SL Archaeology must be reconfigured to respect Tamil parity on heritage: Ganesan

[TamilNet, Monday, 22 July 2019, 23:30 GMT]
The SL Archaeology Department is the evil of all heritage related tensions in the North and East, and thirty-two Sinhala only experts currently advise it. This ‘Sinhala’ Archaeology must be reconfigured, said SL Minister of ‘National Integration’ and Hindu Religious Affairs Mr. Mano Ganesan, in an exclusive interview to TamilNet on Monday. The conservation of the protected sites in the North-East, including the ancient traces of the Tamil Buddhist heritage, must be carried out with the advice of Tamil historians. Mr. Ganesan said he would be moving a cabinet paper to this effect. At least five Tamil experts must be assigned the specific task, he said. Ganesan also warned Tamils against falling prey to the heinous designs of the anti-Muslim extremist monks who want to set the Tamils against the Tamil-speaking Muslims.
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SL Police shoots and kills young Tamil motorcyclist at Chuthu-malai in Jaffna

[TamilNet, Saturday, 20 July 2019, 23:54 GMT]
The SL police has shot and killed a 23-year-old Tamil man who was riding a motorbike on Maanippaay - I'nuvil Road in Jaffna around 9:30 p.m. on Saturday. Another youth, injured in the incident, has managed to escape with fellow motorcyclists. The police was quick to claim that the man belonged to a criminal sword gang and that they had fired as the group of six in three bikes didn't adhere to the instructions to stop. However, the residents suspect the SL police was manipulating evidence by planting a sword at the site of the incident, especially before allowing the media to photograph the scene. The youth group had come from Kodikaamam in Thenmaraadchi 40 km away from Maanippaay. It is unlikely that the group had such a large sword visibly during their long trip across several police posts, the journalists who inspected the site and talked to the residents said.
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Vedanta sections in North-East divided over backing Sinhala-Buddhist chauvinism

[TamilNet, Thursday, 18 July 2019, 12:36 GMT]
Apart from the secular Eezham Tamil activists, including the Saivites and the Catholics, some sections of Vedanta Hindus have braved their North Indian inclination and condemned the escalating heritage genocide against the Tamils in the North-East. The North Indian Vedanta line wants to sustain the anti-Tamil nexus between the Hindutva and Theravada Buddhism. It is also orientated against Tamil-Muslim unity. However, Swami Chidakashananda of Chinmaya Mission Jaffna, who took part in the mobilisation heeding to the call made by the Saivaist Then-Kayilai Aatheenam at Kanniyaa was addressing media at the Jaffna Press Club on Wednesday. He said the accelerating Sinhala-Buddhicisation of Tamil heritage sites in the North-East must be stopped through exerting international pressure on the SL State.
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Suppression of Kanniyaa protest, yet another lesson for Tamils: Trinco councillor

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 17 July 2019, 14:15 GMT]
The discrimination meted out to the peaceful protesters at Kanniyaa in Trincomalee on Tuesday was yet another lesson for Tamils, says elected Piratheasa Chapai (PS) Councillor Vipooshan Chandirarajah, who was reflecting upon the level of SL injustice he witnessed during the occasion. The way the SL State's security and justice system chose to deal with the rally has exposed the inherent militarised nature of the state apparatus. The system advances the chauvinistic Sinhala-Buddhist agenda as its foremost interest. The deployment of more than five hundred Army and Police personnel with riot control and STF commandos was uncalled for at a peaceful protest, he said. Five busloads of Sinahal goons had been brought into the venue in advance, and how could they be allowed to enter Kanniyaa heritage site while a restriction was in force limiting tourism to the ‘archaeological’ place, he asked.
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Sinhala goons confront protesters at Kanniyaa, priest, landowner subjected to “hot water assault”

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 16 July 2019, 11:31 GMT]
The occupying SL Army and the police were blocking more than five hundred peaceful protesters on Anuradhapura Road 1 km away from Kanniyaa Hot Wells on Tuesday when the Eezham Tamil grassroots activists mobilised to express peaceful resistance to the SL State-sponsored act of heritage genocide. At the same time, the SL Police had allowed tens of Sinhala goons to enter the temple site in advance to be prepared to assault Tamils if anyone managed to reach the venue. Heated arguments ensued between the Sinhala police and the Tamil protesters. Finally, unable to withstand the protesters, the SL Police allowed two representatives to proceed to Kanniyaa Hot Wells. Saivaist priest Akaththiyar Adika'laar and Mrs Ganesh Kokilaramany, the landowner and trustee of the temple, accompanied the police. On their way, Sinhala street sellers who had mobilised at the entrance poured hot water at them.
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Eezham Tamils set to mobilise against heritage genocide in Kanniyaa, Trincomalee

