Canadian organizations condemn attack on students in Jaffna

[TamilNet, Friday, 30 November 2012, 09:41 GMT]
Condemning the brutal assaults on the students of University of Jaffna by the occupying Sri Lanka’s police and military apparatus that has been happening with intensity since Tuesday, the Canadian Peace Alliance (CPA), the York Federation of Students (YFS), the Scarborough Campus Students’ Union (SCSU), and the Tamil Youth Organization-Canada (TYO-Canada) have issued statements supporting both the civil and political liberties of the Eezham Tamil students in the homeland as well as the democratic right of the Tamil nation to self-determination.
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Kurdish party conveys solidarity message on Tamil Eelam Heroes Day

[TamilNet, Friday, 30 November 2012, 06:59 GMT]
“History of the world has been full of clashes between the occupiers and the occupied. As a result of struggles, resistances and sacrifices more of the occupied people have been liberated and the fascist and chauvinist occupiers are being destroyed successively,” writes Mr. Rehman Haci Ehmedi, the Secretary General of the Kurdistan Free Life Party (PJAK), in a solidarity message sent to the Eezham Tamil nation on the occasion of Heroes Day. In a note sent to TamilNet via Rojhelat.info on Thursday, Mr. Ehmedi, who is the highest authority in the PJAK, drawing parallels between the struggle of the Kurds and the Tamils, urged the Eezham Tamil nation to continue the struggle, “In the hope of revitalization of the heroic nation of Tamil Eelam, in the hope of triumphant and freedom for the resolute and revolutionary nation of Tamil Eelam; never rest unless triumphing!”
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SLA attack on Tamil students is ‘additional’ issue to US embassy in Colombo

[TamilNet, Thursday, 29 November 2012, 16:45 GMT]
A press release of the US embassy in Colombo on Thursday, while expressing concern about an attack on a reporter in Jaffna on Wednesday and searches without warrants of journalists, considered the entry of SL forces into the gents’ and ladies’ hostels of the Jaffna University and attack on the Tamil students inside the hostels on Tuesday and later when they peacefully demonstrated on Wednesday, as an “additional” issue. On Wednesday, while addressing the university students, a student representative asked, “where can we complain? There is nobody here for us to complain. Only the International Community should do something.”
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Thousands throng Sydney, London Heroes’ Day events

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 28 November 2012, 16:21 GMT]
Thousands of Eezham Tamils from across the UK gathered at London on Tuesday to pay obeisance to the Maaveerar (heroes) who laid down their lives in the struggle for a sovereign Tamil Eelam. Likewise, large crowds showed up at the Heroes Day event at Sydney, which was held in open space, and the people stayed on till the conclusion despite a heavy downpour. At the Heroes day event at Excel centre, London, security sources informed that the overall crowd was roughly around 20,000. Speaking to TamilNet, a community activist from Australia said that the strong presence of Tamil public at the Heroes Day events in different parts of the world showed that the diaspora will not be intimidated by any targeting or attacks on grassroots activists. Separately, Australian Greens Senator Lee Rhiannon also spoke in the parliament on the occasion, referring to challenges faced by the Tamils.
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Peaceful student protest attacked by SL military in Jaffna

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 28 November 2012, 07:28 GMT]
Jaffna University students who boycotted classes on Wednesday and rallied in front of the university entrance Wednesday at 11:00 a.m. protesting against the SL military harassments inside the University premises on Tuesday on the occasion of Heroes Day, were brutally attacked by SL military commanders who had taken position on the road while the students were peacefully walking on a demonstration march.
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SL military attacks house of Kaarainakar PS Head for observing Heroes Day

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 28 November 2012, 05:35 GMT]
A Sri Lankan military intelligence backed squad entered the house of Mr. Anaimukan Velayutham, the head of the civic council (Piratheasa Chapai) of Kaarai-nakar, who is a Tamil National Alliance (TNA) member and a leading trader in Jaffna, and set fire inside his house using burning tyres, news sources in Kaarainakar islet off Jaffna told TamilNet. Mr. Anaimukan was threatened by the gang, alleging that he had observed the Heroes Day by lighting lamps and conducting special prayers at the temples in Kaarainakar.
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Ladies’ hostel lights Common Flame, bells stun SL military in Jaffna on Heroes Day

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 28 November 2012, 04:49 GMT]
Defying the strict instructions by the occupying Sri Lankan military, the people of Jaffna on Tuesday tolled temple bells amid military patrols at 6:07 p.m. in remembrance of heroes. SL soldiers were taken aback witnessing the resolve of the people and hearing the sound of temple bells coming from all directions. Heroes Day remembrance was peacefully and emotionally observed by all the sections of people in the peninsula and in Vanni who lit candles inside their homes. Meanwhile, SL soldiers who entered into the gents’ hostel of the University of Jaffna, where the Heroes Day Common Flame was lit last year, guarded every single room and climbed on to the terrace to prevent it this time. But the flame was lit at the second floor of the Ladies’ Hostel, sharply at 6.07 p.m.
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People of Vanni hoist Tamil Eelam flag at Mu'l'livaaykkaal on Heroes Day

