Rajapakse, Wickremasinghe meet to discuss MoU

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 06 December 2006, 01:51 GMT]
Sri Lanka's President Mahinda Rajapakse and Ranil Wickremasinghe, leader of the main opposition United National Party (UNP) Tuesday held a lengthy discussion at Temple Trees on the implementation of the Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) signed by the Sri Lanka Freedom Party (SLFP), main constituent of the ruling United Peoples Freedom Alliance (UPFA), and UNP on identified issues giving top priority to solve the ethnic conflict, according to news report of the State-run Sri Lanka Broadcasting Corporation (SLBC).
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Sri Lanka Cabinet to review relationship with LTTE

[TamilNet, Monday, 04 December 2006, 13:04 GMT]
The Sri Lanka Cabinet meeting scheduled to be held on Wednesday will make crucial decisions regarding the relationship with the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE), the State run Sri Lanka Broadcasting Corporation (SLBC) reported Monday in the afternoon news bulletin quoting Mr.Keheliya Rambukwella, defense ministry spokesman and minister in the United Peoples Freedom Alliance (UPFA) government.


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India rejects Rajapakse's call for joint naval patrols - Hindu

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 29 November 2006, 16:36 GMT]
Indian Press Reports Wednesday said that Indian External Affairs Minister, Pranab Mukherjee, had expressed India's concerns at the continuing civilian deaths in Sri Lanka and had reiterated that there was no military solution to the conflict between the Government of Sri Lanka (GoSL) and the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE). The proposal for joint naval patrols advanced by the Sri Lankan President was not on the cards, Hindu reported. However, India was prepared to assist the Rajapakse government with "non-lethal" military supplies, according to the report.
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Indian Foreign Secretary meets Rajapakse

[TamilNet, Thursday, 23 November 2006, 17:49 GMT]
Indian Foreign Secretary Mr. Shiv Shankar Menon Thursday evening met with Sri Lankan President Mahinda Rajapakse and conferred with him about the current political and conflict situation in Sri Lanka, political sources in Colombo said.
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"Allow Raviraj's casket to be taken through A9," family requests SL President

[TamilNet, Saturday, 11 November 2006, 10:14 GMT]
Assassinated Jaffna District TNA parliamentarian's widowed wife Sasikala Raviraj, Saturday morning when Sri Lankan Foreign Minister Mr. Mangala Samaraweera visited the parlour, made an appeal to open the A9 Muhamalai exit-entry point in order to take her husband's remains to his hometown Chavakachcheri for cremation. The funeral is scheduled to be held on Wednesday in Chavakachcheri in Jaffna. Hundreds of mourners from all ethnic communities, political leaders, religious dignitaries and social activists gathered in Colombo to pay their last respects to the assassinated Jaffna district Parliamentarian Nadarajah Raviraj.
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Ruling SLFP, opposition UNP sign MoU

[TamilNet, Monday, 23 October 2006, 08:04 GMT]
The Sri Lanka Freedom Party (SLFP), main constituent of the United Peoples Freedom Alliance (UPFA) government and the main opposition United National Party (UNP) Monday signed a 10-clause Memorandum of Understanding to implement a four point common national agenda. The UNP, under the 2 year long MoU, said it would "extend support to the Government in the pursuit of a negotiated settlement to the on-going conflict while opposing terrorism in all its manifestations and upholding human rights."
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U.S. Assistant Secretary Boucher to visit Trincomalee

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 17 October 2006, 12:45 GMT]
Assistant Secretary of State for Central and South Asian Affairs, Richard Boucher, is scheduled to visit Sri Lanka Thursday and Friday in Support of Peace Talks, U.S. Embassy in Colombo said in a press release issued on Tuesday. Mr. Richard Boucher will meet with Sri Lankan President Mahinda Rajapakse, Mangala Samaraweera, civil society leaders, NGOs and will travel to Trincomalee to meet with local government officials and civic leaders, according to the U.S. Embassy. This is the second visit by Mr. Richard Boucher to Sri Lanka this year.
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‘Talk to Tigers,’ Rice tells Samaraweera

[TamilNet, Sunday, 24 September 2006, 00:19 GMT]
US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice urged Sri Lanka’s Foreign Minister, Mangala Samaraweera, to make a concerted effort in planned peace talks with the Tamil Tigers, AFP quoted a senior US official as saying Saturday.
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SLFP, UNP committees meet to work out common agenda

[TamilNet, Friday, 15 September 2006, 12:56 GMT]
The first meeting of the two committees appointed by the Sri Lanka Freedom Party (SLFP), main constituent of the ruling United Peoples Freedom Alliance (UPFA) government and the main opposition United National Party (UNP) was held Friday morning at the parliamentary complex located in Jayawardhanapura in Colombo to work out a common national agenda on seven prioritized areas with the ethnic conflict being the most important, political sources said.
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Sri Lanka seizes TRO funds

[TamilNet, Sunday, 03 September 2006, 07:00 GMT]
The Sri Lankan government has frozen the funds of the Tamil Rehabilitation Organisation (TRO) with immediate effect, the Sunday Times reported. The directive has been given by the Central Bank on the basis of combating the financing of terrorism, the paper said.
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Sri Lanka defiant over aid massacre charge

