to prevent ‘negative interventions’, media reports said on Wednesday, citing a statement of Colombo’s defence ministry run by SL presidential sibling Gotabhaya Rajapaksa. The move primarily targets the Eezham Tamil diaspora having the citizenship of various countries of the West and it equally targets the interaction of Eezham Tamils in the island. It is a master strategy of international imperialist dimensions to keep the genocide-facing Eezham Tamils shackled and submissive. While the Eezham Tamils in India can’t travel outside as they are kept as ‘refugees’ for decades, the target is now the free diaspora in the West, Tamil activists for alternative politics said.
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Citing Buddhist monk, SL police refuses to act on land-grab complaints in Batticaloa

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 14 October 2014, 23:50 GMT]
The Head of the Sri Mangalaramaya Buddhist vihara Venerable Ampitiye Sumanarathana thero has been instrumental in seizing the lands of Eezham Tamils and handing over these lands to Sinhalese from the border villages. When the Tamil land owners complained to the Divisional Secretary of Poaratheevup-pattu (Vellaave’li), the DS accepted their lands have been illegally encroached. But, the Sri Lankan Police at Vellaave’li has refused to accept and act on the complaints by Tamil land owners. The latest seizure of farm lands has taken place at Chinnavaththai village in Vellaave’li division of Paduvaankarai region.
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Rajapaksa deception in North aims at elections

[TamilNet, Monday, 13 October 2014, 23:22 GMT]
The elected representatives of Tamil National Alliance in the North fully boycotted the ceremonial events staged by the visiting SL President Mahinda Rajapaksa in Vanni and Jaffna on Sunday and Monday claiming that the meetings “do not appear to be in furtherance of a legitimate objective, and are not transparent nor collaborative.” While large numbers of SL soldiers were deployed on the streets of Jaffna subjecting the public with security checks, EPDP paramilitary operatives and a section of occupying SL military soldiers were coercing public sector workers, teachers, students together with the people deceived with false promises of livelihood assistance to attend the meetings.
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Senior Journalist Iya Sachchithanantham passes away in Jaffna

[TamilNet, Sunday, 12 October 2014, 21:32 GMT]
The funeral of senior journalist Iya Sachchithanantham was held in Jaffna on Sunday. The 64-year-old journalist, who devoted his life for people-centric journalism and served two dailies, Eezha-Naadu and Thinak-kural, for a long time, passed away Thursday night following a heart attack. He was also a talented announcer, editor of Joasiyar magazine and the regional correspondent for Radio Ceylon.
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Ignoring Sri Lanka’s sexual violence is service to ‘British foreign policy’

[TamilNet, Saturday, 11 October 2014, 05:38 GMT]
British monarch Queen Elizabeth II made Angelina Jolie an honorary dame for her work against sexual violence in war zones and her services to British foreign policy, media reports said on Friday. In June, Jolie co-chaired an international conference on war-related sexual violence, along with former British foreign minister William Hague. The conference was heavily criticised even by British media, for conspicuously ignoring sexual crimes committed by the Sinhala military against Eezham Tamils in the Vanni War.
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Vavuniyaa Citizen Committee chairman escapes assassination attempt

[TamilNet, Thursday, 09 October 2014, 21:51 GMT]
While the Citizen Committee of Vavuniyaa has been preparing for a protest against the prolonged detention of the Tamil activist Ms Jeyakumari and all other Eezham Tamil political prisoners on Friday, an attack squad operated by the Sri Lankan military has targeted the 61-year-old chairman of the Committee, Mr Krishnapillai Thevarasa, on Wednesday night. A 4-member squad that followed Mr Thevarasa while he was returning home after attending a preparatory meeting at Vavuniyaa, blocked him near the Sri Lankan military camp at Nedungkea’ni and brutally attacked him using iron rods and batons. The attack comes 5 days before SL president Mahinda Rajapaksa’s visit to North.
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Shivajilingam reiterates majority demand of genocide investigation

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 07 October 2014, 15:56 GMT]
Northern Provincial Council (NPC) member M.K. Shivajingam on Tuesday vowed to confront any legal action from the South against the joint appeal sent by the majority NPC and Eastern Provincial Tamil National Alliance (TNA) Councillors to the Office of the UN High Commissioner of Human Rights (OHCHR) in August demanding investigations on genocide against Eezham Tamils. At a press conference held at Jaffna Press Club, the senior political leader of Tamil Eelam Liberation Organisation (TELO) also warned those expressing views against the association with former militant groups turned political parties constituting the TNA alliance not to spoil the unity within the Tamil alliance.
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Palestine and Eezham Tamils: The Hindu group's double standard

[TamilNet, Monday, 06 October 2014, 07:24 GMT]
The Hindu group and its associates known for their bias and bigotry towards the issues of genocide and independence of Eezham Tamils, and towards the LTTE-led militant struggle of the recent past, have now reiterated their stand on Palestine, endorsing Hamas as the resistance force representing the people of Gaza. As a response to the recent Israeli military offensive against the people of Gaza, The Hindu and associates have been rallying public opinion in favour of the Palestinian struggle. In two separate events organized in Chennai in Tamil Nadu, the affluent Hindu clique has vehemently condemned Israel and termed its acts against the Palestinians as war crimes and demanded India to take a more vocal stand against Israel, writes a media watcher in Chennai.
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Kurds defend Kobane from Islamic State onslaught supported by Turkey