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 28 November 2012, 03:15 GMT]
Braving the prying eyes of the occupying SL military, the people of Mullaiththeevu on Tuesday honoured the sacrifice of Tamil heroes at Mu'l'livaaykkaal by hoisting a Tamil Eelam Tiger flag at the sites of two Heroes Cemeteries that have now been razed down by the genocidal military of Colombo. A flag post was put up and the Tiger flag was flown at the cemetery grounds at Vadduvaakal, where the last burial of fighters who sacrificed their lives in the Vanni war took place. A Tiger flag was also flown at the site of A'lampil Heroes Cemetery in Mullaiththeevu district.
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Pirapaharan’s LTTE had moves to make Heroes Day inclusive

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 27 November 2012, 10:22 GMT]
Conceding the fact that many members of the other militant organisations too had laid down their lives for the cause of Tamil Eelam, Pirapaharan’s LTTE took initiative in taking an account of them for honouring them as Maaveerar (heroes). Forms had been distributed for this purpose to get written consent from the next of kin of the slain heroes of the other militant organisations. The outbreak of war in 2006 stalled the process started in 2002, revealed a former senior member of the LTTE to TamilNet on Tuesday. If needed, he would openly come out and testify the fact in his own voice, the former senior member said.
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Tamil youth in Canada experiment with virtual cemeteries for Tamil heroes

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 27 November 2012, 03:22 GMT]
"Exactly one year ago, we as youth adopted the Tamil Sovereignty Cognition as a basis for our initiatives in the Diaspora. We should continue to move forward and never compromise on the fundamental principles to which we pledged our allegiance,” Pamela Katheswaran, the president of the University of Ontario Institute of Technology Tamil Students Association in Canada told TamilNet on Sunday, attending the Heroes Day remembrance event organised by the Tamil Youth Organisation (TYO) in Toronto. The organisers had also launched an experimental web-based virtual replication of Eezham Tamils’ Heroes cemeteries (maaveerar thuyilum illam), razed down by the Sri Lankan military following the occupation of the country of Eezham Tamils.
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New Zealand Tamils plant trees to perpetuate memory of heroes

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 27 November 2012, 02:13 GMT]
In a novel way of remembering the Eezham Tamil heroes, the New Zealand Tamils planted trees in their country of domicile during the Heroes Day week. Almost all the Tamil community organisations in New Zealand participated the programme that took place on Sunday. “By planting trees we have conveyed a message to the people of New Zealand that what has happened in our home country was not merely war crimes or crimes against humanity but a full-fledged genocide,” said veteran civil society activist and QSM awardee, Mr. A. Theva Rajan, who presided over the programme.
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Canada’s position on Sri Lanka significant, but not enough: Neethan Shan

[TamilNet, Monday, 26 November 2012, 17:49 GMT]
Within days of the release of the UN internal review report on Sri Lanka, it became the subject of debate in Canada’s House of Commons. The House exchange belies an apparent discrepancy in present government policy, Tamil activists opine, citing the ruling Conservatives strongly denouncing the Sri Lankan government’s lack of respect for human rights, while simultaneously deporting Tamil refugee claimants from Canada to Sri Lanka. “I am happy that the Prime Minister who was generally silent with the mass murder of tens of thousands of Tamils during early 2009, is now beginning to stand up for the human rights of Tamils,” Neethan Shan, Eezham Tamil politician in Canada told TamilNet.
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British envoy in Colombo speaks on diaspora engagement with Sri Lanka

[TamilNet, Monday, 26 November 2012, 01:54 GMT]
The British High Commissioner in Colombo was answering a question on “the ways in which the Sri Lankan diaspora in the UK could support development in Sri Lanka,” said a note of the High Commission’s website last Tuesday, introducing the 13th edition of a PR exercise video series, “Ask the High Commissioner,” initiated by the mission in Colombo. The High Commissioner was in fact answering a question, “What is the Sri Lankan diaspora in the UK doing to assist Sri Lanka,” and he was citing the example of a multi-ethnic group of young doctors from the diaspora visiting the island recently.
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Student associations mark Tamil Eelam Heroes Day in Canada

