SLA refuses permission of reopen fishing jetties in Vadamaraadchi

[TamilNet, Monday, 19 July 2010, 06:19 GMT]
The fisheries societies in Vadamaraadchi protest against Sri Lanka Army (SLA) occupying Jaffna peninsula for refusing to reopen and deepen the fishing jetties in Vadamaraadchi North and East, which had been closed by SLA during war. 11,200 families living in nearly fifteen villages in Vadamaraadchi North and East depend entirely on fishing and are affected by the closure of the fishing jetties in their areas, sources in Vadamaraadchi said.
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SLA soldiers plunder produce of civilians in Batticaloa

[TamilNet, Sunday, 18 July 2010, 16:10 GMT]
Sri Lanka Army (SLA) soldiers intimidate the resettled civilians in Paduvaankarai area in Batticaloa district and take away their home produce without paying money, according to complaints made by the affected civilians to Sri Lanka government authorities. Despite complaints to government officials the SLA soldiers continue to rob the poor civilians of what they had managed to produce as no action has been taken on them, sources in Batticaloa said.
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Non-derogable rights under international law

[TamilNet, Sunday, 18 July 2010, 14:25 GMT]
While the United Nations charter guarantees "the sovereign equality of all its Members," evolving legal doctrines dealing with genocide, war crimes, and crimes against humanity are leading to the theory that the national sovereignty is not absolute, but is qualified by peremptory norms determined by jus cogens or "compelling law." Despite Sril Lanka's persistent opposition, based on sovereignty claims, to international attempts to investigate alleged killing of more than 40,000 of Tamil civilians, the egregious nature of these crimes is unlikely to disappear from the consciousness of the world community and the Tamils affected by war. Until the issue is taken up at the world courts, expatriate Tamils should seek to assert jus cogens based cause of action in the courts of Europe and elsewhere to bring Sri Lanka officials complicit in war-crimes to justice.
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China sends convicts to work in Sri Lanka, Maldives

[TamilNet, Sunday, 18 July 2010, 12:56 GMT]
Thousands of Chinese convicts have been pressed into service in projects by state-run Chinese companies in Sri Lanka, a strategically important country for China, which is seeking a role in the Indian Ocean. Chinese convicts also have been taken to a microstate in the Indian Ocean, the Maldives, where the Chinese government is building 4,000 houses on several different islands as a government-to- government "gift" to win influence there, writes Indian Professor of Strategic Studies Brahma Chellaney in The Japan Times, 5th July. A couple of months back a Chinese technician working in the construction of Nuraichchoalai thermal power plant undertaken by China in Puththa’lam district was arrested for alleged rape of a minor girl, Sri Lankan media reported.
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US landing-ship visits Trincomalee for 'community work'

[TamilNet, Sunday, 18 July 2010, 09:13 GMT]
Sailors and marines from the amphibious dock landing ship USS Pearl Harbour, visiting Trincomalee last week were engaged in repairing broken bathroom sinks and toilets at the base hospital in Moothoor, said the official website of the United States Navy Thursday. Meanwhile, a Sri Lankan media reported Sunday that Sri Lanka shared her experience in fighting Sea Tigers with the US Navy during the three-day visit of the US Pearl Harbour. While some Sailors and Marines are planning to help with military-to-military training on board Pearl Harbor, others are planning on volunteering for medical assistance events ashore, The Sunday Island said.
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SLA installs Buddha statute in Tamil village in Mannaar district

[TamilNet, Saturday, 17 July 2010, 15:09 GMT]
Sri Lanka Army (SLA) soldiers have installed a Buddha statute in Pa’ndivirichchaan, a traditional Tamil village two km from Madu St. Mary’s Church in Madu Assistant Government Agent division in Mannaar district. Residents uprooted during SLA offensive two year back have been recently resettled in Pa’ndivirichchaan.
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Vallai Textile Mills inaugurated defying SLA obstruction

[TamilNet, Friday, 16 July 2010, 16:46 GMT]
Board of Directors of Vallai ‘Ceylon Spinning & Textile Mills Ltd.’ located in Uduppiddi in Vadamaraadchhi inaugurated the re-establishment project of the above concern by unveiling its name board defying Sri Lanka Army (SLA) orders to keep out of the site on claims that it is reserved as ‘Army Land’, Vadamaraadchi sources said. SLA officials stopped Tuesday the initial efforts by Uduppiddi Welfare Society and other public organizations to renovate Vallai ‘Ceylon Spinning & Textile Mills Ltd.’ which had ceased to function for more than twenty years due to war. The event was followed by a public meeting attended by nearly a hundred persons including local residents and members of Uduppiddi Welfare Society and other public organizations of the area.
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Weiss: Colombo dominated by racist ideologues

