PCICMP witnesses in Vanni coerced, threatened by SL military

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 30 September 2014, 19:49 GMT]
Intelligence officers of the occupying Sri Lankan military brought 7 people in their vehicle to witness in front of the Presidential Commission to Investigate into Complaints regarding Missing Persons (PCICMP), which held its sessions in Poonakari on Monday. Two of these witnesses had already appeared in front of the PCICMP at Muzhangkaavil on the previous day. SL soldiers were deployed in civil uniform in large numbers at Poonakari Divisional Secretariat where the session was held. The few witnesses who were present at the site on their own were subjected to strict checking by the SL soldiers. Some of them were sent back by the Sri Lankan soldiers. Those who presented their cases said the Commission was a farce as its members were posing irrelevant questions and were not interested to listen to their complaints of the missing kith and kin.
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1,200 Sinhala families encroached into Batticaloa-Ampaa’rai border

[TamilNet, Sunday, 28 September 2014, 21:36 GMT]
Since 2011, more than 1,200 Sinhala families have been brought into the Batticaloa district within the bordering areas of Ampaa’rai district, say Tamil National Alliance (TNA) politicians who have taken a fact-finding mission to Mayilantha-madu and Periya-maathava’nai on Friday. Thousands of acres of grazing lands allocated for farmers from Batticaloa have been seized by the occupying Sri Lankan military and its so-called ‘homeguards’ paramilitary. The Sinhala colonists are doing agriculture in the occupied lands.
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Tamil Nadu condemns Rajapaksa's presence at UN

[TamilNet, Friday, 26 September 2014, 15:41 GMT]
Condemning the presence of genocide-accused Sri Lankan President Mahinda Rajapaksa at the UN General Assembly, over 20,000 Tamils from Tamil Nadu gathered in Chennai on Wednesday to voice their protest. Over 150 Tamil Nadu based organizations took part in the event. The demonstration saw the participation of political parties, social movements, civil society organizations, youth groups, Muslim and Dalit organizations. The protesters also called on the UN to conduct a referendum for an independent Tamil Eelam. While the protesters in Tamil Nadu were raising their voices against SL president, the Indian Prime Minister is scheduled to have a bi-lateral meeting with SL President in the USA on Saturday. In the meantime, Indian and Pakistani sources ruled out a such bilateral meeting between the presidents of India and Pakistan during their presence in the UK.
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OHCHR fails to recognise de-Tamilisation in ‘Sri Lanka’: Gajendrakumar

[TamilNet, Friday, 26 September 2014, 06:25 GMT]
“Most of the incidents referred to by the oral update are part of a larger pattern aimed at creating the conditions of permanent subjugation of the Tamil people as a whole - a process of de-Tamilisation which we interpret as the structural genocide of the Tamil Nation in Sri Lanka,” said Gajendrakumar addressing the 27th Session of the UNHRC on Thursday in Geneva. “An honest and forthright appreciation of the problems that face the Tamil people is fundamental and we call upon the OHCHR to conduct the inquiry in this spirit,” he told the UNHRC. “We note with concern the oral update’s failure to acknowledge that the Tamil people are being targeted because of their national identity. The fact that religious minorities such as the Muslims and Christians can be mentioned by name for being targets, makes the refusal to mention the Tamils by name all the more disappointing,” he said.
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Tamils denied of observing collective remembrance in Batticaloa

[TamilNet, Thursday, 25 September 2014, 16:11 GMT]
Sri Lankan Police in Batticaloa has been harassing the families of the victims of 1990 Puthukkudiyiruppu massacre on Sunday when they gathered to observe the annual memorial event in front of the statue of 17 civilians who were slain by ‘homeguards’ paramilitary operated by the Sri Lankan military in 1990. Tamil Councillor K. Thurairajasingam, who was present at the event with parliamentarians P. Selvarasa and P. Ariyanethiran blames that the SL Police was blocking the peaceful event with a court order from an Acting Magistrate. This is the second incident in recent days where the SL Police, under false charges of ‘causing disturbance to peace’, has blocked the kith and kin of the victims of the past massacres from paying tribute to their slain victims by lighting candles together.
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Tamils complain discrimination in selection of beneficiaries of Indian housing scheme

