Fishermen in Ezhuvai-theevu protest against Indian poaching

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 12 January 2011, 09:49 GMT]
Fishermen in Ezhuvai-theevu island off Jaffna on Tuesday protested against poaching by Indian trawlers in their waters, heavily destroying the sea-resources and the livelihood of local fishermen. All traffic to and from the island was disturbed and the whole island was at standstill as all the residents joined the protest expressing support to the fishermen. Sri Lanka Navy officers from Kayts, who arrived at the site of protest told protestors that the SLN had no instructions to interfere in the matter as it was an issue of diplomatic relations between the Sri Lankan and the Indian states.
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Tamil villages of Katpiddi Peninsula are for sales by Colombo

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 11 January 2011, 06:05 GMT]
Many traditional Tamil villages in the Katpiddi Peninsula and islets off that in the Puththa'lam district of the North West Province are for sales by Colombo establishment, ostensibly for tourism purposes under Kalpitiya Integrated Tourism Resort Project (KITRP). “There are about 11 investors who applied to invest around US$ 500 million to put up tourist resorts, golf courses, marinas, etc in this zone which was defined as a tourist zone by the Sri Lanka Tourism Authority, but the government is not happy with the bids which have mainly come from Indian parties,” Sunday Times reported. The presence of Chinese is overwhelming in the Katpiddi Peninsula along with construction of Nuraichchoalai power plant, local residents said.
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TNA to contest local elections, TPPF politically divided

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 11 January 2011, 05:14 GMT]
The Tamil National Alliance (TNA) has decided to contest all the local government institutions in the North and Eastern provinces in the forthcoming election. Some of the political parties affiliated to the recently formed Tamil Political Parties Forum (TPPF) have reportedly expressed their willingness to contest the forthcoming local election under the TNA banner, informed sources said. The official TNA stand is to contest alone. Meanwhile, the TNA is increasingly under pressure to put forward a document on political solution as absolute ‘minimum’ from both New Delhi and Colombo establishments, informed sources said.
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Five of six Mannaar abductees released, Colombo involvement exposed

[TamilNet, Monday, 10 January 2011, 08:40 GMT]
Five of six civilians abducted from Mannaar on Thursday, including Jazeel Jaharil whose abduction created confrontation between the abductors and his relatives exposing the squads link with Sri Lankan military, returned Friday evening from Colombo and were handed over to their relatives Saturday early morning by the Sri Lankan Police. Earlier reports said 4 persons were abducted on Thursday. But, according to latest information 6 persons were abducted that day. No information is available about the other person, Mr. Sasi, who is also reported missing on Thursday.
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Colombo hurriedly appoints Sinhala civil officials to North

[TamilNet, Monday, 10 January 2011, 06:45 GMT]
Colombo establishment is hurriedly attempting to appoint Sinhala officials in higher posts of the civil administration in the North in recent days, civil sources in Jaffna said. Sinhala officials are being appointed to top level civil services posts of local civil administration, the civil sources further said. Meanwhile, among 135 new recruits to Sri Lanka Administrative Service (SLAS) recently, there is not even one Tamil and there was only one Muslim. SL Secretary to Public Administration gave an explanation that none of the Tamil medium candidates could score enough marks in the examination evaluated by Tamil academics, implying that standard of education among war-torn Tamils became poor. But Colombo has no explanation why it was poor even among Up-Country Tamils, Colombo Tamils and Muslims, in not being able to bring out administrators.
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Trincomalee, Batticaloa flooded

[TamilNet, Monday, 10 January 2011, 03:39 GMT]
Heavy rain fall since Saturday night has brought the normal life in the three districts of East, Trincomalee, Batticaloa and Ampaarai, to standstill and almost all the villages including DS offices are under water. According to latest figures, in Batticaloa district alone 421,851 persons from 112,039 families have been affected. The two districts, Trincomalee and Batticaloa, were experiencing heavy rain with strong winds till Sunday evening amid fears that it might develop as a cyclone. Several thousand villagers including uprooted and sheltered in transit camps in Trincomalee district awaiting resettlement in Champoor in Moothoor East are again displaced and sought refuge at various places and desperation prevails in many divisions of the Eastern Province.
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Eyewash LLRC makes even the commission members to doze off

[TamilNet, Sunday, 09 January 2011, 03:55 GMT]
LLRC commission members, tired and perhaps sleepless over their own pretentious exercises, were seen dozing off during the session in Mannaar Saturday, when more than 500 gathered to give evidence and many more could not attend due to lack of space in the hall. People were waiting from 8.30 in the morning, the announced time for the session, but the commission members came only at 10.30. The hearing was over by 2.00 PM for the three AGA divisions of Musali, Naanaaddaan and Mannaar Town. 8 witnesses gave evidence and 250 remaining were asked to give their submissions in writing. Meanwhile, representative of Mannaar Tamil Association, V. S. Sivakaran, while giving evidence said that people have lost faith and are suspicious of exercises like LLRC that do not go hand in hand with political initiatives, but on the contrary coupled with more oppression.
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Colombo attempts to divert attention from increasing lawlessness in Jaffna

