SLA re-confiscates land ‘declared’ resettled in Jaffna HSZ

[TamilNet, Saturday, 10 March 2012, 11:56 GMT]
The Sinhala state occupying the country of Eezham Tamils will never observe any of the ‘reconciliation’ hoodwink it simulates to the outside world. This becomes explicitly evident with the Sri Lanka military re-occupying villages ‘declared’ for resettlement in the Valikaamam High Security Zone, to create an extensive and fenced militarized region along the northern coast of Jaffna, news sources in Jaffna exposed. Several traditional villages of Jaffna in the fertile red-soil belt will be lost forever in the creation of an extensive Sinhala military region in the most strategic and economically important part of the country of Eezham Tamils, and civil officials in Jaffna are gagged to open their mouths on the blatant grab that takes place after showcasing resettlement to the world, news sources further said.
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Protest sends away Sri Lanka’s law academic in Tamil Nadu conference

[TamilNet, Friday, 09 March 2012, 09:55 GMT]
Organizers of an international conference at Manonmaniam Sundaranar University in Thirunelvely, Tamil Nadu, decided to escort out Ms Jeeva Niriella of the Colombo University law faculty through the side door, when barging in protestors accusing Sri Lanka of genocide demanded Jeeva to leave India. The afternoon session of the 3-day conference on Thursday was disrupted to the disbelief and shock of the organisers, reported Times of India on Friday. During the morning session, Ms. Niriella was eulogising ‘women empowerment’ in Sri Lanka, citing Srimao Bandaranayake, world’s first woman prime minister and the current chief justice who is a woman. She was silent to a question about large-scale crimes committed on women in the island.
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SL soldiers clash, killing 3 among them inside camp in Jaffna

[TamilNet, Friday, 09 March 2012, 06:15 GMT]
A clash among the occupying soldiers at a major Sri Lanka Army (SLA) camp in the Jaffna peninsula has taken the lives of at least 3 and has injured many on Friday morning, news sources in Jaffna said. The SLA camp is located along the A9 Highway, at Nu'naavil, 5 km south of Chaavakachcheari town. In a territory where the occupying soldiers in the camps often exceed the number of local people, such clashes within the SLA are common, sporadically ending with killings, the sources further said.
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Promote Dublin report, build solidarity, recognize Self-Determination: grassroots activists in UK

[TamilNet, Thursday, 08 March 2012, 21:22 GMT]
Grassroots activists of the British Tamil Forum (BTF) and journalists from the UK-based International Association of Tamil Journalists (IATJ), who came together with leftist activists of the Socialist Resistance (SR) and Denmark-based leftist activist Ron Ridenour, in a meeting held in London on Wednesday, resolved to promote the findings of the Dublin Tribunal on Sri Lanka and to give foremost priority to the work on building solidarity with trade unions and progressive groups in the UK on the campaign to recognize Tamils Right to Self-Determination. The meeting which was chaired by Fred Leplat of the SR, also had participants from the NSSP, Sri Lanka.
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US-resolution binds Tamils to less than the 13th Amendment

[TamilNet, Thursday, 08 March 2012, 07:01 GMT]
A draft resolution that appears in media reports as has been tabled by the USA at Geneva UNHCR, while specifying the ‘constructive’ LLRC recommendations that has to be implemented, talks of only de-militarizing the North but not the East and confines the model of political solution to undefined devolution of powers to the provinces and not to the North-East homeland of Eezham Tamils. While internationally binding Tamils to further dilution of the already inadequate provisions of the Indo-Lanka Agreement, the US-resolution giving international endorsement to LLRC-implementation bails out Sri Lankan state and its regime from international investigations of the genocidal crimes and from the need of any constitutional restructure of the unitary state.
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World socialists reject both US-backed resolution and Sri Lanka’s opposition