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 24 September 2014, 21:49 GMT]
A point system introduced to determine the recipients of the Indian housing scheme discriminates the uprooted people of Champoor in Trincomalee district, civil sources in Moothoor East told TamilNet on Wednesday. The recipients are being selected on the basis that their displacement after year 2008 and that they should now be living in temporary huts at the moment in addition to certain points based criteria. The people of Champoor region were uprooted from their native villages in 2006. Most of the potential recipients are being filtered away by this method, the sources said. Further, there is no transparency in the way the points are being assigned. In some cases, government officers are being bribed to assign temporary huts for some applicants to become eligible, the sources further said.
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Speeding SLA motorbike claims life of 81-year-old man in Batticaloa

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 23 September 2014, 20:20 GMT]
Sri Lanka Army soldiers riding a motorbike over the speed limit lost control of their motorbike and crashed on an 81-year-old man, who was walking on the pedestrian road cross with his bicycle Tuesday morning at Ampalaththadi junction in Vanthaa’rumoolai in Batticaloa. The victim, Sinnathamby Somasekaram died on the spot. The two SLA soldiers were admitted at the hospital with injuries. The SL police is yet to file a case against the SLA soldiers.
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SL military squads intensify attacks on Tamil journalists in Vanni

[TamilNet, Monday, 22 September 2014, 21:19 GMT]
Sri Lankan military intelligence operatives have intensified attacks on independent Tamil journalists in Vanni in recent days. A 33-year-old reporter from Paranthan, Sinnarasa Siventhiran, who files news stories at Uthayan’s branch office at Karadippoakku junction had a narrow escape from a squad that intended to kill him by throwing him in front of a vehicle on A9 Road Sunday night. Squads operated by the SL military have also assaulted two other reporters in recent days and threatened them not to complain or publish news on the attack.
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UPFA victory in Badulla based on manipulations: Upcountry Tamils

[TamilNet, Sunday, 21 September 2014, 08:51 GMT]
More than 50,000 Up Country Tamils from Badulla and Moneregala districts in Uva Provice were not able to cast their votes in the Provincial Council elections held on Saturday, say Upcountry Tamil activists in Badulla. The narrow victory of UPFA in Badulla district is a manipulated victory, they said. The ruling UPFA of Mahinda Rajapaksa has won the elections in Badulla district polling 11,000 votes more than the opposition UNP.
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Colombo to seize more lands for militarisation of North

[TamilNet, Saturday, 20 September 2014, 22:43 GMT]
1,300 acres of lands are to be surveyed and seized by the SL military in Jaffna peninsula in the coming days, informed sources told TamilNet on Saturday. The lands belonging to Tamil people are to be seized in Maathakal, Achchuveali, Chavakachcheari, Nu’naavil and Thikkam. The SL military has already harassed the fishermen at Cheanthaan-ku’lam in Maathakal to vacate from their jetty and relocate their fishing tools as the land was to be surveyed, gazetted and seized for military expansion. On Friday, Tamil National Alliance (TNA) politicians, civic council members and Valikaamam North uprooted people’s organisation protested against an attempt to survey the lands in Maathakal. In the meantime, hundreds of acres of lands are being seized without any procedures in the Vanni mainland, Tamil activists in Mullaiththeevu said.
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Mass grave found in Veala’nai off Jaffna

[TamilNet, Friday, 19 September 2014, 20:14 GMT]
Ceylon Electricity Board (CEB) workers, who dug postholes along the wall of Ooraaththu’rai Civic Council secretariat situated in Veala’nai in the Ooraaththu’rai islet (Kayts) off Jaffna, came across human skeletal remains in all the seven postholes they had dug on Friday. The SL Police has immediately sealed off the site from public access, news sources in Veala’nai said. The residents in Veala’nai alleged that the CEB workers have discovered a mass grave similar to the one that has been recently discovered in Thirukkeatheesvaram in Mannaar.
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SL military begins deceptive recruitment drive in East

