95 Tamil girls ‘alter’ the image, says 300,000 strong Sinhala military

[TamilNet, Sunday, 24 March 2013, 14:09 GMT]
The 300,000-strong genocidal Sinhala military of Sri Lanka on Thursday took ‘pride’ in recruiting for the first time 95 Tamil girls for ‘office’ work and said that it is an evidence for the military not discriminating on ethnicity. Out of 150 Tamil girls who were originally forced to enter Sri Lanka’s military, 55 managed to escape. During the ‘training,’ around 20 driven to the stage of hysteria were admitted in hospital. The Tamil psychiatry doctor who came forward to their help himself was branded as mentally challenged. He is imprisoned and yet to be released. On the passing out parade day, four of the girls fainted, while their kith and kin were helplessly watching. Promises were made for one million rupees housing aid and 44 girls received Indian-made scooters, but parents complained that their daughters, held against their will, are not allowed to visit homes.
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Australia's vote at Geneva raises questions

[TamilNet, Saturday, 23 March 2013, 19:53 GMT]
While rights group and Tamils dismissed the US resolution passed in the UNHRC sessions in Geneva as toothless and as allowing space to Colombo to continue with the structural genocide of Tamils, Australia was reluctant to endorse even this resolution, and voted at the last minute because of "concerns it would offend the ruling Rajapaksa brothers," Australia's ABC news reported quoting executive director of the New York based rights group Human Rights Watch [HRW], Kenneth Roth. "It is pretty clear Australia's policy toward Sri Lanka is the asylum seeker tail wagging the bilateral dog," Roth said.
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Tamil protest in Italy draws support of rights group

[TamilNet, Saturday, 23 March 2013, 13:46 GMT]
At a protest organised by the Tamil organisations in the city of Palermo in Italy on Friday, Marco Farina, the head of Human Rights Youth Organisation (HRYO), a youth group that studies about non-violence, pacifism, and tolerance for change and voices for the civil and human rights, pledged his organization's support for the self-determination of the Eezham Tamils.
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Tamil National People’s Front rejects Geneva resolution

[TamilNet, Saturday, 23 March 2013, 00:07 GMT]
“The resolution asks that local mechanisms to be put in place in order to carry out the investigations. We find it unacceptable and we reject it completely. […] The second reason why we reject the resolution is that it puts emphasis and a lot of faith in the recommendations of the LLRC report. […] And finally, the third reason, why we distance ourselves from this resolution is, because unlike the first resolution passed in 2012, in this resolution there is a specific mention of the provincial council system. […] Our party’s considered view is that we are not only unable to associate ourselves anywhere close with the resolution, but also that we have come to a difficult decision of rejecting the decision that was passed,” announced Mr Gajendrakumar Ponnambalam, President of the Tamil National People’s Front (TNPF), at the Press Club meet in Jaffna on Friday.
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Time to wage next stage of struggle

[TamilNet, Friday, 22 March 2013, 07:13 GMT]
The Eezham Tamil grassroot may have to bring in new leadership that has faith in people’s power; that has the ability to mobilise people’s power; that gets its power from the people and that invites the ‘diplomats’ to come to it rather than going to them. Never forget that non-cooperation is an effective way of democratic struggle, especially in struggles facing imperialism. With confidence coming from the Tamil Nadu upsurge to embark on a new genre of struggle, Eezham Tamils should know converting the solidarity into a joint people’s power rather than detracting it or hijacking it. The Tamil Nadu upsurge cannot be silenced like the defeatists silencing the diaspora uprising. New Delhi and Washington may brush aside the upsurge by adamantly passing an empty resolution. But the effects of the upsurge are already showing and it depends on how the struggle is going to be led further.
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Australian Greens Senator criticizes support to empty US resolution

[TamilNet, Friday, 22 March 2013, 03:44 GMT]
Responding to a motion passed in the Australian Federal Parliament on Thursday which welcomed the Australian government’s decision to support the US resolution at Geneva, Greens Senator Lee Rhiannon said “the Australian Greens cannot congratulate the government in supporting the empty US-initiated resolution on Sri Lanka, tabled at the UN Human Rights Council in Geneva. It is weak because it urges the Sri Lankan government to implement its own investigation into the war crimes that it is accused of committing.” The motion, which is not binding but is significant as a statement of position, that was tabled by Senators Madigan and Xenophon was passed by the senate. In a separate statement, Ms. Rhiannon also called for an independent international investigation on Sri Lanka, referring to the demands of the Tamil Nadu student protestors.
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Genocidal double talk by India, US - Prof. Boyle

[TamilNet, Friday, 22 March 2013, 01:46 GMT]
Professor Francis A. Boyle, an expert in international law, called the statements made by the U.S. Secretary of State, John Kerry, and by India's ambassador to the U.N., Dilip Sinha, after the adoption of the US resolution on Sri Lanka in the Geneva sessions of the UNHCR, as "genocidal double-talk," pointing out the "blatant hypocrisy" in praising a resolution that looked at Colombo to implement the recommendation of its local "truth" commission. While rights groups and Tamils demanded an "international" investigation into the killings in Mu'l'l'vaaykkaal, leaked U.S. State Department memos had earlier revealed US officials acknowledging the futility of local investigations when culpability for the war-crimes pointed at Sri Lanka's President Rajapakse and his siblings.
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TN upsurge transcending establishments inspires NZ Tamils

