Veteran Eezham Tamil activist Rasaiah Navanayagam passes away in London

[TamilNet, Monday, 31 December 2012, 21:46 GMT]
Rasaiah Navanayagam, a veteran Eezham Tamil activist based in the UK, passed away in London on Wednesday at the age of 71. Mr. Navanayagam, who rose in prominence as an activist in UK in the 80s, was instrumental in the formation of several grassroot political and social organizations in London. Recognized for being one of the key organizers of the first Maaveerar Naa'l in London in 1990 with the guidance of the late Col. Kittu, activists who worked with him remember his homeland oriented perspective and his resourcefulness in mobilizing the Tamil community in the UK for political and cultural activities. Mr. Navanayagam’s demise is mourned by a cross-section of the Eezham Tamil community in the UK.
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Puzzling consequence for ‘missing’ doctor caring Tamil women under SL military

[TamilNet, Monday, 31 December 2012, 20:46 GMT]
The fate of a Tamil doctor, R. Sivashankar, who voiced for the rights of Tamil women forcefully recruited and held against their will by the SL military, is not known after he was ‘arrested’ following a dispute with the occupying military at Kokkaavil in Vanni on Saturday, according to the family members and relatives. Informed sources in Ki'linochchi told TamilNet that the SL military operatives who have taken the Medical Officer attached to Anuradhapura Blood Bank, used a psychiatrist in Vanni to issue a false report that the ‘detained’ doctor was mentally ill. In the meantime, the wife of the missing doctor, J Thirumagal Sivashankar, who is also a medical officer, went in search of her husband to Maangku'lam Police station was told by the SL police that they had no information on the whereabouts of her husband.
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Interference in Sri Lanka judiciary under international spotlight

[TamilNet, Monday, 31 December 2012, 19:22 GMT]
Gabriela Knaul, UN Special Rapporteur on the independence of judges and lawyers, warning that intimidation and the "dramatic increase" inattacks against judges and judicial officers in Sri Lanka may constitute a threat to the independence of the justice system, said, “The recent steps taken by the executive and legislative towards impeaching the Chief Justice appear to be the culminating point of a series of attacks against the judiciary for asserting its independence."
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SL Governor's secretary allegedly involved in acid attack on Jaffna trader

[TamilNet, Saturday, 29 December 2012, 23:15 GMT]
The owner of Easwaran Traders, Mr. T. Thuvarakeswaran, who is a brother of the assassinated Tamil parliamentarian T. Maheswaran, was rushed to Jaffna Hospital after he was subjected to acid throwing Saturday morning in the premises of Nalloor temple in Jaffna. While the Sri Lankan police said that the motive of the attack was a private land dispute within the family circles, the victim, Mr Thuvarakesawaran has alleged that the attacker was a Sri Lankan military officer who is a personal secretary of the SL Governor of North, Maj. Gen. (retd) G.A. Chandrasiri.
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Five districts in North under floods, over 100,000 displaced

[TamilNet, Saturday, 29 December 2012, 13:43 GMT]
101,569 members of 28,297 families in five districts Mullaiththeevu, Ki'linochchi, Vavuniyaa, Mannaar and Jaffna in the Northern Province have been badly affected by the torrential rain. Of them about 35,000 members of over 10 thousand families have been sheltered in transit centres. Over twenty thousand houses have been damaged completely and partially due to the rain and flood, according statistics provided by the officials attached to the Disaster Management Unit. Mullaiththeevu district is the worst affected one in the Northern Province where 36,019 persons of 11,261 families have been affected.
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Sri Lanka’s TID summons Gajendrakumar Ponnambalam

[TamilNet, Thursday, 27 December 2012, 18:51 GMT]
Sri Lanka’s Terrorist Investigation Division (TID) has sent summons to Tamil National People’s Front (TNPF) President, Gajendrakumar Ponnambalam, asking him to be present at its investigating office in Colombo on Saturday for inquiries. The summon note, entirely in Sinhala language, was served at Gajendrakumar’s residence in Colombo by a TID officer on Thursday afternoon. Mr. Gajendrakumar is currently outside of the island, informed sources told TamilNet. Meanwhile, notices in Sinhala and English, viciously implicating TNPF Secretary and former TNA parliamentarian, Selvaraja Kajendran as one of the key persons behind the ‘pro-LTTE and TNA/ TNPF network’ in the Jaffna University, is being circulated in the south of the island.
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Gotabhaya appropriates whole village in Mannaar

[TamilNet, Thursday, 27 December 2012, 15:53 GMT]
An entire Eezham Tamil village, Mu’l’lik-ku’lam in the Musali division of Mannaar district, has been declared out of bounds for its uprooted residents by SL defence Secretary and presidential sibling Gotabhaya Rajapaksa visiting the village on Wednesday. The entire village will be used for a military base of the occupying Sinhala forces and to serve as a hub for the Sinhalicisation and Colonisation process of the land and waters of the strategic locality in the Mannaar district. Nobody would be allowed to resettle within a perimeter of 750 meters of the Mu’l’likku’lam village, Gotabhaya said at a meeting held at the SL Naval Base established there on Wednesday between 10:30 am and 1:30 pm.
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Systemic disappearances qualify as crimes against humanity in ICC, says Boyle

