Injured woman from Vanni dies in Point Pedro

[TamilNet, Thursday, 23 April 2009, 16:36 GMT]
A woman brought from Puthu Maaththa’lan in Mullaiththeevu with gunshot injuries by Sri Lanka Navy (SLN) to Point Pedro succumbed to her wounds on the shores of Point Pedro Munai, sources in Vadamaraadchi said. Point Pedro Magistrate conducted the inquest into the death on the beach and directed the police to hand over her body to Manthikai hospital mortuary.
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Vanni civilians in Jaffna SLA detention centres lack basic facilities

[TamilNet, Thursday, 23 April 2009, 16:19 GMT]
Jaffna Government Agent requested immediate assistance from the local Non-government organizations (NGOs) in Jaffna to help meet the basic needs of the civilians from Vanni placed in the Sri Lanka Army (SLA) detention centres in Jaffna, in a meeting held with the representatives of local and international NGOs, due to government’s failure to offer any assistance, local NGO representatives said.
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SL Police arrests Tamil couple in Ratnapura

[TamilNet, Thursday, 23 April 2009, 15:29 GMT]
A young Tamil couple was taken into custody Tuesday by the Nallathanni Police in Ratnapura district while they were staying in a house at an estate in the area. Police said they were detained on detention orders by the Defence Ministry for further inquiry.
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Demonising Tamil struggle without citing solutions

[TamilNet, Thursday, 23 April 2009, 11:40 GMT]
What the Sinhala government is now trying to do to the Tamil people is nothing new. Exactly the same thing was done in Vietnam by the US army, writes Indian journalist T.G. Jacob from Kerala. “Sri Lankan Tamil refugees are there all over Europe and their number in India is growing. All these factors make the situation even more highly volatile, which in all possibility will create new polarizations. The short term military defeat of LTTE cannot at all prevent the Tamil issue from becoming an international one and change to guerilla war within the island. That is why the Sri Lankan political leadership is talking of ‘protected’ villages. Actually this is exactly what is happening now. The Sri Lankan government through all its barbarity and outrageous double talk is immensely facilitating this process”, he writes.
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SLN crafts encircle ICRC ship in Vanni

[TamilNet, Thursday, 23 April 2009, 06:10 GMT]
Many Dvora Fast Attack Crafts of the Sri Lanka Navy (SLN) have surrounded the ICRC ship which was approaching Mu'l'li-vaaykkaal to transport the seriously wounded patients Thursday morning, according to latest reports from Vanni. The SLN attack crafts were also firing cannon shots towards the shore. The hostile presence of the SLN attack crafts have hampered the medical transportation of seriously wounded patients from the makeshift hospital where 700 patients are waiting to be transferred.
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SLA shelling on church kills 14, Caritas-HUDEC Vanni director wounded

[TamilNet, Thursday, 23 April 2009, 05:40 GMT]
Rev. Fr. T. R. Vasanthaseelan, the director of Human Development Centre (HUDEC) of Caritas Jaffna, the social arm of the Catholic Church in the Jaffna Diocese, was seriously wounded Thursday morning around 7:30 a.m. when Sri Lanka Army (SLA) fired shells on Our Lady of Roses Church in Valaignarmadam for the second day. 14 civilians who had taken refuge at the church were killed. The shelling on the church, which is the main centre for people seeking refuge in Valaignarmadam, comes a day after Rev. Fr. James Pathinathar was wounded in a similar attack. The SLA has attacked the church despite repeated calls from Jaffna Diocese not to target the church where 17 priests and 22 nuns were continuing to serve their congregations.
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Major part of civilians seek refuge with LTTE, while US, India deliberate

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 22 April 2009, 17:55 GMT]
Contrary to Colombo’s propaganda, major part of the civilians who escaped capture by Sri Lanka Army are moving towards the LTTE side from Valaignar Madam to Mu’l’li-vaaykkaal, in large numbers, Tiger officials told TamilNet Wednesday. LTTE’s Political Division official C. Ilamparithi said almost 200,000 civilians are still in the LTTE area. Meanwhile, Indian Prime Minister has convened an emergency meeting of ministers and officials to discuss Sri Lankan situation, BBC reported Wednesday. Same day, the US government has urged Colombo to allow international observers to the battlefront and UN access to all points of civilian movement, said a State Department spokesman in a press conference. Unless there are significant changes and swift action from the side of the US, positive developments can hardly take place, Tamil circles commented.
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"Inner well springs" of Tamil struggle can't be destroyed, says South African Minister