[TamilNet, Friday, 22 March 2013, 01:12 GMT]
In a demonstration held in Auckland in New Zealand on Wednesday, the demonstrators profusely thanked the students of Tamils Nadu for internationally highlighting the genocide issue of Eezham Tamils at a most wanted time and for taking the issue beyond the party politics of India in convincing the world that creation of Tamil Eelam is the only solution. “Our struggle begins here and a hard road is ahead,” said one of the speakers at the demonstration, participated by professionals, university students and a large number of women. New Zealand Tamils were one of the first to openly caution the entire diaspora last month itself on the dangers portended by the ‘doing nothing’ approach of the USA towards the question of Eezham Tamils.
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Diaspora youth join Tamil Nadu students in protest

[TamilNet, Thursday, 21 March 2013, 03:46 GMT]
In a demonstration of solidarity with the demands of the Tamil Nadu students’ uprising, Eezham Tamil diaspora youth across several western countries have come out in protest against the pro-LLRC US resolution tabled at Geneva and pushing for a just political solution for the Eezham Tamil nation facing genocidal oppression in its occupied homeland. The protesters were unanimous in rejecting any resolution that binds the Eezham Tamil nation to unitary Sri Lanka. A copy of the US resolution was also burnt in Toronto, where solidarity groups had also participated in protests. While student protests occurred in London, Berlin, Dusseldorf, Toronto, Copenhagen and Oslo on Wednesday, a hunger strike was initiated by students in Sydney on Thursday, and further protests are scheduled in the coming days in major cities in western countries.
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Unprecedented demonstration in Tamil Nadu denounces empty resolution at Geneva

[TamilNet, Thursday, 21 March 2013, 03:29 GMT]
Several hundreds of thousands people across Tamil Nadu took to streets on Wednesday in a students-led demonstration unprecedented in recent decades in Tamil Nadu, denouncing the US-tabled empty resolution further diluted by New Delhi at Geneva, and demanding international investigations and plebiscite on the question of Eezham Tamils. Peaceful demonstrations took place at every part of Tamil Nadu, including all the major cities. Conservative estimates put the total number of participants, mostly students, at a million. The positions taken by Washington and New Delhi, the leading architects and abetters to the genocidal war in the island, in bringing out a deceptive resolution at Geneva have contributed immensely to the confirmed awareness among the people of Tamil Nadu that Tamil Eelam is the only solution to the genocide-affected Eezham Tamils, political observers in Chennai commented.
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Adopting draft resolution will violate Genocide Convention, says Boyle

[TamilNet, Thursday, 21 March 2013, 00:01 GMT]
Commenting on the draft resolution being circulated by the United States at the the Geneva sessions of the UNHRC, Francis Boyle, Professor at the School of Law, University of Illinois and an expert in international law said that UNHRC and its member states, by adopting the draft resolution (3rd draft) will be abetting the on-going systematic structural genocide in violation of the 1948 Genocide Convention. The vote on Sri Lanka resolution is likely to take place as early as Thursday, according to sources in Geneva.
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Tamil Nadu boils - WSJ

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 20 March 2013, 04:26 GMT]
Thousands of students across Tamil Nadu have launched protests urging India to move a resolution in the UNHCR meeting in Geneva against Sri Lanka's war crimes, Wall Street Jounal, Indian edition, reported. Nearly 500 students have been arrested across Tamil Nadu in the past three days "for fasting, picketing and boycotting classes," according to the State's Police Commissioner. Meanwhile, New York Times commented that "[t]he recent upheaval in Tamil Nadu has been sparked by the recent release of disturbing photographs of the body of the former Tamil rebel leader’s 12-year old son, who appeared to have been shot at close range in the chest, and a report on the continued abuse of Tamils in Sri Lanka."
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Indian intelligentsia led by The Hindu, CPI-M, failed Tamils: Thirumurugan

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 20 March 2013, 04:23 GMT]
Talking about the two sides of Indian intelligentsia, and from where the struggle in Tamil Nadu is gaining its ideological support, Mr Thirumurugan Gandhi of the May 17 Movement said, the Indian intelligentsia that is mostly Left-orientated and goes with the CPI-M has failed Tamils in the past. The CPI-M, for its information, depends on The Hindu or NGOs like the Observer Research Foundation that is liaising between the Establishments in Colombo and New Delhi, said Mr Thirumurugan in an exclusive interview to TamilNet in last November.
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German Left youth group conveys solidarity with Tamil Nadu protesters