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 26 December 2012, 22:46 GMT]
The enforced disappearances of human beings that are widespread and systematic, such as the abductions of Tamils in the NorthEast including the midnight abduction of 28-year-old Mrs Soundararajan Sivamalar in Uduvil, Jaffna, on Christmas eve by Sri Lanka's Terrorism Division, are a Crime against Humanity under the Rome Statute for the International Criminal Court (ICC), Professor Boyle of the University of Illinois College of Law said. "So if Gotobhaya travels to an ICC Member State, it might be possible to get him prosecuted in the visiting country under its domestic implementing legislation for the Rome Statute," Boyle said.
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190,000 displaced in Batticaloa due to floods, 30% of paddy destroyed

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 26 December 2012, 20:33 GMT]
211 GS divisions in Batticaloa district have been affected by floods that have caused displacement of 190,966 members of 51,379 families in one week, civil officials at Batticaloa district secretariat said. Four persons were reported dead, one injured and two others have been reported missing in the floods. More than 4,000 houses were damaged. 30% of 155,000 acre paddy cultivation has been destroyed. 25,000 fishermen have lost their livelihood and families engaged in firewood and bricks making have lost their expected income. Several hundred heads of cattle have been washed away by the floods and those engaged in animal husbandry have lost their income, according to Department of Animal Husbandry sources.
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A Christmas plea from 1936

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 25 December 2012, 13:54 GMT]
In a letter to the editor published on Christmas Day in 1936 in the Washington Post, on war and peace, a public citizen asks, "...[h]ow can any country whose citizens are engaged in slaughtering other human beings so like themselves call itself “civilized?” Are the lessons which have been handed down from the beginning of time to be thrown aside, or discarded, like an old shoe when the war drums are sounded? Are wisdom and saneness ever to mean anything but the strategy of war?" ....
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5,000 rendered homeless due to floods in Mannaar

[TamilNet, Monday, 24 December 2012, 23:02 GMT]
5,134 members of 1,690 families have been displaced and kept in transit centres due to floods following the breach of the Malwaththu Oya in the Mannaar district, according to the Mannaar Disaster Management Unit Assistant Director M.A.C.Riyaz. The water released from Malwaththu Oya from Anuradhapura flows through Aruvi Aa'ru in Mannaar district causing deluge in several villages in the district.
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SL military intimidates Tamil villagers for revealing information to UN agencies

[TamilNet, Monday, 24 December 2012, 20:56 GMT]
Tension prevails in the Tamil villages of Trincomalee district following intelligence operatives of the occupying Sri Lankan military have threatened the kith and kin of the disappeared persons not to divulge information to the foreign agencies, especially to UN agencies. A team of Sri Lanka Army (SLA) intelligence operatives, who visited Thampalakaamam in the district in a SLA vehicle three days ago, summoned the family members of the abducted and disappeared persons to a meeting and intimidated them not to pass any information to foreign sources about their missing family members.
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Tamils in Paris, London protest France's inaction in Tamil activist's assassination

[TamilNet, Sunday, 23 December 2012, 19:19 GMT]
Eezham Tamils in France and UK demonstrated at the capital cities of the two countries on Friday, condemning the French government’s lack of interest in bringing to justice the culprits behind the assassination of grassroots activist Nadarajah Mathinthiran alias Parithi. The demonstration in Paris being joined by hundreds of Eezham Tamils in France, also witnessed the participation of several solidarity activists, including members of the Kurdish diaspora. The protestors in the two countries were aghast at the absence of any action from the French government’s side, with many wondering whether the French authorities were colluding with the Sri Lankan intelligence, sources from London and Paris told TamilNet.
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100,000 remain internally displaced, says UNHCR

[TamilNet, Sunday, 23 December 2012, 18:46 GMT]
In a report on the international protection needs of asylum seekers from Sri Lanka, UNHCR identifies several risk profiles including persons suspected of links with the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE), journalists, human rights activists, witnesses to rights violations, and vulnerable children and women, and notes while "there is an ethnic dimension to their vulnerability," in each of these risk groups, "members of the minority Tamil and, to a lesser extent, Muslim communities are reportedly more often subjected to arbitrary detention, abductions or enforced disappearances." Tamil activists including the New Zealand Tamil Action Front was consistently canvassing for this and there was a response in this regard from the Australian representative of the UNHCR in a regional meeting held at Auckland on 19 November.
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Tamil youth protest in London condemns repression of students in Jaffna, urges UK to act