[TamilNet, Thursday, 18 September 2014, 21:50 GMT]
Inviting poverty-stricken Tamil families along the district border between the Ampaa’rai district and Batticaloa district to receive ‘humanitarian supplies’, the occupying Sri Lanka Army has been conducting propaganda meetings promising civil jobs for Tamil women in the SL military, news sources in Ampaa’rai told TamilNet on Thursday. A group of Sri Lanka Army soldiers, who brought drinking water supply to the villagers in 35th Colony, Malaiyar-kaddu and Ka’n’naki-puram were campaigning ‘good salary’ and ‘government pension’ for subservient jobs in SL military. In the meantime, the SL military has also gone to the extent of promising a house to each family that sends their daughters and sons for employment in SL military.
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Funeral of veteran activist Manickasothy held in Uduvil, Jaffna

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 17 September 2014, 19:14 GMT]
Hundreds of Eezham Tamils paid their last respects to veteran Eezham Tamil activist Abimannasingham Manickasothy on Wednesday at Uduvil in Jaffna. Mr Manickasothy passed away Monday night in a vehicle accident on his way to Jaffna from Colombo. Mr Manickasothy, who stood with his people throughout the Tamil struggle, has been articulating the political aspiration of Eezham Tamils in all available platforms. He has been a firm defender of Eezham Tamils right to self-determination for more than 30 years.
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SL Navy attacks on Tamil Nadu fishermen escalate

[TamilNet, Monday, 15 September 2014, 06:26 GMT]
Two dead bodies have washed ashore in Jaffna on Friday and Sunday and 59 fishermen from Tamil Nadu have been arrested by the occupying Sri Lanka Navy in Jaffna and Mannaar on Friday. One of the dead fishermen was identified as 40-year-old Gnanapirakasam from Rameswaram from a tattoo that depicted AIDMK's "two leaves" party symbol. The other body washed ashore in Vadamaraadchi Munai on Sunday is yet to be identified.
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SL military deploys intimidation, deception in East to suppress testimonies to OISL

[TamilNet, Sunday, 14 September 2014, 22:17 GMT]
The intelligence operatives of the occupying Sri Lankan military are exploiting the poverty-stricken Tamil youth from the temporary settlements of uprooted people from Champoor to spy on the activities going on among the uprooted people. The SL military, which has been providing alcohol and other drugs to the youth, have converted some of the young Tamils deprived of education and other facilities to work as spies for them. Former LTTE members have been two choices. They can either choose work for the SL military or face harassment from the SL military, the representatives of uprooted people in Ki’liveddi and Kaddai-pa’richchaan camps in Trincomalee told TamilNet.
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Colombo exploits mineral resources of Eezham Tamils in occupied Vanni

[TamilNet, Saturday, 13 September 2014, 22:50 GMT]
Despite the action by Northern Provincial Council Minister of Agriculture, Livestock, Irrigation and Environment in August this year in prohibiting excavation of sand from the coast of Vaaviyadi and Puthu-aattadi in Kokku’laay region in Vanni, the Colombo government and agents of Namal Rajapaksa, the son of SL president Mahinda Rajapaksa, have accelerated the excavation of mineral sands containing ilmenite and rutile, raw materials for manufacturing Titanium Dioxide. The SL government in Colombo has seized several acres of lands along the coast in recent weeks, news sources in Mullaiththeevu told TamilNet on Saturday.
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Bringing OISL to NorthEast is IC responsibility: Tamil politicians