[TamilNet, Saturday, 08 January 2011, 18:00 GMT]
Colombo is campaigning to portray the continually escalating incidents of civilian murders, disappearance and robberies as being the result of individual enmities and family squabbles among the local population, civil sources in Jaffna said. Jaffna district Senior Superintendent of Police (SSP), Neville Padmadeva, speaking at a conference to explore the reasons for the increasing crimes, held in Jaffna’s Veerasingham Hall Friday, in the presence of NGOs, journalists and civil society members, advanced this view, according to attendees. Colombo is keen to divert the attention of the media and the international community from focusing on Sri Lanka Security forces saturating Jaffna district, and Colombo’s tacit sanction to Jaffna-deployed Sri Lanka soldiers and collaborating paramilitaries to create fear among the public to suppress dissent, civil sources in Jaffna said.
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NorthEast Local Election circulars printed in Sinhala only

[TamilNet, Saturday, 08 January 2011, 13:34 GMT]
Sri Lanka Government has issued circulars and directives for the forthcoming local council elections printed in Sinhala only, sources in Jaffna said. Election officials in the NorthEast are undergoing enormous difficulties in interpreting the directions and procedures to conduct the elections. Civil society sources said that Colombo appears to be imposing Sinhala only policy especially following the recent controversy after forcing the Jaffna Tamil school students to sing the Sri Lankan national anthem in Sinhala.
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JDS condemns silence of Colombo media over terror campaign in North

[TamilNet, Saturday, 08 January 2011, 08:27 GMT]
Detailing the recent killings, abductions and other atrocities in the SL military occupied North, the Journalists For Democracy in Sri Lanka (JDS), an exiled organisation of journalists, on Friday condemned the silence of Sinhala and English media in Colombo over the terror campaign. Instead, these media highlight only the explanations from the side of the SL government, the report said. The JDS statement exposed the latest twist of portrayal of the situation by SL media minister and government spokesperson Keheliya Rambukwella, who wanted to pass the blame on "elements seeking tarnish the image of Colombo government internationally". The JDS statement, with details of earlier unreported crimes, noted that human rights violations not being exposed is high in Vanni as journalists and aid workers were barred from entering Ki'linochchi and Mullaiththeevu districts.
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Fatal blow on Eezham Tamil fishery follows Indo-Lanka ‘defence’ agreement

[TamilNet, Saturday, 08 January 2011, 01:14 GMT]
From Maathakal to Mannaar, several millions worth fishing nets belonging to Eezham Tamil fishermen, laid in the Palk Bay even very close to the shores of the country of Eezham Tamils, were systematically destroyed this week in a highly organised way by trawlers coming from the Tamil Nadu coast. The destruction of Eezham Tamil fishery in the Palk Bay follows immediately the defence agreement signed between New Delhi’s Defence Secretary Pradeep Kumar and Colombo’s Defence Secretary Gotabhaya Rajapaksa in the last week of December. While an agreement has been reached between the two establishments on the security of sea-lanes, as in the past many protocols of it remain a secret. Both the establishments in New Delhi and Colombo have joint interests in bringing in a wedge between the Tamil fishing communities on either side of the Palk Bay.
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Sudden transfer of Vanni GAs, political motivation of SL minister alleged

[TamilNet, Friday, 07 January 2011, 03:59 GMT]
Mannaar Government Agent A. Nicholas Pillai has been suddenly released of his duties and has been transferred to ministry work in Colombo. The Mullaiththeevu Government Agent Nagalingam Vethanayagam is expected to take over Mannaar. A project director in Mannaar District Secretariat, A. Pathinathar will be taking over as government agent of Mullaiththeevu district, informed sources in Mannaar DS said.
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EPDP, SLA, confuse public, lottery-fraud arrested in Jaffna

[TamilNet, Friday, 07 January 2011, 03:31 GMT]
An alleged EPDP member from Vavuniyaa faced the brunt of public anger in Jaffna as he was said to be moving in suspicious ways and was selling fake lottery tickets in Martin Road, Jaffna on Thursday. SL Police, on information from public, arrested him. He is said to have confessed his membership with the EPDP. There was no response from the side of the EPDP. Meanwhile, EPDP leader and SL minister Douglas Devananda in the SL parliament on Tuesday said that he didn’t want to embarrass the SL government internationally by raising the plight of the fear-engulfed people in Jaffna. In the meantime, the public in Jaffna senses EPDP and SLA indirectly passing blame on each other over the systematic infliction of terror by manipulative forces controlling the both.
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First land, now food: Sri Lanka’s powers-abetted genocide progresses unabated