[TamilNet, Saturday, 22 December 2012, 14:38 GMT]
In a protest march in London from Temple Station to 10 Downing Street on Saturday, Eezham Tamil youth in the UK condemned the harassment of the Jaffna University students and faculty by the occupying military and demanded the immediate release of the students arrested by Sri Lanka’s TID. Raising slogans urging the British government to take action, the protestors also called for an end to the occupation of the Tamil homeland. "The UK government and the co-chairs have a moral and political responsibility in what has been happening to the Eelam Tamils after 2009. It is clear from the brutal repression of the students of Jaffna University, that reconciliation in unitary Sri Lanka means denial of basic civil liberties of the Tamil Nation. This is an aspect of genocide and the UK government should immediately respond to this," Bairavi Ratnabal from TYO-UK told TamilNet.
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Jaffna University Teachers' Union President summoned to Vavuniyaa

[TamilNet, Friday, 21 December 2012, 17:38 GMT]
Sri Lankan ‘Terrorist’ Investigation Department (TID) has placed a phone call to the head of Jaffna University Teachers Association (JUTA) Lecturer A Rajakumaran and summoned him to the notorious TID office in Vavuniyaa, informed circles at the University of Jaffna told TamilNet on Friday. The JUTA has been firm in defending the rights of the students and has extended support to the protest by the students. It has also held its own protests against the detention by the TID.
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SL Commander threatens VC-led team visiting Palaali

[TamilNet, Friday, 21 December 2012, 07:46 GMT]
Following the refusal of the Deans of the University of Jaffna to meet the SL commander of the occupying forces at Palaalai military base on Wednesday, the Vice Chancellor of the University of Jaffna on Friday morning led a team to meet the SL commander at Palaali. The team included many of the deans, heads of departments and parents of the detained as well released students. The SL Commander Maj. Gen. Mahinda Hathurusinghe threatened the visiting team that if they insist on the release of the detained students for the re-opening of the University, then there will be no chance of the students getting released. He ignored the pleading and crying parents of the students, who attempted to prostrate before him.
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Eastern province under flood, uprooted people of Champoor suffer

[TamilNet, Thursday, 20 December 2012, 23:44 GMT]
In the fourteen divisional secretariat divisions in the Batticaloa district more than one hundred and fifty thousand people had been rendered homeless following heavy rain with winds at high speed for the last few days. They have sought asylum in public buildings but the Colombo government has been showing indifferent attitude in providing immediate relief through its regional and divisional officials, complain affected people. In Trincomalee district four temporary welfare centers at Ki'liveddi, Paddith-thidal, Ma'nat-cheanai and Kaddaip-pa'richchaan where more than two thousand uprooted people from Champoor are residing are submerged in flood water due to the heavy rain for a week.
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Deans foil SL military attempt to direct Jaffna University

[TamilNet, Thursday, 20 December 2012, 01:53 GMT]
The commander of the occupying Sinhala military in Jaffna, Maj. Gen. Mahinda Hathurusinghe now ventures to directly order the academics and to run the University of Jaffna from his military base at Palaali, news sources in Jaffna said, citing his call to the deans of the faculties to meet him at Palaali on Wednesday to talk to them on resuming classes at the university. All the faculty deans in unison rejected the call and told the Vice Chancellor that it amounts to militarisation of education. Meanwhile, the talks between the Student Council and the Vice Chancellor of the university on Wednesday failed as the students have categorically conveyed their decision of not attending to classes until all the student leaders detained by the SL military are released.
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10 Saiva temples in Champoor on verge of collapse

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 18 December 2012, 23:28 GMT]
At least ten historic Saiva temples in Champoor area have become ruins due to military assault and failure of maintenance after the capture of Moothoor East by the Sri Lanka Army since 2006. The occupying SLA is refusing to allow the uprooted Saivites to conduct any religious activities in these temples, civil sources in Trincomalee said.
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Sampanthan countered, TELO calls for complete exit of occupying forces

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 18 December 2012, 22:36 GMT]
The Sri Lanka military, including its three forces that spearheaded the genocide of Tamils by the Sri Lankan state is viewed by Tamils as a Sinhala military and as an occupation military. The wish of the Tamil people is that such a military should quit completely, said a press release of the Tamil Eelam Liberation Organization (TELO), signed by its political head and former TNA parliamentarian, M.K. Shivajilingam, on Monday. TELO is a constituent party in the Tamil National Alliance (TNA). The press release saying that such a statement on the stand of the TELO became a necessity in the context of current debates on the issue in the Tamil political circles, hinted against a recent statement by TNA leader R. Sampanthan that he was not calling for the complete withdrawal of the SL military.
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40 ex-LTTE members abducted within one week, IOM, UN blamed for silence

[TamilNet, Monday, 17 December 2012, 18:07 GMT]
Sri Lankan ‘Terrorist’ Investigation Department (TID) squads roaming around in Vanni and Jaffna peninsula have detained more than forty former LTTE members after abducting them from their residences and on the streets within the last one week alone, legal sources in Jaffna told TamilNet on Monday. Former LTTE members are also being summoned to the SLA camps and questioned over their contacts and friends. Relatives, friends and even employers of those who were summoned to the SL military camps live in fear. While every civil and social freedom of the ‘released’ former members of the LTTE is severely deprived by the occupying Sinhala military, the IOM and the UN that ‘certified’ their rehabilitation and release keep silent.
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Tamil Nadu protest calls for investigation on 3 UN officials for complicity in Tamil genocide

