Sinhala militarisation, genocide in East goes unnoticed, unaccounted

[TamilNet, Sunday, 17 February 2013, 10:51 GMT]
In the name of a Sinhala-titled programme ‘Divineguma,’ Colombo intensively spearheads structural genocide of Eezham Tamils in the East. It has now gone to the extent of mushrooming Sinhala military camps and settlements running grocery shops and restaurants to the public. The only major construction activity in the East is the construction of Sinhala military camps. By talking only of the North and leaving out the East, the visiting foreign dignitaries buttressing State in the island systematically obscure what is happening in the East and imply that the annihilation of the nation of Eezham Tamils in the East is ‘normal and acceptable’. The line of subversion started when Mr. Robert Blake was the US ambassador in Colombo after the SL military capture of the East from the LTTE, and the line was later taken up by the Indians, political activists in the East said.
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UK under secretary gives ‘friendly’ advice to genocidal Colombo

[TamilNet, Sunday, 17 February 2013, 04:30 GMT]
Stating that the genocide-accused Mahinda Rajapaksa “has banished terrorism from his country and ushered in a new period of prosperity”, Alistair Burt, British Under Secretary of State at the FCO, advised Colombo to learn from the British experience in Northern Ireland and to implement the LLRC recommendations, in an article written for the Canadian news agency The Globe and Mail, on Friday. Mr. Burt was making these comments after a tour of the militarily occupied Tamil homeland earlier this month, which was criticized by civil society activists in the North as a “war picnic”. Grassroots Eezham Tamil activists in the UK came down on the Conservative minister’s article, alleging that it was lending legitimacy to the genocidal Sri Lankan state.
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Major Sinhala colony crops up at entrance to Jaffna city

[TamilNet, Saturday, 16 February 2013, 11:06 GMT]
A permanent Sinhala colony is in the making at Naavat-kuzhi in Jaffna with the assistance and backing of the genocidal government in Colombo and with the protection of its occupying Sinhala military in Jaffna. Buddhist associations in the south and EPDP collaborating with the Rajapaksa regime are also involved in the process, news sources in Jaffna said. Naavat-kuzhi is a major junction located 5km east of Jaffna city, where the two highways A9 and A32 that come from the south join and enter into the city. To give protection to the colony, a Sinhala military camp is also established there amidst the colonisers. The Sinhala colony at the location is planned to control the arteries of the city and to even Sinhalicise Jaffna city itself, as similar tactics were tested earlier at Trincomalee, the sources further said.
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Swiss, South Africa reconciliation attempt in Sri Lanka ‘ill-conceived’, says ICG

[TamilNet, Saturday, 16 February 2013, 00:59 GMT]
Switzerland's backing of a South African post-Apartheid reconciliation initiative to bring adversarial parties in Sri Lanka to the negotiating table, is ill-conceived and has little chance of yielding any positive results, Alan Keenan, an ICG [International Crisis Group] Sri Lanka expert commented. Keenan "accused the Sri Lankan government of having no interest in fair negotiations with Tamil political parties, no intention to devolve meaningful power to the Tamil-majority northern province or the Tamil-speaking majority eastern province, and of going back on its many promises." The Swiss government funding and the South African brokering were behind the GTF convened and Burghof Foundation facilitated Berlin conference, informed circles say.
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SL military operatives attack peaceful protest against Jaffna SMZ

[TamilNet, Friday, 15 February 2013, 12:20 GMT]
More than ten Sri Lankan military operatives, co-mingling with and camouflaging as protestors in front of Thurkkai Amman temple in Thellippazhai, where a token fast against Colombo converting the former SL Miltiary High Security Zone (HSZ) into Sinhala Military Zone (SMZ) in Jaffna, attacked the peaceful protestors on Friday. The attack came after the SL Opposition Leader Ranil Wickramasinghe had left the site taking part and addressing the protestors. The SL military men went amok on Tamil parliamentarians and journalists at the site of the protest. However, the attackers who were causing panic among the participants were confronted by the protestors. More than one hundred SL policemen silently watched the unfolding episode without restraining or arresting the civil clad military operatives.
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Colombo shuns Tamil representation in Delimitation Committee in Trincomalee

[TamilNet, Thursday, 14 February 2013, 23:47 GMT]
Not a single Tamil officer was appointed to the six-member Trincomalee District Local Authorities Delimitation Committee that is headed by the Sri Lankan Government Agent (SLGA) who is a retired Major General of the occupying Sri Lanka Army, civil sources in Trincomalee said. Four members are Sinhalese, including the SLGA, and the remaining two are Muslims. The Trincomalee District Local Authorities Delimitation Committee is empowered to demarcate the boundaries of the existing wards and carve out new wards of the 13 local authorities under the Amended Local Government Ordinance.
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R2P doctrine failed in Sri Lanka to protect Tamil Nation: TNPF

