Colombo targets NPC member Ananthi for witnessing against Sri Lanka

[TamilNet, Thursday, 16 January 2014, 07:59 GMT]
“I am fully prepared to confront the Sri Lankan Ministry of Defence, which has leaked a news threatening to put me through their so-called military rehabilitation,” said Ananthi Sasitharan, the only woman candidate of the Northern Provincial Council (NPC), who also polled largest number of preferential votes next to the chief minister candidate of the NPC. Ms Ananthi Sasistharan was one of the public witnesses at the recent hearings by the Permanent Peoples Tribunal held in Bremen. She also met the US Ambassador-at-Large for War Crimes Issues, who visited Jaffna recently and explained to him that what went on in Vanni in 2009 was a genocidal onslaught and that a programme of structural genocide was being stepped up against Eezham Tamils.
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Colombo ‘reveals’ US connections in cluster bomb use

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 15 January 2014, 15:55 GMT]
United States Pacific Command (USPACOM) advised the Sri Lankan Defence Establishment to purchase Cluster Bomb Units (CBUs) during the peace talks mediated by Norway in 2002. The Island paper, which gives media space for PSYOP and information war waged by the SL military Establishment, on Monday released portions of an alleged FOUO-classified document of the US Defence Establishment. The ‘leak’ was made to remind the US Ambassador-at-Large for War Crimes Issues Stephen J. Rapp, that Colombo was having proofs of ‘US complicity’ in the genocidal onslaught it waged on Eezham Tamils, an informed journalist from South told TamilNet. Colombo’s Defence Secretary Gotabhaya Rajapaksa himself timed the ‘leak’, the journalist further said.
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Sri Lankan Weltanschauung

[TamilNet, Monday, 13 January 2014, 01:38 GMT]
The accumulating woes for Sri Lankan State in the international scene can be attributed to two distinct and inter-related phenomena. One, the continuing denial of the history of injustices inflicted by the State on the Tamils, culminating in the Mu'l'livaaykaal massacres of civilians and the refusal by the Sinhala rulers and the elites to acknowledge the killings, and second, the locally prevailing "Weltanschauung" (worldview) cultivated as an instrument for the ruling autocracy to stay in power, which accepts that, to eliminate the Tigers, any atrocity against any Tamil is acceptable. However, the Sri Lankan weltanschauung does not apply in the international arena. Colombo's refusal to respond to the accusations of war-crimes, and genocide, partly arises from the tolerance for Tamil injustice that is intrinsic to Sri Lanka's weltanshauung.
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40th year of massacre at World Tamil Research Conference remembered

[TamilNet, Saturday, 11 January 2014, 09:20 GMT]
Tamil politicians and activists in Jaffna on Wednesday observed the 40th year remembrance of the massacre carried out by the occupying Sri Lankan Police on the final day of the Fourth International Conference of Tamil Studies held in Jaffna in 1974. The massacre took place on 10th January, which was the final day of the conference.
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Stephen Rapp was briefed on structural genocide at Bishop's House in Jaffna

[TamilNet, Thursday, 09 January 2014, 17:06 GMT]
After having caused massive deaths and disappearances on the Tamil civilian population during the times of war, the Sri Lankan State now continues to commit acts of structural genocide in the Tamil land. This aims at causing demographic and identity change, ethnic subordination and dilution of Tamils political power, the Bishop of Mannaar Rt. Rev. Dr. Rayappu Joseph told the visiting US diplomat on Wednesday. The visiting delegation was primarily interested in the details of the ‘war crimes’ during the final months of the war, according to Mannaar Bishop. Mr Rapp was told that an international investigation was necessary, not to punish any individual, but to create a conducive environment, which would in turn cause an attitudinal change on the part of the Sri Lankan State.
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26 victims exhumed, mass grave reveals torture, executions at standing position