[TamilNet, Monday, 17 December 2012, 01:47 GMT]
UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon, former UN Chief of Staff Vijay Nambiar and former UN Under-Secretary General for Humanitarian affairs Sir John Holmes were in complicity in the genocidal onslaught on Eezham Tamils by Sri Lanka in 2009, declared a protest held by political activists and grassroot movements in Tamil Nadu on Sunday. May 17 Movement, the organisers of the protest, citing the recent report of the Internal Review Panel on UN Action in Sri Lanka led by Charles Petrie, accused the ‘axis of the UN trio’ for shielding the Sri Lankan government during the peak of its genocidal onslaught on the Eezham Tamil nation. The demonstrators, who blamed the UN for denying justice to the victims after the genocidal war, also accused the UN for having failed to provide a just political solution to the national question of Eezham Tamils.
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Colombo punishes Tamil officials with transfer for opposing Sinhala encroachment

[TamilNet, Sunday, 16 December 2012, 16:47 GMT]
Tamil civil servants, who take legal action against Sri Lankan State and military run Sinhala encroachment of lands belonging to Tamils in the Batticaloa district, are under threat of transfer by the Colombo government, civil sources in Batticaloa said. Recently, the Divisional Secretary of Koa'raippattu South, Mr M. Thavarasa, who filed cases against illegal encroachers in Vadamunai, Oottuch-cheanai and Kallichchai, is to be transferred from January next year by the Colombo government.
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Kurdish grassroot federation in Germany shows solidarity with Jaffna University students

[TamilNet, Sunday, 16 December 2012, 12:18 GMT]
YEK-KOM, a German based federation of numerous Kurdish organizations, condemned the genocidal policies of the Sri Lankan government and the repression of the Eezham Tamil students in Jaffna, conveying its solidarity with the protesting students in the Tamil homeland. In a statement in German released on Friday, it said “The oppressed Tamil people for over 60 years have been facing the extinction of their culture, language, religion and homeland. Overlooking this oppression means active support to the decades of genocide of the Tamils.” The statement further urged “the international humanitarian and democratic forces to collectively voice and demonstrate their support with the demands of the Tamil people in solidarity.”
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ICG silently withdraws mischief on TamilNet

[TamilNet, Saturday, 15 December 2012, 16:50 GMT]
The International Crisis Group (ICG) silently removed a mischievous part of a statement on TamilNet that appeared in its latest report on Sri Lanka, No. 239, dated 20 November 2012. TamilNet on 23 November, in a news item “ICG plays mischief with TamilNet,” challenged the ICG to prove its credibility on the concerned part of the statement and said, “If an open apology is not forthcoming from the ICG, TamilNet may have to seek justice from the law of the countries where the ICG is registered.” TamilNet, on Monday, has noted the removal of the part along with its implicating footnotes in the online version of the ICG report.
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Chain of protests in London against repression of students in Jaffna

[TamilNet, Saturday, 15 December 2012, 11:07 GMT]
A series of protests have been organized outside the British Prime Minister’s Office in 10 Downing Street, London since Monday to condemn the repression of the Jaffna University students by the occupying Sinhala military. Condemning the arrests and detentions of the students and the Sinhala military’s systematic assaults on the civil rights of the Eezham Tamils as a part of the genocide of the Tamil nation, the protestors urged UK and the International Community to ensure the immediate release of the arrested students and to safeguard the democratic rights of the Eezham Tamil nation in the island.
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Sri Lanka Defence coerces parents or fabricates statements on conscripted Tamil girls

[TamilNet, Friday, 14 December 2012, 22:19 GMT]
The helpless parents of the Tamil girls conscripted by the occupying Sinhala military in Vanni are now either coerced by the military or are left to accept fabricated statements coming in their names supporting the conscription. The official website of genocidal Sri Lanka’s Ministry of Defence and Urban Development run by presidential sibling Gotabhaya Rajapaksa, came out with a reporting on Friday that by slip showed coercion or fabrication. The SL defence report follows Tuesday’s news about 21 out of around 100 Tamil girls coerced to join the Sinhala military ending up in hospital in a mentally affected state, allegedly due to the sexual agenda of the military of genocidal intent.
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HR Day event in Toronto brings Tamils closer to global progressive networks

[TamilNet, Friday, 14 December 2012, 00:03 GMT]
More than twenty social, economic, and environmental justice groups in Canada that joined together in Toronto on the eve of International Human Rights Day to forge a common forum against military occupation, apartheid, genocide and political imprisonment, have voiced against the SL military detention of the students of the University of Jaffna. The event gains significance as the recently formed Coalition for Tamil Rights was invited to represent the perspectives of Eezham Tamils along with other progressive forces. On the occasion of the event, activists of socio-political organizations in Canada condemned the arrests and detentions of Tamil students of the University of Jaffna in the SL military occupied country of Eezham Tamils. The activists demanded immediate release of the students and called for an end to the Sri Lankan military occupation of the Tamil homeland.
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SLA summons 4 girl students, house-by-house intimidation to resume university