[TamilNet, Monday, 15 July 2019, 19:03 GMT]
Following the call from the Saiva priest of Thenkayilai Aadheenam at Kanniyaa, Trincomalee, the grassroots of the Eezham Tamils are mobilising for a unified protest against the heritage genocide at Kanniyaa Hot Wells. Former Chief Minister of Northern Province Justice CV Wigneswaran expressing his solidarity named the joint activity against Tamils at Kanniyaa as an “open act of genocide”. The pattern of the cultural and heritage destruction as well as the landgrab by the various SL Departments has become a widespread phenomenon especially after the Easter Sunday attacks, he said in a statement issued in Tamil on Monday. In the meantime, the District Organiser of the Tamil National People's Front in Trincomalee Dr Ra Shrignaneswaran urged the UN agencies such as the UNICEF and UNESCO as well as the foreign governments that fund the SL State not to back the heritage genocide.
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Colombo wants to grab lands once again for power plants in Champoor

[TamilNet, Sunday, 14 July 2019, 23:49 GMT]
The occupying Sinhala-Buddhist unitary state in Colombo has once again schemed to acquire the agricultural and residential lands of the Eezham Tamils in Champoor in Trincomalee for the construction of two power plants. The project seems to have been outsourced to a Japanese firm this time. The Tamil people were protesting against the controversial project as the SL authorities came to survey the locality last week. Former Provincial Land Commissioner to East, Kathrigamathamby Kurunathan, who made a trip to help the Tamil landowners earlier this week, condemned the latest acquisition of lands as a fundamental violation of the human rights of the resettling Tamils. Furthermore, the land expert characterised the project as detrimental to the environment, which has already been compromised by the five cement plants already constructed in the eastern port city.
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SL Archaeology Department resumes disputed ‘chaitya’ project in Kanniyaa

[TamilNet, Thursday, 11 July 2019, 18:12 GMT]
Openly violating the promise extended to Mano Ganesan, the SL Minister of Hindu Religious Affairs and National Integration on 10th June 2019, the occupying Colombo's Archaeology Department has resumed the controversial dismantling of the base construction of the old Saiva temple of Pi'l'laiyaar at the heritage site of Eezham Tamils in Kanniyaa, Trincomalee three days ago. The SL Archaelogy officers engaged in the dismantling claimed that SL Minister Mano Ganesan had agreed to such reconstruction when the Saiva Priest of Then-Kayilai Aatheenam, Thavath-Thiru Akaththiyar Adika'laar, visited the disputed site on Thursday. The officials were violating the promise extended by themselves and the monks that they would not proceed with the disputed dismantling/construction work at the site.
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Colombo not prepared to return military-seized lands belonging exiled Tamils

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 10 July 2019, 20:39 GMT]
Suren Raghavan, the SL Governor to North, has told 71-year-old Maheswary Thambirajah, whose lands the occupying SL Army had seized for military purposes, that the properties which she had transferred to her daughters were unlikely to be released back to the rightful owners as they were staying outside the island. The mother of seven met the SL Governor on Wednesday seeking his support to exert pressure on the SL government in Colombo to release her lands back to the rightful owners. The SL Government could only consider providing alternative lands for those who were residing in the island and that too at a distant locality in Vanni, the SL Governor has told the mother.
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Toxic cancer medicines transported from South for improper disposal in Jaffna

[TamilNet, Monday, 08 July 2019, 22:59 GMT]
Unused and outdated cancer treatment medicines, which are extremely toxic to humans and animals, are being transported from Anuradhapura Cancer Hospital and disposed through an average medical waste incinerator at Thellip-pazhai Cancer Hospital, informed medical sources in Jaffna told TamilNet this week. The equipment is not made to handle such a large quantity of cytotoxic drugs at necessary high temperature. The disposal tool at use doesn't meet the required standards for burning the poisonous human-made chemicals that turn into dioxins, which could cause many new types of cancers to the resettling Eezham Tamils in Valikaamam North, the informed health-workers warned. Several truckloads of outdated cancer medicines have been disposed throughout the last three years, they said.
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Photos from Tamil feast of uprising in Vanni

