UN investigation key to resolve Tamil question: Suresh Premachandran

[TamilNet, Thursday, 05 February 2015, 22:47 GMT]
“Be it Ranil Wickramasinghe, Chandrika Kumaratunga, the new president Maithiripala Sirisena, or whoever it may be [in the South], they don't have a basic idea of how to resolve the Tamil national question, because they are always talking about a unitary constitution,” said Tamil National Alliance Spokesman Suresh Premachandran in an exclusive interview to TamilNet this week. In order to change the existing SL Constitution from unitary into a united form of government, one needs international leverage. That leverage is only possible through proceeding with international pressure in tandem with the regime change in tandem. Therefore, the much-anticipated OISL report should not be postponed, Mr Premachandran told TamilNet.
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Tamils protest on SL ‘independence day’, remind UK of its moral, legal responsibility

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 04 February 2015, 23:29 GMT]
The grassroots activists of Eezham Tamils in UK commenced a torch relay towards Geneva from London on the so-called independence day of Sri Lankan State on Wednesday. The Tamil activists have also launched a signature campaign recalling the role of the United Kingdom in the genocide of the Eelam Tamil nation by: (a) Forcibly transferring Eelam Tamils' sovereignty to the Sinhala nation in 1948 and; (b) Internationally aiding Sri Lanka, including by training the armed forces of the Sinhala state, to carry out its protracted campaign of genocide against Eelam Tamil nation. The torch will travel across UK for next 10 days, then France, Belgium, The Netherlands, Germany and Switzerland to reach Geneva on 16th March, nine days ahead of OHCHR discussion on Sri Lanka.
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Missing-persons' families stage protest, denounce LLRC-based outlook

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 03 February 2015, 12:12 GMT]
Tamil families of forcibly disappeared persons in Ki'linochchi staged a protest on Monday in front of the District Secretariat urging the new Sri Lankan President to establish the whereabouts of their family members, whom they had handed over to the Sri Lankan military at the end of the genocidal onslaught in Vanni in 2009. The mothers of the Tamil youth, who were abducted and made disappeared by the so-called white van squads of the SL military, also joined the protest. The protesting families complained to media that they were disappointed by the inaction so far since Maithiripala Sirisena came to power in the South. In their appeal to SL president, they denounced the LLRC-based outlook in addressing the accountability of the Sri Lankan State.
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Paalai-meen-madu, Min-neariya

[TamilNet, Monday, 02 February 2015, 23:03 GMT]
The White Mullet fishpond

The fish reservoir
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Ananthy Sasitharan responds to ITAK ‘interdiction’ letter

[TamilNet, Monday, 02 February 2015, 21:04 GMT]
Northern Provincial Councillor Ananthy Sasitharan has requested the leadership of Ilangkai Thamizh Arasuk Kadchi (ITAK) to provide evidence in the form of records of debates, decisions and the names of participants to document that a democratic decision was arrived at before Mr R. Sampanthan went public on 03 January 2015 with the decision to explicitly support a particular candidate in the SL presidential elections. Ms Ananthy Sasitharan further stated that she had articulated her stand according to her conscience, protecting the decades-long fundamental principles of the Tamil politics and in the belief that internal democracy existed within the party.
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Sivanesan Memorial Hall declared open in Jaffna

[TamilNet, Sunday, 01 February 2015, 18:40 GMT]
A memorial hall has been declared open in Jaffna on Saturday in commemoration of Maamanithar K. Sivanesan, a Tamil National Alliance (TNA) parliamentarian who was assassinated in a targeted claymore explosion by the Deep Penetration Unit of the Sri Lanka Army (SLA) on 06 March 2006 inside LTTE-controlled Vanni. Sivanesan worked tirelessly to improve the conditions of the deprived sections of population among the Eezham Tamils for a long time. He played also a key role in the democratic mobilization of the Tamil masses at the grassroots level.
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Nationhood, Self-Determination non-negotiable: V.T. Thamilmaran in 2003

[TamilNet, Saturday, 31 January 2015, 21:01 GMT]
“The nationhood of Tamils and their right to self-determination are non-negotiable. Any political solution that might emerge out of the on-going peace process can't go below these,” opined V.T. Thamilmaran, 12 years ago in January 2003, just a few days after the so-called Oslo Declaration (Dec 2002). The international community, by volunteering to back the Internal Right to Self-Determination based solution, is duty-bound to extend its support for future Tamil struggle, he said in 2003: “It would impose on them a moral duty to extend their support for any further struggle by the Tamils.” Five years after 2009, the IC needs to be reminded again of this moral duty as it failed to protect the nation of Eelam Tamils from a brutal genocide, comment youth activists of the Tamil National Alliance in the North. The IC should now respect Tamils Right to External Self-Determination, they said.
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Learning lessons from political discourses of past