[TamilNet, Thursday, 13 December 2012, 20:31 GMT]
The occupying genocidal military of Sri Lanka now engages in entering each and every house of the Jaffna University students to individually intimidate them to drop the protest and to return to the university or face dire consequences. The Vice Chancellor Prof Vasanthi Arasaratnam installed by colonial Colombo, most of the council members appointed by the regime or planted by collaborating paramilitary and some external intelligence agencies, and the threatened Deans are forced to connive with the new paradigm of occupying military running the university, news sources in Jaffna said. Meanwhile, in addition to the key student leaders of the university detained for ‘rehabilitation,’ the SL military has freshly demanded the submission of four girl students by their parents.
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New Zealand politicians, Peoples Forum mean action on Sri Lanka

[TamilNet, Thursday, 13 December 2012, 10:13 GMT]
UN internal review report is clear on the failure of the UN. We will not lie low. We will press for full inquiry and suitable action on those who connived at the human disaster–a blot on the civilized world in the 21st century, said New Zealand’s Green Party parliamentarian, Ms Jan Logie, at the Universal Human Rights Day observations organized by Peoples Forum in Auckland. What is happening in Sri Lanka is akin to what is happening in Palestine. On CHOGM, we will do everything possible to see that countries respecting democracy do not attend, the MP further said adding that she would draw the attention of the NZ government through an adjournment motion in the parliament on the new wave of oppression on Tamil university students and youth.
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HR group alerts on plight of Tamil women coerced by SL military

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 12 December 2012, 13:22 GMT]
The Asian Human Rights Commission (AHRC) on Tuesday forwarded a statement coming from the Women’s Action Network, expressing concern on the plight of Tamil women coerced into joining the SL military, The AHRC-forwarded statement for immediate release said that the Women’s Action Network (WAN), as a collective of 11 groups from the North and East, is deeply concerned by the recent efforts to recruit women into the SL military in the districts of Ki’linochchi and Mullaiththeevu. The statement details how the women were deceived and were taken by the SL military and thereafter intimidated not to leave.
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SLA conscripted Tamil females admitted at Ki'linochchi hospital in mentally affected state

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 12 December 2012, 11:59 GMT]
21 of around 100 Tamil girls, who were conscripted to Sri Lankan military in Vanni, were admitted in Ki’linochchi hospital in a mentally affected state on Tuesday night around 11:00 p.m. by the SL military from Paarathipuram in Ki'linochchi, parents of the victims told TamilNet. In the meantime, TNA parliamentarian Sritharan was at the hospital struggling to get permission to witness the plight of the victims. But, around 30 SL military personnel guarding the hospital were not allowing him to independently witness the state of the victims, the parliamentarian told TamilNet.
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SL military ‘rehabilitation’ for detained University student leaders

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 11 December 2012, 22:50 GMT]
After releasing 7 of 13 students of the University of Jaffna, the Sri Lankan ‘Terrorist’ Investigation Department has handed over detained students, comprising President of the Jaffna University Student Union (JUSU) V Pavaananthan, Secretary of the JUSU P. Tharshananth, President of the Arts Faculty Students Union K. Jenemajeyamenan and S. Solomon of the Science Faculty, to the headquarters of the SL military in Vanni, which placed the students at the torture chamber of the notorious Joint Services Special Operations (JOSSOP) camp in Vavuniyaa and later transferred them to Sri Lankan military ‘rehabilitation’ detention at Welikanda in Polonnaruwa - Batticaloa border, where ex LTTE cadres and members are detained under a brutal ‘rehabilitation’ programme. In the meantime, SL military has stepped up threats against civil protests in the North.
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Grenade attack targets TNA's youth politician from Jaffna islet

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 11 December 2012, 22:13 GMT]
A motorbike squad, allegedly operated by the SL military intelligence, on Monday, lobbed a grenade on the house of Tamil National Alliance (TNA) youth wing coordinator of Jaffna islets Mr Nishanthan. The attack took place around 9:00 p.m. targeting Nishanthan's house situated on Vyman Road, near Nalloor Kanthasaami temple in Jaffna. The attack on Nishanthan comes after the occupying SL navy entered the house of TNA politician Anaimukan, accusing him for tolling bells on the Heroes Day coinciding with the Kaarthikai festival in the temples of Kaarainakar.
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UN representatives see fabricated ‘civil society’ in Jaffna

[TamilNet, Monday, 10 December 2012, 00:58 GMT]
Sri Lanka’s permanent representative at the UN, Palitha Kohona, brought resident representatives of the UN in 13 countries, including Japan, Italy and South Africa to Jaffna on Satuday. The team during its visit was shown with a fabricated civil society that praised the ‘development’ of Colombo in Jaffna, news sources in Jaffna said. The team held talks with the occupying SL governor in the North, Maj. Gen G.A. Chandrasri and the supporters of the EPDP collaborating with Colombo, who were presented to the visiting team as the ‘civil society’ of Jaffna. However, the visiting UN representatives, while speaking to the Bishop of Jaffna said that had an impression of the true situation as they had already met the TNA and various others in Colombo.
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TID interrogators fabricate accusation against 14 students in Jaffna