[TamilNet, Thursday, 14 February 2013, 11:37 GMT]
“What is now public knowledge of credible allegations of what transpired during the last stages of the war, amply points to the complete failure of the UN and the international community in its obligations under the doctrine of Responsibility to Protect (R2P) to have intervened on behalf of the Tamil Nation,” said Tamil National Peoples Front, in an open appeal on Thursday urging UNHRC member states to resolve to set up a transitional administration in the Tamil homeland comprising of the North East provinces in the island of Sri Lanka, as a matter of urgency. The said transitional administration will have to necessarily lie outside the present constitutional apparatus.
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Protests across India against UN complicity in Tamil genocide

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 13 February 2013, 00:10 GMT]
Criticizing the United Nations, especially the Ban Ki Moon, Vijay Nambiar and Sir John Holmes trio for their complicity in the genocide of the Eezham Tamils owing to their calculated inaction, protests took place across different parts of India on Tuesday calling for punitive action to be taken against the three UN officials, besides pressing for a referendum among the Eezham Tamils and an independent international investigation to probe the charges of genocide against the Sri Lankan state. Demonstrations took place at Chennai, Koodangku'lam, Mumbai, Bangalore and New Delhi. Over 600 protestors outside the UNICEF office in Adayar, Chennai were taken into custody by the police and released later in the day.
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Navi Pillay pre-concludes ‘procedures’ to adopt by UNHRC process

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 12 February 2013, 22:46 GMT]
While the US officials, who visited the island of Sri Lanka last month, were talking of tabling a ‘procedural resolution’ to approach affairs of the island at the March sessions of the UNHRC in Geneva, the report that has come from the office of Ms Navi Pillai (OHCHR) on Monday outlined what procedures have to be taken to further the processes started with last year’s resolution at the UNHRC. When the US-tabled resolution, watered down by India and passed last year, was fundamentally responsible for the acceleration of structural genocide of Eezham Tamils as witnessed in the course of the year, any further ‘procedural’ enhancement of the resolution is like decorating the rat’s tail with a silk tassel, as the saying in Tamil goes (eli vaalukku padduk kungncham), commented human rights activists in Jaffna.
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SL commander admits converting HSZ into permanent Sinhala Military Zone (SMZ)

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 12 February 2013, 07:04 GMT]
Sri Lanka’s military commander occupying Jaffna, Maj. Gen. Mahinda Hathurusinghe, on Monday openly admitted to media in Jaffna that the so-called High Security Zone of Valikaamam on the Northern coast of Jaffna Peninsula, occupied and displaced of its Tamil inhabitants in the guise of High Security Zone (HSZ) two decades ago, will now be converted into a permanent Sri Lanka/ Sinhala Military Zone (SMZ). Meanwhile, genocidal Sri Lanka’s President Mahinda Rajapaksa, visiting Jaffna on Monday, has opened a ‘tourist resort’ of the SL Navy at Mayiliddi in the said SMZ. The major fishing port of Eezham Tamils at Mayiliddi will cease to exist hereafter and the occupying Sinhala military has undertaken cultivation of onions using spring irrigation in the traditional horticultural lands of Eezham Tamils in the SMZ that has been created.
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SL military demolishes Hundreds of Tamil houses in Jaffna ‘HSZ’

[TamilNet, Monday, 11 February 2013, 23:08 GMT]
In a sudden and swift move, Sri Lanka military occupying Jaffna has started demolishing hundreds of houses of Eezham Tamils in the stretch of land at Valikaamam that was occupied by the Sinhala military in the guise of ‘High Security Zone (HSZ)’ two decades back. The war is over, proclaims everyone, including the USA and India. The Tamil public righteously expected the return of their houses and ancestral properties if the war was over. There was propaganda that resettlement takes place stage by stage in the HSZ, which was also endorsed by all the Establishments in complicity. Then how, why, and with what authority vested with whom, the decision has been now taken to raze down the ancestral houses of Eezham Tamils in the so-called HSZ, ask the concerned people up-rooted for more than two decades and finally lost everything to the designs of the genocidal partners.
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Hospital becomes breeding ground for disharmony between Tamils, Muslims in Ampaa’rai

[TamilNet, Sunday, 10 February 2013, 22:16 GMT]
The Base hospital of Kalmunai North in Ampaa’rai district has become a breeding ground for disharmony between Tamils and Muslims following systematic posting of 22 Muslim health workers with the backing of SL ministers aligned with the Colombo regime with an intention of causing communal dissension, health officials at the hospital say.
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Uprooted Champoor families live in fear following arrest of 7 persons by TID

[TamilNet, Saturday, 09 February 2013, 20:11 GMT]
Tension and fear prevail among uprooted Tamil families from Champoor area currently being sheltered in temporary sheds described as welfare centres at four places, Kaddai-pa'richchaan, Paddith-thidal, Ma'nat-cheanai and Ki'liveddi since the arrest of seven Tamils by a special TID team from Colombo last week alleging them as LTTE members. Two of them are inmates of Paddith-thidal welfare camp. They are all breadwinners of their families. They were taken to a place out of the Trincomalee district for military ‘rehabilitation’.
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Sinhala paramilitary attacks Tamil dairy farmers in Batticaloa

