Karuna assaults landowner in Batticaloa

[TamilNet, Saturday, 21 March 2015, 23:52 GMT]
An armed squad led by paramilitary operative and former SL deputy minister Vinayagamoorthy Muralitharan (Karuna) on Saturday assaulted a Tamil farmer, R. Vanaraja, while he was engaged at cultivation in his own agricultural land at Noo'ru-eakkar in Kiraan, Batticaloa. Mr Vinayagamoorthy Muralitharan was claiming ownership to the land. The land was earlier under the control of the Tigers after Vanaraja family had displaced from his village. Later, Muralitharan, who defected from the LTTE had seized the land for commercial purposes, news sources in Batticaloa said.
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Colombo stages eyewash resettlement amidst military cantonment in Jaffna

[TamilNet, Friday, 20 March 2015, 23:11 GMT]
211 families, who registered on Friday to resettle in Vasaavi'laan East in Valikaamam North and were allowed to visit and see their villages, have complained that the Colombo regime was still upholding the militarisation of their villages in the former ‘High Security Zone’. The SL military is still occupying their residential areas. Even the few houses situated in the area being released to the people have been totally demolished while the houses within the areas fenced off for continued military use are intact. In addition, most of the lands being released are either agricultural lands or quarry lands unfit for resettlement or agriculture, they complained. The SL military is still occupying the fertile agricultural lands, which have been converted into farms run by the military.
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Grasping affairs of Maldives in larger perspective

[TamilNet, Thursday, 19 March 2015, 00:06 GMT]
Rather than taking sides with the imprisoned former Maldivian President Mohamed Nasheed or with the current President Abdulla Yameen, the people of the Maldives and the peoples of entire southern South Asia should carefully understand the larger anti-people designs of New Delhi, Washington and Beijing, and vigilantly act in unison against the larger security threat that is being caused by the powers to the peoples of the region, commented Tamil activists for alternative politics. Nasheed, who is often highlighted in the Western and Indian media as the first democratically elected president of the archipelago, was also the first in involving the country in genocide in the neighbourhood, the activists cited.
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TNA, TNPF politicians address press conference in Geneva

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 18 March 2015, 22:02 GMT]
Northern provincial councillors Ananthy Sasitharan, M.K. Shivajilingam and TNPF Leader Gajendrakumar Ponnambalam addressed the press at the Geneva Press Club on Tuesday, briefing the audience on the various aspects of the structural genocide targeting the Eezham Tamil nation, which continued unabated despite the internationally orchestrated ‘regime change’ hatching Maithriplala Sirisena as the SL president. The Tamil politicians from the homeland also said that the procrastination in delivering justice to Tamils on the part of the international community in the deferral of the OISL report only emboldened the Sri Lankan State in its crimes against Tamils. Human rights activist and one of the judges in the People’s Tribunal on Sri Lanka, Maung Zarini also addressed the audience together with Tamil diaspora activists Sivakami Rajamanoharan from the UK and R Sri Ranjan from Canada.
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Theakkam, Theakkam-A'naikkaddu, Tha'n'neerth-thaangki

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 18 March 2015, 20:58 GMT]
The place where the river water stagnates by a barrage (for diversion into a canal)

The dam or barrage causing the river water to stagnate

The water tank
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New regime silently steps up military land grab in North

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 18 March 2015, 09:01 GMT]
The occupying Sri Lankan military has again started to seize private lands outside the so-called High Security Zone (HSZ) in the North. While releasing some of the lands in the HSZ back to people in the North, the SL military is silently seizing lands outside the HSZ to maintain and expand its cantonments in the country of Eezham Tamils. Informed sources from the district secretariats of Ki'linochchi and Mullaiththeevu told TamilNet Wednesday that the military seizure of lands has been stepped up during the past 3 weeks at more than 20 localities in Vanni. Under the Rajapaksa regime, the SL officials were open about the military seizure of lands. But, now the process is almost invisible. Surveying officers are also brought from Colombo and legal notices are not issued in order to avoid public protests.
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Premachandran challenges Colombo on ‘Gota’ detention camp in Trincomalee