[TamilNet, Sunday, 09 December 2012, 01:28 GMT]
The ‘Terrorist’ Investigation Department operated by the Sri Lankan Defence Ministry is engaged in fabricating a false accusation against 13 students of the University of Jaffna and a few other students in the peninsula, informed sources close to paramilitary circles in Vavuniyaa said. The TID interrogators were working on a false accusation that ‘instructions’ and ‘money’ were provided by the Tamil diaspora in the West to observe Heroes Day in the homeland. Already, nine students of the University of Jaffna are illegally detained by TID interrogators at Vavuniyaa. According to news sources in Jaffna, two student leaders chose to seek humanitarian protection with the SL Human Rights Commission office in Jaffna on Friday. Two more students from the ‘wanted list’ of the TID are yet to seek protection, news sources in Jaffna said.
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South Africa rejects Silva for deputy ambassadorship?

[TamilNet, Saturday, 08 December 2012, 17:59 GMT]
Southern Africa Litigation Centre (SALC), a non-profit group that promotes human rights and rule of law in South Africa, noting that South Africa's President is constitutionally mandated, in terms of section 84(2)(h) of the Constitution, to either receive and recognize foreign diplomats or to decline the sending state’s request, and asserting that "[a]uthoritative and extensive information, including a high-level UN Secretary-General’s report, exists linking General Silva to the commission of war crimes and crimes against humanity during the Sri Lankan civil war," concludes "General Silva [as] ineligible for the nominated diplomatic post," and that South Africa is compelled to refuse to receive and recognize him as such." SALC said it has learnt that "South Africa has declined to receive General Silva, although there is no official confirmation of this."
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Fein: U.S.'s immunity determinations flout due process

[TamilNet, Saturday, 08 December 2012, 14:43 GMT]
In the final legal brief filed with the United States Court of Appeals in the case against Sri Lanka's President Mahinda Rajapakse for civil damages on war-crimes charges, appellants, Dr Manoharan et al.'s attorney Bruce Fein asserts that "[n]either the Constitution, nor the Torture Victim Protection Act (“TVPA”), nor customary international law (“CIL”) crowns the Executive with exclusive authority to determine whether a sitting head of state is immune from a TVPA suit founded on the grisly and universally abhorred crimes of torture or extrajudicial killing under color of foreign law," and argues that the Court should reject the U.S. State Department's contention that "when the Executive speaks on immunity, the judiciary is ousted of jurisdiction to interpret the law, [and that the] Adjudication of the case moves from Article III courts to the Article II President."
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SL “Terrorist” division abducts 18-year-old student in VVT, Jaffna

[TamilNet, Saturday, 08 December 2012, 11:37 GMT]
An investigator attached to the so-called Terrorist Investigation Department (TID) of the Colombo regime, which functions under the direct command of the Sri Lankan Defence Ministry, on Thursday, phoned the family of an 18-year-old Tamil student, Arulampalam Dishokraj, who was abducted the previous day in Valveddith-thu'rai (VVT) in Jaffna. The TID official has informed the family that their missing son was under the custody of the TID for investigations. Another youth from Oo'ra'ni in VVT, 24-year-old Prasath Sivasampu, who was an ex-LTTE member, has been reported missing since December 01 when he left for Colombo. Meanwhile, the presence of SL military in the environs of the University of Jaffna was still threatening the students of the Jaffna university, the student union said Friday announcing that it will continue the protest till the students are released by the TID.
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Release arrested Tamil students immediately: Paul Murphy, MEP

[TamilNet, Saturday, 08 December 2012, 09:26 GMT]
Conveying his solidarity with students’ protests in Jaffna, Paul Murphy, MEP, in a statement demanded the immediate release of the arrested Tamil students and political prisoners. In a solidarity message sent to an emergency demonstration organized outside the Sri Lankan High Commission in London on Friday, Mr. Murphy said "I express my solidarity with the protest taking place against the arrest of Tamil students in Sri Lanka. I demand that the Sri Lankan government release all those arrested immediately. The arrest of these students under the Prevention of Terrorism Act just for participating in a peaceful protest shows the extent of how much the democratic rights are under attack in Sri Lanka. The Sri Lankan government must end this immediately and release all political prisoners.”
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Shame on Norway for being silent on Sri Lanka: Red party leader backing Jaffna students

[TamilNet, Saturday, 08 December 2012, 07:31 GMT]
Addressing the youth demonstrators in front of the Norwegian parliament on Tuesday, protesting the SL military atrocities committed on the Jaffna University students, the leader of the Norwegian Red Party and an elected representative of the Norwegian Council of Eezham Tamils (NCET), Bjørnar Moxnes, said: “Norway has had a special role as facilitator of the peace process till 2008. This gives us a special responsibility. Unfortunately, the Red-Green government of Norway has chosen to be very silent against Sri Lanka. This is a shame for Norway.” During this week, demonstrations showing solidarity with the Jaffna University students took place in 7 countries, Canada, Norway, UK, Australia, Switzerland, France and Germany.
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Canadian youth mobilises global community in showing solidarity with Jaffna students

