Sinhala colony, military, Buddhist complex crop up at Jaffna city entrance

[TamilNet, Friday, 05 July 2013, 14:04 GMT]
Naavat-kuzhi is a place just 5km east of Jaffna city where the two highways A9 and A32, the only existing land arteries that lead into Jaffna from the south and the western coast meet. First the Sinhala military occupied the junction with camps at both the branching highways. Then a Sinhala colony cropped up in the last two years with permanent concrete houses complete with all facilities at the most potential stretch of land there. Now, foundation is laid for the construction of a Buddhist stupa at this place along the highway to gleefully greet everyone entering into Jaffna city through land. Officers of the genocidal Sinhala military occupying Jaffna attended the foundation-laying ceremony, conducted recently by the Naaka Vihaara Buddhist prelate in Jaffna.
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American feminist writer contrasts gender politics of LTTE and GoSL

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 03 July 2013, 23:51 GMT]
“The Sri Lankan government has used rape against Tamil men and women suspected of being members of the LTTE [...] but the Tamil Tigers have seemingly not used it in retaliation,” writes American feminist writer Michele Lent Hirsch. In an article that is general commentary on the use of rape by both state and non-state actors in war published on Women Under Siege on Tuesday, the author compares and contrasts the gender politics of the LTTE with other actors in conflicts, and concludes that “if rape is not inevitable in war, it follows that we have all the more reason to hold the perpetrating groups responsible.” Commenting on this, a Tamil feminist activist from Vanni remarked that it is not only important to condemn rape in war in general, it is also important to recognize the nature of the sexual violence used in specific cases and to deal justice to survivors accordingly.
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Gotabhaya open on demographic genocide

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 03 July 2013, 18:03 GMT]
Genocidal Sri Lanka’s presidential sibling Gotabhaya Rajapaksa on Tuesday openly admitted that the Sinhala State’s intention is not giving even provinces to Tamils, but to proceed with demographic genocide to erase out their territorial identity, when he said “alienation of provinces based on ethnicity” was not the solution. What Gotabhaya said was also the thrust of the LLRC report that was internationally legitimised as the basis for solutions in the island by the Washington-initiated and New Delhi-fine tuned resolutions at Geneva. It is increasingly transparent that the Sinhala State’s open boldness, in committing genocide in war and in continuing structural genocide in all its facets, actually stems from a collective agenda of the USA and India, said Tamils for alternative politics in the island.
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Sri Lanka bans Time Magazine’s issue on Myanmar Buddhist extremism

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 02 July 2013, 23:36 GMT]
The GoSL has banned the Time Magazine’s July 1st edition that had coverage of Buddhist extremism in Myanmar as its cover story. Sri Lankan officials claimed that the issue, which focuses on the anti-Muslim “Buddhist terror” of the 969 Movement in Myanmar led by the monk A. Wirathu, would offend “religious sentiments” in the island. However, progressive media activists from the island questioned why is it that not one international magazine has bothered to cover the several faces of Sinhala ‘Buddhist terror’ that have been collectively responsible for the genocide of the Eezham Tamil nation.
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Sinhala leftist criticizing government repression overlooks Tamils’ struggle

[TamilNet, Monday, 01 July 2013, 23:26 GMT]
The Sri Lankan government’s real concern at the moment is “the threat of widespread social unrest and an uprising by workers, youth and poor”, writes Sinhala leftist K. Ratnayake in article published on the Trotskyite World Socialist Web Site on Monday. Referring largely to Gotabaya Rajapaksa’s “Sri Lanka’s National Security Concerns” lecture at the Kotelawala Defence University in early June, the author claims that “The defence minister’s reference to a renewed “terrorist” threat is aimed at whipping up anti-Tamil communalism to divide the emerging struggles of the working class.” However, an alternative politics Eezham Tamil activist from Jaffna questions whether Mr. Ratnayake, who overlooks the Tamils’ struggle for sovereignty resisting genocidal occupation of their homeland by the GoSL, is consciously or unconsciously defending the state structure that he claims to criticize.
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Eezham Tamil refugees arrested in Trichy

