Candidates of common opinion elected in Norway for TGTE

[TamilNet, Monday, 03 May 2010, 01:09 GMT]
3511 Eezham Tamil voters turned out to elect 3 representatives for Transnational Government of Tamil Eelam (TGTE) Sunday in a technically well conducted election across 17 centers in Norway. Dr. Sivakanesan Thillaiampalam (2449 votes), Jeyasri Balasubramaniam (2342) and Murali Sivanandan (2321) representing a common shade of opinion on how the TGTE should be structured, were elected.
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IUSU demands detainees' names made public

[TamilNet, Sunday, 02 May 2010, 19:06 GMT]
Inter University Students Union (IUSU) has given ultimatum to the Sri Lanka government authority concerned to release the names of uprooted persons detained in internment camps enabling their relatives to identify their kith and kin who are reportedly missing during the war or later. In failing to do so relatives of those missing would hold demonstration in front of detention centres with victims’ photographs, said IUSU President Udul Premaratne at a media briefing held Friday. Relatives of the missing persons brought down from Mannaar were present in the media briefing, media sources said.
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MIA spreads genocide message through video, album

[TamilNet, Sunday, 02 May 2010, 17:15 GMT]
In a recent release of a video called "Born Free" containing "a hyper-violent mini-film" as a pre-release to her forthcoming album to be released on June 29, Oscar and Grammy award nominee, Eezham born music phenom, Maya Arulpragasam (MIA) expresses her sympathy for genocide victims with the powerful imagery of her video. YouTube yanked her video Tuesday, triggering an avalanche of publicity, including a detailed narrative of MIA's album that appeared in the weekend edition of the Washington Post, MTV, and Los Angeles Times among other media outlets.
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Sivaram showed how Sri Lankan state was dependent on oppression of Tamils: Prof. Whitaker

[TamilNet, Saturday, 01 May 2010, 17:10 GMT]
Sivaram’s biographer and close friend Professor Mark P. Whitaker said Thursday that Sivaram’s ability as a professional journalist to show convincingly how the Sri Lankan state was dependent upon its oppression of Tamil people, was one of the key reasons why he was targeted and killed exactly five years ago. Professor of Anthropology of the University of South Carolina , Mark P. Whitaker made these observations when delivering a speech at an event in London to commemorate the fifth death anniversary of Sri Lanka ’s top journalist Dharmeratnam Sivaram, well-known by his pseudonym as Taraki.
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TamilNet releases Sivaram video footage on Tamil journalism

[TamilNet, Saturday, 01 May 2010, 10:55 GMT]
TamilNet has released video clippings from a lecture conducted by late D. Sivaram (Taraki), the well-known political and military analyst and senior editor of TamilNet, on the occasion of the fifth anniversary of his assassination, at a remembrance event held in Oslo by the Norwegian Council of Eelam Tamils on Thursday.
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International war corporatism continues silencing Eezham Tamils

[TamilNet, Friday, 30 April 2010, 12:30 GMT]
Diaspora Tamils wonder at the arrests, crackdowns and deportations of Eezham Tamil activists taking place in an orchestrated way in the West as well as in the East by governments conniving with the war-crimes-accused defence establishment of Colombo. The targets are those who are firm in their views on the national cause and those who work with the grass root. The timing is diaspora organising its polity. Whether the orchestration is pre-emption, expecting resurgence of the struggle as the IC knows no solutions to the crisis in the island, or whether it foretells something unpleasant that is going to be imposed on Tamils through a deal of Colombo with New Delhi and the West, are questions asked in the diaspora. How the Transnational Government of Tamil Eelam is going to be structured and how Tamil Nadu is going to play its role gains new significance in the unfolding situation.
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Indian corporate to build high-rise buildings, apartments, in Jaffna

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 28 April 2010, 10:12 GMT]
An Indian engineering corporate L&T Infrastructure Development Projects is keen in road projects, high-rise buildings, apartments and hotels and power generation in Jaffna, and is looking for trade partners according to Vishal Mathur, its Chief Operating Officer. The high-rise buildings and apartments are for whom, wonder the people of Jaffna. According to Mathur, tourism would boom in Jaffna and there would be a demand for them.
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Diaspora paramount in voicing aspirations of Tamils: The Age