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 07 March 2012, 17:04 GMT]
“The Obama administration is pushing the resolution as a means of pressuring the Rajapakse government to accommodate US interests and those of India […] At the same time, the Sri Lankan government has mounted a hysterical campaign at home against the supposed “international conspiracy” to tarnish the country’s name […] The bourgeois Tamil National Alliance (TNA) is likewise manoeuvring. It previously condemned the LLRC report, but now calls for the implementation of its recommendations—in line with Washington and New Delhi. The TNA is desperately seeking US and Indian backing for a “political solution”, from which it hopes to benefit […] The Socialist Equality Party rejects both the phony US-backed resolution and the Rajapakse government’s chauvinist campaign against it, said World Socialist Web Site on Wednesday.
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Tamil Nadu Catholic Church reminds umbilical cord relations at Kachchatheevu fete

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 07 March 2012, 08:42 GMT]
Amidst intense presence of the occupying Sinhala military at Kachcha-theevu during the annual fete of St. Antony on Sunday, the Ramnad diocese of Tamil Nadu Catholic Church that jointly conducts the prayers along with the Jaffna diocese, reminded the umbilical cord relations of the people on either side of the Palk Bay. The theme of this year’s joint prayer by Tamil Nadu and Jaffna Catholic Church was war-torn Eezham Tamils reuniting with their relatives. The commanders of the occupying military were shocked when Fr. Michael of Ramnad, delivering the sermon, deeply felt for the mass killings of Eezham Tamils and death of humanism in the island, and said that the sons of the soil should be released, they should be honoured and they should lead their lives as heroes (Maaveerar).
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Sumanthiran, Sritharan contradict reasoning Geneva absentia

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 06 March 2012, 00:22 GMT]
In a meeting held by the Tamil National Alliance (TNA) in Jaffna on Monday, explaining to the public why the TNA opted out canvassing in Geneva, TNA’s Vanni parliamentarian Sritharan and nominated parliamentarian Sumanthiran came out with contrasting reasons. As the TNA has publicly rejected the LLRC recommendations, is there any point in going to Geneva where the resolution is harping on implementation of the recommendations; won’t it be strengthening the resolution, asked Sritharan. But, Sumanthiran implied that the resolution comes after TNA conferring with the US State Department four months back and that it won’t be diplomatically beneficial to the sponsors of the move if the TNA is present in Geneva.
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West has to concede to Tamils its failure of ‘war crimes–reconciliation’ paradigm

[TamilNet, Monday, 05 March 2012, 07:16 GMT]
The West, especially the USA has to concede to Eezham Tamils that its post-war paradigms of war crimes accountability and reconciliation have failed to bring in solutions from Sri Lanka, commented a new generation Tamil politician in the island, citing the repeated state of affairs at the UNHRC in Geneva. Attitudinal change and fresh thinking in the West should at least now accept the reality of genocide in the island and approach the question from the angle of right to self-determination of the affected nation. Polity of Tamils in the island, diaspora and in Tamil Nadu also should stop playing second fiddle to futile paradigms of others and should stage their own paradigm for their own problem to make it inevitable for the powers, especially India and the USA to listen to, the politician added.
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Worried Colombo consulted top D.C. law firm for advice

[TamilNet, Sunday, 04 March 2012, 15:22 GMT]
John Bellinger, currently a senior partner in a large Washington Law firm, and formerly the legal adviser to the State Department in the Bush Administration, writes in a popular website that the Sri Lankan Government consulted him for advice on the war-crimes charges against Sri Lanka's President Rajapakse in the D.C. District Court. The article also discloses that Sri Lanka requested the U.S. State Department to intervene in the Rajapakse war-crimes case more than nine-months ago, but the State Department delayed issuing the "Suggestion of immunity" until after Judge Kotelly formally requested the views of the U.S. Government. Judge Kotelly dismissed the case on the grounds of Head of State Immunity.
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Colombo harasses Tamil politicians, civil officials

