Revisiting Sinhala nationalist mindset

[TamilNet, Monday, 16 August 2010, 00:15 GMT]
As long as Sinhala nationalist mindset deny the antiquity and right of Eezham Tamil nation in the island and unable to come out with appropriate political models, no ‘reconciliation’ will be possible and there will be only subjugation. The Tamils don’t deny the Sinhala nation in the island but they are not reciprocated. It has become a must that the national question be decided with secession for any genuine reconciliation at least in the future. The ‘kohomba kankariya’ model of the past envisaged by some academics, who want to be ‘Tamil and Sri Lankan,’ will not work under current norms of Sinhala nationalism. If the current subjugation of Tamils continues there won’t be anyone in the island in future even to read what these academics have written in Tamil, says an academic of Tamil studies in Jaffna.
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Rajapaksa authorizes Court Martial sentence on Fonseka

[TamilNet, Sunday, 15 August 2010, 09:15 GMT]
Sri Lanka’s President Mahinda Rajapaksa Saturday authorized the sentence imposed by the 1st Court Martial on the former Commander of the Sri Lanka Army (SLA) Sarath Fonseka. The first Court Martial Friday sentenced Sarath Fonseka which strips him of all military ranks, being found him guilty of involvement in political activity while in service. Rajapaksa has now authorized the sentence to be carried out with immediate effect, acting Military spokesman Colonel Duminda Gamage told media.
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UNP asks LLRC to summon Peiris, Moragoda, Karuna

[TamilNet, Sunday, 15 August 2010, 08:47 GMT]
Lessons Learnt and Reconciliation Commission appointed by the Sri Lanka’s President Mahinda Rajapaksa has been asked by the main opposition United National Party (UNP) to summon G.L.Peiris, Milinda Moragoda and Vinayagamoorthy Muralitharan alias Karuna Amman to get a balanced view of the peace process during the 2002 cease fire period under the then UNP government.
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SLA imposes new restrictions on resettled families in Vanni

[TamilNet, Saturday, 14 August 2010, 05:13 GMT]
Sri Lanka Army (SLA) occupying Vanni has instructed the resettled families not to allow anyone other than the family members to stay with them and not to offer food, sources in Vanni said. The restriction causes great difficulty for the relatives and friends of the resettled families who come a long way from Vavuniyaa, Jaffna and other places to visit them. Meanwhile, a large number of army uniforms had gone missing recently in one of the SLA camps in Mullaiththeevu district in Vanni, the sources said.
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Boat with 490 Tamil refugees docks in British Columbia

[TamilNet, Saturday, 14 August 2010, 04:50 GMT]
After spending nearly three months in sea, MV Sun Sea, a 59-metre Thai cargo ship, docked near Victoria, Canada Friday with nearly 490 Tamil refugees who fled Sri Lanka seeking safety and security in a foreign land thousands of miles away from northern Sri Lanka, their place of birth. The Canadian authorities boarded the ship the night before to bring the ship to the shore. 90 women and 45 children are estimated to be part of the migrant group, according to reports from Canada. The political climate will engulf migrants in immigration legal battles especially after the controversy surrounding the detention and later release of 76 Tamil migrants from the ship Ocean Lady last October, relatives of the migrants speculated.
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Colombo begins deluding campaign through ‘Lessons Learnt’ Commission

[TamilNet, Friday, 13 August 2010, 14:24 GMT]
Accusing the LTTE for missing the opportunity of ‘mega development’ and for walking out from the Peace Process on ‘flimsy grounds’, Sri Lanka’s former head of the Peace Secretariat, Bernard Gunatilleke inaugurated the misinformation campaign of Colombo while appearing before the ‘Lessons Learnt’ Commission on Wednesday. However, Gunetilleke who emphasized that the Interim Self Governing Authority (ISGA) demanded by the LTTE for return to negotiation could not have been granted by the government, didn’t attribute any reasons for it. Whether hoodwinking Tamils with ‘development without political solution’ is a long-contemplated strategy of Colombo and its abetters and whether it was this attitude that ditched the peace process is the question asked in the Tamil circles.
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Malaysian Tamil leader hard on Sri Lanka’s abetters, urges boycott