[TamilNet, Friday, 30 January 2015, 23:36 GMT]
The last advice of the late Professor A.J. Wilson, a highly respected academic who had the closest connections with the hierarchy of the government echelons from time to time, and who was an optimist genuinely believing the possibility of Tamils and Sinhalese co-existing, was that the Tamil academics and professionals should not let themselves to be lured by promises, sweet talk, and false vanity liberally dispensed by their Sinhala counterparts and Sinhala leaders. According to him this is what that had spoiled Sir P. Ramanathan, G. G. Ponnambalam, M. Thiruchelvam and to a certain extent Thanthai Selva (SJV Chelvanayagam) and A. Amirthalingam. Writing in 2003 on the positions and policies in Tamil politics in the past, Mr. V.T. Thamilmaran was comparing the discourses of two political intellectuals, A.J. Wilson and the other being the doyen of ITAK, V. Navaratnam.
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UK minister cites ‘other stakeholders’ in furthering Geneva investigations

[TamilNet, Thursday, 29 January 2015, 20:35 GMT]
The visiting British Minister of State for the Foreign and Commonwealth Office Hugo Swire in Jaffna said that there was no change in British position on proceeding with Geneva-based war crimes investigations. But, there are also other stakeholders behind the Geneva discourse, the visiting British minister told the Chief Minister CV Wigneswaran. In the meantime, Conservative and Labour MPs who debated the developments in the island of Sri Lanka on Wednesday that took place in British parliament have recognised the crime against Tamil civilians as genocide and have called for continuation of Geneva-based investigations as a necessary step for reconciliation. Yet, the British politicians' framework continues to harp on ‘unitary Sri Lanka’ and ‘minority Tamils’, British Tamil activists lamented.
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Sinhala occupation continues at gunpoint in East despite ‘regime change’ in Colombo

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 28 January 2015, 19:39 GMT]
A Sinhala squad claiming as ‘forest guard’ raided the huts of Tamil cattle herders in their grazing lands situated in Koa'ra'laippattu-South (Kiraan) division of Batticaloa district Tuesday around 5:00 a.m. The squad assaulted the dairy farmers, burned down their huts, robbed off their belongings at gunpoint and separated the cattle herders from the cattle numbering around 1,000. “Although Maithiripala came to power securing Tamil votes, there is no change on the ground for the Tamil dairy farmers who are undergoing untold hardship caused by the occupying Sinhala settlers, who have encroached into the grazing lands that has been ours for years and years,” Nimalan Chelliah, the president of farm owners association, told TamilNet.
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Documentary on Tamil Muslims inspires approach to Tamil national struggle

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 27 January 2015, 23:39 GMT]
While global and regional powers engineering new world order of corporate imperialist designs try to play the card of religion to deviate the question of oppressed nations without State all over the world, and try to confine the ideological questions of humanity in the post cold war era within the ambit of ‘Clash of Civilizations’ coloured by religions, Tamils who have evolved their identity and civilization in a different way over millennia due to their location have to be extra- cautious in facing the paradigm. The Tamil struggle that has seen the injustice of all the Establishments will be lost if it doesn’t come out with its own model, commented Tamil activists for alternative politics appreciating a documentary film on Tamil Muslims in Tamil Nadu, produced by Mr. S. Anwar.
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Poo-malarnthaan, Poop-pooththaan-ku'lam

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 27 January 2015, 03:01 GMT]
The flower-blossomed (pond or tank)

The flower-blossomed tank
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Mothers of forcibly disappeared persons demand action from SL State, TNA, IC

[TamilNet, Monday, 26 January 2015, 23:41 GMT]
The mothers of forcibly disappeared persons in Mannaar staged a silent protest on Monday demanding immediate attention from the Tamil National Alliance, the new Sri Lankan regime and the international community to establish the truth on the whereabouts of the persons who were made forcibly-disappeared by the occupying Sri Lankan military; to release the Tamil political prisoners from Sri Lankan jails; to continue the excavation of mass grave of Mannaar killing field and to continue the international investigations on Sri Lanka. The protesting mothers, who were talking to journalists said they were yet to see any constructive step from the new regime or the TNA. They also questioned why the new regime is asking for a ‘list’ of missing persons from the TNA instead of checking their own lists and coming with answers, the protesting mothers asked.
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Veadar-kudiyiruppu, Wædda-gala

[TamilNet, Sunday, 25 January 2015, 23:30 GMT]
The settlement of the aborigine hunter tribe