[TamilNet, Sunday, 25 November 2012, 23:13 GMT]
Tamil Student Associations (TSAs) in over eight University campuses in Canada engaged in commemorating Heroes Day last week. Annually the TSAs individually commemorate Heroes Day during the week leading up to the broader Tamil Youth remembrance event held on the 25 of November. Commending the solidarity work that Eezham Tamil youth in Canada have been undertaking over the past years, James Clark from the Canadian Peace Alliance said at the event at York last Monday: "Maaveerar Naal is an occasion not only to remember and pay tribute to the martyrs and heroes of Tamil Eelam, but also to reflect on the lessons of the struggle for peace and justice."
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Emotion-charged homage paid to slain diaspora activist in France

[TamilNet, Saturday, 24 November 2012, 18:30 GMT]
Thousands of Eezham Tamils paid their last respects at a state-like funeral given on Saturday to Nadarajah Mathinthiran alias Parithi, who was assassinated outside Tamil Coordinating Committee office in Paris two weeks ago. While the International Community has been unable to exert any meaningful pressure on the Sri Lankan state, the continued ban of the LTTE in countries outside the island, only encourages the SL state to deal with the diaspora through a militaristic counter-insurgency approach, activists in Paris said, adding that the mass attendance at the funeral of the slain Tamil activist was also a message to the International Community of Establishments (ICE) that was projecting the Tamil diaspora as a hostile actor, from the UN panel report to the latest document of the International Crisis Group (ICG).
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Demographic genocide aimed in SL military surveying Batticaloa border villages

[TamilNet, Saturday, 24 November 2012, 08:59 GMT]
The occupying Sinhala military of Colombo, stationed in more than 10 military bases along the villages in Batticaloa district in the area bordering Polannaruwa district, has enforced Eezham Tamils to register their households and their lands. The enforced registration is carried out in a military operation style, is claimed to be under the so-called ‘Eastern Province Development Plan’ of the Mahaweli Development Ministry. The intention is to appropriate excess lands to be distributed among ‘landless’ people, a SL military intelligence officer involved in the project said when confronted by the villagers. The enforced registration is being carried out without involving the SL Government Agent of Batticaloa district and the divisional officers under him.
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‘UN internal report meaningless without action, long term solution needed’: Tamil activist

[TamilNet, Friday, 23 November 2012, 21:01 GMT]
Criticizing the UN for its deliberate silence which “protected the Sri Lankan state from international criticism and allowed it to strategically conduct a genocidal campaign under the guise of a “war on terror””, Dr. Sam Pari, an Eezham Tamil activist with the ATC, argues in news site Crickey.com that the recently released internal review report of the UN on Sri Lanka is meaningless to the Eezham Tamils without concrete steps in action. Giving an outline of different ways in which the Sri Lankan state is conducting genocide of the Eezham Tamils, she writes “The Sri Lankan regime’s strategy of eradicating the Tamil people through various avenues is only being abetted by the super powers’ silence. What is required is a longer term solution that deals with the root cause — an oppressive force, the racist Sri Lankan regime, intent on erasing the identity of a people, the Tamils.”
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ICG plays mischief with TamilNet

[TamilNet, Friday, 23 November 2012, 08:40 GMT]
The International Crisis Group (ICG) in its latest report on Sri Lanka, No. 239, dated 20 November 2012, came out with the following sentence: “The influential website TamilNet, whose editors are linked to the so-called Nediyavan faction of the LTTE, frequently criticises the TNA for moderation allegedly imposed by the Indian and U.S. governments.” In the footnotes for the statement, the ICG cites Norway questioning Nediyavan, the Dutch investigating illegal LTTE fundraising and D.B.S. Jeyaraj writing on “Tigers overseas chief Nediyavan” getting questioned in Oslo over alleged links to LTTE fund raising (page 13).
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Colombo disregards school development in North-East: TNA MP

[TamilNet, Thursday, 22 November 2012, 15:42 GMT]
The Colombo government has been systematically neglecting the development of Tamil schools in the North and East provinces and the trend has been evident in the proposed 2012 budget proposals now being debated in the Sri Lankan parliament, says Batticaloa district Tamil National Alliance parliamentarian P. Selvaraja.
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Appellants granted time extention in Rajapakse war-crimes case

[TamilNet, Thursday, 22 November 2012, 15:41 GMT]
The United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit granted appellants’ motion for extension of time to file the Reply brief, by two weeks, in the appeal case against Sri Lanka's President Mahinda Rajapakse for civil damages on war-crimes charges, according to the court docket. The revised briefing schedule indicated that the Appellant's Reply brief will now have to be filed by December 7, 2012. Attorney for the Appellants, Bruce Fein, told the court that the the intervening holidays and his case work load had necessitated the request for extension and the Court granted his motion.
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"Multimedia book to unbury facts of Sri Lanka war"