[TamilNet, Thursday, 12 August 2010, 17:12 GMT]
Malaysian Tamil leader and Deputy Chief Minister of the Penang State Prof P. Ramasamy came hard on some industrial circles of Ceylonese in Malaysia buttressing Colombo in the name of ‘development. Speaking to media Thursday he urged global Tamils to boycott commercial pursuits of Karunanidhi family. Party decisions announced by him urged Malaysian government to take a serious view of the situation in the island and wanted war crimes investigation to cover the roles played by Indian Prime Minister, Home Minister, Congress Party leader and Tamil Nadu Chief Minister. His party plans tabling resolution on war crimes investigation in the Penang State Assembly and internationally working for solutions to the national question of Eezham Tamils.
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Youth abducted in Valikaamam escapes

[TamilNet, Thursday, 12 August 2010, 04:35 GMT]
Two unidentified men stopped a youth on motorcycle Tuesday night in Thellippazhai, located next to the High Security Zone (HSZ) of occupying Sri Lanka Army (SLA) in Valikaamam North and abducted him on his motorcycle. The youth managed to escape the abductors and sought protection at Thellippazhai police station, sources in Thellippazhai said. The men could not have abducted the youth without the knowledge of the SLA soldiers present in the place, the sources said.
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SLA in Vanni harass hapless resettled families

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 11 August 2010, 19:01 GMT]
Sri Lanka Army (SLA) soldiers occupying Vanni are forcibly evacuating resettled uprooted families from their houses and lands on charges that they are supporters of Liberation Tigers and demand money to be allowed to live in their properties which they have managed to make livable, according to many complaints made to Vavuniyaa Human Rights Commission (HRC) office. The complainants, mainly women whose male members of their families had been killed or arrested and detained by SLA, say that members of certain organizations who maintain close relations with SLA soldiers assist them in this racket in which local SLA officers get a major share. In order to exhort money the SLA soldiers claim that the lands are needed for their own use.
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Devotees not permitted to stay overnight to continue rituals in Keerimalai temple

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 10 August 2010, 06:28 GMT]
Sri Lanka Army (SLA) occupying Jaffna peninsula did not allow thousands of Hindu devotees Monday night to continue the religious rituals to their ancestors in the historically famous Keerimalai Nakuleasvaram temple located in the SLA High Security Zone (HSZ) in Valikaamam North, sources in Jaffna said. The residents of this area, evacuated 20 years ago by SLA have not been permitted to resettle in their own properties which are under SLA occupation. Earlier in April, SLA had put up notices that no one should pollute the temple pond and the seas around as the area has been declared as a tourist spot. This infringement on religious rights had angered the devotees who gather to perform rites which had been observed by Hindus through ages.
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Extremism of defeatism

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 10 August 2010, 02:31 GMT]
Promoting extremism of defeatism is the latest ‘counterinsurgency’ weapon Colombo and those who abetted it in the war are trying on Eezham Tamils and especially on their diaspora in recent times. They do it for different purposes but none of them are prepared to come out with solutions other than subservience. Individual extremists of defeatism, who seek political space by upholding united Sri Lanka with wrong elements, are making the same mistake of their forefathers that haunt Eezham Tamils to this day and will continue to haunt their posterity. Eezham is the only rightful living space in the world for Eezham Tamils. Whatever geopolitical contests take place in the island the world will care only when Eezham Tamils have an independent polity for them.
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2 Indian High Commission officials on sudden visit to Jaffna

[TamilNet, Monday, 09 August 2010, 19:05 GMT]
Two key officials of the Indian High Commission to Sri Lanka in Colombo visited Jaffna Monday and held talks with high officers of Sri Lanka Amy (SLA) and police in Jaffna Secretariat. Northern Province Governor Major Gen. G. A. Chandrasiri and Jaffna Government Agent, Ms. Imelda Sukumar participated in this meeting, sources in Jaffna said. The visit of the Indian officials had not been announced and local media was not allowed to cover the meeting.
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HC applications to be filed by familes of disappeared LTTE key persons