The rocky hill of the aborigine hunter tribe
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SL military assaults family man after playground dispute in Jaffna

[TamilNet, Sunday, 25 January 2015, 23:28 GMT]
The occupying Sinhala soldiers at Ellaang-ku'lam camp in Uduppiddi in Vadamaraadchi brutally assaulted a 29-year-old father of three from the same village Saturday evening around 5:15 p.m. The victim, Selvaratnam Jegan, was admitted to the Valveddiththu'rai (VVT) Hospital with serious injuries. The SL military on Sunday threatened the family not to reveal the news to media and exerted pressure on the hospital administration to send the injured patient home, news sources in VVT told TamilNet. The SL military camp at Ellang-ku'lam has been a notorious place for torture.
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Resettling Tamils silently expelled from Champoor in Trincomalee

[TamilNet, Saturday, 24 January 2015, 23:43 GMT]
Following the election of Maithiripala Sirisena as new Sri Lankan President, the uprooted families from a section of the 5th Division and 7th Division of Champoor situated along both the sides of Champoor main road, started to clear their lands for resettlement. Their lands, seized by Colombo under the so-called ‘Special Economic Zone’ (SEZ) were to be handed over to a Chinese-owned corporate. The occupying Sri Lanka Navy was blocking the uprooted Tamils from resettling in their lands. Despite the ‘regime change’, the Sri Lanka Navy occupying Champoor and the Sri Lankan Police have chased away the 162 families, who were clearing their plots to prepare for resettlement in the 1,430 acres of lands appropriated by Colombo under the so-called SEZ.
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Investigating ‘root cause’ of injustice to Eezham Tamils

[TamilNet, Friday, 23 January 2015, 23:25 GMT]
The All Party Parliamentary Group for Tamils (APPG) in the UK and the British Tamil Forum (BTF), jointly host an annual dinner on 29th January, this time with the theme “Tamil People’s Right to Democracy and Justice in Sri Lanka.” The highlights of the dinner hosts’ requests to British government are: Justice for the war crimes and crimes against humanity (including the ‘intent of genocide’); Political solution to address the root cause to the conflict and that the UK government should put pressure on the Sri Lankan regime. What actually needed is an international investigation on the root cause of Britain forging and enforcing a single State of genocidal dimensions in the island and Washington and New Delhi following the footsteps, resulting the genocide and on-going genocide, commented Tamil activists for alternative politics in the island.
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Singapore Principles of 2013: Tamil polity taken for ride from Oslo to Singapore

[TamilNet, Thursday, 22 January 2015, 07:19 GMT]
Right from the Indo-Lanka agreement of 1987 to Oslo Declaration of 2002 and to hitherto unrevealed Singapore Principles of 2013 that brought the Sampanthan polity into a conceptual framework for the recent regime change in Colombo, the external forces seeking to influence the affairs of the island have taken the Eezham Tamils for a ride to confine the Tamil polity into the unitary State of genocidal Sri Lanka without securing any concrete and descriptive guarantee from the Sinhala polity. By its latest move, the ITAK has pushed the Tamils back into the past, Tamil political observers in Jaffna said citing the so-called Singapore Principles from 2013. TamilNet brings out the text of the so-called Singapore Principles for the edification of global Tamils.
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Protests erupt in Jaffna against continued militarisation, unemployment

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 21 January 2015, 23:44 GMT]
The owners of five houses and lands that have been illegally seized by the Sri Lankan military for more than two decades at Koozhaavadi, situated on Maanippaay Road at Aanaik-koaddai in Jaffna protested on Wednesday against the attempt by Colombo to transform their lands into State property with the motive of permanently sustaining a war-time military camp, which was notorious for extra-judicial interrogations, abductions and disappearances since 1996. At the same time, unemployed graduates staged a protest in front of Jaffna District Secretariat demanding jobs.
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SL military in Batticaloa continues to exploit families returned from Vanni

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 20 January 2015, 22:15 GMT]
The Sri Lankan State and its military intelligence in Batticaloa district continue to harass 1,080 families that survived the genocidal onslaught in Vanni in 2009. The families from Batticaloa returned to their native villages situated in 10 of the 14 Divisional Secretariat divisions in the district. The DS Secretaries in these divisions have also been instructed to refuse assistance to these families by the genocidal military. There is no change in the harassments on the ground despite the ‘changes’ taking place in Colombo, the families said. Even those affected by the recent floods have been neglected in the humanitarian assistance. Women-headed families continue to complain about targeted sexual harassments by the occupying Sinhala military in Batticaloa. Two of the 10 divisions where the families have resettled, Koa'ralaippattu South and Koa'ra'laip-pattu North are worst affected.
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