Obama greetings disregard Tamil aspirations - TNA MP

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 03 February 2009, 15:36 GMT]
While Eezham Tamils all over the world observe a Black Day on the occasion of Sri Lankan Independence Day on February 4, US President Barack Obama's greetings to the Sri Lankan President that hint integrity of Sri Lanka is viewed by Tamil circles as hurting the democratic aspirations of Tamils, Tamil National Alliance (TNA) pariamentarian S. Jeyananthamoorthy told TamilNet.
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SL police arrests Tamil youth in Ratnapura

[TamilNet, Monday, 02 February 2009, 17:31 GMT]
A Tamil youth, originally from the East and staying with his relatives in Deniyaya in Ratnapura district was arrested by Sri Lanka police on Friday.
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Sri Lanka warns interfering Westerners

[TamilNet, Sunday, 01 February 2009, 14:47 GMT]
Sri Lanka’s hardline government warned Sunday that Western ambassadors, news agencies and INGOs of "dire consequences" if they attempt to give the LTTE a second breath of life. "They will be chased away (if they try) to give a second wind to the LTTE terrorists at a time the security forces, at heavy cost, are dealing them the final death blow," Defence Secretary Gotabaya Rajapaksa told The Sunday Island.
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Grenade attack on Vavuniyaa TNA MP’s office

[TamilNet, Sunday, 01 February 2009, 05:42 GMT]
Unidentified persons hurled a hand grenade on the Vavuniyaa office of Selvam Adaikalanathan, Tamil National Alliance (TNA) parliamentarian for Vavuniyaa and the head of Tamil Eelam Liberation Organization (TELO), Saturday around 8:00 p.m, causing damage to the rear section of the office, sources in Vavuniyaa said. The office is located in Vairava Pu'liyangku'lam in Vavuniyaa.
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Muthukumar triggers off mood of defiance in Tamil Nadu

[TamilNet, Sunday, 01 February 2009, 02:11 GMT]
Muthukumar was not there but his spirit was there. The lamentable self-immolation of the youth and the last statement he distributed had significant impact especially on the youth of Tamil Nadu and triggered off a series of consequences, unprecedented in such acts earlier in Tamil Nadu. Apart from public unrest, tension and street violence, the deeper manifestation was the open public defiance of the Government of India ban against the LTTE, which the people demonstrated carrying LTTE flags, placards and images of Pirapaharan in the funeral procession of Muthukumar. The intensification of student uprising as an aftermath of his sacrifice has made the state government to close colleges indefinitely, reports a journalist from Tamil Nadu.
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Tamils held in prisonlike SLA detention centres - CJPCD

[TamilNet, Friday, 30 January 2009, 16:23 GMT]
“Considering the plight of the 2000 Tamils who had fled war and are detained in Sri Lanka Army (SLA) detention centres, a justifiable fear arises as to what would happen to those who come to these detention centres which are like prisons; youths detained in these centres are said to have gone missing,” Commission for Justice and Peace of the Catholic Diocese of Jaffna (CJPCD) said in its appeal sent on its third day of the protest fast observed in Jaffna, against the killing of Tamils in the Vanni, sources in Jaffna said.
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TNA salutes Muthukumar’s sacrifice of life to the cause of Eelam Tamils

[TamilNet, Friday, 30 January 2009, 13:02 GMT]
“Tamil National Alliance (TNA) wishes to express its deepest grief and condolence to Muthukumar’s family and the people of Tamil Nadu along with the entire Tamils of the world for having laid his live in supreme sacrifice in support of the Eelam Tamils,” the message of condolence released by TNA said.
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Last statement of Muthukumar

[TamilNet, Friday, 30 January 2009, 09:04 GMT]
Journalist Muthukumar distributed a 4-page statement in Tamil before his self-immolation Thursday in Tamil Nadu. TamilNet provides a translation for the English readership to grasp the significance, without taking responsibility for the accuracy of facts. "The sacrifice of young and idealistic Muthukumar is lamentable beyond words and thoughts of re-enactment should never become a necessity to anyone. It is a reminiscence of the Vietnam of 1960's when self-immolation of monks protesting brutal atrocities as a consequence of US military campaign was common. Such acts occur as a last resort of public frustration when governments suppress democratic space and don't respect overwhelming public opinion of emotional importance," said a diaspora Tamil academic.
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Colombo's war crimes turn to rape of the fleeing - Jaffna MP

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 28 January 2009, 11:45 GMT]
Civilians who have been caught by the Sri Lanka Army recently in Vadamaraadchi East in Jaffna and from Murasumoaddai in Ki'linochchi district, who are confined to the 'detention camps' run by the Sri Lankan military, have complained to their relatives that the Sri Lankan soldiers have taken several women into their custody and were sexually abusing them, said Jaffna district parliamentarian S. Gajendran on Wednesday. Those who continue to justify and abet the on going war against Tamils and those who directly or indirectly advocate surrender of Tamil civilians to their adversaries are a party to war crimes, he further said.
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2 Tamil civilians reported missing in Colombo

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 27 January 2009, 18:42 GMT]
Two Tamil civilians residing in Colombo have been reported disappeared since January 11 with the van they were traveling, according to complaints lodged with the Kotahena and Borella police by their wives on Monday.
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TNA calls for shut down in North, East of Sri Lanka

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 27 January 2009, 12:31 GMT]
Tamil National Alliance (TNA) called upon the people in the North and East of Sri Lanka to observe a general shut down on Friday, the 30th of January, to protest against the killing of Tamil civilians by Sri Lanka armed forces. Several hundreds of Internally Displaced People (IDPs) assembled within the Colombo designated "safety zone" have died in the last four days from artillery and air strikes by Sri Lanka military.
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TNA seeks IC to stop carnage, urges medical help to victims

[TamilNet, Monday, 26 January 2009, 15:47 GMT]
The Tamil National Alliance (TNA) in an urgent press statement has called upon the international community to use all its influence with the Sri Lankan State to bring an immediate end to the massacre of these Tamil civilians. The TNA further appeals that the international community intervenes to secure immediate medical supplies and medical personnel to be sent to treat the affected civilians.
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Samaraweera to raise Colombo's rights violations with U.S.