[TamilNet, Monday, 09 August 2010, 07:28 GMT]
The family members of Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eezham (LTTE) key persons gone missing after arrest by Sri Lanka Army (SLA) or surrender at the end of the war on Vanni are to file Habeas Corpus (HC) applications next week, sources Jaffna said. According to Sri Lanka minister D. Gunasekara the wives of LTTE senior key persons Balakumaran and Yogi are now widows. Some sources say that both had been killed after surrendering to SLA and some that they are held in special SLA detention centres. The contradicting and confusing information have led their family members to file HC applications, the sources added.
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Moothoor east uprooted families languish in temporary shelters

[TamilNet, Sunday, 08 August 2010, 15:43 GMT]
Hundreds of uprooted Tamil families from Champoor north and east, Kooniththeevu and Navarathinapuram in Trincomalee district are accommodated in temporary shelters made up of tin sheets and cadjan leaves in Ki’liveddi, Ma’nalcheanai and Paddiththiddal in Moothoor division. They are agitating for their early resettlement in their villages. They fled from their villages following the military offensive launched by Sri Lanka Army (SLA) in April 2006. The uprooted families had sought refuge first in Batticaloa district.
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Malaysian politician to form Committee on genocide in Sri Lanka

[TamilNet, Sunday, 08 August 2010, 14:26 GMT]
Deputy Chief Minister of Penang, and human rights advocate, Prof. Ramasamy, is to form an international committee to collect evidence on the genocide of Tamils in Sri Lanka, with the aim of presenting a case to the United Nations (UN) Human Rights Panel, a Malaysian companian site to the Sun newspaper said Sunday. "The group will also fight for human rights anywhere, in places where people are deprived of their rights and privileges," said the Batu Kawan MP who is a long-time human right activist.
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US demining aid to alleviate Jaffna mine woes, says Jaffna SLA commander

[TamilNet, Sunday, 08 August 2010, 04:16 GMT]
With the United States announcing a fresh aid amounting to US$ 5.4 million to assist the demining activities in the northern province, steps have been taken to expedite demining and make the Jaffna peninsula an area free of demining by September this year, Jaffna Commanding Officer Major General Mahinda Hathurusinghe is reported to have said. Nearly one-third of the aid will bolster equipment capability of the Sri Lanka Army (SLA's) "Humanitarian Mining Unit," according to figures released by the US embassy in Colombo.
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Hordes of monkeys plague resettled families in Vanni

[TamilNet, Saturday, 07 August 2010, 05:19 GMT]
Monkeys in Vanni having multiplied in numbers after the war on Vanni invade into the temporary sheds of uprooted families hastily resettled by Sri Lanka government without clearing the area of the overgrown shrubs and jungle, sources in Vanni said. The resettled uprooted families in Vanni left to fend on their own without the needed assistance and subjected to occupying Sri Lanka Army (SLA) harassment are further assailed with the problem and danger of monkeys, the sources added.
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22 SLA personnel injured in road accident in Vavuniyaa

[TamilNet, Friday, 06 August 2010, 21:18 GMT]
A bus carrying Sri Lanka Army (SLA) personnel travelling from Jaffna to the South on vacation met with an accident Friday morning at Ee'ratperiyaku'lam in Vavuniyaa injuring 22 SLA personnel, Vavuniyaa hospital sources said. Over speeding was said to be the cause of the accident.
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Sri Lanka's "Lessons Learnt" Commission to start sittings

[TamilNet, Friday, 06 August 2010, 12:21 GMT]
Sri Lanka's 8-member Commission, with a mandate drafted to carefully avoid inquiry into alleged war-crimes committed by protagonists or to investigate into rights violations, is to start sittings from next Wednesday, Sri Lanka Government's news portal announced. For Sri Lanka, the sittings assumes importance after Sri Lanka's failed attempt to prevent functioning of the United Nations advisory committee, and the refusal by Non-Aligned Member (NAM) nations to endorse Sri Lanka's letter to UN objecting to the UN panel.
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Odduchuddaan

[TamilNet, Thursday, 05 August 2010, 21:01 GMT]
The quarry mound
The mound or high ground that remains after quarrying
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