TELO holds annual conference

[TamilNet, Thursday, 10 April 2003, 12:00 GMT]
Tamil Eelam Liberation Organization (TELO), a constituent of the Tamil National Alliance (TNA), held its 3-day sixth annual national conference in its Mannar office starting from Saturday, sources said.

The conference elected Parliamentarian Selvam Adaikalanathan as the President, Indrakumar Prasanna as Secretary General, N. SriKantha as the Leader, Nokarathalingam Vino as Treasurer, Henry Mahendran as Deputy President and S. Paskaran as Deputy Leader.

The conference passed the following motions:

• The Sri Lanka Government should expedite addressing the plight of Political detainees being held under the Prevention of Terrorism Act (PTA) and Emergency Regulations (ER).
• The Conference expresses regret for the exclusion of the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam from the donor conference due to be held in the U.S, and appeals the U.S Government to extend invitation to the LTTE.
• The Sri Lanka security forces should immediately vacate all homes and public buildings currently being occupied by them in the Northeast. The Conference expresses dismay in the Memorandum of Understanding not being trully fulfilled in this matter to allow Tamil people to resettle in their own lands and homes.
• The five decade old national problem resulted in two decades of brutal war that has devastated the Northeast, the homeland of Tamils. The Conference condemns the actions of elements who are attempting to sabotage the peace process that is currently being held with the support of the international community to find a fair and just solution. In particular, the Conference appeals to people interested in peace to identify saboteurs within the Janata Vimukthi Peramuna (JVP) and parties collaborating with JVP. The Conference appeals to those supporting the peace process within Peoples' Alliance and its supporters to work to oppose such saboteurs of peace.
• The LTTE has agreed for cessation of hostilities after three decades of war and to accept a solution that recognizes Tamil peoples' right to internal-self determination. Conference calls upon the two main Sinhala parties of the South to work towards finding a just solution in this climate of peace.
• The Government of SriLanka (GOSL) should come forward to pay compensation of minimum of 5 lakhs (Rs.500,000) to each of the families of more than the 600 Tamils disappeared in Jaffna and those disappeared from Sathurukondan, Vantharumoolai, islets and other villages of Northeast. In addition the GOSL also should investigate publish the details of disappeared, who are believed to be killed by the security forces.
• Volunteer teachers in the Northeast should be given permanent appointments immediately.
• In the name of Justice, the Conference appeals to the Jusices of Supreme Court to conduct cases involving Security forces in a Trial-at-Bar basis with only justices hearing the case without jury for the Kumarapuram and Thampalakamam, Trincomalee (1995) murder cases. If a jury-based trials are held then the partisan Sinhala jury will likely acquit the security forces as happened in the Mylanthanai massacre case in a display of abject perversion of justice.

   

  Email this article      Print this article      Feedback on this article