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 17 March 2015, 08:42 GMT]
Tamil National Alliance (TNA) Parliamentarian Suresh Premachandran on Monday said he was in possession of evidences to prove that there existed a notorious detention camp at the Sri Lanka Navy (SLN) base in Trincomalee with more than 700 Tamil detainees and 35 families. “We can provide such evidences only if the witnesses could be protected,” Mr Premachandran said. After the TNA MP had raised the issue in the Sri Lankan Parliament in February, the new regime in Colombo promised to come up with answers. Now, the SL Prime Minister Ranil Wickramasinghe (UNP) has responded citing the Commander of the Sri Lanka Navy as saying that there was no such detention camp. The Sri Lankan Justice Minister Wijeyadasa Rajapakshe (UNP) has also gone on record denying the accusation of the so-called Gotabhaya camp.
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Naayanmaar-kaddu, Naayanaar-koayil, Naayiniyaar-kollai

[TamilNet, Monday, 16 March 2015, 23:21 GMT]
The residence or mansion of the lords

The temple of the (warrior hero/ guardian) deity

The grove of the (folk) goddess or the grove of the lady
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Tamil protest at Geneva demands UN investigations on Tamil genocide

[TamilNet, Monday, 16 March 2015, 22:17 GMT]
More than 4,000 Diaspora Tamils across Europe gathered at Palais des Nations, in front of the United Nations office in Geneva, Switzerland, on Monday demanding international investigations on Tamil genocide and UN monitored plebiscite on Tamil Eelam. Activists from different solidarity groups participated in the protest, which received attention from various media organisations. The protest also witnessed active participation of Eezham Tamils recently exiled from their homeland and a new group of second generation activists from Switzerland.
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NESoHR vice chairman pays homage to Justice V.R. Krishna Iyer

[TamilNet, Sunday, 15 March 2015, 23:03 GMT]
Former Supreme Court Judge Justice V.R. Krishna Iyer who reformed the Indian criminal justice system and championed the cause of the suppressed including the Eezham Tamils, is remembered by exiled Eezham Tamil rights activist Attorney K. Sivapalan, who is also the vice chairman of the North Eastern Secretariat of Human Rights (NESoHR). Krishna Iyer had passed away 100 days ago on December 4, 2014 at the age of 100. “Even in his ripe old age he made a plea on behalf of Murugan, Shanthan and Perarivalan to commute their death sentence to Life imprisonment. He was a great supporter of Eelam Tamils in their struggle for their rights,” Mr Sivapalan writes.
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Wigneswaran seeks extra-constitutional approach to resolve Tamil national question

[TamilNet, Saturday, 14 March 2015, 16:03 GMT]
NPC Chief Minister C.V. Wigneswaran on Saturday urged the visiting Indian PM to support a negotiation process without succumbing to the constraints of the Sri Lankan Constitution and the associated protocols. Such a negotiation process should involve the Indian Government, Sri Lankan Government and the Provincial Councils of North and East in the island to resolve the national question. The current 13th Amendment Framework and the existing Sri Lankan constitutional architecture had evolved since the first Republican Constitution of 1972 without the consent and participation of Tamils of North and East of our Country, he said adding that both of them pose formidable challenges and hindrances in realizing the quantum of devolution required to fulfill the needs and aspirations of the Tamil Speaking People of North and East of Sri Lanka.
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Jaffna voices grief at Indian PM's cosmetic visit

[TamilNet, Saturday, 14 March 2015, 13:19 GMT]
Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi's visit to North ended up as a ceremonial tour on Saturday. The uprooted people, who were promised resettlement, just one day ahead of his visit to Jaffna, complained that the occupying Sri Lankan military was robbing even the remaining roofs of their houses till the last minute. The families of the victims of enforced disappearances, who marched from Jaffna Bus Stand to the office of the Consulate General of India at Nalloor, were disappointed to learn that Mr Modi was visiting the North-East after advising the TNA Parliamentary Group in Colombo to ‘re-strategize’ its approach and maintain ‘patience’ with regards to what it expects from the new regime in Colombo. They urged the Indian PM to exert pressure on Colombo to act without further delay.
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New Delhi should stop looking at Eezham Tamils through Colombo

[TamilNet, Friday, 13 March 2015, 23:54 GMT]
The very fact that no Indian Prime Minister before Mr Modi hitherto cared to visit Jaffna shows the long-offensive foreign policy attitude of New Delhi towards the nation of Eezham Tamils, located at the closest proximity to India. This should be read along with another foreign policy fact that it was in the case of Eezham Tamils India for the first time in its history was involved in the crime of genocide outside of its country. Both stemmed from an adamantly practised policy of New Delhi viewing Eezham Tamils through the prism of ‘Sri Lanka’ and the establishment in Colombo. Whether China or the USA, or both – whatever may be the ultimate foreign policy concern of India, the times are such that New Delhi should learn to approach Eezham Tamils as a nation of its own right.
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Indian consulate attempts to prevent civil mobilisation during Modi visit