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 22 April 2009, 17:36 GMT]
South Africa's deputy minister for Communications, Radhakrishna Padayachie, has reiterated calls for bilateral talks between the Sri Lankan Government and the LTTE to establish a permanent peace. The African National Council (ANC) Member of Parliament, citing a "common conviction in the right to people for self determination" as the basis of continued relationship between his party and the LTTE, rejected suggestions that the LTTE can be defeated, and added that a political solution that addressed the "resolution of the minority question" was the only possible way forward.
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Thousands of civilians under SLA custody in Vanni

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 22 April 2009, 16:40 GMT]
Sri Lanka Army (SLA) is said to be holding civilians from Vanni in Iyakkachchi without permitting them to enter Jaffna, since Monday, according to reliable sources in Jaffna. So far, only 4,325 civilians who were brought to Point Pedro in fishing boats by Sri Lanka Navy (SLN) have been placed in the SLA 'detention centres' in Thenmaraadchi, according to Divisional Secretariat sources there. Several thousands of civilians were caught by the SLA on Tuesday when it advanced its troops into the 'safety zone'. Exact number of civilians in SLA custody is not known. The SLA has been accused for separating females, males and elderly and for subjecting the separated for 'filtering' before placing them in separate internment camps.
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Nambiar reluctant to brief UN Security Council on Sri Lanka humanitarian situation

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 22 April 2009, 11:08 GMT]
Ban Ki-moon's chief of staff, Vijay Nambiar, who was sent to Sri Lanka as the United Nations envoy to report on the humanitarian catastrophe unfolding in the beaches of Mullaiththeevu has expressed reluctance to have "even a closed door briefing" on the crisis, Inner City Press reported Tuesday. Nambiar's refusal to brief is likely have been influenced by Indian officials during Nambiar's stop-over in India after his three day visit to Sri Lanka, political sources in Colombo said.
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SLA fire hampers ICRC evacuation of seriously wounded civilians from Vanni

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 22 April 2009, 10:17 GMT]
Sri Lanka Army (SLA) started cannon fire from Manthuvil in Puthukkudiyiruppu across Nanthikkadal lagoon towards the coastal stretch of Mu'l'li-vaaykkaal Wednesday afternoon as local ICRC workers were providing coordinates to the ICRC ship to come close to the shore to transport the severely wounded from the makeshift hospital, according to latest reports from the medical sources in Vanni.
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SLA shells Church in Valaignarmadam, Fr. James Pathinathar wounded

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 22 April 2009, 08:07 GMT]
Sri Lanka Army (SLA) stepped up artillery and mortar barrage on Valaignarmadam Wednesday killing and maiming civilians who have sought refuge at several locations. Rev Father James Pathinathar, a prominent Catholic priest was injured in SLA shelling that hit the Church in Valaignarmadam Wednesday noon, initial reports said.
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Colombo blocks WFP supply ship scheduled to reach Vanni Tuesday

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 21 April 2009, 17:29 GMT]
Sri Lankan authorities have put off the departure of a ship with WFP supplies scheduled to reach Vanni on Tuesday despite the local civil officials in Vanni indicated the coordinates for the new landing point, Vavuniyaa District Secretariat officials told TamilNet Tuesday evening. Starvation-stricken civilians have long been waiting for humanitarian supplies to arrive and the officials urged the WFP to impress upon the government of Sri Lanka not to delay the humanitarian supply ship, the sources further said.
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Contradicting figures raise fears of disappearances

