Sri Lankan military desecrates war cemeteries in Batticaloa - TNA parliamentarian

[TamilNet, Sunday, 26 August 2007, 07:03 GMT]
Tamils returning to their villages after months in refugee camps in Batticaloa were frustrated to find out that the cemeteries of their LTTE war dead sons and daughters have vanished without any trace, said Tamil National Alliance parliamentarian P. Ariyanenthiran. Sri Lankan military has recently bulldozed and desecrated Tiger War Heroes Cemeteries in the district. The destruction of the largest war heroes' cemetery in Tharavai in Vadamunai region and the next largest cemetery at Thaa'ndiyadi in the western hinterland of the district "not only mark the SL forces' continued disrespect of the norms of the civlized world, but also reveal a colonization agenda in the near future," he charged.


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TamilNet Transcription

[TamilNet, Thursday, 23 August 2007, 04:08 GMT]
Near accurate Tamil pronunciation is a challenge to English news reporting. Tamil words and place names have long been misspelt due to ambiguity in transcription. Conventional transliteration symbols are difficult to compose, store and retrieve. Known transcription systems are unaesthetic to look at and tiresome to compose due to mix-up of lowercase and uppercase characters. TamilNet presents a standard transcription system to face the existing challenges and to cater to contemporary social and cyber needs.
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TamilNet Transcription: improved facilities introduced

[TamilNet, Thursday, 23 August 2007, 04:07 GMT]
TamilNet Transcription is now possible in Unicode with simultaneous display facilities. Transcription from Tamil to Roman and reverse transcription from Roman to Tamil can now be done without any limit to the size of the text, using the TamilNet web tool. Readers can make use of the facility by accessing the link provided on the right-hand top of the front page. Those who wish to get the source code are welcome to contact us. It is a non-profit offer from the TamilNet.
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APRC is dead, says UNP

[TamilNet, Thursday, 16 August 2007, 00:43 GMT]
After the Tuesday meeting of the All Party Representative Committee (APRC) on Constitutional Reforms was abruptly halted and adjourned indefinitely due to demands from Sri Lanka Freedom Party (SLFP) and Mahajana Eksath Peramuna (MEP) members, and failed to "finalise a draft report by today to keep to a deadline set by the United National Party UNP," the opposition UNP spokesperson said the "APRC process is dead in the water," the Morning Leader reported in the Wednesday edition.
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Tamil film-styled gang fight in Oslo

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 14 August 2007, 02:25 GMT]
At least two persons were seriously injured, one of them struggling for life, as a result of a gang fight that took place in Kalbakken, a suburb of Norway's capital Oslo, on Sunday. Confrontation between local Tamil youth and a few who intruded into Norway in recent months is said to have caused the formation of gangs that fought to settle scores, using handguns and Samurai swords.
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Heavy fighting in the seas off Pulmoaddai - LTTE

[TamilNet, Sunday, 12 August 2007, 23:02 GMT]
Three Sri Lanka Navy Fast Attack Crafts (FACs) were damaged and more than 20 Dvora gunboats were chased away by the Sea Tigers, the naval force of the Liberation Tigers of Tamileelam (LTTE), towards Trincomalee port Sunday night after a fierce sea battle off Pulmoaddai that lasted from 10:00 p.m. till 2:30 a.m. Monday, according to Sea Tiger officials in Vanni. Six Sea Tiger fighters were killed in action in the battle, the Tigers said. Meanwhile Sri Lankan military sources claimed that they had sunk a Sea Tiger vessel in the clash.
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'Para Demala': a reader's response

[TamilNet, Sunday, 12 August 2007, 01:58 GMT]
A Sinhala reader of TamilNet has come out with the following note on our news feature 'Para Demala', dated 06 August 2007. According to him, the word 'para' is the worst kind of derogatory word in Sinhala, but is used in the sense to mean alien or foreign. It is not connected to the Pa'raiyar community. He further adds that even Sinhala-Buddhist reformers of the calibre of Anagarika Dharmapala had used the phrase 'Para Demala' in a negative sense to mean low-grade aliens.
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Mullaiththeevu fishing woes