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 21 November 2012, 00:18 GMT]
Benjamin Dix, a former UN staffer who spent four years in Sri Lanka from 2004 till 2008 when Sri Lanka asked all NGOs to leave the island, and who with illustrator Lindsay Pollock, is documenting the effects of Sri Lanka war through the story of a Tamil refugee, in an interview given to TamilNet says, "I felt terrible after the UN evacuation from Vanni and very angry that they international system had abandoned civilians at their time of need....Due to the media blackout on the conflict, I felt that it was very important to tell the stories of the dead and the survivors of the conflict." Arundhati Roy, writes in support of Dix's project, "tens of thousands of tamil civilians who were brazenly and brutally killed and powerful countries which have strategic and business interests in the region are rapidly burying these facts," and that the book will unbury these facts.
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British diplomat briefed on demographic genocide taking place in Trincomalee

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 20 November 2012, 23:43 GMT]
The leader of opposition in the Eastern Provincial Council (EPC), Mr Singaraveloo Thandayuthapani, a Tamil National Alliance (TNA) politician on Monday briefed the Deputy High Commissioner of UK Mr Robbie Bulloch, who was on an official visit to Trincomalee district. The TNA politician described the land appropriation by the Sri Lanka Army affecting Eezham Tamils in the district as a systematic and planned act of demographic genocide.
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Eyewitnesses to Kumaarapuram massacre summoned to Anuradhapura

[TamilNet, Monday, 19 November 2012, 20:16 GMT]
Witnesses to February 1996 brutal massacre of 24 Tamils by the occupying Sri Lanka Army (SLA) at Kumarapuram vilage in Trincomalee, have been sent summons to appear on Monday in Anuradhapura High Court situated in predominantly Sinhala district, more than 16 years after the genocidal massacre. “This gang rape and massacre of innocent civilians, including children and women, forms part of a system evidence of Genocide against Eezham Tamils,” a lawyer from Trincomalee told TamilNet commenting “justice delayed is justice denied.” Many of the witnesses are poor labourers who do not know Sinhala. The witnesses have also been threatened by the SL military not to appear in the Courts, the sources further said.
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SL police detains 65-year-old Tamil mother in Mannaar

[TamilNet, Monday, 19 November 2012, 19:39 GMT]
Sri Lankan Police personnel who arrived in Mannaar from Jaffna Monday morning took into custody a 65-year-old Tamil woman, who was alone at her residence in Moor Street. SL Police in Mannaar and the police from Jaffna detained her and took her back to her house and photographed her in front of her house and at the backyard.
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UN culpable under "complicity clause," says Professor Boyle

[TamilNet, Sunday, 18 November 2012, 22:22 GMT]
Dismissing the "recommendations" of the Petrie report as "UN double talk" similar to the language used by the UN to excuse UN's complicity in the Srebrenica massacre, Professor Boyle, an expert in International Law, said that the Petrie report, however, provides legal evidence to establish UN's culpability on the element of "complicity" to war crimes and genocide, as defined in the Article 3(e) of 1948 Genocide Convention. Further, Boyle said, contrary to the claims in the Petrie report, the UN Secretary General (UNSG) has independent powers, and need not adhere to the dictates of the Security Council.
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SL Colonial governor uses 30 million rupees on 3 day conference in Jaffna

[TamilNet, Saturday, 17 November 2012, 23:48 GMT]
While thousands of uprooted people are suffering without access to their homes and properties, 35 to 40 million rupees of the money belonging to Northern Provincial Council (NPC) has been used up for the 15th meet of SL governors held in Jaffna from Wednesday to Friday, media sources in Jaffna accused. Uthayan daily, in a report published on Thursday said 30 million rupees had been already used up. Former SL military commander of Jaffna, Maj. Gen. (retd) G.A. Chandrasiri, who is the colonial governor of North, controlling the entire activities of the NPC, has already used up more than 190 million rupees of the NPC money in building a modern bungalow for the governor.
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Tamil activists take different view of Canada’s support to UN’s internal report

[TamilNet, Saturday, 17 November 2012, 00:16 GMT]
Canada’s Foreign Affairs Minister John Baird issued a statement on Thursday regarding the UN Secretary General’s Internal Review Panel Report on Sri Lanka. Offering support to the report, the statement laid stress on the failure of the Sri Lankan government to make progress on ‘reconciliation, accountability and respect for human rights in Sri Lanka’. Responding to this, Tamil activists in Canada told TamilNet “ if the Canadian government is genuinely concerned about ensuring that mistakes made in Sri Lanka are not repeated, then they must acknowledge that addressing the fundamental national question of Eezham Tamils and providing justice for the genocide they suffered should be a prerequisite to any ‘work’ of the international community.”
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Colombo accelerates demographic genocide in Trincomalee