[TamilNet, Friday, 12 September 2014, 23:18 GMT]
Tamil politicians who met the British Deputy High Commissioner Lara Levis, who was on a trip to North and East, urged the diplomat to pass a message to her government and the international community to exert maximum pressure on Colombo to allow the Geneva-based OHCHR Investigation on Sri Lanka (OISL) to visit the homeland of Eelam Tamils in the North and East of the island. “The Deputy High Commissioner, who listened to our complaints on the human rights violations of the Tamil people, was silent. We urged her to impress upon her government and the international community to enable the OISL to visit the island,” TNA parliamentarian P Selvarasa from Batticaloa said.
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SL judiciary blocks massacre victims remembrance in Batticaloa

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 10 September 2014, 22:54 GMT]
The occupying Sri Lankan Police in Batticaloa on Tuesday blocked the 24th annual remembrance event of the victims of the brutal massacre of Chaththuruk-ko’ndaan massacre carried out by the Sri Lanka Army in 1990. Batticaloa District Magistrate Mr NMM Abdulla issued an injunction order prohibiting the remembrance event at the memorial site accepting the SL police version, legal sources in Batticaloa said.
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SL military floats 5,000 cell phones for surveillance on Tamils in Batticaloa

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 09 September 2014, 16:30 GMT]
The military intelligence of occupying Sri Lanka has distributed more than 5,000 cell phones to selected Tamil civilians in former LTTE administered areas in Vaakarai and Paduvaan-karai regions of Batticaloa district in an attempt to convert the recipients of the SL military 'gift' into informants and collaborators. 3,000 of the mobile phones have been provided to women. In the meantime, ex-LTTE members are being harassed to report at the SL military camps and instructed to collaborate with the SL military if they wished to avoid 'future problems', civil sources in Vaakarai say.
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Tamil villagers fear Sinhalicisation of South Bar in Mannaar

[TamilNet, Monday, 08 September 2014, 19:25 GMT]
The officials of the occupying Sri Lanka have been harassing 8 uprooted Tamil families to vacate from their huts at the village of Shanthi-puram, situated in South Bar GS division of Mannaar DS division. The officials, under the instruction of Sinhala Government Agent of Mannaar District, have claimed that the land has been allocated for the construction of Buddhist vihara.
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SL military starts dismantling remaining houses in occupied Champoor

[TamilNet, Sunday, 07 September 2014, 23:11 GMT]
The occupying Sri Lankan military has started to destroy properties situated inside the so-called ‘Economic’ zone in Champoor in Trincomalee district, news sources in Moothoor told TamilNet on Sunday. The houses and wells have been bulldozed to the ground in an occupied residential area near Champoor Sri Paththirakaa’li Amman temple within the last few days, according to the land-owners. The SL military has started to dismantle the remaining buildings in Champoor as they did in Valikaamam North in Jaffna, the sources further said. At the same time, Colombo’s surveying department has been engaged in surveying the lands within the occupied zone.
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'LTTE ban contributes to further oppression of Tamils'

[TamilNet, Saturday, 06 September 2014, 19:29 GMT]
The international proscription of the LTTE only contributes to criminalizing the political struggle of the Tamils and facilitates increased oppression in their homeland, argues Chris Slee in an article published on the Green Left Weekly on Saturday. "These bans were imposed because the governments of these countries were opposed to the Tamil national liberation struggle. Most Tamils living in exile were sympathetic to the LTTE, seeing them as freedom fighters, not terrorists. The banning of the LTTE in various countries was aimed at intimidating Tamils from supporting the struggle for self-determination in their homeland," he writes. A case challenging the ban on the LTTE in EU is pending in European courts.
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SL TID in Jaffna terrorises Tamil Catholic priests who served in Vanni

[TamilNet, Saturday, 06 September 2014, 10:02 GMT]
Sri Lankan ‘Terrorist Investigation Department’, which receives direct instructions from SL presidential sibling and Defence Secretary Gotabhaya Rajapaksa, in recent days has been monitoring, intimidating and ‘interrogating’ Eezham Tamil Catholic priests, who have been with their people in Vanni during and before the genocidal onslaught on Vanni. One of the six priests, who were detained in military-controlled barbed-wire camps in Menik Farm in 2009, Fr. A. Anton Stephen, was questioned by the TID officers at the Bishop’s House as the TID of the occupying Colombo was speculating that he is one of the key witnesses submitting an eyewitness account to the three member OHCHR investigation on Sri Lanka (OISL) panel tasked to produce a report on the investigation process in Sri Lanka after collecting direct reports from individuals, organisations and governments.
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Thousands of Tamil Nadu fishermen protest India's apathy to their plight

