Dublin conference on geopolitics highlights need for critical solidarity

[TamilNet, Friday, 25 May 2012, 23:40 GMT]
Activists from Kurdistan, Colombia, Ireland and the island of Sri Lanka, talking about the role geopolitics played in determining peace-processes and conflict in various cases, informed a mixed audience of activists, academics and journalists of the nuances of their respective cases connecting it with larger trends at an event organized at Trinity College, Dublin on Thursday. The public meeting titled ‘The Local and the Global: The Geopolitics of Peace and Conflict’, focussing on conflicts in Colombia, Kurdistan, Northern Ireland and Sri Lanka, elaborated on how different alignments of global interests influenced political outcomes at local levels. The conclusion of the conference saw the unanimous passing of a resolution that opposed the criminalization of political organizations like the FARC, PKK, LTTE that fought for political and democratic demands of peoples.
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SL military coerces Jaffna University students to closed-door talks

[TamilNet, Friday, 25 May 2012, 06:21 GMT]
The commander of the occupying Sinhala military in Jaffna, Maj. Gen. Hathurusinghe, intimidated leaders of the boycotting students of the Jaffna University to come for a closed-door meeting at the occupation headquarters on Wednesday to tell them that the SL military would not provide security to students if they engage in political or social activities. The students were boycotting classes since last Friday, after an attack on the students’ union secretary, Mr. Dharshananth, when he was going to the university to organise Mu’l’livaaykkaal remembrance. Demanding security assurance to come from the Vice Chancellor of the university, earlier the students refused to talk directly with the occupying military unless it was an open meeting involving the media. But through the VC the military threatened the students of ‘dire consequences’ to force them into a closed-door meeting.
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India’s Marxist Communist Party calls for withdrawal of Sri Lanka military

[TamilNet, Thursday, 24 May 2012, 03:33 GMT]
The Marxist Communist Party of India (CPI-M) in a press release on Wednesday called for immediate withdrawal of the Sri Lanka military stationed in Tamil areas of the island. In one of the five resolutions passed at the state committee meeting of the party held at Ealakiri in Tamil Nadu last Sunday, it was decided to urge the Indian government to diplomatically pressurize Sri Lanka to withdraw the troops. Observing that the SL military is intimidatingly omnipresent in the Tamil areas, the CPI-M said that it strongly condemns the stand of Mahinda Rajapaksa not to withdraw the troops. It only shows that the Sri Lanka government is not interested in resolving the Tamil question, the press release further said.
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Tamils will never accept Sri Lanka constitution: Sivajilingam

[TamilNet, Thursday, 24 May 2012, 00:43 GMT]
Eezham Tamils were not a party and will never accept the one-sided constitutions Sri Lanka enacted either in 1972 or in 1978, said former TNA parliamentarian MK Sivajilingam speaking in Jaffna on the 40th anniversary of the 1972 republican constitution of Sri Lanka on Tuesday. The 1978 constitution not only continued the unitary concept but also made it more autocratic under executive presidency. The Amendments, including the 13 Amendment only strengthened the unitary character. Therefore, Tamils will not accept solutions bound by these constitutions. Based on the right to self-determination we demand the right to rule ourselves in our land, Sivajilingam said.
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1972 constitution reminds Tamils not to backtrack idea of nationhood

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 23 May 2012, 18:05 GMT]
The 1972 republican constitution of Sri Lanka, which for the first time constitutionalised a unitary Sinhala-Buddhist state, was enacted without the participation or mandate of Eezham Tamils. Not only their political opposition was brushed aside but even the judiciary also played a game against legal challenges. The constitution forced the shift in Tamil polity from federal to the idea of right to self-determination of the nation for independence, pointed out Jaffna University Law Lecturer, Guruparan Kumaravadivel on Tuesday, citing legal cases involving the republic. “You don't have to go further and look for anyone else than Murugesu Thiruchelvam's argument in the Amirthalingam trial-at-bar as to why our politics should be done on the idea of Tamil nationhood and self-determination,” Guruparan said addressing especially to the people in the TNA.
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40-year-old Sri Lanka constitution burnt at cremation ground of Parvathi Amma

