Peace talks to resume soon – Balasingham

[TamilNet, Monday, 23 June 2003, 18:44 GMT]
The Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) said today that the peace negotiations between the Government of Sri Lanka and the Tamil Tigers, suspended for the past few months, will resume soon.
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Negotiating Tamil sovereignty

[TamilNet, Saturday, 21 June 2003, 00:52 GMT]
“Tamils have only had very compelling political and moral reasons for not acceding their sovereignty to the Sri Lankan state since Britain gave independence to this island. Therefore no road map to peace in Sri Lanka should be allowed to compromise the Tamil people’s sovereign and inalienable right to decide their political status in the land of their forebears," said Mr. Selvam Adaikalanathan, Tamil National Alliance MP for Vanni, reacting Friday to suggestions that the Liberation Tigers should agree to a peace road map in return for workable interim administration for the northeast.
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LTTE responds to Prime Minister’s offer

[TamilNet, Thursday, 19 June 2003, 18:03 GMT]
The Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) said Thursday that they would consider returning to the peace negotiations only when the Government of Sri Lanka offers a practical conceptual framework for an interim administrative structure.
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Jaffna Children's Media Group demands action

[TamilNet, Monday, 16 June 2003, 10:07 GMT]
In a mini-parliament involving the Children's Media Group (CMG) facilitated by the Save the Children in Sri Lanka, Jaffna district was held in Veerasingham Hall earlier this month. In the event, the children of Jaffna called on the decision makers to take action on issues of health and nutrition, child abuse and Education that affect the children. This report contains corrections to an earlier report published in TamilNet.
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Road closure by SLA halts temple festival in Kalkudah

[TamilNet, Saturday, 14 June 2003, 11:37 GMT]
Trustees of Munai Murugan temple in Kalkudah, 35km North of Batticaloa town, said Saturday that devotees have no access to the temple and that the popular annual temple festivals cannot be held due to the closure of the main road leading to the temple by the Sri Lanka Army (SLA).


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‘Let my people lead normal lives’

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 10 June 2003, 20:01 GMT]
“My people have endured great agony and suffering for twenty years. Let them lead normal lives like those in other parts of the country”, the Bishop of Mannar, Rt. Rev. Rayappu Joseph told a delegation of Sri Lankan armed forces and officials that is on a fact finding visit to the district on the island’s northwestern coast Tuesday. “It is imperative that they shouldn’t be made to wait any longer for their rightful share of the peace dividend which everyone outside the northeast has enjoyed for more than an year”, the Bishop said.
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Talks should be based on concrete proposals – Balasingham

[TamilNet, Saturday, 07 June 2003, 06:45 GMT]
Negotiations on an Interim Administration for the Northeast could only begin once the Sri Lankan government had produced a detailed draft of its proposals for such a body, the Liberation Tigers said Friday. Discussions could only proceed usefully on the basis of “specific and concrete” proposals from Colombo, the LTTE’s Chief Negotiator and Political Advisor, Mr. Anton Balasingham, told TamilNet when asked about press reports suggesting the government had agreed to the establishment of an Interim Administration.
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Political confusion in Colombo said undermining peace

[TamilNet, Thursday, 05 June 2003, 20:04 GMT]
"It would be absolutely imprudent on our part to predicate the future of the Tamil people on the unpredictable political climate we are witnessing in Colombo now. It is getting progressively unstable. A politically powerful section of the Sinhala Buddhist clergy asserts that President Kumaratunga wowed during a meeting with its leaders that she would divide the Northeast province. The political bankruptcy of the Sri Lankan state in solving the ethnic conflict never stood so well exposed," said Mr. Selvam Adaikalanathan, MP, a senior leader of the Tamil National Alliance, Thursday.
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Foundation stone laid for Chavakachcheri maternity home

[TamilNet, Thursday, 05 June 2003, 17:31 GMT]
The foundation stone for the construction of a government maternity home at Chavakachcheri in the Jaffna district was laid Thursday by the Regional Director of health Services Mr.T.Sivapatham who was the chief guest at the event . The hospital complex was completely destroyed when the Sri Lanka Army (SLA) launched multi-barrel artillery (MBRL) attack on the town in 2000.
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Colombo urged to drop ‘double standard on interim mechanism’

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 03 June 2003, 18:07 GMT]
“The cease fire agreement (CFA) between Colombo and the Liberation Tigers has no basis in the laws of Sri Lanka. It is an extra constitutional instrument on which the island’s peace has stood for more than 15 months. Therefore, why can’t the Sri Lankan government look beyond the constricting parameters of its constitution to formulate an interim mechanism for rebuilding and rehabilitating the war ravaged northeast? We are urging the Sinhala polity to drop its double standard on this matter for the sake of peace," Mr. Joseph Pararajasingham, a senior Tamil National Alliance MP, said Tuesday.
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Defying C.I dogma, massacre village rises from ashes