[TamilNet, Thursday, 15 July 2010, 23:28 GMT]
Arguing the reasons why Sri Lanka is making "fanciful" claims that "as many as half of all Tamil boatpeople have "links" to the Tigers," Gordon Weiss, UN spokesperson in Sri Lanka during the war, says "Its [Sri Lanka's] government is dominated by racist ideologues who promote the notion of the Sinhalese as a "chosen people." Government death squads have snatched thousands of people from the streets over the years. The country's highest court has explicitly rejected the role of international human rights instruments in Sri Lanka's affairs. And the government continues to deny that it killed civilians during the recent war, that there were battlefield executions, that it bombed hospitals, or that there is anything wrong with the sham democratic machinery of the state. The repressive creature of extreme nationalism is alive and well in Sri Lanka."
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Verdict on Sri Lanka should be warning to others: Pakistan Newspaper

[TamilNet, Thursday, 15 July 2010, 18:07 GMT]
“The verdict on Sri Lanka should come as a warning to other armies fighting on their own soil”, says Thursday’s editorial of Pakistan’s influential newspaper Dawn, commenting on UN’s efforts of war crimes investigation and Sri Lanka’s opposition to it. “The war was conducted by the army but had the full backing of the president who believed that Tamil Eelam was an intractable problem which could not be resolved through political means”, the Dawn said. Meanwhile, Tamil circles were commenting on the war crimes of peace brokers. The former peace facilitator Erik Solheim made a statement last month that lives would have been saved and the UN, the USA and India would have taken over the situation had the LTTE surrendered. Why didn’t he tell this possibility when hundreds of thousands took to street to stop the war, asks Dr. T. Sivakanesan, a member of Transnational Government of Tamil Eelam.
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SL government intends to keep Jaffna in SLA grip

[TamilNet, Thursday, 15 July 2010, 17:44 GMT]
Sri Lanka government has speeded up constructing several new Sri Lanka Army (SLA) camps and bases around Jaffna town. Hundreds of SLA soldiers are working day and night constructing a big base on the coastal area government land between Pa’n’nai and Kurunakar, sources in Jaffna said. A big SLA base is already under construction in Meenaadchipuram in Pa’n’nai area and another important base in Jaffna Fort. Meanwhile, though it had been announced that the private properties occupied by SLA 512 Division in Jaffna town are to be located elsewhere so far nothing in that direction has been done. Jaffna is being swiftly converted into a garrison town of SLA encircled by camps and bases, the sources added.
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Tamil Nadu Police detains Vaiko, Nedumaran, Rajendran

[TamilNet, Thursday, 15 July 2010, 15:13 GMT]
Tamil Nadu police arrested Wednesday Vaiko, the leader of Marumalarchi Dravida Munnetra Kazhakam, Pazha Nedumaran of Tamil Nationalist Movement, Viduthalai Rajendran of Periyar Dravidar Kazhakam and 160 activists including 23 females as they marched in protest towards the Sri Lankan Deputy High Commission in Chennai demanding the closure of it. Mr. Pazha Nedumaran, in a statement issued Friday, had condemned the Indian state for lack of response as Sri Lanka Navy continues to kill Tamil Nadu fishermen while the Sri Lankan government which has been waging a genocidal onslaught on Tamils has gone to the extent of propping up a campaign against the UN office in Colombo, sources in Chennai said.
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SLA soldiers sexually harass Tamil women in Paduvaankarai, Batticaloa

[TamilNet, Thursday, 15 July 2010, 08:47 GMT]
Soldiers of the Sri Lanka Army are reported to be engaged in sexually harassing resettled Tamil women in the Batticaloa district, according to residents of several resettled villages. SLA soldiers camped in small sentry points located in Thikiliveddai in Ea'raavoor police division have been harassing the women, civil sources say.
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SLA appropriates Vallai weaving centre premises in Vadamaraadchi

[TamilNet, Thursday, 15 July 2010, 06:32 GMT]
Sri Lanka Army (SLA) officials stopped Tuesday the initial efforts by Uduppiddi Welfare Society (UWS) and other public organizations to renovate Vallai weaving centre which had ceased to function for more than twenty years due to war, UWS representatives said. The organizations have decided to meet Friday to explore ways of overcoming the SLA obstruction, they further said.
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Residents forced indoors as SL armed forces take control of Vanni