[TamilNet, Friday, 16 November 2012, 18:33 GMT]
The Colombo government led by President Mahinda Rajapakse has been implementing a land appropriation policy to reduce the parliamentary strength of Tamils in Trincomalee district with the support of occupying Sri Lanka Army, say Tamil politicians in the district. While landless residents of the district have to fight for the allocation of half an acre per family, the outsiders brought down from south are allowed to clear forest lands 2 to 3 per acres per family. More than three hundred Sinhala families have been brought down from southern districts of the island and are allowed to clear forest area in Suriyawewa situated in Seruwila DS division at the rate of two to three acres per family.
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Israel airstrikes kill Hamas military commander

[TamilNet, Friday, 16 November 2012, 09:33 GMT]
The Israeli Defence Force (IDF) began on Wednesday a heavy bombardment of the Gaza strip with a targeted airstrike, killing Hamas military commander Ahmad al-Jabari and a passenger in his vehicle. The IDF cited his involvement in the hostage-taking of Gilad Shalit, an episode in the 2006 war on Lebanon, as its justification. Israel's "Operation Pillar of Cloud" signals the largest escalation in the conflict since 2008-9 Gaza invasions. “This name invokes the Hebrew nation's biblical pre-history - much as Sinhala-Buddhist nationalism conjures the Mahavamsa as an ideological tool in it’s very modern state military strategy,” comments Lorenzo Fiorito, an activist working with solidarity groups in Canada. “The present Gaza offensive has little to do with the individuals it has killed or with millenia-old founding myths - it has to do with the Palestinian claim to statehood,” he adds.
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BTF to push for genocide investigation: HR activist

[TamilNet, Thursday, 15 November 2012, 00:18 GMT]
Palaka'ni interviews Human Rights Coordinator of British Tamils Forum (BTF), Kana Nirmalan, on the significance of the recent conference held by All Party Parliamentary Group for Tamils (APPG-T) and the BTF, with the participation of Tamil politicians and representatives from the Tamil homeland, Tamil Nadu and the diaspora. The resolution of the conference has demanded international independent investigations on war crimes, crimes against humanity and genocide.
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No mention of Nambiar in UN report: ICP

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 14 November 2012, 22:57 GMT]
“It is not at all clear that this long delayed Petrie report represents any more serious approach by Ban's UN on the ongoing issues in Sri Lanka,” opined Inner City Press (ICP) on Wednesday after the UN released the Petrie report in which portions were blacked-out or redacted. The ICP said it did a fast word search and found that while the name of John Holmes – who defended his and the UN's actions on Tuesday – appeared in the report, UN envoy Vijay Nambiar did not.
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'World failed Eezham Tamils'

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 13 November 2012, 21:39 GMT]
With the much delayed report authored by U.K.'s Charles Petrie on the review of UN inaction during the 2009 Mu'l'livaaykkaal massacre due to be released to the U.N. Secretary General Ban Ki Moon tomorrow, UN Dispatch, a website that covers the U.N., chronicles the "massive and system wide failure to prevent the slaughter of an estimated 40,000 ethnic Tamils in five short months in the winter and spring of 2009," and says, like what the UN has done, "[a]nti-genocide constituencies around the world ought to also undertake the same hard-hitting self examination" on the failure to first prevent, and later the failure to expose the mass atrocity against Eezham Tamils.
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Resettlement remains frozen for 51,000 Tamils in Valikaamam, Jaffna

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 13 November 2012, 01:45 GMT]
Since 2010, the SL government officials in Jaffna, including the GA, have been claiming that there were no ‘High Security Zones’ in the Jaffna district. In the meantime, more than 51,000 Tamils, belonging to 22 GS divisions, are denied access to their fertile lands and houses in Valikaamam, Jaffna. While the Colombo government was claiming that there were only ‘no go zones’ where land mines were yet to be cleared, the SL Supreme Court gave permission to proceed with the FR petition filed by Mr Mavai Senathiraja, 1 year later.
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Politics breaches international law in denying Eezham Tamil Nation: Gajendrakumar

[TamilNet, Monday, 12 November 2012, 23:20 GMT]
Gajendrakumar Ponnambalam, the president of the Tamil National People's Front (TNPF), interviewed by TamilNet's Palaka'ni on Saturday said that Eezham Tamils are legally qualified for nationhood under the existing international law. Nationhood is denied to Eezham Tamils not by the law, but by the international politics, he said.
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Uprooted Tamils in Champoor live in camps under flood water

[TamilNet, Monday, 12 November 2012, 16:19 GMT]
Uprooted Champoor Tamil families numbering about 1,250 are undergoing untold sufferings in temporary shelters due to ongoing heavy rain and strong winds. Temporary shelters situated in Kaddai-pa'richchaan, Ki'liveddi, Manatcheanai and Paddiththidal are under flood waters and the latrines are submerged in the water, according to C. Thandayuthapani, the opposition leader in the Eastern Provincial Council (EPC).
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Colombo plans to settle 25,000 Sinhala families in Batticaloa district