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 28 April 2010, 10:04 GMT]
Amid Sri Lankas' legal constitution that classifies Tamils as “Second class citizens” and “continuing problems of ethnic marginalisation and persecution”, the Tamil Diaspora feel they “need to press for and represent Tamil claims, because Tamils in Sri Lanka have lost their voice, and have no representation following the defeat of the LTTE” said an article in the Age on Friday, a day after results of Australia’s historic Tamil referendum were announced showing “unanimous support for the proposal for an independent Tamil homeland in Sri Lanka”.
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Australia's young lawyers to document Sri Lanka's war-crimes

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 28 April 2010, 01:39 GMT]
While calls for independent investigations into Sri Lanka's war crimes continue to mount, and United Nations Secretary General Ban Ki-Moon's appointment of advisory panel on Sri Lanka's war-crimes shows no progress, ABC Radio Australia reported that Australian Young Lawyers Group in New South Wales is joining forces with the International Commission of Jurists (ICJ) to take witness statements and prepare evidence on the conduct of Sri Lanka's Security Forces, and the Polical and Military Command for future war crimes tribunals on Sri Lanka.
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All in the game in the name of archaeology

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 27 April 2010, 03:19 GMT]
The Sinhala academics cannot compare their plight of opposing totalitarian social fascist system of governance with that of the Tamils who bear the entire brunt of fascism amounting to genocide set against them by an ethnic-powered state mechanism, says a Tamil academic in Jaffna responding to professor Sudharshan Seneviratne defending the archaeology agenda of Colombo. Genuine dialogue on culture, co-existence etc and partnership in opposing fascism come only when sovereignty snatched away from Tamils is restored as a priority and when there is parity. However patronising in overtures, individuals and organisations serving Colombo cannot escape from being ultimately colonial. Academics who are always on the side of enjoying the comforts of state power in the island are yet to explore ways of contributing to their ideals better by coming out of the system they identify as oppressive.
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British candidate calls Tamils victims of genocide

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 27 April 2010, 02:45 GMT]
Dr Rachel Joyce, Conservative Parliamentary Candidate, Harrow West, UK, in a statement circulated to her constituents, said she believes that since Sri Lanka's independence "the acts perpetrated the Government of Sri Lanka on Tamils including the burning down of Jaffna library...disappearance of Tamil individuals...and the use of concentration-style camps for internally displaced Tamils should be classed as Genocide." Dr Joyce further made a campaign promise to "work with the Tamils to get the acts perpetrated on the Tamils classed legally as a genocide so that the UN Convention can be used to address the problems."
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British Tamils must pick candidate, not party

[TamilNet, Sunday, 25 April 2010, 15:19 GMT]
With Britain’s general election less than two weeks away, campaigning is in full swing. In an election that is too close to call and with many constituencies where British Tamils' vote can be decisive, the vital question facing expatriate Tamils is where best to place their votes? "As British Tamils, we have in this country, every opportunity to make our voices heard. By participating with enthusiasm in the forthcoming general elections British Tamils can work towards a just and stable future for Tamils in Sri Lanka," argues TamilNet political commentator in UK.
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Lawyers, media persons attacked in Chennai High Court premises

[TamilNet, Sunday, 25 April 2010, 07:07 GMT]
Condemning the inaction by Tamil Nadu government for not executing Chennai High Court orders to dismiss Tamil Nadu police officers who had attacked lawyers in the high court in an earlier instance, Tamil Nadu lawyers launched a black flag protest when Tamil Nadu Chief Minister M. Karunanidhi arrived in Chennai High Court Sunday to unveil the statue of Dr. B. R. Ambedkar, sources in Chennai said. Chief Minister’s Dravida Munetra Kazhakam (DMK) men who arrived at the scene brutally attacked the protesting lawyers and media persons besides smashing their video cameras and equipments, the protesting lawyers alleged.
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Police administration in North continues in ‘Sinhala Only’

[TamilNet, Saturday, 24 April 2010, 05:14 GMT]
Police administration in police stations and in courts in the North and East continue only in Sinhalese language causing immense difficulties to public as their complaints and statements are recorded in Sinhalese, a language not known to them, sources in Jaffna said. Despite the repeated insistence by magistrates in the North police administration is still carried out in Sinhalese language as the police officers being Sinhalese are not proficient in Tamil language to record complaints or statements in the language of the people. Six moths ago, Mahinda Rajapakse government had made great publicity of appointing Tamils in the police stations in the North and had held interviews to select candidates for training but nothing has come out of it, sources in Jaffna said.
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Tories, Tamils reach out

