Resettling Tamils confront SL Navy consolidating deployment along Northern cost

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 09 March 2016, 05:46 GMT]
The resettling villagers of Cheanthaan-ku'lam near I'lavaalai in Jaffna successfully blocked the occupying Sri Lankan Navy (SLN) from seizing the lands belonging to St. Anne's Church on Tuesday when the SLN of genocidal Sri Lanka brought Survey Department officials to survey 4 acres of lands situated between Maathakal and Keerimalai along the coast. The SL Navy from ‘Uttara’ naval cantonment in Kaangkeasan-thu'rai (KKS) was attempting for the fourth time to survey and seize the lands for a ‘coastal observation point’. The beach of Cheanthaan-ku'lam was a former Sri Lankan military ‘High Security Zone’, situated near Maathakal and Kaangkeasanthu'rai in Valikaamam North. The resettling people have blocked the SL Navy from carrying out the survey.
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Hora-vinna, Eeri-minna, Ne'lu-vini

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 08 March 2016, 20:40 GMT]
The forest of Hora trees

The forest of Eeri trees

The forest of Ne'lu trees
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Senior Jaffna reporter Navaratnarajah passes away

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 08 March 2016, 17:21 GMT]
61-year-old N. Navaratnarajah (Navam GS) from Mallaakam in Jaffna, who briefly served in TamilNet as a reporter for Jaffna during the turbulent times in the past, has passed away in the early hours of Tuesday due to heart attack at the Teaching Hospital in Jaffna. Mr Navaratnarajah was a Village Officer (GS), a committed social activist and was engaged in news reporting as a freelance journalist for at least 2 decades. Despite his busy schedule, Mr Navaratnarajah remained committed as a full time journalist, working for Uthayan, Chudar-O'li, Veerakesari, Tamil Mirror and to certain Tamil language websites for a long time. He was born on 14 April, 1954.
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Tamil political prisoners denounce compromise, intensify hunger strike

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 08 March 2016, 08:23 GMT]
Fourteen Tamil prisoners, who have been on a hunger strike inside the New Magazine prison for 15 days till Tuesday have vowed not to drop their demand of dignified release of all Tamil political prisoners from the Sri Lankan jails. On Monday, the 10 prisoners on hunger strike at Welikade prison and the remaining four admitted to hospital, vowed to continue their hunger strike refusing medical treatment anymore. Meanwhile, the Tamil National Alliance (TNA) parliamentarians were urging the prisoners to drop their struggle giving false based on the promises from SL Minister of ‘Prison Reforms’ DM Swaminathan, who was working on a draft motion to be presented to SL Parliament on Tuesday. However, the prisoners have responded stating that they will not abandon their struggle with empty promises. They want to see actions based on a principled decision of releasing all political prisoners.
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SL ‘TID’ operatives threaten Tamil family in Mannaar at gunpoint

[TamilNet, Monday, 07 March 2016, 23:10 GMT]
Five Sinhala-speaking operatives of the notorious ‘Terrorist Investigation Division’ who entered the house of 66-year-old Manikam Ilaiyathamby, situated near Mannaar Hospital Road Junction, have threatened his family on 26 February 2016 around 10:30 p.m. demanding the family to hand over their 36-year-old son who is residing in UK. The SL military intelligence and the TID division operatives have been harassing the family since the breakdown of the Norway-brokered Ceasefire Agreement between the Sinhala State and the Tamil Tigers. The Sinhala operatives under the direct command of the Sri Lankan Defence Ministry in Colombo have been harassing the family for some time stating that they were having photos of Ilaiyathamby Kalaivanar, the son of Mr Ialaiyathamby garlanding LTTE Political Division members who arrived at Mannaar following the CFA.
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Tamil Diaspora Youth vow solidarity with Kurds against global injustices

[TamilNet, Sunday, 06 March 2016, 23:49 GMT]
The younger generation of Eezham Tamil Diaspora has expressed solidarity with the Kurds, condemning the Turkish State atrocities and the global injustices that criminalize Kurdish resistance. The U.S., NATO, and E.U. made evident, with the exclusion of the PYD from the UN hosted Syria-talks in Geneva in February, their brazen support of their regional ally Turkey, while it is intensifying its six month long war against the Kurdish population of Northern Kurdistan (Bakur). The Western media have also failed the Kurds by avoiding to cover the crimes against the Kurds. Amidst global silence on the ongoing massacres of Kurds, voices of solidarity have emerged from Tamils in the form of a collective response through the opinion platform Tamil Diaspora Youth Network and the Tamil Youth Organisation (TYO) in UK taking part in a national protest on Sunday.
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Mal-asna