[TamilNet, Sunday, 11 November 2012, 23:42 GMT]
The Sri Lankan government with the assistance of occupying Sri Lanka Army and the paramilitary politicians, has been implementing a scheme to settle down about twenty five thousand Sinhala families in the Batticaloa district in the eastern province, informed sources in Batticaola said. More than 5,000 Sinhala families brought from south have been settled down along 16 km coastal area from Paasik-kudaa in Koa'ralaippattu DS division to Chavukkadi in Ea'raavoorpattu (Chengkaladi) DS division.
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ILPS conference in Canada discusses liberation struggles and state oppression

[TamilNet, Sunday, 11 November 2012, 21:36 GMT]
The three-day Canadian conference of the International League of Peoples’ Struggle (ILPS) culminated on March 10. The public discussion series at Toronto’s Ontario Institute for the Study of Education comprising several topics, was organized to coincide with the Second General Assembly of the ILPS-Canada. Krisna Saravanamuttu, a second generation Eezham Tamil, was one of several activists who delivered strategic analyses of state tools against liberation movements, under the topic “The War on Resistance,” to an audience of approximately 25 activists. Presentations advanced perspectives on Tamil, Palestinian, Indian, and Quebecois social movements. Among participants originally of Latin American, Kashmiri, Philippine, Quebecois, and Anglo-Canadian origin, second-generation youth members of the Tamil community made up a prominent proportion of attendees to this event.
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Tamil delegates interact with London Tamils, affirm support for genocide investigation

[TamilNet, Saturday, 10 November 2012, 23:37 GMT]
Concluding the three day global conference organized by the BTF and APPGT, politicians and civil society activists from the island and Tamil Nadu participated in an interactive session with an Eezham Tamil diaspora audience in London, on Friday. This event follows a meeting among the Tamil delegates in the British parliament on Thursday, where they had arrived at a consensus on the resolutions proposed on the day before calling for an independent international investigation into the genocidal war crimes of the Sri Lankan state.
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Colombo appropriates lands, constructs Buddhist Stupas in Kuchchave'li

[TamilNet, Saturday, 10 November 2012, 20:37 GMT]
The Sri Lankan Department of Archaeology is engaged in constructing Buddhist Stupas in lands appropriated from Tamil and Muslim villagers at Kuchchave'li division of Trincomalee district. The appropriation of lands and the construction of the Buddhist temples are taking place with the backing of the occupying Sri Lanka Army. Foundation stone was laid on Friday for the construction of a Buddhist Stupa on the top of a rocky hillock called Karadimalai, along the seacoast, adjacent to the SL police station as well as the old Rest House complex in Kuchchave’li. The prime tourist location will get an exclusive Sinhala-Buddhist cultural image soon. The SL military is also appropriating lands in Kuchchave'li village, for its own purposes.
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16 killed, 45 wounded, prisoners clash with SL commandos in Welikada

[TamilNet, Friday, 09 November 2012, 13:17 GMT]
16 inmates were killed and more than 45 have sustained injuries in a clash between Sri Lankan Special Task Force elite commandos and Sinhala hardcore prisoners, initial reports from Colombo said. A group of STF elite commandos, who entered the Welikada prison in Colombo, on a search operation has provoked anger among the Sinhala inmates after engaging in verbal abuse against the prisoners. The rioting prisoners seized an arms storage at the prison and started firing against the STF personnel, wounding 13 of them. One of those wounded was a Deputy Inspector General, news sources in Colombo said.
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U.S. reasserts immunity to Rajapakse from war crimes

[TamilNet, Friday, 09 November 2012, 09:00 GMT]
The United States Department of Justice late Thursday filed an amicus brief suggesting immunity to Sri Lanka's President Rajapakse against the alleged war crimes, in the case brought by three Tamil plaintiffs. The US brief claimed that the "Executive Branch may submit determinations concerning foreign sovereign immunity," and noting that while the FSIA “transfer[red] primary responsibility for immunity determinations” regarding foreign states “from the Executive to the Judicial Branch, the Congress did not eliminate the State Department’s role in determinations regarding individual official immunity," asked the Court to affirm the district court’s decision dismissing the lawsuit against Sri Lanka's President Rajapaksa.
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Mannaar fishermen attack Badurdeens ‘development’ project

[TamilNet, Thursday, 08 November 2012, 23:54 GMT]
Fishing farms earmarked in the Mannaar Sea and that are allocated to his supporters by SL minister Rishard Badurdeen, were destroyed by a group of 450 villagers on Friday in protest against the destructive ‘development’ planned by the Colombo government that hampers their fishing industry.
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Tamil nationalist political organiser assassinated in France