[TamilNet, Friday, 03 October 2014, 10:28 GMT]
The Islamic State (IS) supported by the Turkish state has since 15th September heavily intensified their military onslaught against the Kurdish people and their self-rule government in the region of Kobane in Rojava (Western Kurdistan) in Northern Syria. Following the brutal three pronged IS military assault to capture Kobane more than two hundred thousand Kurdish civilians were forced to flee to the Turkish border. The Turkish border which had hitherto been used unhindered by the IS to infiltrate into Kobane to attack the Kurds had now been closed to weaken the Kurdish resistance. Nevertheless recent information from Rojava reports that the Kurdish resistance is growing as the IS has suffered heavy causalities in battling the Kurdish Peoples Protection Units (YPG/YPJ) defending the region.
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SL military enslaves Eezham Tamils along border villages of Batticaloa district

[TamilNet, Thursday, 02 October 2014, 22:19 GMT]
The occupying Sri Lankan military has effectively enslaved the gagged Eezham Tamil families in the border villages of Paduvaankarai region. Seven years after the end of war in East, the livelihood of the villagers has worsened than during the times of the war. While the resources are being exploited by the intruding Sinhala colonists and fishermen on one hand, the Tamils are being provided only one option of becoming second class citizens serving the interests of the occupying SL military, Tamil activists in Batticaloa said urging immediate focus from the global Tamils on the deteriorating situation of Eezham Tamils in Paduvaankarai.
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Military minds would fail if righteous political wills not respected

[TamilNet, Monday, 29 September 2014, 06:26 GMT]
“India suspicious as Chinese submarine docks in Sri Lanka,” said a headline of a news report in Times of India on Sunday. The report cited New Delhi’s Navy Chief saying that the Indian Ocean Region (IOR) “is our area of operations.” However, the TOI report illustrated the military weakness of India compared to China in budget, armed forces, submarines, warships, fighter jets and tanks, and added that, “insiders fear India’s already stark military asymmetry with China only seems to be expanding all the time.” Military minds and media minds in India fail to see that the foremost of the weaknesses of India in the IOR is not military asymmetry but New Delhi’s loss of credibility with the peoples of the region inside and outside, commented Tamil activists for alternative politics in Eezham.
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Timing of Jayalalithaa case targets Dravidian polity

[TamilNet, Saturday, 27 September 2014, 17:10 GMT]
Tamil Nadu Chief Minister and AIADMK Chief Ms J Jayalalithaa has been sentenced on Saturday to 4 years of imprisonment, Rs. 100 crore fine and has been debarred from contesting elections for six years after the completion of the prison term by a special court of India, in a 18-year-old disproportionate assets case. Last month, New Delhi’s Central Bureau of Investigation filed a new telecommunication corruption case against a former DMK minister and a Malaysian corporate owner of Eezham Tamil origin, in addition to earlier cases on DMK leaders. The New Delhi government stridently opposes and blocks any UN or international scrutiny on crimes committed in the island of Sri Lanka. Ms Jayalalithaa, personally as well as through Tamil Nadu State Assembly, has been demanding international investigations on the genocide in the island.
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SL military begins deceptive recruitment drive in East

[TamilNet, Thursday, 18 September 2014, 21:50 GMT]
Inviting poverty-stricken Tamil families along the district border between the Ampaa’rai district and Batticaloa district to receive ‘humanitarian supplies’, the occupying Sri Lanka Army has been conducting propaganda meetings promising civil jobs for Tamil women in the SL military, news sources in Ampaa’rai told TamilNet on Thursday. A group of Sri Lanka Army soldiers, who brought drinking water supply to the villagers in 35th Colony, Malaiyar-kaddu and Ka’n’naki-puram were campaigning ‘good salary’ and ‘government pension’ for subservient jobs in SL military. In the meantime, the SL military has also gone to the extent of promising a house to each family that sends their daughters and sons for employment in SL military.
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Funeral of veteran activist Manickasothy held in Uduvil, Jaffna

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 17 September 2014, 19:14 GMT]
Hundreds of Eezham Tamils paid their last respects to veteran Eezham Tamil activist Abimannasingham Manickasothy on Wednesday at Uduvil in Jaffna. Mr Manickasothy passed away Monday night in a vehicle accident on his way to Jaffna from Colombo. Mr Manickasothy, who stood with his people throughout the Tamil struggle, has been articulating the political aspiration of Eezham Tamils in all available platforms. He has been a firm defender of Eezham Tamils right to self-determination for more than 30 years.
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Eezham Tamils learning languages

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 16 September 2014, 13:38 GMT]
Thanks to the sustained efforts of the Indian Consulate in Jaffna ‘interest in Hindi’ is sprouting among Jaffna Tamils, reports New Indian Express on Tuesday, citing ‘Hindi Diwas’ [Hindi Day] celebrated by the Consulate, 20 students completing a course and one of them telling that “There are now people who think it will be useful to know Hindi if they go to north India for studies or pilgrimage.” Eezham Tamils wish that the Chinese embassy would soon start teaching Mandarin Chinese and the other embassies would follow suit in teaching major European, Latin American, Arabic and other Asian languages, so that the nation of Eezham Tamils could have a wider interaction with the world and with their own kith and kin worldwide, commented Tamil activists for alternative politics in the island.
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