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 23 May 2012, 02:05 GMT]
The 1972 republican constitution of Sri Lanka, which for the first time constitutionalised the unitary Sinhala-Buddhist State and brought in the name ‘Sri Lanka’, against the wishes of the nation of Eezham Tamils in the island, has been burnt on its 40th anniversary on Tuesday, 22 May 2012, at the spot where the LTTE leader Pirapharan's mother was cremated but desecrated by the occupying Sinhala forces last year.
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Remembering Mu’l’livaaykkaal is for edification of international community

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 22 May 2012, 22:14 GMT]
Remembering Mu’l’livaaykkaal is not wailing for a tragedy. It is remembering the highest achievement of modern Tamil history, when Tamils decisively said no to an entire international community abetting a genocidal state. Mu’l’livaaykkaal is not an end of a journey. It calls for our massive re-commitment of collective political aspirations more than ever, as the Sri Lankan state has intensified its second phase of genocide, again aided by the international community, said Dr. Jude Lal Fernando, addressing Mu’l’livaaykkaal rememberance event in Dublin, Ireland, on Friday. Dr. Fernando, a Sinhalese currently lecturing and doing post-doctoral research in peace studies in Ireland was one of the main co-ordinators of the Dublin Permanent People’s Tribunal on Sri Lanka held in January 2010.
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Tamil diaspora youth group condemns attack on JUSU leader

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 22 May 2012, 01:08 GMT]
In a statement issued on Monday, the Global Tamil Youth League (GTYL), a diaspora youth group, said that the assault by a four-member squad on the secretary of the Jaffna University Student Union (JUSU) on the day of Mu’l’livaaykkaal Remembrance was an attempt by the occupying Sri Lankan forces to instil fear in students and silence their voices for justice. The GTYL blamed the Government of Sri Lanka for targeting such remembrance events of Eezham Tamils with the aim of extinguishing the memory of the victims.
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Sinhala-Buddhist temple opened to ‘celebrate’ genocide at Mu’l’livaaykkaal

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 22 May 2012, 00:33 GMT]
Coinciding the third anniversary of Mu’l’livaaykkaal genocide, a secretly built Sinhala-Buddhist stupa was inaugurated at Vaddu-vaakal, the entrance to the Mu’l’livaaykkaal genocidal strip of land in Mullaiththeevu. As the Tamil public is yet to be allowed into the stretch of land, the building of the stupa at the genocidal site went unnoticed until its inauguration. Two weeks ago, Colombo opened a coastal road built by Chinese, linking Mu’l’livaaukkaal with Kokku’laay and Pulmoaddai where Sinhala colonisation takes place in high speed. Mu’l’livaaykkaal has already become a ‘tourist’ place for the Sinhalese from the South. While the ‘tourists’ and the Sinhala colonists using the new road are permitted to roam in the stretch of land, Tamils are not permitted to get out of the vehicles. The stupa, with an all-Sinhalese signboard has been built at the side of the new road.
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General of genocide released in Colombo

[TamilNet, Monday, 21 May 2012, 23:11 GMT]
Sri Lanka’s former military commander General Sarath Fonseka, who led the Sinhala military in the ‘international community’ –abetted genocidal war against the Eezham Tamils, has been released by the Mahinda Rajapaksa regime in Colombo on Monday. While the so-called international community reducing the genocide into mere war crimes, now verbally demands investigation into the ‘war crimes’, the general who led the war and later imprisoned because Rajapaksa found him a challenge, was considered by the USA as a ‘political prisoner.’ His release on that count was always demanded by the USA, the main architect of the war. Fonseka during the war declared that Sri Lanka belongs to the Sinhalese. He also ridiculed the politicians of Tamil Nadu protesting the war as ‘jokers’.
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LJP President Paswan backs call for UN referendum