[TamilNet, Monday, 01 July 2013, 22:09 GMT]
Five Tamil refugees from Sri Lanka were arrested in Trichy on Sunday for allegedly planning to migrate to Australia through brokers, the PTI reported on Sunday. Citing police sources, the report said that the arrest was made by the Q Branch “who kept an eye on them” and that the police were on a hunt for the brokers. The Indian establishment which engages with the Sri Lankan government in facilitating and legitimizing genocidal conditions in the occupied homeland of the Eezham Tamils, is particularly cruel towards such refugees who are only seeking a chance for living, commented a Tamil Nadu activist working for the rights of the Eezham Tamil refugees.
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Tamil youth in East face stiffer racial discrimination: TNA MP

[TamilNet, Sunday, 30 June 2013, 23:22 GMT]
In yet another instance of the structural genocide taking place in the country of Eezham Tamils, students from the East stand now to lose the opportunity to learn technical education in their GCE Advanced Level studies since the Colombo government seems to have deliberately ignored Tamil educational institutions in the selection of institutions for introduction of technical education under higher standards. Tamil National Alliance (TNA) Parliamentarian Pon Selvarasa has alleged that the Tamil educational institutions from the East have been deliberately ignored by the Colombo government in the selection of institutions for introduction of technical education under the higher standards of general education.
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Colombo seizes 4,000 acres of paddy lands from Tamil farmers in Ampaa'rai

[TamilNet, Saturday, 29 June 2013, 22:09 GMT]
Around 4,000 acres of paddy lands belonging to Eezham Tamil farmers in the western side of Thirukkoayil of Ampaa'rai district in the East are under appropriation by the Sri Lankan State in Colombo through its Department of Forest Conservation. This also includes more than 1,000 acres of lands with paddy crops. The Colombo Establishment is committing a systematic demographic genocide on the ancient Tamil villages in the East while the Establishments in Washington and New Delhi, fully aware of Sri Lanka's Sinhalicisation, Buddhicisation and Colonisation programmes, continue to provide the necessary ‘time and space’ to Sri Lanka by seeking to deceive Eezham Tamils with LLRC-based empty resolutions in Geneva and by upholding the 13th Amendment of the unitary constitution of Sri Lanka.
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Ban on water supply threatens agriculture of Eezham Tamils in Batticaloa

[TamilNet, Friday, 28 June 2013, 22:34 GMT]
By banning water supply to agriculture and paper mills and supplying water to tourist houses, the Colombo government is putting lives of many Eezham Tamils in stake in Batticaloa. The Sri Lankan Finance Ministry, which comes directly under SL president Mahinda Rajapaksa, who is also the finance minister in Colombo, has imposed on ban on supply of water from Vaakaneari lake to the agricultural farms, agriculturalists from the area complain.
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Hypocrisy at best: US policy towards Syria and Sri Lanka

[TamilNet, Friday, 28 June 2013, 13:44 GMT]
US media reported on Wednesday that the CIA has begun shipping of arms to Syrian rebels to counter Bashar al-Assad’s forces. This move comes in spite of strong opposition from UNSC member Russia and warnings by a UN expert that increase in flow of weapons into Syria would only escalate the conflict. Likewise, American diplomat Susan Rice termed UNSC’s inaction on Syria a “stain” on the body. The hypocrisy of assisting Sri Lanka in its genocidal war on the Tamil nation while crying foul over al-Assad’s operations apart, the US through its actions on Syria makes it clear once again that the UNHRC, UNSC are of least concern should the US decide to intervene in a conflict. Given this nature of US foreign policy, till how long then will the Tamil Geneva pundits continue to believe in the impotent resolutions on Sri Lanka in the UNHRC, questions a political analyst in Colombo.
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AI compromising with UK’s CHOGM participation condemned