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 20 March 2013, 03:31 GMT]
The North Rhine-Westphalia youth wing of the Die Linke leftist political party in Germany conveyed its solidarity with the student upsurge in Tamil Nadu in a statement released on Tuesday. Criticizing the US administration for supporting Sri Lanka owing to “geo-strategic interests in the region”, the statement further called on the German federal government “to push for an international, independent investigation of the genocide, as well as to support a referendum on an independent Tamil state.” Speaking to TamilNet, Balakrishnan Koculan, a leftist Eezham Tamil youth activist from the same party, criticized those sections of diaspora organizations that compromised principled Tamil politics unwilling to criticize the US, urging the diaspora youth to join in protest along with the Tamil Nadu students.
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Conscious inequity: The Hindu’s “Mindless solidarity”

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 20 March 2013, 01:28 GMT]
As the peoples’ mobilisation in Tamil Nadu is surging up to question the junta of the Establishments that was ultimately responsible for the genocide and on-going genocide of Eezham Tamils, The Hindu that played a leading part in the media game seems to be ‘missing’ the LTTE. “With the terrorist Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam no longer in the picture, large sections of the people in Tamil Nadu have begun to openly sympathise with the plight of Tamils in Sri Lanka,” said the editorial of The Hindu titled “Mindless solidarity” on Tuesday. The Hindu, perhaps because of its base in Chennai and perhaps because it represents the interests of a particular class (not exactly caste) suffers from the defect of cat’s eye view when it comes to the question of Eezham Tamils, writes TamilNet political commentator in Colombo.
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Confusion prevails among pro-Establishment lobbyists in Geneva

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 19 March 2013, 16:30 GMT]
While the students of Tamil Nadu and the grassroots among the global Tamil diaspora exposed the danger of the US-proposed, LLRC-based, empty resolution from its very inception in the 22nd UNHRC session, a section of the Establishment-centric lobbyists were pinning hopes on the resolution. However, they were taken aback Tuesday, when they were shown the latest amendments that had been made to the draft, informed sources at Geneva told TamilNet.
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Karunanidhi pulls out from New Delhi Establishment

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 19 March 2013, 13:52 GMT]
DMK chief Mr M Karunanidhi in a press meet in Chennai on Tuesday announced the decision of his party pulling out from the ruling Congress coalition and cabinet at New Delhi. Continuing any further in the Indian Central Government is committing great evil to Tamil people, after the Indian Government has largely diluted the US resolution and didn’t consider the suggestions made by the DMK, and as there is a situation created that is not going to help the Eezham Tamils in any way, Mr. Karunanidhi told media. There could be no ambiguity in opinion that Rajapakse regime committed genocide in Tamil Eelam, Mr Karunanidhi said. Paying heroes’ homage (Veera Va’nakkam) to the Tamil fighters and their families who laid down their lives in the Eezham War, Mr Karunanidhi said they fought for idealistic victory, while people lacking Tamil feeling ridiculed at them.
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Rape and murder of Tamil women by Sri Lankan forces aims at genocide: NZ Tamils

[TamilNet, Monday, 18 March 2013, 23:56 GMT]
In a letter addressed to Ms. Navaneetham Pillay, UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, on Sunday, the Tamil Action Front of New Zealand (TAFNZ), citing established cases of the rape and murder of Tamil Women by the Sinhala military of Sri Lanka, said that there is a pattern of structural genocide being meticulously executed by Sri Lanka, irrespective of who is in power. What is new is the openly declared policy of the Rajapaksa regime to complete the genocide with tacit international support and by calculated false propaganda materialized through wine, women, diamonds and dollars, the TAFNZ letter signed by its coordinator, Mr. A. Theva Rajan, accused.
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Jayalalithaa urging international investigation cum interim setup slips in solution

[TamilNet, Monday, 18 March 2013, 23:28 GMT]
Tamil Nadu Chief Minister Ms. Jayalalithaa in a letter addressed to Indian Prime Minister Dr Manmohan Singh on Monday, demanded India to “strengthen” the US resolution tabled at Geneva by including an “unequivocal call for a credible, independent, international mechanism to prosecute genocide, war crimes and war criminals.” She wanted the process, including bringing the responsible for trial before an International Court, to be completed within six months for reporting at UNHRC next March. The CM, implying an international interim setup, has also urged India to modify the resolution so that Sri Lanka has to accept an international institution to act on reconciliation coupled with “a pragmatic political package,” making Tamils equal citizens on par with Sinhalese. However, her outlook for solutions was based on a ‘Sri Lankan Tamil minority’ framework.
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TN readies biers for US resolution, demands genocide acceptance, interim set-up, referendum

[TamilNet, Sunday, 17 March 2013, 23:19 GMT]
Declare genocide, announce international investigations on Sri Lanka, bring forth interim administration and conduct UN referendum to do justice to the question of Eezham Tamils, demanded thousands of protestors, who gathered at Marina Beach in Chennai in Tamil Nadu on Sunday. Meanwhile, students of the Indian Institute of Technology in Chennai (IIT), an internationally renowned all-India institute, came out in solidarity with the student upsurge, by observing a day-long fast. Despite the attempt of Tamil Nadu state to deter the upsurge by closing a section of government colleges, the student movement gained momentum during the weekend. In the struggle demanding justice, the students' movement prepares biers to take the US resolution to ‘cremation’ on Monday, news sources in Tamil Nadu said.
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