[TamilNet, Sunday, 07 July 2019, 18:17 GMT]
Hundreds of Eezham Tamils from all walks of life got together on Saturday to mark a Pongkal feast at the small temple for Neeraaviyadi Pi'l'laiyar at Naayaa'ru in Mullaith-theevu. The locality is exposed to Sinhala Buddhicisation, erection of controversial Buddha statue and other associated structures while the SL State-run ‘Archaeology’ department backing the militant sections of Sinhala Theravada Buddhists. The occupying Sinhala Army stationed at the locality has been grooming the monk who wants to transform the entire area into a Sinhala Buddhist enclave. The marking of the temple feast on Saturday evolved as a manifestation of Pongku-Thamizh resistance.
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Unprecedented uprising marked at Sinhala-Buddhicised Naayaa'ru in Vanni

[TamilNet, Saturday, 06 July 2019, 20:16 GMT]
Eezham Tamil grassroots activists from the Northern and Eastern provinces transformed the mobilisation for the feast of their deity, Neeraaviyadi Pi'l'laiyaar in Naayaa'ru in the Mullaiththeevu district, into a successful uprising, establishing it as a wave of unceasing Pongku Thamizh. They were braving the harassments of the occupying Sinhala police, military and the extremist Sinhala-Buddhist section, Sinhala Ravaya, that had come to the locality with a confrontational attitude on Saturday. The grassroots activists-cum-devotees came from all directions from six of the eight districts in the North-East. The scheduled 108 Pongkal pots were increased to 150 as more than four hundred people from all walks of life took part in the emotional marking. Hindus, Christians and non-believers came together in the sense of Tamilness. The mobilisation has taken place through the social media.
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SL military, Sinhala monk exploit poverty among Tamils in East for religious conversion

[TamilNet, Friday, 05 July 2019, 23:12 GMT]
A Sinhala Buddhist monk, Ven Katugastota Mahindalankara thero, stationed at Mayilang-karaichchi village in Vaazhaich-cheanai, 31 km north of Batticaloa city, has been operating a Theravada Buddhist Dhamma School targeting conversion of poverty-stricken Tamil children into Buddhism since 2014. The Sunday school, named ‘Mahindalangkara Dhamma School’ is functioning at the Buddhist temple called Sri Bodhirajaramaya (also named Sri Mahindarama Viharaya). The monk has also arranged a Sinhala lady teacher, L Sisiliya, to teach Sinhala language to the Tamil children in Mayilang-karaichchi for some years. For the last one month she is also teaching Sinhala at her residence, Tamil rural society activists told TamilNet adding that the Sinhala Buddhist vihara establishment was systematically attracting the poverty-stricken Tamil children at a village where all other facilities remained neglected.
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Fishing by intruding colonists hampers livelihood of Tamils in Batticaloa North

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 03 July 2019, 21:17 GMT]
Sinhala colonists from the Trincomalee district are intruding into the territorial waters of Eezham Tamils in Vaakarai located to the north of Batticaloa (Koara'laip-pattu North division). The occupying Sinhala navy and the SL fisheries authorities are backing the illegal deployment of purse seines by the Sinhala fishermen. In the meantime, the SL military is harassing the Tamil fishers who engage in fishing using legally allowed methods, the Head of Vaakarai Fishers Society T. Baskaran told TamilNet. The SL military is also backing the former TMVP paramilitary (Pi'l'laiyaan faction) personnel to engage in the exploitative fishing activities, he further said.
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SL military in Jaffna hurriedly constructs Buddhist vihara in ‘HSZ’ lands in KKS

[TamilNet, Monday, 01 July 2019, 23:33 GMT]
The occupying military of genocidal Sri Lanka is silently and hurriedly erecting a Buddhist vihara at Thaiyiddi in Kaangkeasan-thu'rai (KKS) in Jaffna. The construction is taking place inside the military-held former High-Security Zone area which has not been released back to the people. Tamil civic member Shageevan Shanmugalingam from Valikaamam North (Thellip-pazhai) Divisional Council told TamilNet on Monday that he was turned back by the SL military when he went there to see the construction. In the meantime, journalists have managed to photograph the structure from a distance, exposing the project. New Delhi talking about the ‘development’ of the KKS port and upgrading the Palaali airport without ensuring de-militarisation, is paving the way for socio-economic and cultural Sinhalicisation of the coastal stretch of Eezham Tamils in Valikaamam North, Tamil activists in Jaffna said.
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Tamils vow to stage feast at Naayaa'ru, disregard ‘advice’ on not to provoke monks