[TamilNet, Saturday, 11 August 2007, 05:13 GMT]
Thanapalasingham Suman, 22 and his brother Manoharan, 27, were wounded in A'lampil seas in Mullaiththeevu on 28 July this year when SLN Dvora gunboats fired at their fishing boat. The brothers are currently recovering at the Mullaiththeevu District hospital. In an interview with TamilNet this week, Suman said many fishermen in his area have to risk their lives against frequent attacks by the Sri Lanka Navy (SLN) to feed their family, and often to support ageing parents.
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Japan's aid not conducive to peace in Sri Lanka - Sampanthan

[TamilNet, Monday, 02 July 2007, 19:38 GMT]
R. Sampanthan, parliamentary group leader of the Tamil National Alliance (TNA), has said that the decision by Sri Lanka's major donor country Japan, to continue economic aid to Sri Lanka, will soften the International pressure on the SL government to seek a political solution and strengthen Colombo to pursue the military option. Pointing out Sri Lanka President's categorical statement that there would be no change in his policy on a "unitary structure of a government" with the "district as the unit of devolution," Mr. Sampanthan dismissed the efforts of All Party Representatives Committee (APRC) as "no more than a mere pretense" to show some action is being taken towards political solution.
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Sri Lanka blocks TamilNet

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 19 June 2007, 15:32 GMT]
TamilNet has completed 10th year of its web publication on 7th June 2007. TamilNet is a globally based news agency, run by an independent group of persons, to cover news and views related especially to the North and East of Sri Lanka. TamilNet has earned its credibility for news reporting and has become an indispensable news source for analysts and opinion makers worldwide. Unsurprisingly, the Government of Sri Lanka has thought of rewarding the TamilNet on its 10th anniversary by surreptitiously blocking it to the public of Sri Lanka.
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TamilNet Transcription: automation for trial

[TamilNet, Saturday, 05 May 2007, 04:07 GMT]
Readers are requested to refer to our transcription system launched last week. Here is an automation trial to convert the Tamil text into Roman characters and vice versa. Try and comment to us. It is restricted to 200 characters at present. A full version for the use of our readers will be presented shortly.
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RSF condemns murder of Jaffna journalist

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 01 May 2007, 01:12 GMT]
Reporters Without Borders (RSF - Reporters Sans Frontiers) the French based Journalist organization condemned the killing of young journalist, Selvarajah Rajivarman, who was killed in Jaffna Sunday by a lone gunman riding a motorbike.
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SLAF bomber shot over Ira'naimadu

[TamilNet, Monday, 30 April 2007, 11:22 GMT]
Sri Lanka Air Force's (SLAF's) aircraft on a bombing raid south of Ira'naimadu in Vannai around 2:45 p.m. spewed large cloud of smoke after a explosion and the jet suspended the bombing raid struggling to maintain height, traders in Kilinochchi who saw the troubled aircraft said. Meanwhile, unconfirmed reports from Colombo said a Israeli-built fast attack Kfir which took off from Katunayake Air Force base Monday has failed to return to the base.


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Air Tigers attack 2 targets in Colombo - LTTE

[TamilNet, Saturday, 28 April 2007, 22:33 GMT]
Two oil storages that supply fuel to Sri Lanka Air Force (SLAF) bombers were attacked by the Tamileelam Air Force, Tiger Military Spokesman Irasiah Ilanthirayan told TamilNet. Oil and fuel storages in Kolonnawa and Muththuraajawala were attacked by the TAF at 1:50 a.m. Sunday and at 2:05 a.m. after Sri Lanka Air Force bombers attacked a suburb of Kilinochchi town in Liberation Tigers of Tamileelam administered territory, Mr. Ilanthirayan said adding that the Tiger bombers had safely returned to their airbase in Vanni.
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TamilNet introduces computer-friendly transcription