[TamilNet, Saturday, 08 December 2012, 06:34 GMT]
The rally organized in Canada showing solidarity with Jaffna University students by the York University Tamil Students Association was participated by Students Against Israeli Apartheid (SAIA), Middle Eastern Students Association (MESA), Indian Cultural Association (ICA), York University Graduate Students Association (YUGSA) and the York Federation of Students (YFS). “We condemn in the strongest possible terms the attack on our brothers and sisters at Jaffna University. What is necessary in order to ensure the safety and democratic rights of the Tamil people is for the IC to immediately recognize the nation, territoriality and right to self-determination of the Tamils,” said Tanya McFadyen, Vice President of the Graduate Students Association of the York University.
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Jaffna University teachers remind SL President about rule of law

[TamilNet, Friday, 07 December 2012, 12:59 GMT]
“There is now no anti-state terrorism in Jaffna. An important part of consolidating peace is for the State to conduct itself in a manner that induces respect for the rule of law,” reminded Jaffna University Science Teachers’ Association in an appeal sent on Friday to Sri Lanka’s President Mahinda Rajapksa on grave and dangerous plight of students at the University of Jaffna. “Your Excellency well knows, having been in politics for several decades and in the center of two Southern insurgencies, that the defeat of an insurgent force does not extinguish the feelings or causes that gave rise to it. Such feelings are not a police matter, but are rather to be handled as part of the political task of reconciliation and rebuilding,” the academics reminded the SL President further.
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Sri Lanka's alleged war-criminal inspects UN Lebanon mission

[TamilNet, Friday, 07 December 2012, 01:35 GMT]
Sri Lanka's Acting Permanent Representative to the United Nations, and ex-Major General in Sri Lankan Army (SLA), Shavendra Silva, under whose command the SLA's 58th division allegedly committed war crimes during the last months of Sri Lanka's civil war, is "visiting and even inspecting the UN Mission in Lebanon UNIFIL from November 28 through December 4, 2012," Inner City Press (ICP) reported. While the recent Petrie report accused the UN of "massive and system wide failure to prevent the slaughter of an estimated 40,000 ethnic Tamils in five short months," the UN continues to allow an alleged criminal to penetrate and to engage in UN's official affairs, ICP said.
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SL police directs Medical Dean to hand over students to SL military intelligence

[TamilNet, Thursday, 06 December 2012, 20:12 GMT]
People of Jaffna were shocked to see Prof Balakumaran, the Medical Faculty Dean of the University of Jaffna under pressure, handing over five students of his faculty directly to Sri Lanka’s military intelligence on Thursday. Another student of the Science Faculty was handed over by his father. When the students were first taken to the SL police at Koappaay, the police refused to take charge of them saying that they had no ‘instructions’ and directed the university authorities to take the students to Military Intelligence headquarters in Jaffna. The students who were handed over were immediately taken to Vavuniyaa where a notorious unit of Colombo’s White Van defence functions. While escorting the students the Medical Faculty dons scared of even taking the students in their cars asked them to come in motorbikes.
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Suresh calls upon diaspora youth to respond to Jaffna University situation

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 05 December 2012, 20:12 GMT]
Tamil National Alliance (TNA) parliamentarian and Eelam People Revolutionary Liberation Front (EPRLF) leader Suresh Premachandran in a video interview to TamilNet this week, called upon the diaspora youth studying in the Western World to take up the matter of SL military oppression of Jaffna University students with the Western governments, in order to push them to prevail upon Colombo’s undemocratic activities. Meanwhile, diaspora circles especially in the UK and in Canada now realize how in the last three years Colombo’s agents have succeeded in hijacking, silencing and deviating the diaspora alumni associations of the leading schools of Eezham Tamils. They also cited at the strange silence of an alumni association started in the UK in the name of the Jaffna University.
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Tamil lands in Ampaa'rai appropriated for army housing schemes

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 05 December 2012, 17:28 GMT]
The occupying Sri Lanka Army in Ampaa'rai district in the Eastern province has been appropriating lands belonging to Eezham Tamils for the construction of so-called housing schemes for their troops while the uprooted Tamil families languish in tents and with their relatives without basic facilities. Such an occupation scheme is under construction by the occupying army under a programme for the families of dead soldiers in war in the lands that belong to Tamils, close to Malwatte and Ka'napathipuram villages in Chammaanthu'rai DS division.
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Jaffna demonstration backing students demands IC action, appeals to Tamil youth outside