[TamilNet, Thursday, 08 November 2012, 23:41 GMT]
Nadarajah Mathinthiran alias Parithi, an ex-LTTE commander who had left the movement in the early 90's and later coordinated Tamil organisational political activities in France since 2003, has been assassinated on Thursday evening outside the office of the Tamil Coordinating Committee (TCC) in Paris, news sources in France said. People close to the 50-year-old organiser, who was also known as Reagon, blamed the Sri Lankan military establishment for the assassination. “This seems to be a psyop assassination serving the agenda of the Sri Lankan state targeting the political mobilisation of the Tamil diaspora,” Mr Pradeep, an independent political activist based in Paris told TamilNet. The French Police is investigating the killing.
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Tamils vote with Muslims in EPC against SLA land grab of Muslim village

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 07 November 2012, 15:30 GMT]
The Eastern Provincial Council (EPC), which is now under the control of ruling United People Freedom Alliance (UPFA) passed a resolution unanimously Tuesday against the appropriation by the Sri Lanka Army of the entire traditional Muslim village, Karimayilaiyoottu with a century old mosque. C.Thandayuthapani, the opposition leader in the EPC who represents the Tamil National Alliance (TNA) extended full support to the motion saying that no one would tolerate the appropriation of a traditional Muslim village and the mosque by the Sri Lankan military. The resolution was brought by Ameer Ali, a ruling party member, at the monthly meeting of the EPC.
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SL military interference deprives livelihood of Tamil fisher families in Mannaar

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 06 November 2012, 23:06 GMT]
More than 2,000 families dependent of fishing as their livelihood at Panangkaddik-koddu, a coastal village situated in Mannaar division of Mannaar district, have complained to the Sri Lankan Government Agent Sarath Raveendra that the SL military officials at Tha'l'laadi military base have provided 108 additional permits to Sinhala fishermen apart from the 65 permits that have been provided by the SL minister for fisheries within the last 2 months. The native people of Panagkaddik-koddu say that the Sri Lankan state-sponsored Sinhala intruders have deprived them of their livelihood.
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UNHRC resolution has failed to exert pressure on Colombo: FirstPost

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 06 November 2012, 17:33 GMT]
“If anybody thought Sri Lanka would mend its ways after the United Nations Human Rights Council resolution, they are mistaken,” writes G Pramod Kumar, a senior editor of Indian news portal FirstPost.com on Monday. In a story titled ‘Impeachment of Sri Lankan chief justice is India’s foreign policy failure’, Mr Pramod Kumar notes that “while the international community continues to put pressure on the country to improve its human rights standards and fix accountability for its alleged war crimes, it has become more defiant.”
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Sri Lanka rejects 100 recommendations at UPR

[TamilNet, Monday, 05 November 2012, 23:37 GMT]
A hundred recommendations that came out in the submissions of the member states of the United Nations at the Universal Periodic Review (UPR) on Sri Lanka have not enjoyed the support of Sri Lanka, reveal a draft document by the UPR working committee on Monday. The report also identified 110 recommendations as enjoying the support of Sri Lanka. All conclusions and/or recommendations contained in the present report reflect the position of the submitting State(s) and/or the State under review. They should not be construed as endorsed by the Working Group as a whole, said the draft report. At its 18th meeting held on Monday, the Working Group adopted the report on Sri Lanka India, Benin and Spain had been selected by the UN Human Rights Council as rapporteurs (troika) to facilitate the review of Sri Lanka.
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SL Navy continues to obstruct resettlement of displaced Muslims of Musali

[TamilNet, Sunday, 04 November 2012, 23:47 GMT]
Displaced Muslim residents of Musali divisional secretariat division in Mannaar district are being prevented by the occupying Sri Lanka Navy under the pretext that the area has been brought under the high security zone. Rishard Badurdeen, a cabinet rank SL minister, who has been working with the Colombo government to appropriate lands of Tamils in Mannaar district, is now being accused by his own community for his inability to stop Colombo's appropriation of lands that belong to Muslims from Musali division, according to representatives of displaced people from Musali.
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Dublin tribunal takes up genocide investigation

[TamilNet, Saturday, 03 November 2012, 01:22 GMT]
“In April 2013, a panel of international experts will be convened as Judges of the 'Permanent People's Tribunal' to examine reports submitted by many specialised working groups on the accusation of the crime of Genocide against the Government of Sri Lanka and on the accusations against various international actors who had supported and prepared the conditions for the Sri Lankan Government to implement this alleged crime,” said a joint statement issued by the 'Permanent People's Tribunal' (PPT) based in Rome on Friday. The move is supported organisationally by the 'Irish Forum for Peace in Sri Lanka' (IFPSL) based in Dublin and the International Human Rights Association based in Bremen (IMRV). Dublin Tribunal was the first independent international undertaking that recognised the need to look into the case of genocide in the island as early as in January 2010.
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ICE rewards Solheim with international position to lead development facilitation