[TamilNet, Sunday, 30 June 2019, 10:37 GMT]
How about Tamils considering an approach of collaborating with the Sinhala Buddhist establishment and adopting a line without provoking the monks, the US Ambassador in Colombo recently asked a Tamil minister, informed sources in Colombo said. The SL minister was also working hard to contain the escalating dispute at Neeraaviyadi in Mullaiththeevu and at Kanniyaa in Trincomalee in an attempt to strike a compromise. However, the monks were not listening. They came with expanding plans of Neeraaviyadi and stepped up their hostile protests. The militant monks started to threaten the Tamils by naming and shaming a prominent activist of the anti-Mahaweli protests at a demonstration they staged recently at Neeraaviyadi. Now, the Tamil grassroots activists in Vanni have vowed to carry 108 Pongkal pots to the Pi'l'laiyaar temple at Neeraaviyadi on 06 July 2019 to stage a feast to their deity.
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Anti-Muslim harassment escalates in Mannaar

[TamilNet, Thursday, 27 June 2019, 23:51 GMT]
The occupying Sinhala Navy and Army along with the SL Police are harassing the Tamil-speaking Muslims in two hotspots in Mannaar district as never before, and the trend is worsening every day without anyone to voice for the rights of the affected innocent people. The predominantly Sinhala soldiers, particularly the SL Navy personnel at Thaaraa-puram in Mannaar island and those stationed in the mainland in Musali division, are humiliating the residents of more than 20 colonies. These settlements were put up by the controversial politician, Rishard Bathiudeen, who was serving the successive regimes in Colombo while creating a voter base for himself with the funding he facilitated from the Arabic world. The former SL Minister's opportunistic political behaviour has not only backfired against him but also against the Muslim residents of Thaaraa-Puram, which is his native village in Mannaar.
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Ploy of monks and bigotry of politicians critical to TNA's Quisling politics

[TamilNet, Saturday, 22 June 2019, 17:05 GMT]
A section of Tamil politicians, who claim that they are opposed to the Tamil National Alliance (TNA) on principles grounds regarding Tamil rights, have fallen right into the sophisticated trap laid by the extremist Sinhala Buddhist establishment in the district of Ampaa'rai. The Tamil politicians, who were attending the hunger-strike in which the role of Ven Ranmuthugala Sangharathana Thero had become the ‘foremost’ attention-drawer, were contributing to severing the ties between the Tamils and Muslims in the future. By making their presence at the platform promoted by the Bodu Bala Sena General Secretary Gnanasara Thero, JHU Parliamentarian monk Athuraliye Rathana Thero and Vinayagamoorthy Muralitharan alias Karuna, they were betraying the legitimate cause, including their objective criticism of the Quisling hierarchy of the TNA.
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Tamils should demand to scrap Mahaweli ‘development’ in North-East: Wigneswaran

[TamilNet, Friday, 21 June 2019, 23:04 GMT]
The SL military and three departments coming under Colombo, SL Forest, Archaeology and Mahaweli, have seized more than 80,000 acres of lands in Mullaiththeevu district alone. The Sinhala colonisation has targeted the North-East with the so-called ‘Mahaweli development’ for a long time since 1948. The ultimate motive is three-fold: grabbing the lands of Tamils, enacting demographic changes and wedging the territorial integrity of the North-East, which constitutes the traditional homeland of Tamils, said Justice C.V. Wigneswaran, the former Chief Minister of Northern Provincial Council, in his weekly response to questions from media on Thursday.
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Time for Canadian Eezham Tamils to chart next course of diaspora action

[TamilNet, Thursday, 20 June 2019, 23:39 GMT]
The political parties in Canada have unanimously called upon the UN to “establish an international independent investigation into the allegations of genocide against Tamils committed in Sri Lanka including the last phase of the armed conflict in 2009” along with two other demands to Colombo. A resolution was unanimously adopted extending condolences to all of the victims of violence while demanding the SL government to deliver justice to the Easter Sunday attacks, including protection of all religious places of worship and to fulfil its obligations made in Geneva within a clearly specified timeframe. Welcoming the move, the Tamil activists in the island urged the Canadian Tamil diaspora to concentrate on educating their host country on the unworkability of transitional justice in the island without international investigations on the genocide taking precedence over the other two demands.
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