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 04 December 2012, 10:19 GMT]
In an impressive show of solidarity on Tuesday, the TNPF-called demonstration in Jaffna condemning the attack on Jaffna university students and the arrest of student leaders by the occupying forces of Sri Lanka, was actively participated by the mainstream TNA, University Teachers Association, University Students Union, Jaffna Chamber of Commerce, Medical Association, Lawyers Association and other civil society organisations, besides progressive leftist party representatives from the South. The demonstrators demanded the IC to immediately recognize the nation, territoriality and right of self-determination of Tamils in order to ensure their safety and democratic rights. Questioning the trustworthiness of the IC, the demonstrators appealed to Tamil youth in the diaspora and in Tamil Nadu to take up continued agitations to the edification of the IC.
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Dutch police arrest 55 Kurds on alleged PKK links

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 04 December 2012, 08:19 GMT]
The Dutch police have arrested 55 Kurds on the suspicion that they were linked to the Kurdistan Worker’s Party (PKK) on Monday. The PKK has been banned in Netherlands since 2007. Similar large scale arrests of Kurdish activists on suspicion of PKK links happened in 2004, but the case could not sustain itself then. Ever since the ban, there has been considerable clamping down on Kurdish political activities in the Dutch state. Holland is also notorious for its intimidation of Eezham Tamil activists working for the Tamil national cause.
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SL military threatens senior faculty members of Jaffna University

[TamilNet, Monday, 03 December 2012, 09:42 GMT]
The occupying military of genocidal Sri Lanka individually approached the Deans and former Deans of all the faculties of the University of Jaffna to threaten them not to take up the issue of the students arrested following the Heroes Day observations, news sources in Jaffna said. Parallely, the military also went in search of a student leader at Thiruvaiyaa'ru in Ki'linochchi last night. The University remains vacated as student leaders are forced into hiding. A protest demonstration by the Medical Faculty of the university scheduled for Monday was cancelled, as the Administration of the university advised against it, citing ‘secret negotiations’ taking place between the university and the occupying military at the Palaali base. However, the University of Jaffna Teachers Association is firm that all the arrested students have to be released without charges, the news sources further said.
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UNHCR thinks of revising circular on Sri Lanka: Australian representative

[TamilNet, Monday, 03 December 2012, 02:22 GMT]
The United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) is in the process of revising its earlier circular of 5th July 2010 that declared normalcy in Sri Lanka, said Mr Richard Towle, Resident Representative of UNHCR in Australia, in a meeting held at Auckland on 19 November. He was responding to a question from Mr. A. Theva Rajan, president of the New Zealand Tamil Senior Citizens Association, at the annual conference of the UNHCR on refugee related matters held at Auckland, which was participated by a representative gathering of refugee welfare organisations including many from Africa.
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Sinhala paramilitary attacks Tamil cattle farmers in Batticaloa

[TamilNet, Sunday, 02 December 2012, 18:10 GMT]
Sinhala ‘home guards’ operated by the occupying Sri Lankan military have been attacking Tamil cattle farmers in the border villages of the Batticaloa district. The SL police is ignoring the complaints made by Tamil farmers against such attacks. The Sinhala ‘home guards’, who have appropriated lands of Eezham Tamils are doing cultivation in the occupied lands and are given military training by the SL military to operate as an occupation paramilitary along the borders of Polonnarwa - Batticaloa and Batticaloa - Ampa'rai districts in the East.
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EPC TNA councilor condemns attack on University students in Jaffna

[TamilNet, Sunday, 02 December 2012, 15:55 GMT]
Jaffna University student J.Jenanarthanan who is also a Tamil National Alliance (TNA) councilor in the Eastern Provincial Council issued a statement condemning the attack on Jaffna university students by the State armed forces on the Heroes Day. Mr Jenanarthanan was one of the three councilors elected to the Eastern Provincial Council on the TNA ticket from the Trincomalee district. He has been studying in the Arts Faculty of the Jaffna University.
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Rice's silence on Sri Lanka may hurt cabinet appointment - paper

[TamilNet, Saturday, 01 December 2012, 13:57 GMT]
While the accusation that Dr. Susan Rice, the U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations, intentionally mislead the public by saying that the Bengazhi killings of four Americans was a spontaneous attack in response to a film mocking prophet Mohammed, appears to have damaged her chances of being appointed as the U.S.'s Secretary of State after Hilary Clinton, Rice's human rights record in the U.N., including her inaction on Sri Lanka killings, has also come under closer scrutiny, Washington Post said in an article this Friday, quoting comment from an official of the Human Rights Watch.
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Paramilitary allegedly backed by India effects arrest of Jaffna University students

[TamilNet, Saturday, 01 December 2012, 12:07 GMT]
In a revealing turn of affairs following the Heroes Day incidents at the university of Jaffna, four Jaffna University student representatives were detained by occupying Sri Lanka’s police, based on a complaint made against seven students by a newly created paramilitary, called Sri TELO that is operating along with the SL military. The paramilitary, consisting of some Tamils recently brought from camps in India and allegedly backed by New Delhi, hurriedly opened an office adjacent to the university campus a week ago and lodged a complaint with the SL police at Koappaay that the named university students had engaged in throwing petrol bombs at its office on Thursday 3:30 a.m. According to unconfirmed reports, the paramilitary functioned with the SL forces in entering the hostels and in the attack on students.
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