[TamilNet, Sunday, 06 March 2016, 08:22 GMT]
The hill neighbourhood
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Sri Lanka still precarious for returning Tamil asylum seekers, says Swiss NGO

[TamilNet, Saturday, 05 March 2016, 18:34 GMT]
While Amnesty International and Swiss NGOs, including the Swiss Refugee Council, said that the situation for Tamils in Sri Lanka is still precarious and that it is too early for asylum seekers from Switzerland to be returned to Sri Lanka, the Swiss Government and the visiting Sri Lanka’s foreign minister, Mangala Samaraweera, signed a "migration partnership" the technical consulatations [on involuntarily returning Tamil refugees] of which is to take place soon, according to a Swiss Embassy press release.
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Largest donor US orchestrates UN OHCHR actions, says Boyle

[TamilNet, Saturday, 05 March 2016, 16:50 GMT]
"He who pays the piper calls the tune. That is why the UN Human Rights Council and the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights have gone along with the U.S.-sponsored GOSL “domestic mechanism” that is designed to whitewash, cover-up and facilitate the ongoing GOSL war crimes, crimes against humanity and genocide against the Eelam Tamils," said Professor Francis Boyle, an expert in international law and who teaches at the University of Illinois College of Law.
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Colombo resumes surveillance of Eezham Tamils through ‘registration’ in Batticaloa

[TamilNet, Saturday, 05 March 2016, 11:11 GMT]
Occupying Colombo's Sinhala police, the intelligence operatives of the SL State and military surveillance officers are conducting fresh ‘registrations’ of people living across the 14 divisions of Batticaloa district, citing section 76 of the SL ‘Police Ordinance’ which states that householders should furnish the officer of police of his or her division with a list of all the inmates in the house and that any change occurring in the households should be reported to the police or legal authorities of the SL State. The surveillance measure is now being systematically implemented in the entire district of Batticaloa. In addition, Sinhala military intelligence officers are visiting selected households every month and some others every third month. Those who have been in Vanni earlier are being harassed with ‘terrorist’ questions, Tamil civil sources in Batticaloa told TamilNet on Friday.
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Fr Fontgalland sacrificed his entire life for downtrodden Upcountry people: Fr Jeyasegaram

[TamilNet, Friday, 04 March 2016, 16:00 GMT]
Following the example set by the late Rt Rev Leo Nanayakkara OSB, the first Bishop of Badulla, who was a Sinhalese and was renowned for his committed actions among the downtrodden masses, Rev Fr Guy de Fontgalland, who was a Tamil from Jaffna, decided to work among the Upcountry Tamils, continuing the legacy of committed action grounded in grassroots development since the demise of Leo Nanayakkara in 1982. The late Rev Fr Guy de Fontgalland was preparing to launch a big project of planting 10,000 palmyra seedlings in the islets off Jaffna in 2017, said his close associate Rev Fr A.F. Jeyasegaram, the director of Neitha'lam, which is a diocesan center for fishing workers in Jaffna. Fr Jeyasagaram has known Sathiyapillai Guy de Fontgalland since his childhood till his demise on Monday.
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Veteran development activist Fr Sathiyapillai Guy de Fontgalland passes away

[TamilNet, Thursday, 03 March 2016, 23:18 GMT]
Veteran Eezham Tamil development activist Rev Fr Sathiyapillai Guy de Fontgalland, who has dedicated his life to the upliftment of the Upcountry Tamils in the island, passed away at the age of 69 on Monday after being hit by a sea wave in Trincomalee. Fr S Guy de Fontgalland, who hails from Ooraaththu'rai (Kayts) island in Jaffna, was the founder of Leo Marga Ashram (LMA) in Bandarawela, which is an alternative development-oriented action group, based in Badulla district. With a vision of liberating the plantation community and a mission of creating an alternative leadership in the plantation sector through conscientization programs aimed at a people’s movement.
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Released Tamil prisoner says all inmates subjected to wrongful convictions