[TamilNet, Thursday, 27 June 2013, 16:25 GMT]
The Amnesty International opts out outright denouncement of the UK for its decision to participate the CHOGM meet hosted by genocidal Sri Lanka, by suggesting that the UK should make use of the meet to put pressure on Sri Lanka on international investigation of war crimes and on rectifying general ‘human rights’ situation in the island, commented a Tamil activist for alternative politics in Jaffna. The Amnesty International that doesn’t recognize the genocide and the on-going structural genocide committed on the nation of Eezham Tamils, and that doesn’t demand action or investigation on the crux of the matter, but tucks everything into a general human rights situation to imply endorsement to the integrity of the genocidal State, is just a partner in the game, the activist said.
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Indian outfits, Sinhala military, hijack Tamil religious struggle in East

[TamilNet, Thursday, 27 June 2013, 08:57 GMT]
An RSS-linked outfit ‘Hindu Sevaa Sangkam,’ (HSS) in collaboration with the genocidal Sinhala military, attempts to hijack and deviate the religious part of the struggle of the genocide-facing Eezham Tamils in the East. Backed by SL military intelligence, and run by members of the Pillaiyaan group, the HSS uses the name of Vishva Hindu Parishad in infiltrating and breaking the national struggle of Eezham Tamils, in order to serve the unholy alliance of Indian corporatism and genocidal Sinhala State, news sources in Batticaloa said. Under the occupying Sinhala military, while Saiva temples face destruction, desecration and plunder everyday, but new Buddhist stupas mushroom, a protest of the grassroot YMHA was banned but an HSS hoodwink was permitted this month in Batticaloa.
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Tamil Nadu protests condemn Indo-Sri Lanka military co-operation

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 26 June 2013, 05:18 GMT]
Protests in the Nilgiris district of Tamil Nadu came down sharply on the Indian government for its continued military co-operation with the Sri Lankan military, which is accused not just of the genocide of the Eezham Tamils but also of murdering hundreds of Tamil Nadu fishermen. The protests erupted in the wake of the news that two SL military officers were to be given training at the Defence Services Staff College in Wellington, Nilgiris. While this opposition led to the transfer of the officers to another facility in Andhra Pradesh followed quickly by the GoSL’s recall of the officers, Congress minister E.M. Sudarsana Natchiappan defended India’s military relationship with Sri Lanka, playing the China card.
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Tamil youth in UK demand referendum for Tamil Eelam

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 25 June 2013, 11:53 GMT]
Second generation Eezham Tamil youth in the UK demonstrated at 10 Downing Street on Sunday demanding a referendum towards the creation of the state of Tamil Eelam. The Tamil youth and student activists from different universities who assembled for the protest called for an independent international investigation into the genocidal war crimes of Sri Lanka, also urging Prince Charles and the British Prime Minister David Cameron to boycott the CHOGM summit in Sri Lanka. The activists affirmed that British authorities' endorsing the CHOGM was tantamount to an approval of the genocide of the Eezham Tamil nation. The protest was held under the banner of 'Student's Uprising Day', to commemorate the sacrifice of the late Pon. Sivakumaran, a pioneer of the Tamil resistance movement in the early 70s.
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Ibsen’s Doll’s House translated into Eezham Tamil in Norway

[TamilNet, Monday, 24 June 2013, 00:02 GMT]
Modernism’s world famous playwright Henrik Ibsen’s Et Dukkehjem (A Doll’s House) has found earlier translations in Tamil. But what is special about the present translation by Kasinather Sivapalan is that it is in spoken Eezham Tamil, making the reading and staging of the play homely to Eezham Tamils in their country and in the diaspora across the world. A Doll’s House, written in 1879 and said to be the world’s most performed play by the early 20th century, is not new to Eezham Tamils. Even 50 years ago it was staged in Jaffna, scripted in Tamil and directed by veteran writer, the late Mr E. Mahadeva (Thevan-Yaazhppaa’nam), who was Mr Sivapalan’s teacher at Jaffna Hindu College. The current translation by Mr Sivapalan, produced in Norway where he is in exile now, comes as a publication of Mithra Arts and Creations in Chennai.
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Survivors of 1991 Kashmir mass rape case assert struggle for justice