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 14 July 2010, 20:47 GMT]
The recently resettled people in Vanni were forced to remain indoors Wednesday as Sri Lanka Army (SLA) soldiers, Special Task Force (STF) commandos, Sri Lanka police and the President’s Special Security Force soldiers took control of A9 road and the main streets in the districts of Ki’linochchi and Mullaiththeevu as a part of security measures related to the Cabinet meeting held by President Rajapakasa in Ki’linochchi Wednesday, sources in Vanni said.
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Cabinet meeting in Ki'linochchi aims to deceive Sinhala people: UNP MP

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 14 July 2010, 18:17 GMT]
“All should understand that the Sinhala people also have to bear the burden of foreign loans Sri Lanka has to borrow to develop the North which was destructed by Tigers,” Sri Lankan President Mahinda Rajapaksa claimed in a public meeting in Ki’linochchi Wednesday after having held the Cabinet Meeting in Ira’naimadu Sri Lanka Army (SLA) head quarters in Vanni. Nearly a hundred people brought by SLA participated in the meeting held under tight security. “There is no minority in the country but all are majority in the sense that all are Sri Lankans,” Mahinda Rajapaksa further claimed. Meanwhile, Jayalath Jeyawardene, an opposition United National Party (UNP) parliamentarian said in a statement to media in Colombo Wednesday that Mahinda Rajapaksa’s cabinet meeting in Ki’linochchi was a political drama to deceive the Sinhalese in the South, condemning the Ki’linochchi cabinet meeting.
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SLN constructs big base in Batticaloa district

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 14 July 2010, 15:42 GMT]
Sri Lanka Navy (SLN) has begun the preliminary work on the construction of a big base in a 1200 acre land in Koa’ra’laippattu North Divisional Secretariat division in Batticaloa district denying the people of this area their livelihoods besides affecting them socially and economically, sources in Batticaloa said. The Minister of Economic Development who presided over the recent District Development meeting said that the land in question had not been made use of when Batticaloa district Tamil MPs, members of Provincial Council members and local government bodies of Batticaloa raised protest over the encroachment of public land, the sources added.
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Thampanaik-ku'lam

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 14 July 2010, 09:28 GMT]
The reservoir in the locality of Thampanai trees (Mischodon zeylanicus)
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SLA denies irrigation facility to resettled civilians in Ki’linochchi district

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 13 July 2010, 19:20 GMT]
Sri Lanka Army (SLA) occupying Ki’lnochchi has stopped the supply of water to the paddy fields cultivated under Akka’rayan Ku’lam in Ki’linochchi district by resettled civilians claiming the water in the reservoir is reserved for its supply of drinking water, the resettled civilians said. The paddy cultivated by the resettled civilians face the risk of withering off due to lack of water, they said. SLA in Akka’rayan Ku’lam area obtains its drinking water transported in water bowsers from the tank.
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SLA strengthens security in Ki’linochchi prior to Cabinet meeting

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 13 July 2010, 18:23 GMT]
Sri Lanka Army (SLA) has strengthened security in and around Ki’linochchi in Vanni as President Mahinda Rajapaksa has decided to hold his cabinet meeting in Ira’naimadu SLA Vanni Head Quarters Wednesday, sources in Ki’linochchi said. Traffic along A9 road has been cut down while hundreds of SLA soldiers and police personnel are posted at several points along the road. This is the first ever cabinet meeting to be held out of Colombo and an important one for President Mahinda Rajapaksa after the end of the war on Vanni, the sources added.
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Houses constructed for SLA in Vanni as resettled civilians suffer, abandoned in huts

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 13 July 2010, 14:38 GMT]
While the resettled civilians in Vanni suffer in makeshift huts in broiling sun Colombo government is hastily constructing semi-permanent houses for Sri Lanka Army (SLA) soldiers near Muruka’ndi in Vanni in a Sinhalese colonization scheme consisting of 12,000 houses with facilities including hospitals, schools, post offices, sources in Vanni said. The houses are being constructed in a newly declared SLA High Security Zone, strictly out of bounds for all outsiders. Hundreds of container vehicles bring the construction material for the semi-permanent houses and heap them along A9 road. These materials are transported in SLA trucks to the construction site so as to prevent any outsider seeing the work in progress, the sources added.
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