[TamilNet, Monday, 06 January 2014, 06:59 GMT]
Some of the victims slain in the mass grave at Thirukkeathessvaram in Mannaar have been shot after being ordered to stand up straight inside the bunkers, according to those who witnessed the excavation of the mass grave in Mannaar. Of the four more skeletons recovered on Friday, one skull was found covered by a camouflage cloth used by the SL military. Gunshot wounds were also found on two of the skulls recovered on Friday. There were also teeth of children among the remains recovered on Saturday. On Monday, a full skeleton of a 6-year-old child has been exhumed. 26 skeletons have been found till Monday noon. Several skeletons recovered so far also bore marks of torture, the sources told TamilNet Monday. The exhumation effort will continue, the reports said.
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Top US war-crimes official visits Sri Lanka

[TamilNet, Monday, 06 January 2014, 00:50 GMT]
US Ambassador for Global Criminal Justice Stephen Rapp will spend five days in Sri Lanka meeting with government, political and civil society officials "on a range of issues focusing on Sri Lanka's justice, accountability, and reconciliation processes," the US State Department said. While Rapp was previously holding the title Ambassador-at-large for War Crimes Issues, Rapp's office released a damaging "Report to Congress on Incidents During the Recent Conflict in Sri Lanka," to US Congress as required by the US Supplemental Appropriations Act of 2009. Also, in July 2010, US and UK representatives of Tamil diaspora groups briefed Ambassador Stephen Rapp, and his staff on the historical context of the Tamil struggle, and submitted supporting evidence and affidavits on war-crimes and crimes against humanity committed by the Sri Lankan State on Eezham Tamils in the island of Sri Lanka.
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Trincomalee students killing - 8th Anniversary

[TamilNet, Thursday, 02 January 2014, 00:31 GMT]
Parents and relatives of five Trincomalee students who were extra-judicially executed at a seafront in Trincomalee by Sri Lanka armed forces on the 2nd of January 2006 will be commemorating the eight anniversary of the death of their sons today, Thursday. Despite a determined and relentless pursuit for justice by Dr Kasippillai Manoharan, the father of Ragijar, one of the students killed, including campaigns by Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch, justice has eluded the families of the students killed. "Until the perpetrators of the crime, and the at Sri Lanka's helm who issued the order to kill my son, are brought to justice, I will keep on fighting," Dr Manoharan told TamilNet, adding, "I remain grateful for the Rights groups and the organizations that campaigned and highlighted the need for international involvement to bring justice to us."
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Australia’s conduct on Tamil deportations comparable to Hitler’s deniability on Jewish question: Haigh

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 01 January 2014, 15:17 GMT]
Bruce Haigh, a retired diplomat, a rights activist, and an expert witness to the Bremen People’s Tribunal established to adjudicate on whether Sri Lanka committed genocide on Tamil people, in an article appearing in Canberra Times, compared the “deniability adopted and refined by Hitler's Third Reich towards the final solution of the Jewish question” to Rudd and Abbott’s Governments conduct over Tamil asylum seekers. Haigh said that Tamil witnesses from Sri Lanka told him that Australian diplomatic mission has been briefed adequately on the situation, and that he believes the Australian Government(s) have ignored these for reasons of policy and politics. “This would suggest that both major parties knowingly acted illegally with respect to processing Tamil asylum seekers,” Haigh said.
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Human skeletons spotted inside well, bunkers in PTK

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 01 January 2014, 11:00 GMT]
Human skeletons have been spotted inside a well and the surrounding land of a house located at 2nd division of Puthuk-kudiyiruppu (PTK) in Mullaiththeevu district, news reports from Mullaiththeevu said. On the latest reports of finding human skeletons in PTK, Tamil activists in Mullaiththeevu suspected that these could be the victims who were executed by the advancing Sri Lankan military in 2009 genocidal onslaught on Vanni.
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Colombo's motive of using China for forensic examinations on Mannaar mass grave questioned