[TamilNet, Sunday, 23 June 2013, 12:13 GMT]
A court in Kupwara district, Kashmir on Tuesday ordered the re-opening of the infamous Kunan Poshpora mass rape case, allegedly committed by Indian military personnel during a cordon and search operation in the Kunan Poshpora village on February 23, 1991. Despite the case gaining international attention and sparking condemnation by human rights bodies like Amnesty and HRW, the Indian government had officially been in a state of denial as regards the incident. In the wake of this court order, an event titled “Kunan-Poshpora mass rape and torture: Case reopening and future struggle for justice” was organized by Jammu and Kashmir Coalition of Civil Society on Saturday in Srinagar in which the rape survivors and their relatives spoke to the public, asserting their struggle for justice.
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Gotabhaya names TamilNet a ‘security threat’

[TamilNet, Sunday, 23 June 2013, 00:04 GMT]
While listing ‘national’ security threats faced by genocidal Sri Lanka, its Defence Secretary and presidential sibling Gotabhaya Rajapaksa included the name of TamilNet and said that it is controlled by the Tamil Coordinating Committee, led by Nediyavan, which in turn has control over most of the assets of the LTTE’s international organisation. Gotabhaya who said it on 13 June, while addressing the Kotelawela Defence University, also said that now all the various intelligence services of his State are brought under one Chief of National Intelligence, who reports directly to him (as Defence Secretary). What Gotabhaya said on TamilNet either shows the ignorance of his intelligence or his intention to distort TamilNet’s image. TamilNet challenges him on the truth of his statement.
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Sinhalicisation of Chu’ndik-ku’lam to permanently choke Jaffna Peninsula

[TamilNet, Saturday, 22 June 2013, 08:55 GMT]
The Eezham Tamil fishermen’s efforts to reconstruct their war-torn lives face fresh threats from the occupying Sri Lanka’s rampant Sinhalicisation of the North. During the last two weeks, hundreds of Sinhala fishermen are being settled at Chu’ndikku’lam, a coastal village situated in Vadamaraadchi East of the Jaffna district. By employing banned methods of fishing, the invading Sinhala fishermen have been posing a grave threat not only to the resettlement of the uprooted Tamils in the village, but also to the livelihood of the Tamil fishermen of Vadamaraadchi East. However, the worst threat is Sinhala military and fishermen permanently choking the one and only natural entry point into the Jaffna Peninsula, as Chu’ndik-ku’lam is the sandbar that links the peninsula with the main island. 1000 houses are planned for colonizing Sinhala fishermen at this location, says TNA-MP Sritharan.
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India’s housing in un-freed land facilitates Sinhalicisation

[TamilNet, Friday, 21 June 2013, 09:32 GMT]
Batticaloa district Tamil National Alliance parliamentarian Mr P Selvarasa has warned that the occupying Colombo government has planned to grab several houses allocated under the Indian aid for war-affected Tamil families in the Eastern Province especially in Batticaloa district to be handed over to Sinhalese who are being brought down to the Batticaloa district from the South. The ultimate culprit that makes the housing meaningless is the Indian policy of not recognising or freeing the land of Eezham Tamils for them. If the policy is tacit support to demographic genocide, the result will be a Palestinian crisis for Eezham Tamils in the island. What has to be primarily addressed is the policy of New Delhi, commented activists of alternative politics in the East.
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UK Tamils gather at Cardiff protesting Sri Lankan cricket

[TamilNet, Thursday, 20 June 2013, 16:12 GMT]
Hundreds of Eezham Tamils from the UK gathered near the cricket stadium in Cardiff on Thursday to protest the presence of the Sri Lankan cricket team on British soil, urging the UK for a complete boycott of sporting and cultural ties with the genocide-accused Sri Lankan state. This mass protest follows on the heels of a violent incident near the Oval stadium on Monday, where dozens of Tamil activists protesting on the occasion of the Sri Lanka-Australia cricket match were brutally attacked by Sinhala mobs.
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