[TamilNet, Monday, 21 May 2012, 06:36 GMT]
Ram Vilas Paswan, the president of Lok Janshakthi Party from the state of Bihar and a former Indian minister, took part in a candlelight vigil organized near the Kannagi statue at the Marina Beach, Chennai by May 17 Movement on Sunday and signed on the list of the signature campaign calling for UN referendum among Eezham Tamils to assert their political destiny. Mr. Paswan, a Rajya Sabha MP, talking to media also said that Tamils had mandated the creation of Tamil Eelam in 1977 elections, which was based upon Vaddukkoaddai Resolution of all Tamil parties that represented Tamils in the island. The Sri Lankan state has not only ignored Eezham Tamils' democratic mandate, but has also systematically unleashed violence on them.
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Mu’l’livaaykkaal remembered as symbol of protest in Australia, Canada

[TamilNet, Monday, 21 May 2012, 05:50 GMT]
Exhibiting a spirit of commitment to the Tamil Eelam freedom struggle and seeking to undo defeatist mentalities of some in the diaspora, Eezham Tamil youth in Australia and Canada organized Mu’l’livaaykkaal remembrance events in their countries as symbolizing Tamil resistance to oppression and genocide, on Friday and Saturday respectively. Speaking to TamilNet, the organizers asserted that Mu’l’livaaykkaal was not a time to weep and mourn, but an occasion to remember the heroic deeds of those who went down fighting for freedom though a genocidal army assaulted them without respite with the aid of world powers, and an occasion to pledge commitment to the ideals of struggle for Tamil Eelam.
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Germany’s Mu’l’livaaykkaal remembrance highlights IC’s abetment of genocide

[TamilNet, Sunday, 20 May 2012, 05:39 GMT]
Addressing a huge gathering of Eezham Tamils who had gathered to remember those massacred in May 2009, speakers at the Mu'l'livaaykkaal Remembrance at Dusseldorf highlighted the role the powers in the International Community played in abetting the genocide of the Eezham Tamils, besides emphasising the need to remain faithful to the fundamentals of the struggle for Tamil Eelam, on Friday. While Dr. Andrew Higginbottom, lecturer at Kingston University, London spoke about how the US-UK axis provided the necessary background for the Mu’l’livaaykkaal massacre to happen, Ninthujah Sutharshan, research scholar and Deputy Chief of Eezham Tamils’ Country Council in Germany, said that the ideals of the Tamils’ struggle “was defined in Mullivaikkal by the people who died defending that cause and cannot be redefined in Berlin or London or Paris or New York to match our comfort and convenience.”
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Independent international investigation on Sri Lanka called for at London event

[TamilNet, Sunday, 20 May 2012, 05:35 GMT]
Eezham Tamils from across the UK gathered at Trafalgar Square, London to remember the Mu’l’livaaykkaal massacre at a remembrance event organized by the British Tamils’ Forum, on Saturday. With participation from the main political parties of the UK, diaspora groups and activists from the homeland and Tamil Nadu, speakers at the occasion emphasised the need for an independent international investigation in the island, a probe into charges of genocide committed by the Sri Lankan state, ending the militarization and colonization of the Tamil homeland, and self-determination of the Tamil people. Many of the non-Tamil speakers also strongly stated that the UK should stop deporting the Eezham Tamil asylum seekers back to the island. The event drew a crowd of over five thousand the organizers said, citing police sources.
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Demand UN-monitored referendum: Mahendran, Communist Party of India

[TamilNet, Saturday, 19 May 2012, 13:00 GMT]
We should demand withdrawal of SL military and creation of an atmosphere conducive to conduct an UN-monitored referendum for Eezham Tamils to decide on their political solution, said Mr. C. Mahendran of the Communist Party of India (CPI), interviewed Friday in Oslo by Palaka’ni presenter M.Pirabukannan from Tamil Nadu. If Washington and New Delhi want to refuse our rights, let them try. This is a struggle for justice. The emancipation comes when you realise that rights cannot be won by the mercy of others. Independence is achieved through uprising of people and their resolve. The unity of Tamil Nadu, Eezham Tamils and the diaspora holds the key. The next phase is to evolve joint action based on mass struggle from the three dimensions. I am convinced about big changes taking place in Tamil Nadu. Mu’l’livaaykkaal has brought a historic task on to World Tamils, he further told Palaka'ni.
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Jaffna University comes to standstill following attack on student leader