[TamilNet, Friday, 01 September 2006, 13:59 GMT]
Accused by international ceasefire monitors of being responsible for the massacre of 17 aid workers, Sri Lanka reacted with indignation, rejecting the findings and launching a blistering personal attack the outgoing head of the Sri Lanka Monitoring Mission (SLMM), Swedish Maj. Gen. Ulf Henricson. And whilst its senior representatives lambasted the SLMM, the Sri Lankan government slapped new restrictions on other international aid workers. Meanwhile, reflecting international reaction to the SLMM’s findings, the United Nations threatened to stop its agencies’ activities in the country, a warning it subsequently toned down.
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‘War not way to peace’ - India

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 29 August 2006, 04:58 GMT]
As Sri Lanka’s military launched a new offensive against the Liberation Tigers this week, India re-iterated that war was not the way to resolve the island’s conflict. “We do not believe that war is the way out...We do not think violence, whether from LTTE's side or an armed conflict, can resolve any issue,” press reports quoted India’s Foreign Secretary Shyam Saran as saying in Delhi Monday. Meanwhile, The Hindu newspaper reported that, worried over the violence in Sri Lanka, peace-facilitator Norway and India “are engaged in quiet consultations to defuse the situation.”
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Sampoor threatens Trinco Harbour - Rajapakse

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 22 August 2006, 09:20 GMT]
Sri Lankan President Mahinda Rajapakse on Monday told the representatives of the Co-Chairs of Tokyo Donors’ Conference for the Sri Lankan Peace Process, that the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) controlled Sampoor posed a threat to Trincomalee Harbour and justified the Sri Lankan armed forces offensive as "preventing" or "responding" to Tigers. However, informed sources in Colombo said the humanitarian crisis escalated by the Maavilaru offensive, initiated by Colombo and the targeting of civilians in air-strikes and the slaying of NGO workers in Muthur, were discussed at the meeting between the Sri Lankan President and the diplomats representing the Co-Chairs.
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GoSL paying "scant regard" to Norway's peace efforts - LTTE

[TamilNet, Monday, 07 August 2006, 06:39 GMT]
"It is the plea of the Tamil people to the international community that it understands the stark truth behind these actions of the GoSL," the Peace Secretariat of the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) said Monday as Norwegian Special Envoy Jon-Hanssen Bauer was scheduled to visit Trincomalee to meet Head of Sri Lanka Monitoring Mission Major General Ulf Henricsson in his final efforts to avert the outbreak of war. The Tigers on Sunday said they considered Sri Lankan forces continued attacks towards the LTTE controlled territory as Declaration of War by Colombo.
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Colombo bombards Maavilaru, SLMM Head narrowly escapes

[TamilNet, Sunday, 06 August 2006, 09:21 GMT]
Sri Lanka Monitoring Mission officials, Liberation Tigers Political Head S. Elilan and civilian representatives who went to Maavilaru site to re-open the closed sluice gates came under Sri Lanka Army artillery attack, initial reports said. Dozens of artillery shells were fired. Norwegian Special Envoy Jon Hanssen Bauer is in direct contact with Royal Norwegian Government and Colombo discussing the latest hostile attacks. Sri Lankan Foreign Minister Mangala Samaraweera had ealier assured Norwegian Envoy Jon-Hanssen Bauer that attacks would be ceased. The re-opening of sluice gates is blocked by the new escalation of attacks.
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Court orders port workers to suspend work-to-rule

[TamilNet, Thursday, 20 July 2006, 10:04 GMT]
The weeklong work-to-rule campaign by port workers which crippled the loading and unloading activities of the Sri Lanka Port Authority (SLPA) came to an end following an enjoining order issued by the Colombo District Judge restraining ten trade unions involved in the union action on an application filed by the SLPA, legal sources said.
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Tamil protest mars UK tourism push

[TamilNet, Monday, 19 June 2006, 03:05 GMT]
A major effort by Sri Lanka to promote tourism from Britain did not make much headway last week as British television and newspapers simultaneously gave considerable coverage to the spiraling violence in the island and highlighting fears of a slide back to war. Moreover, the grand finale of a ten-day festival promoting Sinhala culture held in Trafalgar Square Saturday drew a novel protest by Tamil youth organizations in London – traditional Tamil arts being performed for the public while volunteers distributed leaflets highlighting the bloodletting underway in the distant island.
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Samaraweera receives "unusually high-level" reception in Norway

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 14 June 2006, 15:14 GMT]
Sri Lanka's Foreign Minister Mangala Samaraweera has received a high-level reception, unusual for a Foreign Minister, according to International Development Minister Erik Solheim, who said Wednesday that Norway has to maintain close relationship with the parties to the conflict if it was to achieve any progress in the peace process. Mangala Samaraweera, once an opponent of Norwegian facilitation in Sri Lanka, was received by His Majesty King Harald V while Norwegian Tamil activists protested outside the Royal Palace in Oslo.
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Norway's peace role useful- Samaraweera

[TamilNet, Monday, 12 June 2006, 13:55 GMT]
Sri Lankan Foreign Minister Mangala Samaraweera who is leading a high-level delegation of the Government of Sri Lanka (GoSL) officials to Norway said Norway's role in Sri Lanka was "useful," when he addressed the media in Oslo at the Norwegian Foreign Ministry Monday.
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Sri Lanka's FM to visit Norway, Finland

[TamilNet, Sunday, 11 June 2006, 12:34 GMT]
Sri Lanka' Foreign Minister, Mangala Samaraweera is scheduled to visit Norway and Finland to discuss bilateral relations with high level officials, a media release from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs issued Saturday from Colombo said.
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