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 21 April 2009, 15:05 GMT]
While the Sri Lanka Army (SLA) claimed Monday that 30,000 civilians had reached territory under its control from the so-called safety zone, civil officials in Vavuniyaa and in Jaffna reported Tuesday that only 8,500 have arrived in the districts. However, SLA officers in Jaffna gave contradicting figures ranging between 5,000 and 12,000 in the custody of the army in Vanni, waiting to be evacuated. Meanwhile, over 1,000 civilian casualties were reported from reliable sources in Vanni Monday. In addition a large number of injured were also in the custody of the SLA. Unconfirmed reports put the casualty figure much higher. It seems at least one in ten suffered either death or injury in the SLA's operation to capture the civilians on Monday.
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Tamils blockade London's Parliament Square

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 21 April 2009, 12:15 GMT]
Thousands gathered around Parameswaran Subramaniyan's tent early Monday morning demanding the British Government to take immediate action against the carnage of Tamils in Sri Lanka to avoid another Tamil life being forsaken at Parliament Square in London, according to sources in London. Parameswaran, 28, on his 14th day of hunger strike, reiterated his calls to the British Government to impose for urgent ceasefire in Sri Lanka. Doctors by his side reported that his condition is critically weak. Dr Arundkumar Velauthapillai said "His condition is deteriorating rapidly. He is not taking enough water but he is stable for now."
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Fr. Karunaratnam remembered on First anniversary

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 21 April 2009, 11:24 GMT]
Mr. K.Sivapalan, Deputy Chairperson of North East Secretariat on Human Rights (NESoHR), on the first year anniversary of the killing of founder Chairperson of NESoHR, Rev.Father Mariampillai Xavier Karunaratnam, recounts his services to the community, and asks why the International Community is standing by as a Rwanda unfolds in Vanni. Father Karunaratnam was killed by the Deep Penetration Unit (DPU) of the Sri Lanka Army (SLA) on 20th April 2008 while he was driving from his residential prayer and counseling center in Vavunikku'lam.
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Schools closed down for a week in Jaffna peninsula

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 21 April 2009, 10:42 GMT]
Directed by the Ministry of Education, Northern Province Education Ministry Secretary instructed Jaffna Education Officials to postpone the start of the second term of all schools in the peninsula Tuesday for a week so that they could be used to lodge the civilians fleeing war in Vanni, sources in Jaffna said. Government officials, directed by their superiors to be ready to receive Vanni civilians in their thousands, had dispatched a large number of buses to bring them to the peninsula Monday. But so far no one has been brought to Jaffna peninsula, the sources added.
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TNA MP in Vanni fears mass slaughter amidst starvation

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 21 April 2009, 10:33 GMT]
The Tamil Natonal Alliance (TNA) MP for Vanni, Sathasivam Kanagaratnam, who talked to TamilNet correspondent in Vanni on Monday blamed the Sri Lankan military for planning to cause a mass slaughter of civilians as Colombo announced a 24-hour ultimatum of surrender to the LTTE. Colombo has warned of concerted attacks into the so-called 'safety zone' starting from Tuesday noon. "The remaining area in the south of safe zone is full of civilians as many more have fled in recent days," Mr. Kanagratnam said fearing an unprecedented civilian carnage.
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SLA cluster bombs kill doctor, medical staff at Valaignarmadam

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 21 April 2009, 09:11 GMT]
A doctor at the makeshift hospital in Valaignarmadam and several other medical staff including civilians were killed Tuesday afternoon when Sri Lanka Army (SLA) fired cluster bombs on them, TamilNet correspondent in Vanni said citing a fleeing patient who escaped from the attack.
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'SLA advances behind human shield, act fast to rescue civilians,' Puleedevan urges UN

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 21 April 2009, 08:20 GMT]
Director of Liberation Tigers of Tamileelam (LTTE) Peace Secretariat S. Puleedevan on Tuesday told TamilNet that the Sri Lanka Army (SLA) has started to move on two fronts at Valaignar-madam and at Maaththa'lan using a section of the civilians who were caught by the SLA on Monday as human shields. When asked how the SLA was advancing, Mr. Puleedevan said the Sri Lankan military has forced hundreds of civilians to walk through LTTE defece line at gun point and was moving its troops under the cover of the civilians. "These are serious war crimes and the Sri Lankan government and the head of the armed forces are direct responsible for this carnage," Puleedevan said in a statement.
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