[TamilNet, Friday, 23 April 2010, 22:33 GMT]
It’s a sight that would have been incongruous a few years ago, but is almost unremarkable today. Nestled amongst the Tamil restaurants, grocery shops and other businesses on the main strip in Rayners Lane, a suburb of London, a large sign on the front of former store front says: ‘British Tamil Conservatives’. On the other side of London, another office of the BTC opened a few weeks ago with a lamp lighting ceremony accompanied by mirithungam drummers, directly opposite the tube station in the Tamil-dominated suburb of East Ham.
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Senior ex-LTTE cadres under pressure to confess

[TamilNet, Friday, 23 April 2010, 09:46 GMT]
Colombo Establishment has subjected hundreds of senior Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) cadres in its custody to confess to alleged accusations of war crimes, promising that a general amnesty would be granted sooner to those who confess, informed legal sources in Colombo told TamilNet Friday. The move, backed by Indian advice, comes as the Rajapaksa government secured majority of seats in Sri Lankan parliament. Concerned legal sources urged Diaspora Tamils to take meaningful action in arranging legal assistance to the victims through independent and reliable sources without allowing Indian or Colombo backed legal practitioners to victimise the detained cadres.
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99.4 percent vote for Tamil Eelam in Australia

[TamilNet, Thursday, 22 April 2010, 05:07 GMT]
99.4 percent of those who cast votes in the Tamil referendum across Australia last weekend said “yes” to the formation of independent and sovereign Tamil Eelam in the contiguous north and east of the island of Sri Lanka. The results were announced Thursday at a press conference held at NSW State Parliament in front of state and national media. 8,272 out of the registered, numbering around 10,000, participated in the polls. The number of eligible Eezham Tamil voters in Australia is estimated to be around 15,000. The formation of Tamil Eelam was assented by 8,154. The negative votes were 51 and 67 were invalid.
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Chennai High Court calls for clarification on deportation of Pirapaharan’s mother

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 21 April 2010, 12:20 GMT]
Chennai High Court judge who took up Wednesday for inquiry the petition filed by Mr. M. Karupan, a senior lawyer and human rights activist, citing Tamil Nadu Chief Minister Mr. M. Karunanidhi and the Indian Central Government as respondents for having sent back Mrs. Velupillai Parvathi, mother of Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) leader Mr. V Pirapaharan, to Malaysia without allowing her to land in Chennai airport, ordered Mr. Karunanidhi and the Indian Central Government to submit a report on why Mrs. Velupillai Parvathi was sent back, before next Monday, legal sources in Chennai said.
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Australian Tamil referendum attracts media, provokes Colombo's envoy

[TamilNet, Monday, 19 April 2010, 23:35 GMT]
More than 10,000 registered to cast their votes in the referendum across Australia last weekend, on the creation of independent Tamil homeland in Sri Lanka, reported SBS Australia, citing organisers. However, the success of mass participation provoked Colombo's envoy to retaliate that "the Tamils who are in Sri Lanka at the moment are perfectly happy to go on with the present system. It is only the Diaspora who are trying to force this thing on the people in Sri Lanka”. But, it won the support of John Dowd, the president of the International Commission of Jurists in Australia, SBS said, citing him saying that the referendum highlighted the aspirations as well as the plight of Tamils in the island of Sri Lanka. "Australians need to be reminded that there is a common obligation to these people who for centuries or indeed millennia have led their own lives there," John Dowd further said.
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JNU convention condemns Sri Lanka war crimes

[TamilNet, Sunday, 18 April 2010, 14:15 GMT]
"[C]onditions in Sri Lanka cannot improve unless the Tamils are given a respectful place in society as equal citizens. Unfortunately, that is not happening,” said Rajinder Sachar former Chief Justice on Delhi High Court in a conference on Sri Lanka's war crimes held at the Jawaharlal Nehru University (JNU) Thursday, a summary report of the convention issued by the organizers said. The convention concluded with passing a resolution condemning "the genocidal war crimes perpetrated by the Sri Lankan government on the Tamils," and demanding that the war criminals in the Sri Lankan government be brought to justice, Tamils who have been forcefully detained in camps be released and settled in their native homes, an immediate end to colonization, and suspension of military aid by India.
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