[TamilNet, Monday, 26 January 2009, 04:13 GMT]
Asserting that Mahinda Rajapakse regime is “the darkest, the most brutal and the most ruthless,” that has ruled Sri Lanka, Mangala Samaraweera, the convenor SLFP (M), in an interview published in this weekend Sunday Leader, said that he will “seek an appointment with the US State Department and the incoming Secretary of State, Hilary Clinton,” to offer evidence related to human rights violations committed by “Gotabaya [Rajapakse] and Basil Rajapakse as well as Sarath Fonseka…The US must deal with these people. They have an obligation to deal with them.”
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'Safety zone' shelled again, 5 civilians killed, 83 wounded

[TamilNet, Friday, 23 January 2009, 16:53 GMT]
Five civilians, including a10-year-old girl and a 56-year-old Saiva priest, were killed and 83 civilians wounded Friday when Sri Lanka Army (SLA) fired artillery shells targeted 'safe zone' areas such as Iruddumadu in Udaiyaarkaddu and Va'l'lipunam in Mullaiththeevu district at least four times, according to medical sources in the region. More than 20 of the wounded people were children. More than 20 of the wounded victims are children.
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TNA urges IC to put an end to genocidal war

[TamilNet, Thursday, 22 January 2009, 03:26 GMT]
The Tamil National Alliance (TNA) in a press release issued on Wednesday urged the International Community to prevail upon the Sri Lankan state to bring the war to an immediate end stating that It is the considered view of the TNA that the Sri Lankan State is prosecuting the current war in pursuit of an ideology, namely the assertion of Sinhala Buddhist supremacist nationalism, and in order to achieve that objective a process of Genocide of the Tamil people is in progress. The inhuman conditions and the daily killings to which the Tamil civilians in LTTE controlled areas are being subjected to are only the more obvious elements of this process, the statement by the TNA said.
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British FO sabotaging Tamil national question condemned

[TamilNet, Thursday, 22 January 2009, 03:13 GMT]
A statement released by the British Secretary of State for Foreign & Commonwealth Affairs on Wednesday, totally ignoring the national basis of the decades old Tamil struggle and treating the humanitarian crisis of civilians as an outcome of terrorism is strongly condemned by Jaffna district Tamil National Alliance (TNA) Parliamentarian S. Gajendran, who added: The preaching of the modern "corporate religion of greed" to Tamils seems to be "submit yourself to thy genocidal killers."
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Elderly man recovered dead in Jaffna

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 21 January 2009, 13:05 GMT]
Unidentified armed men abducted Tuesday night an elderly man going from his home in Thaavadi in Jaffna to his brother’s house and dumped his body after having tortured him to death, on a road in Koa’ndaavil Arasadi area in Jaffna around 10:30 p.m. same night, during Sri Lanka Army (SLA) imposed curfew hours, sources in Jaffna said. Koappaay police recovered the victim’s body and handed it over to Jaffna Teaching Hospital mortuary.
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IC urged to act on humanitarian grounds to safeguard civilians

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 21 January 2009, 12:45 GMT]
Sri Lanka Army (SLA) has cornered civilians in overcrowded areas in the suburbs of Puthukkudiyiruppu (PTK) town, according to sources in Vanni. While artillery shells exploding in densely populated makeshift settlements have caused several civilian casualties, civilians are fleeing from indiscriminate bombardment from air and ground are forced to seek shelters throughout the day, civil sources from Vanni said. IDPs' representatives express fear that those who fall into the hands of SLA units are likely to be forcibly transported under close military supervision to detention centre style camps at locations isolated from mainstream communities, as evidenced in Mannaar and in areas north of the recently SLA-occupied Elephant Pass.
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Unprecedented civilian carnage in Vanni

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 20 January 2009, 18:44 GMT]
Fifteen civilians including 5 children were killed and 29 seriously injured in the relentless artillery barrage that Sri Lanka Amy (SLA) kept pounding the internally displaced persons (IDPs) in Visuvamadu, Udaiyaarkaddu, Chuthanthirapuram and Maa'nikkapuram areas in Mullaiththeevu district Tuesday, sources in Vanni said. SLA continued its artillery barrage on the IDP settlements Monday from 11:00 a.m till 12:30 p.m in Chuthanthirapuram and Theavipuram areas in Vanni killing two IDPs and seriously injuring nine including children.
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'International media abetted death of journalism in Sri Lanka'

[TamilNet, Monday, 19 January 2009, 03:04 GMT]
Following the latest assassination of prominent editor Lasantha Wickramatunge of The Sunday Leader, four notable journalists, have reportedly fled Sri Lanka last week. "Had the international media, which was refused access to the war front and LTTE held territories, boycotted the government news, from the beginning itself as a measure of asserting media rights, the casualty of journalism in the island could have been avoided. But, the international media, especially the popular news agencies, are part of the game and they pay only lip service at every media casualty in the country," says a journalist formerly based in Colombo and now operating in the West.
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