[TamilNet, Saturday, 03 March 2012, 11:21 GMT]
Sri Lankan ‘Criminal Investigation Department’ in Colombo has stepped up harassments on Tamil politicians and civil officials summoning them for investigation meetings in Colombo. A politician and a medical officer have been recently ‘invited’ to appear in Colombo without providing any information on why they were being ‘investigated’. Colombo government has again started to systematically harass the active sections Eezham Tamils, seeking to dis-empower them by de-motivating and demoralising such activists.
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Land grabbed for Buddhist stupa, local people blocked at Kudumpimalai, Batticaloa

[TamilNet, Saturday, 03 March 2012, 07:33 GMT]
Sri Lanka's Sinhala military occupying the scenic sacred hillock Kudumpimalai (Baron's Cap) in the Koa'ra'lappattu South Division of the Batticaloa district has not only appropriated five acres of land there to build a Buddhist stupa, but also blocks the local people from entering that area. The occupying military plans to convert the local sacred place of Eezham Tamils and a former jungle stronghold of the LTTE into a tourist place for the Sinhala-Buddhists from the south, informed civil officials of the division told TamilNet. The land has been appropriated at Alli-Oadai junction, 2km south of the hillock and the local people are blocked from going to that junction and beyond it, besides being prevented from entering their grazing lands in the nearby village Tharavai. The name of the junction also has been Sinhalicised similar to the Sinhalicisation of Kudumpimalai into Thoppigala.
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US, Sri Lanka squabble whether hang or slaughter Eezham Tamil Nation

[TamilNet, Thursday, 01 March 2012, 23:32 GMT]
The LLRC recommendation of the majoritarian and genocidal state of Sri Lanka is clear on the point that ethnic territories cannot exist in the island, and ‘trilingual’ society (ostensibly paving way for total Sinhalcisation) should be achieved by 2020. While Sri Lanka in Geneva sessions wants implementation of its agenda left completely to itself, the US-backed resolution seeks international endorsement to the LLRC recommendations and international commitment from Sri Lanka in the implementation and phases. In an exclusive interview to Ceylon Today on Thursday, the US ambassador in Colombo, Patricia Butanis praising the LLRC for coming out with “some excellent recommendations,” argued why then the qualms in publicly committing to implementation. The squabble is just on whether publicly hang or secretly slaughter the Tamil nation, commented an Eezham Tamil politician.
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Enragement over US-India stand results in Sumanthiran-effigy in Jaffna

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 29 February 2012, 23:44 GMT]
The nominated parliamentarian of Tamil National Alliance (TNA) M.A. Sumanthiran faced the brunt of public enragement in Jaffna on Wednesday, for reflecting the stand of the USA and India, in handing over even the last of the trumps of Eezham Tamils to Sri Lankan state, by internalizing war-crimes accountability and political solution. Washington allegedly backs proposals at the UNHRC sessions in Geneva that will give international legitimacy to the LLRC hoodwink of Colombo and whatever the differences with New Delhi backing Colombo that could only be related to binding Colombo with a time frame for the implementation of the LLRC recommendations. Meanwhile, the stands of both the Tamil Nadu chief minister Jayalalithaa and the DMK Chief Karunanidhi are also just confined to urging New Delhi to back the US proposal in Geneva that is ‘perceived’ to be against Sri Lanka.
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RSF calls for condemnation of Sri Lanka over media rights violations

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 29 February 2012, 02:20 GMT]
Reporters Without Borders (RSF), in a media release issued Tuesday, called on members of the Geneva-based United Nations Human Rights Council (UNHRC) "to pass a resolution condemning the Sri Lankan government’s violations of freedom of information and to demand an end to threats and violence against news media and human rights defenders in Sri Lanka." The release also referred to TamilNet's struggle against the modern electronic form of suppression of media freedom saying, "[s]ince 25 February: Distributed Denial-of-Service Attacks (DDoS) have been disrupting web traffic of TamilNet.com. The service provider is struggling to keep the website online."
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DDoS attack disrupts TamilNet web traffic