[TamilNet, Monday, 30 December 2013, 08:42 GMT]
Occupying Colombo's police officials in Mannaar have said that the skeletons recovered at the mass grave at Thirukkeatheesvaram were being dispatched to China for forensic examinations. Responding, legal sources in Mannaar asked the motive of Colombo using China for DNA testing of the skeletons discovered at the mass grave and questioned the fate of similar cases earlier sent to China for ‘forensic examinations’. In 2009, China had allegedly provided Colombo with ‘movable crematory vehicles’ to get rid of the dead bodies of the genocidal victims in Vanni. Tamil activists urged the alternative world to assist the nation of Eezham Tamils to undertake forensic examinations in future in a credible and independent manner.
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Local contacts of visiting Indian journalist exposed to TID interrogators in Colombo

[TamilNet, Sunday, 29 December 2013, 21:34 GMT]
In one of the strongest investigations and monitoring conducted so far on a foreign journalist visiting the island, the experienced interrogators of the notorious ‘Terrorist Investigation Department’ of Colombo had not only confiscated the electronic and non-electronic possessions from the young journalist from Tamil Nadu, but also monitored and traced all his contacts from the moment he landed at Colombo airport for the second time, informed media sources in Colombo told TamilNet Sunday. In the meantime 22-year-old Maga Thamizh Prabhagaran, when contacted by TamilNet after his deportation to Chennai, said he was subjected to ‘psychological torture’ like condition at the hands of the TID interrogators in Colombo and that the TID had his Tamil book of his first visit translated when they questioned him on his affiliations.
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Freudian motive to Sri Lanka's notoriety in rape

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 25 December 2013, 00:54 GMT]
While one may expect that the word "sex" may emerge as a heavily searched word in Google, what is surprising is that Sri Lanka has created a world record for topping the list of the countries with the most number of searches for this "word" viewed by philosopher Freud as the most important in the dynamics of the psyche of humankind. Sri Lanka has excelled in demonstrating this Freudian motive even while the Rajapakse family had over two years ago banned most such web sites about sex, preventing Sri Lankans in logging into those sites. This singular achievement may also point to the inner workings of the perverted cultural mind of the Sri Lanka military which has been blamed, and enjoys immunity from criminality, for several gang rapes with bestial brutality on Tamil fighting women during the war, and Tamil civilians after the end of the war in Sri Lanka.
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UN offers immunity to Indian diplomat accused of visa fraud

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 24 December 2013, 21:12 GMT]
In a blatant exhibition of skullduggery and political nepotism, Secretary General of the United Nations (UNSG), Ban Ki Moon, Monday, has approved the appointment to a diplomatic position, a New York-based Indian diplomat, accused of visa fraud, thereby affording her diplomatic immunity from alleged criminal conduct. Earlier, U.N. raised no opposition to UN appointments of Sri Lanka's alleged war criminals, ex-military General Shavendra Silva, under whose command Tamil civilians were massacred, and Palitha Kohona, who has a complaint pending in the International Criminal Court over his complicity the killing of surrendees in the Sri Lanka war. Political observers say U.N. has become a safe haven for friendly states to provide diplomatic protection from past crimes and to whitewash alleged criminal conduct.
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DNA testing, a persistent threat to Colombo on genocide culpability

[TamilNet, Sunday, 22 December 2013, 18:08 GMT]
While in the western liberal democracies advanced DNA-based evidence collection has been the staple of modern crime investigations since the advent of DNA testing in 1985, in Sri Lanka DNA testing on Tamil victims have been systematically blocked by Colombo likely as part of the politically sanctioned strategy and forced on the subservient judicial branch to suppress evidence of Sinhala military criminality. While the blocking of Maanthai skeletal findings is the latest in Colombo's involvement in suppressing possible military complicity, the results of the DNA testing of the body of the popular Catholic priest Rev. Fr. Jim Brown, whose mutilated torso was found at Pungkudutheevu sea on 14 March 2007, was also suppressed by Colombo. Colombo media, under direct and indirect threat from Rajapaksas, self-censored the coverage of the Brown story in 2007.
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UN, a safe haven for alleged criminals?