[TamilNet, Saturday, 09 February 2013, 20:41 GMT]
A group of armed Sinhalese ‘home guards’ have attacked Tamil farmers who were herding their cattle, after ‘allowing’ the Tamil farmers to breed their cattle. The attack has taken place at ‘Mangalagama’ area in Vellaave'li division two days ago, the victims said, adding that they were using the grazing lands to breed their cattle for four decades.
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‘Extra-constitutional interim solution to counter Sinhala militarization must be probed’

[TamilNet, Saturday, 09 February 2013, 17:33 GMT]
Arguing that while the strategy for Tamils world over should be the restoration of Eezham Tamil sovereignty over their traditional homeland, RM Karthick writes that the Tamil diaspora organizations must arrive at a consensus for an immediate tactic to alleviate the mutilation of the Eezham Tamil nation in the Tamil homeland by the occupying Sinhala military via an interim solution of an intervention of international powers in the island to facilitate the dismantling of the Sinhala military apparatus. Contending that such an interim solution should not give any legitimacy whatsoever to the Sri Lankan constitution, the writer further argues that any interim solution can be successful only on an extra-constitutional basis that has pre-constitutional recognition of the Eezham Tamil nation’s territoriality and historical sovereignty.
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Tamil Nadu protests Rajapaksa's ‘pilgrimage’ to India

[TamilNet, Friday, 08 February 2013, 23:31 GMT]
Sri Lanka's President Mahinda Rajapaksa on Friday landed in India, drawing widespread protests in Tamil Nadu against his ‘pilgrimage' trip to India, media reports in India said. While MDMK leader Mr Vaiko courted arrest together with MDMK activists, who marched towards Indian Prime Minister's residence in New Delhi, condemning the Centre and the visiting SL president, in Tamil Nadu, DMK Chief Mr M Karunanidhi was taking part in protests with DMK activists.
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Poonakari becomes another major hub of Sinhala militarisation, colonisation

[TamilNet, Friday, 08 February 2013, 07:50 GMT]
Similar to the so-called High Security Zone (HSZ) on the northern coast of Jaffna Peninsula, including KKS harbour and Palaali airport that has now become a permanent enclave for Sinhala military cantonment, colonisation and corporatism, another enclave in the Poonakari division is in the making, news sources in Vanni said. Around 31,000 Sinhala military personnel are stationed in the Poonakari division where currently only 6216 families live, which means that for every Tamil family there are 5 personnel from the genocidal military. While the SL military alone occupies 800 acres of land, the Sri Lanka President Mahinda Rajapaksa’s siblings Basil and Gotabhaya, and progeny Namal have appropriated many more acres of land. Building a Chinese assisted international airport at Poonakari is in the centre of the plans.
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SL ‘Terrorist’ squad arrests 7 Tamils in Moothoor East

[TamilNet, Thursday, 07 February 2013, 22:11 GMT]
An elite squad of the Sri Lankan ‘Terrorist’ Investigation Division (TID) that arrived in Trincomalee on Monday from Colombo has been conducting search operations in the district targeting Tamil youth. The squad has so far arrested 7 Tamils and transferred them to Colombo from Moothoor police station, news sources said. The latest rounds of harassments by the TID squad is reported following the protest by Eezham Tamils who had put up posters condemning the observation of the SL ‘independence’ day in Trincomalee.
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Civil Society insists on pre-constitutional recognition of Tamil nation, self-determination

[TamilNet, Thursday, 07 February 2013, 01:41 GMT]
In a set of preliminary points submitted at a conference held in Berlin, 26-27 January, facilitated by the Berghof Foundation, the Tamil Civil Society (TCS) from the island insisted on “pre-constitutional recognition of Tamil nationhood and self-determination” before Tamils could sit down and debate institutional proposals for a constitutional design within a united Sri Lanka. Such recognition “does not mean a separate state,” the TCS added. The Tamil Civil Society or any other party or group based in the island are not free bodies to comprehensively or authentically talk on the issue as they are bound by the 6th Amendment of the constitution of the genocidal State of Sri Lanka. Such organisations should first insist on the IC and its outfits to create conditions going beyond the 6th Amendment to have honest discussion on the issue, commented new generation Tamil activists in the island.
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British Under Secretary’s ‘war picnic’, misleading comments, draw flak from Tamils

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 06 February 2013, 21:17 GMT]
While Alistair Burt, British Under Secretary of State at FCO, endorsed on Twitter on Wednesday the self-determination of the people of the Western Sahara, in his Twitter discussions on Tuesday with Eezham Tamils, he opined that “Detail of political settlement must be for Sri Lankans themselves. We encourage TNA and govt to make serious progress.” Likewise, in a video recording taken with the British High Commissioner in Sri Lanka a few days back at the Mullaitheevu coast, which witnessed the worst massacres in May 2009, he welcomed the defeat of the LTTE calling it “terrorism” and picked only politically insignificant flaws with the Sri Lankan government. Civil society activists from the North remarked that the minister seemed to be on a sort of a “war picnic”, appreciating some aspects with Sri Lanka and criticizing others. Activists in the UK have also reacted to Mr. Burt’s comments.
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