[TamilNet, Friday, 05 September 2014, 04:35 GMT]
Thousands of Tamil Nadu fishermen in Rameshwaram protested against India's continued apathy to their plight and condemned BJP member Subramaniam Swamy for his remarks supporting the Sri Lanka Navy's seizure of the boats of Tamil fishermen. In the demonstration organized outside Fisheries Department, the protesters burnt Swamy's effigy and demanded an apology from him. Protests were held in other parts of Tamil Nadu as well on Thursday.
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Jayalalithaa condemns Swamy’s stance on Tamil Nadu fishermen issue

[TamilNet, Thursday, 04 September 2014, 04:26 GMT]
In a letter sent to Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Tuesday, Tamil Nadu Chief Minister Jayalalithaa said that the views of BJP member Subramanian Swamy on the fishermen issue “has given rise to resentment and angst not only amongst the fishermen community but also amongst the entire population of Tamil Nadu.”Ms. Jayalalithaa was referring to an interview of Swamy where he had said that he had given the idea to the Sri Lankan government to seize the boats of Tamil Nadu fishermen who crossed the IMBL. This letter comes in the wake of the arrest of 9 fishermen, the sinking of one boat and the seizure of another by the SL Navy on Monday. Separately, TESO staged a protest on Wednesday where the DMK chief Karunanidhi said that Tamils in the island lived like slaves, PTI reported.
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Time for Norway to speak out against SL stand on OHCHR investigation: Paper

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 03 September 2014, 11:55 GMT]
Sri Lankan president Mahinda Rajapaksa’s arrogance against the international community cannot be passed over in silence, opined VG (Verdens Gang), the popular Norwegian daily with largest circulation, in a editorial column on Tuesday, reminding the Norwegian State and politicians who have involved in resolving the conflict in the past of their duty. “If Norway or Norwegian interests continue to have a say on the regime in Sri Lanka, it is now time to speak out,” the newspaper said putting Sri Lanka in the same league as that of North Korea and Syria.
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Corporate big-shot praises ‘Sri Lanka’ as an ‘emerging market’

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 02 September 2014, 23:03 GMT]
Peter Kohli, the CEO of DMS Funds, in an article in NASDAQ on Tuesday praised Sri Lanka as an emerging market, encouraging foreign investment in the island. Mr. Kohli, an Indian by birth who runs a stock exchange company in the USA, further said that “Sri Lanka has put in place the necessary reforms and is on the road to continued rapid economic expansion”. The article, which expresses admiration for the expansion of the Sri Lanka’s economy post-2009, also provides advice to potential investors. Commenting on this, Tamil activists for alternative politics in the island said that as the genocidal grip of the Sinhala state in the occupied Tamil homeland intensifies, a parallel process of a global corporate-military interest in the island that has no concern for humanitarian issues is being exposed.
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Colombo steps up Sinhalicistion of public sector in North

[TamilNet, Monday, 01 September 2014, 21:37 GMT]
While hundreds of Tamil nurses who have completed their studies in the Northern Province are without jobs, 84 Sinhalese from South have been provided appointments filling the vacancies in the hospitals in war-affected hospitals in Mannaar, Ki’linochchi, Vavuniyaa and Mullaiththeevu districts in the Northern Province and at the Point Pedro, Chaavakachcheari and Thellippazhai base hospitals that come under the health ministry of the Northern Provincial Council (NPC), news sources in Jaffna said. Colombo is Sinhalicising the public sector in the North and East along with transformation of the SL military cantonments into Sinhala Military Zones in Jaffna and Trincomalee.
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