[TamilNet, Thursday, 19 December 2013, 01:17 GMT]
While the treatment of a woman Indian consular officer in the hands of the wayward New York law enforcement officials who stripped and cavity searched her for an alleged visa fraud has triggered widespread condemnation, the Government of India's swift action to transfer the official to a United Nations post to offer her retroactive diplomatic immunity, has further highlighted that, under the leadership of Secretary General Ban Ki Moon, the United Nations is becoming a safe haven for alleged criminals, political observers in Washington said. Sri Lanka's alleged war criminals, ex-military General Shavendra Silva, under whose command Tamil civilians were massacred, and Palitha Kohona, who has a complaint pending in the International Criminal Court over his complicity the killing of surrendees in the Sri Lanka war, hold UN posts that protect them from prosecution.
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SL military further stifles civil life in North

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 17 December 2013, 16:53 GMT]
Following the instruction from occupying Colombo's Defence Secretary and Sri Lankan Presidential sibling Gotabhaya Rajapaksa, a number of 'Terrorist Investigation Department' (TID) cells have started to function inside the Sri Lankan Police stations in the North in recent days. SL intelligence operatives claiming as TID investigators are engaged in muzzling the civilians, relatives of the victims demanding justice, social media activists and journalists. Those who interacted with the US Embassy delegation that visited Jaffna recently, were being invited for interrogations over the phone, news sources in Jaffna said.
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Asylum seeker tells UK Court of Colombo sanctioned abduction, torture

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 11 December 2013, 23:08 GMT]
The Immigration and Asylum Chamber of UK's Upper Tribunal, during hearings of an appeal by a Sri Lankan ex-Police officer who sought asylum in the UK claiming imminent threat of persecution, refused asylum to the appellant on the grounds that there was plausible evidence that the officer knowingly participated in war-crimes, and therefore, is excluded from the protections of the Refugee Convention. The Police officer, named "Mr. AS" in the proceedings to preserve anonymity, and believed to be a Sinhala officer, told the courts that he and 11 other members of a special unit of the police took part in white-van abductions of Tamils suspected of having links with the LTTE, and that his unit operated from abandoned buildings and received direct orders from Deputy Inspector General (DIG), a high level Police authority.
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UN, Ban Ki Moon celebrate Congo's military victory

[TamilNet, Sunday, 08 December 2013, 15:20 GMT]
In a meeting on 6th December in Paris with Congo's President Joseph Kabila, UN Secretary General had "...congratulated the DRC for the successful military operation against the M23...," and "reiterated the United Nations support to the DRC for which President Kabila expressed his gratitude," a UN official readout of the meeting appearing in the UN website said. Inner City Press (ICP) which covers UN proceedings asked, "since when did the UN start congratulating governments for "successful military operations"?, and comparing against UN actions in Sri Lanka, said, "[t]his harkens back for some to the UN's approach in 2009 to the Sri Lankan government's "successful military operations" against the Tamil Tigers or LTTE. A rebel group was wiped out; in that case tens of thousands of civilians were killed."
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Evidence presented against Sri Lanka at Genocide Tribunal in Germany

[TamilNet, Sunday, 08 December 2013, 01:29 GMT]
During the Second Session of the Peoples’ Tribunal on Sri Lanka which opened Saturday in Bremen, Germany, a panel of eleven eminent judges heard the "Prosecution outline its case that the crime of genocide has been and is being committed against the Tamil people in Sri Lanka," the press release issued by the sponsoring organizations, Permanent Peoples Tribunal (PPT) and Internationaler Menschenrechtsverein Bremen e.V. said. Eleven direct witnesses gave evidence to the panel during the first day. The judges, many of whom are legal scholars on genocide, will apply the principles enshrined in the 1948 Genocide Convention to the evidence presented, and announce their legal determination this Tuesday, December 10th.
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