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 27 May 2003, 13:30 GMT]
The Sri Lanka army massacred seventeen villagers, including six children, and burnt and razed to the ground Thoni Thaattamadu, an impoverished Tamil hamlet on the east coast’s remote interior 16 years ago on May 27, 1987. The massacre was an integral part of a counter insurgency (C.I) campaign by Sri Lankan armed forces. The village remained a no go zone since then, until the Liberation Tigers signed a ceasefire agreement with Colombo in February last year.
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Empty development promise keeps old ferry working

[TamilNet, Monday, 26 May 2003, 03:14 GMT]
The Batticaloa district has one of the most underdeveloped road networks in Sri Lanka. Many parts of this network remain disconnected by three lagoons that separate most of the district's large hinterland from the coast due to long years of neglect by successive regimes in Colombo. Tamils say most parts of the northeast were subjected to systematic economic deprivation for many decades since the island's Sinhala majority established firm control over the country's finances with inflexibly unitary constitutions in 1972 and 1978, which, they charge, were made without their endorsement.
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TNA briefs foreign envoys on NE interim administration

[TamilNet, Thursday, 22 May 2003, 15:57 GMT]
A delegation of the Tamil National Alliance Thursday told the American Ambassador for Sri Lanka Mr.Ashely Wills the urgency in setting up of an interim administration to rebuild the war ravaged northeast province and to rehabilitate the displaced families in their villages, TNA sources said.
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‘Border pioneers’ face uphill task

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 21 May 2003, 12:44 GMT]
“We settled here in 1954 to safeguard our homeland. Today there is nobody to save us”, says Mr. Kanapathipillai Poopalapillai, 79, former President of the Rural Development Society of Sinnawaththai, a destroyed border Tamil village in the east coast’s interior. The Special Task Force and Sri Lanka Police built their camps in the Sinhala sector of this border zone with bricks and wood from the Tamil homes they dismantled or demolished in Sinnawaththai.
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Colombo launches stopgap measure in north

[TamilNet, Friday, 16 May 2003, 12:34 GMT]
A military officer appointed by Colombo to assess the number of houses and properties occupied by the Sri Lanka army (SLA) in Jaffna began work Friday, according to SLA sources. The officer, Lt. Col. M. G. Ratnayake, who was appointed to the position Wednesday by Colombo, will receive applications from civilians in Jaffna whose homes and lands are still occupied by the military, the sources said. The stopgap measure to get the stalled peace talks back on track by Colombo got lukewarm reception in the northern town.
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Few in Jaffna get resettlement aid

[TamilNet, Saturday, 03 May 2003, 04:58 GMT]
Forty thousand families in the Jaffna have applied to the Government Agent for assistance to resettle in their homes in the war ravaged northern peninsula, a senior official said. “Although eight percent of the Jaffna district population is in dire need of material and financial support to rebuild their homes destroyed or damaged in the war, we got funds to make part payments to only to 4112 families after January this year," he said.
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Mannar farmers said facing ruin

[TamilNet, Saturday, 03 May 2003, 00:10 GMT]
“Mannar rice farmers are facing ruin for they cannot market their produce. Each farmer will have to lose more than 9000 rupees per acre (92 USD) of paddy if they do not find means to market their rice at reasonable prices”, Mr. Seemanpillai Soundiranayagam, President of the Federation of Farmers’ Associations of Mannar told Tamilnet Friday. The district saw its first good harvest in 13 years this season following the lifting of draconian Sri Lanka army restrictions on fuel, fertilisers, irrigation and transport of rice last year.
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Balasingham denies ‘irresponsible’ reports on Premier’s letter

[TamilNet, Friday, 02 May 2003, 10:54 GMT]
The Liberation Tigers’ Chief Negotiator and Political Advisor, Mr. Anton Balasingham, Friday flatly denied press reports that he had dismissed Sri Lankan Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe’s response to the LTTE’s letter outlining its reasons for suspending Norwegian facilitated peace talks. Speaking to TamilNet on Friday, Mr. Balasingham described the reports in the Daily Mirror and Gulf News as “irresponsible journalism” based on “pure conjecture.”
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Repairs to Giant’s Tank after two decades’ neglect

[TamilNet, Thursday, 01 May 2003, 12:33 GMT]
Repair work on the long neglected Giant’s Tank (reservoir) in Mannar began Thursday under the World Bank North East Integrated Agricultural Project (NEIAP). The ancient reservoir feeds 160 minor irrigation tanks in mainland Mannar. The reservoir’s 10 sluice gates were opened Thursday to drain its waters for the repairs.
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White Pigeon branch opened in Trincomalee

[TamilNet, Monday, 28 April 2003, 22:26 GMT]
The Tamil Rehabilitation Organization (TRO) sponsored White Pigeon Technical Institute, headquartered in the Vanni region, opened its third branch Monday at Ananadapuri, three km to the north of Trincomalee town, TRO sources said.
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