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 02 March 2016, 23:07 GMT]
The kith and kin of imprisoned Tamil prisoners of war and political prisoners staged a protest in front of Jaffna Bus Station on Wednesday morning expressing their solidarity with the political prisoners who are on hunger-strike at New Magazine prison in Colombo. Two Tamil prisoners recently released from the prison, attended the protest and one of the released prisoners, 32-year-old Komahan Murugiah, a former member of Jaffna Municipal Council, gave an emotional speech, in which he said all of the inmates languishing with him during the past 6 years were wrongfully convicted based on forced confessions in the past.
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Eli-bichchiya, Ka'nu-bichchiya, Thoara-bichchiya

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 02 March 2016, 08:14 GMT]
The outside wall or embankment

The pillared or staked wall

The wall or embankment to separate; or the bank of Thoara shrubs
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Uppa'lam, Lu'nu-ka'lapuwa

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 01 March 2016, 21:12 GMT]
The saltpans or the saltern

The salt producing lagoon
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Protesters in Jaffna demand UN to restore media access to ICP at UN HQ

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 01 March 2016, 14:20 GMT]
Northern Provincial Councillors Ananthy Sasitharan and M.K. Shivajilingam along with the kith and kin of missing persons staged an emotional protest on Tuesday morning in Jaffna in front of UN's Sub Office (WFP office) demanding the United Nations Headquarters in New York to restore UN-accredited media access to Matthew Russell Lee of Inner City Press, who has been continuously revealing how human rights affairs of Eelam Tamils are being handled at the United Nations HQ at New York. “On behalf of the stateless nation of Eelam Tamils, I am urging you to resolve the dispute and restore UN accreddited media access to Matthew Russell Lee and take disciplinary action against the elements threatening free speech at the esteemed world body,” Ms Ananthy Sasitharan said.
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S.T. Arasu remembered by his disciple and friend

[TamilNet, Monday, 29 February 2016, 22:50 GMT]
The multi-faceted personality of the late Mr S.Thirunavukkarasu (S.T.Arasu) was remembered in an interview given to TamilNet last week by Rajaratnam Nadarajah (75), the owner of Baby Photo in Jaffna. Mr Nadarajah was recollecting his close relationship with Mr Arasu since 1958, right from the days of their photography work at Sellams, which was involved in the production of the pioneer Eezham Tamil film ‘Kadamaiyin ellai’. He was also recollecting the encounter of Mr Arasu with the Ceylon military during the non-violent protest of Eezham Tamils in 1961 under the leadership of Mr S.J.V. Chelvanayakam.
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Three Tamil political prisoners on hunger strike admitted to hospital

[TamilNet, Sunday, 28 February 2016, 19:04 GMT]
Three of the Tamil political prisoners, who have been on hunger-strike since Monday have been forcefully admitted for medical treatment by the SL prison authorities at New Magazine prison, legal sources in Colombo told TamilNet. Out of 15 Tamil prisoners who were on fast-unto death, one prisoner had withdrawn and the condition of five prisoners worsened on Saturday, the sources said. Through their hunger strike so far, the Tamil prisoners have exposed that there are several prisoners without proper legal process and each and every one of them are forced to fight to expedite their cases or to get them released.
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Ku'nda-saalea

[TamilNet, Sunday, 28 February 2016, 16:14 GMT]
The king's leisure house or pleasure house
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Uprooted Tamils in Jaffna to launch occupy movement carrying ‘white-flags’

[TamilNet, Saturday, 27 February 2016, 21:31 GMT]
The uprooted Eezham Tamils from Valikaamam North in Jaffna, languishing in so-called welfare camps in Jaffna for 25 years, on Friday resolved that they were no longer prepared to wait in silence trusting the empty promises from David Cameron made in 2013 to Zeid Ra’ad Al Hussein in 2016 that they would be soon resettled. The genocidal State of Sri Lanka and its occupying Sinhala military, being groomed as a ‘Lascarine’ force, have transformed their lands from ‘High Security Zone’ into ‘Sinhala Military Zone’. Now, the SL Defence Secretary in Colombo has claimed that Colombo is to sign an agreement with India in June on transforming SL military occupied Palaali airport into an international airport and that the uprooted people should only expect alternative lands citing ‘development’.
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