Women's Awakening Day celebrated in NE

[TamilNet, Saturday, 11 October 2003, 00:01 GMT]
The Tamil Eelam Women's Awakening Day and the sixteenth death anniversary of 2nd Lieutenant Malathi (Pedurupillai Sahayaseeli) were marked Friday throughout the Northeast Province on a grand scale with rallies and public meetings where thousands of women from all walks of life participated in the events, TamilNet sources said.
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Jaffna SLA trains for crowd control

[TamilNet, Friday, 10 October 2003, 08:37 GMT]
Units of the Sri Lanka army’s 51-4 Brigade in Ariyalai East are training for crowd control on the outskirts of Jaffna town from this week, military sources in the northern town said Friday. “The training was initiated to prepare the army too for tackling any civil unrest here”, said a source. “In Jaffna’s present political climate it would be counter productive to deploy the army even to assist Police for managing restive crowds”, Mr. M. K Sivajilingam MP for Jaffna told TamilNet, reacting to the report.
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Garrison holds 6645 destroyed, damaged homes

[TamilNet, Thursday, 09 October 2003, 03:29 GMT]
Six thousand six hundred and forty five homes remain completely destroyed or damaged in the Valigamam North Division of Jaffna, which is heavily garrisoned by the Sri Lankan armed forces, rehabilitation officials in the northern peninsula said Thursday. All the houses are large and medium permanent brick and cement structures, according to them.
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Muslim-Tamil tension in Trinco south village

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 08 October 2003, 18:50 GMT]
More than four hundred families from Aalangkulam, south of Trincomalee, left their village Wednesday evening in fear of attacks by a Muslim group, residents from the area said. “The situation remains tense here among the Tamils,” Mr. Ketheeswaran Arunasalam, President of the village temple’s trustee board, told TamilNet.
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Stateless Tamils’ long struggle bears fruit

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 07 October 2003, 16:59 GMT]
A bill to grant citizenship to 168,141 stateless Tamils in Sri Lanka descended from people who settled in the hill districts of the island in the 19th century was passed Tuesday without opposition in Sri Lanka’s Parliament. Speaking on the bill, Mr. Arumugan Thondman MP, leader of the Ceylon Workers’ Congress, the largest Tamil political party in the hill districts, said: “These people have contributed so much to this country but were denied all their rights and had to struggle for 55 years to achieve the rights they had prior to 1948. This is symbolic of the ethnic divide in this country.”
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SLA arrests two Pt. Pedro MPCS workers

[TamilNet, Monday, 06 October 2003, 08:44 GMT]
The Sri Lanka army arrested two persons working at the Multi Purpose Co-operative Society (MPCS) in Pt. Pedro, Jaffna Monday morning for having in their possession two copies of the tenth anniversary volume of the Charles Anthony Brigade, the first conventional military formation of the Liberation Tigers. The Pt. Pedro MPCS is located inside part of the town centre garrisoned by the SLA’s 52-4 Brigade.
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Army, Police clash with residents in Jaffna suburbs

[TamilNet, Saturday, 04 October 2003, 08:22 GMT]
Widespread clashes erupted between Sri Lanka army and large crowds of angry residents in the Jaffna town suburbs of Gurunagar and Paashaiyoor Saturday morning. Three civilians were injured in the clashes that rapidly spread to all the neighbourhoods of these densely populated coastal suburbs, Police said. Four people and a Policeman were wounded when Police tried to break up a protest at Kondavil junction in the northern environs of the Jaffna town.
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“We will benefit from Ireland's experience” - Thamilchelvan

[TamilNet, Thursday, 02 October 2003, 08:56 GMT]
“We would be having discussions with Irish experts who were associated with the peace process in Ireland. The Irish have also struggled for their rights like us. Their experience and knowledge will help us better understand the intricacies of negotiating peace”, Mr. S. P Thamilchelvan, the head of the Liberation Tigers’ political division told TamilNet while waiting at the Kilinochchi town grounds to board the Sri Lankan Air Force helicopter to Colombo Thursday morning.
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Building up the case for war

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 30 September 2003, 02:11 GMT]
There is a steadily growing body of opinion among the Singhalese that Colombo’s dealings with the Liberation Tigers amount to nothing but a misguided policy of appeasement and plain treachery. The case for going to war with the Tigers again is being argued in different guises – its rhetorical veils are getting thinner as the ranks of those who oppose the peace process swell with each passing week.
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SLA again stops work on NECORD project in VVT