[TamilNet, Saturday, 03 November 2012, 00:25 GMT]
The failed Norwegian peace facilitator Erik Solheim, who was recently removed from his ministerial portfolio by his party in Norway, has been rewarded by the International Community of Establishments (ICE) with an international position to lead the Development Assistance Committee (DAC) of the Organisation of Economic Corporation and Development (OECD), run by a group of leading developed countries in setting the agenda of development in developing countries.
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Colombo leases Tamil islet in Puththa’lam for one billion to Canadian affiliate

[TamilNet, Friday, 02 November 2012, 09:53 GMT]
An islet of Eezham Tamils, called Uchchi-Munai (meaning the top point) off the Katpiddi Peninsula in the Puththa’lam district, has been leased to Sapphire Bay Resorts (Pvt) Ltd for 99-years by Colombo. The genocidal regime in Colombo will get 1070 million rupees as upfront payment from the transaction of the 450-acres islet. The leaseholder, started operating in the island of Sri Lanka only since 2010, is an affiliate of a Canadian Development Group, media reports said.
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IC should no longer accept empty promises by Sri Lanka: Amnesty says after UPR session

[TamilNet, Friday, 02 November 2012, 03:03 GMT]
“Sri Lanka’s promises on human rights should no longer be accepted by the international community, Amnesty International said in a press statement after the UN Universal Periodic Review (UPR) on Thursday. “Sri Lanka has been making empty promises about human rights for decades. This was made clear by a number of countries which questioned Sri Lanka’s lack of progress in ending human rights violations during the review,” said Yolanda Foster, Amnesty International’s expert on Sri Lanka.
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Sinhala academic condemns ICE’s manipulations of Eezham Tamils at Italy conference

[TamilNet, Friday, 02 November 2012, 01:39 GMT]
“Today there is a psychological and political warfare waged against the Tamil Diaspora not only to forget the past but also to abhor the whole project of a Tamil state. Domination under the Sinhala dominated unitary state has been justified as a rational and realistic choice,” Sinhala academic Dr. Jude Lal Fernando said at a conference held in Lecce, Italy last Friday. Criticizing the West for tilting the parity of status against the LTTE, he added that “what has been committed is genocide with full international endorsement. It is approved simply to protect the unitary state of the Sinhalese.” The conference titled “We demand our land” was also addressed by TNPF leaders Gajendrakumar Ponnambalam and S. Kajendran, besides Italian EU politician Adriana Poli Bortone, and human rights activist Klodiana Cuka and lawyer Italo Porcaro.
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Rajapakse depends on U.S. to defend War Crimes charges

[TamilNet, Friday, 02 November 2012, 00:48 GMT]
Sri Lanka's President Mahinda Rajapakse filed his reply brief at the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Thurdsay in response to the opening brief filed by the three Tamil Plaintiffs-Appellants in the case, Kasippillai Manoharan versus Percy Mahendra Rajpakse, attorney for the appellants Bruce Fein said. "Rajapakse attorneys again appear to depend on the Department of Justice of the United States to reassert the "suggestion of immunity" and for the Appeals judges accept, as did the trial court, to defend Rajapakse on the charges of war-crimes," legal sources in Washington said.
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Colombo plans to appropriate Trincomalee campus of EUSL for Sinhalese

[TamilNet, Thursday, 01 November 2012, 09:29 GMT]
Tamil undergrads in the Trincomalee Campus of the Eastern University of Sri Lanka (EUSL) are coming under continuous physical attack by Sinhalese students who have now become the majority of the campus in the country of Eezham Tamils. Attacks on 'minority' Tamil undergrads are being carried out with the hidden agenda of the chauvinist administration of the SL University Grants Commission (UGC) to convert the EUSL as fully fledged Sinhala campus, Tamil academic sources say.
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Kurds’ protests in Turkey intensify in solidarity with demands of hunger-strikers

[TamilNet, Thursday, 01 November 2012, 03:48 GMT]
While more than 650 Kurdish political prisoners in Turkey’s prison have been on a hunger-strike more than 6 weeks, thousands of Kurds in Turkey have taken to the streets in solidarity with the incarcerated protestors, resulting in clashes with the Turkish police in many places. The worst clashes were at Diyarbakir prison, in south-eastern Turkey, but they also took place in Istanbul, the BBC reported on Tuesday. The hunger-strikers, who have been on a fast since September 12, have been demanding an end to the solitary confinement of PKK leader Abdullah Ocalan as well as the right to use the Kurdish language in Turkey’s legal and educational systems.
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