[TamilNet, Monday, 27 February 2012, 23:14 GMT]
Distributed Denial-of-Service Attack (DDoS), identified by the service provider of TamilNet as originating in an orchestrated way from certain affluent parts of the world, has been disrupting web traffic of TamilNet.com since Saturday. The attack on the independent media reporting to the world on Tamil affairs coincides with the opening of the 19th sessions of the United Nations Human Rights Council (UNHCR) in Geneva on Monday, where the USA and Sri Lanka have already pitched positions in hijacking the focus of issues concerning the cause of genocide-affected Eezham Tamils. TamilNet has been forced to seek expert services in regularising the web traffic. As a media arguing for Eezham Tamil public to take up the issues into their hands, TamilNet depends on the support of nobody other than the Tamil masses and the alternative world.
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SLA, paramilitary, force Tamils in Batticaloa to take part in anti-UN protests

[TamilNet, Monday, 27 February 2012, 22:26 GMT]
SLA operated paramilitary operatives, dispatched by the occupying Sri Lanka Army in Batticaloa, visited the Village Development Council (VDC) leaders in various villages in the district on Monday instructing the heads of the VDCs to have at least 150 people to get on board the buses they would be bringing to transport civilians against their will to march from Batticaloa Hindu College to the Clock Tower in Batticaloa city. The heads of VDCs were told that they would have to resign their posts if they failed to meet the demand. The people, gathered against their will were then taken to Batticaloa city and were forced to burn the effigy of US President Barack Obama and to chant slogans against the UNHRC session taking place in Geneva.
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SL colonial governor coordinates anti-UN demonstration of SLFP, EPDP in North

[TamilNet, Monday, 27 February 2012, 16:41 GMT]
Occupying Sri Lanka’s colonial governor, Maj. Gen. G. A. Chandrasri was seen coordinating the two factions collaborating with the Rajapaksa regime, the Angkayan-led SLFP and Douglas Devananda-led EPDP, in staging a simulated demonstration in Jaffna and Vanni against UNHRC discussing Sri Lanka in Geneva on Monday. The simulation forced in sections and individuals waiting for benefits from the Colombo regime. An attendance register was maintained for the participants. However, a media clip that captured comments of a passing-by youth street vendor, universally encapsulated the game on the island. The youth told the unemployed graduates in the ‘demonstration’: “I am not educated like you to perform this act.” The youth has not said that to the ‘demonstrators’ alone, commented media circles witnessing the scene in Jaffna.
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Peace academic denounces US-LLRC formula, urges alternative mechanism for justice

[TamilNet, Sunday, 26 February 2012, 10:53 GMT]
“The US support given to UNHRC’s proposal for an accountability mechanism for Sri Lanka would not go beyond requesting GoSL to implement LLRC recommendation which legitimised war to protect the state and reduced human rights violations to the ‘misbehaviour ‘of individual soldiers,” writes Jude Lal Fernando, academic of the Trinity College, Dublin. Establishing what took place was not mere war crimes or crimes against humanity but was intended genocide by Sri Lankan state, and arguing why justice will not come from the powers that conceal the truth and stifle justice and recovery, the academic who was earlier involved in the Dublin Tribunal urges alternative international community to pursue an international independent accountability mechanism.
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US ‘tables’ Rajapaksa formula while pretending pressure

[TamilNet, Saturday, 25 February 2012, 02:30 GMT]
Other than the US attempting to ‘steal’ the credit of passing a resolution on Sri Lanka at the March UNHRC sessions in Geneva, there is no difference between what the US ‘proposes’ and what the genocidal Colombo ‘envisages’ for Eezham Tamils, political observers commented on a ‘leaked’ draft of the resolution as well as on statements made by US State Department spokesman Mark Toner on Thursday. Perhaps the only difference the Colombo regime is fussing about is the resolution expecting a time-frame from Sri Lanka to implement the wanting recommendations of the LLRC. The Rajapaksa-regime is not prepared even for that. Despite the US deception on genocide-affected Eezham Tamils, some Tamil politicians in the island, Colombo-based ‘civil society’ and some diaspora lobbyists try to paint a picture that the US ‘pressure’ is bringing in something substantial for Eezham Tamils.
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