[TamilNet, Friday, 07 January 2011, 01:17 GMT]
In its innovative model of inspiring the entire world on genocide, the Sri Lankan state has decided to deploy its occupying military to cultivate 40, 000 acres of abandoned land in the country of Eezham Tamils, after uprooting them in the war and not allowing them to resettle. The program is being implemented under the directions of SL President Mahinda Rajapaksa and Defense Secretary Gotabaya Rajapaksa, according to SL military media. The SL colonial governor in the north, Maj. Gen. G A Chandrasiri said this week that the government would cultivate black gram on 19,786 acres, groundnuts on 7,231 acres, red onions on 4,709 acres, green chillies on 4,329 acres and cowpea on 4,729 acres. The SL Army will also buy produce of farmers cultivating near its sprawling estates, and it will sell vegetables in Colombo at ‘concessionary’ rate to control market prices.
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Indian coast guard says deterring Sri Lankan attacks

[TamilNet, Thursday, 06 January 2011, 17:05 GMT]
The Indian Coast Guard is taking steps to protect Indian fishermen from the attacks by the Sri Lankan Navy (SLN), outgoing Inspector General of the Eastern Region A. Rajasekhar told IANS last week. Speaking on Dec 29, the day after twenty Tamil Nadu fishermen were assaulted mid-sea by the SLN, he claimed the number of attacks on Indian fishermen were declining due to the Coast Guard’s vigilance. The Coast Guard has ordered twelve hovercraft to expand its capacity, he told IANS. The twenty fishermen were attacked in mid-sea off Dhanushkodi village, PTI quoted fisheries officials as saying in Rameswaram last Tuesday.
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Assault on Tamil media personnel continues in East

[TamilNet, Thursday, 06 January 2011, 16:55 GMT]
Attacks on media persons in Batticaloa and Ampaa'rai districts by armed groups and politicians associated with Colombo is on the increase. On Wednesday, P.M.M.A.Cader, a media person working for several years in the Ampaa'rai district, was severely assaulted on Wednesday by a councillor of the Kalmunai Municipal Council when the journalist was on his way to Maruthamunai to collect information about displaced persons due to the recent floods. Mr. Cader has been warded in Maruthamunai base hospital.
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Colombo extends Emergency for another month

[TamilNet, Thursday, 06 January 2011, 16:52 GMT]
The Sri Lanka’s parliament Wednesday evening adopted, as usual, a motion to extend the State of Emergency for another month by a majority of one hundred and eleven votes. One hundred and thirty four members of the ruling United Peoples National Alliance (UPFA) and its constituents voted for the motion.
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Tamil jewellery shop in Colombo burgled

[TamilNet, Thursday, 06 January 2011, 10:47 GMT]
A jewellery shop located close to a police station along busy Galle Road in Wellawatte was burgled by a gang of unidentified persons Tuesday morning. The owner of the jewelry shop is a Tamil person. Initial investigations revealed that the value of the jewellery robbed could be estimated to the tune of several hundred thousands of rupees, Police said. The Tamil business community in the Wellawatte area is highly perturbed over the day time robbery carried out by a gang in a busy area watched by recently installed detective cameras by the Sri Lankan defense ministry.
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Sri Lanka's attempt at illegal arms deal with Iran, N.Korea exposed

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 05 January 2011, 02:08 GMT]
A classified State Department cable dated May 1st, 2009, released by WikiLeaks and posted in Norwegian daily Aftenposten, revealed that Sri Lanka's alleged attempts to negotiate arms deal with Iranian Government and North Korean Government violated U.S's Iran Non-proliferation Act of 2000 (INKSNA), and the United Nation's Security Council Resolution 1718 (UNSCR 1718). Lanka Logistics, a Sri Lanka Government owned firm was named in the classified document as the Sri Lanka party involved in the illegal arms deal. Gotabaya Rajapakse, brother of Sri Lanka's President, held the post of chairman of the firm and exercised complete control over arms purchases, according to Colombo media reports.
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Send all party delegation to Jaffna to assess situation, says UNP

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 04 January 2011, 13:54 GMT]
Ranil Wickremasinghe, leader of the main opposition United National Party (UNP) Tuesday made an appeal to the Speaker of the Sri Lanka Parliament to take immediate steps to send an all party delegation to the Northern Province to assess the ground situation amid complaints by that people in Jaffna live in fear psychosis due to the rise in abduction, killing extortion by armed gangs. EPDP, one of the Para military groups supporting the government state security machinery, has been accused of encouraging abduction, killing and extortion in Jaffna by civic groups. A recent disclosure of confidential note by a US ambassador revealed that the paramilitaries operate with impunity for criminal acts sanctioned by highest level officials in Colombo.
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