[TamilNet, Thursday, 12 March 2015, 23:32 GMT]
The officials at the office of the Consulate General of India (CGI) in Jaffna have been urging the Tamil National Alliance (TNA) parliamentarians, provincial councillors and civic members not to promote any peaceful rally during the visit by the Indian Prime Minister to North. The CGI officials in collaboration with a section of Sri Lankan officials have also instructed the government officials to suppress public mobilisation. A representative of War-affected people's group, Mr V. Sahathevan, who is waging a three-day fasting in front of the Public Library of Jaffna was insulted on Thursday as the Municipal Council officers removed his banner and his temporary hut. However, a section of the public organisations in Jaffna have announced a peaceful rally on Saturday with 10 demands addressed to the visiting Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi.
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SL military operatives threaten distributors of Tamil weekly

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 11 March 2015, 23:14 GMT]
While the Sri Lankan State is waging a propaganda that it has allowed free media operations in the island, the SL military intelligence of Maithiripala Sirisena's regime has silently stepped up monitoring and harassment on the Tamil weekly, Ithu Nam Theasam, a pro TNPF paper which has gained popularity among the serious Tamil readers in the recent times, especially after the regime change. Three operatives, who came in two motorbikes were following the distributor of Ithu Nam Theasam at Sivanakar in Ki'linochchi on Tuesday. The squad stopped the distributor at a place where there was no civilian witnesses and seized the papers from him issuing a threat on his life, the distributor told media.
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Vayiraaviyaar-keeththu

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 10 March 2015, 11:37 GMT]
The part (of paddy-field land) assigned to a Siva temple official
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Ki Pi Aravinthan's 2008 interview to TamilNet serialized

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 10 March 2015, 09:06 GMT]
TamilNet serializes this week a 2008 interview with veteran former Tamil militant, poet and writer Ki Pi Aravinthan (Christopher Francis alias Sunthar), who passed away on Sunday in Paris at the age of 62. Mr Aravinthan narrates the background of early Tamil militancy, the political events in the island and the prevailing outside trends of the late 1960s that contributed to the culmination of the armed struggle of the later decades. From his perspective as a teenage student, as an associate militant of Sivakumaran in 1974 and later as an EROS member till 1988, he explains the nation-formation of the Eezham Tamils and the evolvement of Tamil militancy which culminated into a mass movement from the active participation from all the echelons of the Tamil society.
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Tamils demonstrate against Sirisena's UK visit

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 10 March 2015, 07:07 GMT]
Around 1,000 Tamils from across the UK gathered in London to demonstrate against the visit of Sri Lankan President Maithripala Sirisena on Monday. The protest, which was held outside Westminster Abbey and the Commonwealth Head Office at Marlborough House, took place as Sirisena joined the British Queen and others at the Annual Commonwealth Day evening reception. The demonstration saw a large participation of youth activists who rejected the LLRC and demanded an independent international investigation into the genocide of Eezham Tamils.
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Tamil women, youth activists in North resolve to step up protests to next phase

[TamilNet, Monday, 09 March 2015, 09:59 GMT]
Concluding a three-day fasting campaign and a four-day walk of Tamil youth activists from Mu'l'livaaykkaal in Vanni to Nalloor, where the fasting campaign by the women activists of the missing persons relatives led by NPC Councillor Ananthy Sasitharan, the women activists on International Women Day said they were preparing for the next step in intensifying their protest demanding international investigations without internal manipulations by Colombo if the new regime in Colombo failed to issue the details on the whereabouts of their kith and kin subjected to enforced disappearance by the occupying Sri Lankan military. The SL military has been harassing the activists who were walking from Mu'l'livaaykkaal to Nalloor at various places in Vanni.
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Ki Pi Aravinthan passes away in Paris

[TamilNet, Sunday, 08 March 2015, 09:07 GMT]
Mr Ki Pi Aravinthan, a veteran former Tamil militant of the 1970's, a poet and a well-known Tamil writer has passed away at the age of 62 at a hospital in Paris on Sunday morning. Born as Christopher Francis, he was also known by the name Sunthar. He was an associate of Urumpiraay Sivakumaran in early 1970s and was the only surviving member of Sivakumar's movement. He was arrested after Sivakumaran's demise in 1974 and was imprisoned by Colombo for some years. Later, he was a senior member of the EROS.
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