[TamilNet, Monday, 29 September 2003, 18:12 GMT]
Vadamaradchi fishermen Monday began work on micro breakwater for mooring fishing boats and deepening boat-mooring space inside these in Valvettithurai (VVT), Inbaruty and Thumpalai coastal areas, defying the ban on the project by the Sri Lanka Army, and tension arose when the SLA rushed to the area, and the Sri Lanka Monitoring Mission (SLMM) had to intervene to keep the situation under control, sources said.
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Catholic shrine demolished, Mannar tense

[TamilNet, Monday, 29 September 2003, 11:23 GMT]
Mannar town was tense Monday following the demolition of a catholic shrine in Erukkalampiddi, a Muslim village in the western part of the Mannar Island. Officials from the Mannar District Secretariat, the Liberation Tigers and officers from the Sri Lanka army and Police were engaged in talks to defuse the situation amid a sit in protest in the town by more than a thousand catholic fishermen from Pallimunai, a coastal suburb of Mannar town, who had built the shrine.
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Valvettithurai fishermen to defy SLA order

[TamilNet, Sunday, 28 September 2003, 15:49 GMT]
The Fisheries Co-operative Society officials in Athikoviladi, Valvettithurai, Sunday said they would commence work Monday on micro breakwater for mooring fishing boats and deepening boat mooring space inside these, regardless of whether the Sri Lanka Army allows it. The SLA had Thursday stopped the fishermen from starting the work, fisheries sources said.
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A life as rough as coir

[TamilNet, Friday, 26 September 2003, 18:09 GMT]
Few would dare to make a living on Jaffna’s ‘forgotten coast.’ Layers of concertina, sentry points, fences, bunkers and watch towers seal the lagoon shore for about 12 kilometres between Koilakandy and Kilaly, southeast of the Jaffna town. But for the coir makers and fishermen who survive here, it is home – the waters and soil where their forbears made their livelihood for centuries.
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SLA stops NECORD work in Valvettithurai

[TamilNet, Thursday, 25 September 2003, 16:53 GMT]
The Sri Lanka Army Thursday stopped an Asian Development Bank funded project to assist fishermen on Jaffna’s Vadamaradchi coast even though the fisheries societies had obtained permission for the project from the SLA, fisheries sources in Vadamaradchi said.
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Pongu Thamil calls for IA with 'adequate' powers

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 24 September 2003, 19:11 GMT]
At the Pongu Thamil event held in Vavuniya Wednesday, the participants made a declaration emphasizing Tamil people's aspirations, and said that to restore the people's normal life, an interim administration (IA) with adequate powers should be established. "The IA should include powers to deal with Land, Finance, Police and Judicial services," the declaration said.
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Vavuniya Pongu Thamil festival draws thousands

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 24 September 2003, 11:44 GMT]
Thousands of Tamil men, women and students from all walks of life thronged the urban council grounds in Vavuniya Wednesday evening from five corners of the town to attend the Pongu Thamil festival meeting, sources said.
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Festival atmosphere marks Vavuniya Pongu Thamil

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 24 September 2003, 03:38 GMT]
"If we desire permanent peace let us negotiate a permanent solution to the conflict," said many of the yellow-red banners in the Pongu Thamil celebrations being held in a festival atmosphere in Vavuniya Wednesday, sources in Vavuniya said.
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Nine Indians smugglers, fishermen remanded

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 23 September 2003, 13:35 GMT]
Nine fishermen and smugglers from India have been remanded by the Mannar magistrate’s court for smuggling refugees and explosives and for poaching in Sri Lanka’s maritime zone, legal sources in the northwestern town told TamilNet Tuesday.
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SLA blocks resettlement in Meeravodai

[TamilNet, Sunday, 07 September 2003, 13:14 GMT]
Sri Lanka Army (SLA) has refused permission to 352 displaced Tamil families to resettle in their former homes and land in Meeravodai in Valaichenai Pradeshya Sabai in Batticaloa district, said Tamils Rehabilitation Organization (TRO).


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Paris meeting 'Positive and Innovative'

[TamilNet, Saturday, 30 August 2003, 19:54 GMT]
Delegates to the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) Constitutional Affairs Committee meeting in Paris to prepare a response to the Government of Sri Lanka's (GoSL's) proposal for an Interim Administration to the Northeast described the meeting as "positive and innovative," in a press release issued at the conclusion of the discussions that lasted from 23rd to 26th of August in Paris.


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