[TamilNet, Saturday, 28 April 2007, 21:12 GMT]
Near accurate Tamil pronunciation is a challenge to English news reporting. Tamil words and place names have long been misspelt due to ambiguity in transcription. Conventional transliteration symbols are difficult to compose, store and retrieve. Known transcription systems are unaesthetic to look at and tiresome to compose due to mix-up of lowercase and uppercase characters. The TamilNet aims at presenting a standard transcription system to face the existing challenges and to cater to contemporary social and cyber needs.
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Taraki Sivaram remembered

[TamilNet, Saturday, 28 April 2007, 10:14 GMT]
"We once again remember with pride the service rendered to the media by Taraki Sivaram. He exercised his right to freedom of expression without fear. We bear this in our minds as we take it among the people on his second death anniversary," the statement issued by North Sri Lanka Journalists Association (NSLJA) Friday said. Members of NSLJA and Jaffna University Media Research & Training Centre (MRTC) jointly took part in the first event of a programme launched to remember Taraki Sivaram, the well-known, political analyst and senior editor of TamilNet, on the second anniversary of his assassination on 28 April 2005.
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Tiger aircrafts bomb Palaali military base

[TamilNet, Monday, 23 April 2007, 22:09 GMT]
Two attack aircraft of the Liberation Tigers bombed the Sri Lankan military’s main base complex in the Jaffna peninsula in the early hours of Tuesday morning, inflicting heavy damage and casualties, LTTE military spokesman Irasiah Ilanthirayan told TamilNet. Tamileelam Air Force bombers had hit an Engineering Unit of the complex and a military storage, the Tigers spokesman claimed. Meanwhile sources said continuous explosions were heard from inside the High Security Zone for five hours after the air raid. Military sources in Colombo confirmed that at least 6 of their personnel were killed. Informed military sources said more than 30 troopers were wounded the attack inside the HSZ.
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LTTE: Sri Lanka’s accusations of credit card fraud is ‘attempt to distract from rights abuses’

[TamilNet, Sunday, 22 April 2007, 09:08 GMT]
Liberation Tigers Political Head, S. P. Thamilchelvan, responding to allegations by the Sri Lankan Embassy in London that the Liberation Tigers were involved in organised crime in Britain involving the cloning of credit cards, dismissed the accusations and slammed them as an attempt by the Colombo government to distract international attention from widespread human rights abuses by its armed forces. Mr. Thamilchelvan said Sri Lanka's accusations which sought to implicate the hardworking and law-abiding Tamil Diaspora, stemmed from the "same chauvinism that caused the island’s protracted ethnic war."
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Thousands of Tamils defy Paris protest bar

[TamilNet, Monday, 09 April 2007, 22:37 GMT]
Over 2,000 Tamil expatriates gathered in front of the Eiffel Tower Monday, despite the authorities’ cancellation of a planned protest rally to condemn the arrests by French police of several Tamil activists for raising funds for the LTTE. The protestors gathered in nearby public places, blocking traffic. Although the protest’s cancellation had been publicised on Tamil radio and television by the rally’s organisers who told expatriates that permission would be sought anew, several thousand people converged on the city centre, defying orders to disperse, to condemn the arrests on April 1, a week after the LTTE airstrike on Katunayake.
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Colombo battles to sidestep Human Rights focus - Thamilchelvan

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 03 April 2007, 15:58 GMT]
The Government of Sri Lanka (GoSL) is trying to sidestep International Community's focus on Colombo's worst record of human rights abuses and institutionalized impunity for crimes against the Tamil people, by attempting to use the forum of the South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation (SAARC) Summit against Tamil people's right to defend themselves, Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) Political Head S.P. Thamilchelvan told TamilNet when asked to comment on Colombo's focus shift to LTTE's air capability, prior to the 14th SAARC Summit in New Delhi.
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