[TamilNet, Saturday, 19 May 2012, 04:31 GMT]
Following a lethal attack on the Jaffna University Students’ Union Secretary, Dharshananth, who was on his way to the university on Friday to organize the Mu’l’livaaykkaal Remembrance Day, students demanding the Vice Chancellor to get assurance for their security, decided to boycott classes and continue their struggle in various ways until the security question is resolved. We are not waging an armed struggle. We fight for our rights and for our people through democratic means. But politically motivated violent attacks continue to be unleashed against us. The International Community has committed a colossal blunder. Three years after the genocide none of the culprits has been punished. Our message to Tamil political parties and to the diaspora is that their actions should not betray our hopes, students said in their speeches.
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Tamil Nadu begins campaign for UN referendum on Tamil Eelam

[TamilNet, Saturday, 19 May 2012, 00:03 GMT]
Demanding the UN to conduct a referendum among Eezham Tamils to allow them to determine the political future of their homeland, Tamil Nadu based civil society group Youth Against War Crimes and Genocide (YAWCAG) started a campaign to collect one crore signatures to convey solidarity for the same, on Wednesday. The signature campaign which was inaugurated near the Gandhi statue at Marina beach involved participation of veteran political activists and civil society groups from Tamil Nadu. The organizers plan to take the campaign to other districts of Tamil Nadu soon. “It is necessary for the people of Tamil Nadu to pressurize the state and central government to recognize that the Eezham Tamils cannot live with dignity and peace under a unitary Sri Lankan state,” E. Ra. Thirumalai, one of the co-ordinators of YAWCAG, told TamilNet.
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Colombo unwilling to give grounds to Tamils, says NY Judge

[TamilNet, Friday, 18 May 2012, 00:40 GMT]
Accusing the international community for being "unwilling or incapable of objective fact finding on the issue applied to the Tamils and what has happened in Sri Lanka," Judge Dearie, Judge for the District Court of the Eastern District of New York (EDNY), said during the sentencing hearing of Karunakaran Kandasamy, a Tamil charged with material support to the LTTE, that the situation "really does cry out for some independent reliable voice to tell the full story," and noted that "[t]his Colombo government doesn't seem willing to give ground in terms of the Tamil community, and although the war is over, the conflict continues."
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SL military celebrating ‘victory’ in Jaffna insults Indian diplomat

[TamilNet, Thursday, 17 May 2012, 16:38 GMT]
Indian diplomat in Jaffna, V. Mahalingam, who chose to insult the Eezham Tamils bereaving the Mu’l’lvaaykkaal genocide by participating the ‘victory’ celebrations of the genocidal Sinhala military at the Palaali camp in Jaffna, was in turn insulted by the occupying military and its commander Maj. Gen. Hathurusinghe on Thursday. The consul at the Deputy Indian High Commission in Jaffna was offered neither a place in the stage nor a seat reserved for him, but was ignored by the SL military and officials of the colonial governor Maj. Gen. Chandrasri. Mahalingam getting out of the event was seen encountered by Hathurusinghe and entering into an argument. Later, a seat was offered to him in the frontline of the audience. Meanwhile school children in Jaffna were forced to participate the celebrations to ‘honour’ Sinhala soldiers with medals.
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Solheim joins orchestration against independence of Eezham Tamils

[TamilNet, Thursday, 17 May 2012, 05:13 GMT]
Spelling out the current orchestration against the independence of Eezham Tamils, the former Norwegian minister and failed peace facilitator, Erik Solhiem said that international support is not for a new separate state in Sri Lanka, but for a multicultural, multiracial and multireligious state. Given the age-old understanding of the phrase in the context of the island, Solheim in other words was only implying support to the annihilation of the ancient nation of Eezham Tamils. Solheim, recently removed from ministerial position by his own party was invited to address a gathering in Oslo on Tuesday, by a 2012-registered Tamil organisation led by Yogarajah Balasingham alias Basharan, who was rejected by Norwegian Tamils in the diaspora elections. Sharing the stage with Solheim was visiting TNA parliamentarian Suresh Premachandran.
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