Continued detention of IDPs endangers future political stability: Pascoe

[TamilNet, Saturday, 19 September 2009, 04:11 GMT]
“Keeping these persons in the camps is breeding resentment and endangering the future political stability of Sri Lanka,” United Nations Under Secretary General of Political Affairs Lynn Pascoe told reporters Friday night in Colombo after meeting President Mahinda Rajapakse, sources in Colombo said. The UN too reflected the same sentiments saying that the political stability of Sri Lanka is jeopardized due to rising resentment among the Internally Displaced Persons (IDPs) detained in the camps, the sources further said. While Mr. Pascoe was expressing his concerns of future stability of the [unitary state of] Sri Lanka, the UN administration of Ban Ki-moon in New York, was seeking to control its message and limit questions, to turn the tide of negative coverage of its handling of Sri Lanka, Inner City Press reported.
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Court directs CID to expedite inquiry against detained Tamil civilians

[TamilNet, Saturday, 19 September 2009, 04:08 GMT]
Colombo Chief Magistrate Nishantha Hapuarachchi Friday directed the Criminal Investigation Department (CID) to expedite the investigation into the cases against twenty-seven Tamil civilians arrested in connection with alleged terrorist activities and to report to the court on the progress made so far, on September 29. The order was made following Defence Counsel claiming that the Terrorist Investigation Division (TID) was acting unfairly in its investigations.
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UN envoy Lynn Pascoe insists on early release of IDPs

[TamilNet, Friday, 18 September 2009, 16:36 GMT]
Under-Secretary-General for Political Affairs, Lynn Pascoe who met Sri Lanka’s President Mahinda Rajapakse Friday to present the letter from UN Secretary General, Ban Ki-moon outlining the concerns of the international community on the situation of Internally Displaced Persons (IDPs) and other related matters, said that he had raised the issue of the early release of the IDPs and their freedom of movement with the President, sources in Colombo said. "It is frustrating to live in such conditions and therefore the people should be allowed to return to their original homes at the earliest. The security concerns of the government are understandable but at the same time the people must also be taken into serious consideration", Mr. Pascoe said.
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Prison guards assault hunger striking detainees in Colombo

[TamilNet, Friday, 18 September 2009, 10:00 GMT]
At least 36 Tamil political prisoners who were part of a fast unto death hunger strike at the central jail in Welikada Colombo are alleged to have been severely assaulted by guards and jailers on early Friday, informed sources told TamilNet. 32 of the political prisoners who were being held in Cell Block G were transferred to the Block M, and some of them had sustained injuries in the episode, according to the sources. The detainees have been forced to stop their hunger strike.
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Video investigation by Colombo not impartial - Alston

[TamilNet, Friday, 18 September 2009, 02:17 GMT]
Noting that two of the four experts cited by the government were full-time government employees, another had previously acted on behalf of the government, "and the basis on which the fourth was identified and selected as an expert remains unclear," Philip Alston, the UN Special Rapporteur on extra-judicial, summary or arbitrary executions, said Thursday, that studies could not be characterized as impartial. "The only way to do this [authenticate the video] is for an independent and impartial investigation to take place,'' Alston said. The video clip, aired in British Channel-4 TV, allegedly showing Sri Lankan troops executing Tamil prisoners stripped naked and hands tied behind backs, has shocked the world community, and re-ignited calls for investigations of war-crimes against Sri Lanka military.
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Australian Minister for Foreign Affairs meets Tamil Diaspora group

[TamilNet, Thursday, 17 September 2009, 23:35 GMT]
Australian Minister for Foreign Affairs, Hon. Stephen Smith, participated in a meeting organised by the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade (DFAT) with representatives of several Australian Tamil organisations and individuals, chaired by Mr. David Holly, the Assistant Secretary, South and West Asia Branch of the DFAT, sources in Australia said. Minister Smith explained his government’s approach to handling the conflict in Sri Lanka.
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Tamil political prisoners in Colombo on hunger strike

[TamilNet, Thursday, 17 September 2009, 16:05 GMT]
Tamil political prisoners arrested on suspicion under Emergency Regulations (ER) and Prevention of Terrorism Act (PTA), languishing in Magazine Prison and Colombo Remand Prison (CPR) for many years without being produced in the courts, launched a hunger strike from 6:00 a.m Thursday as their requests placed in previous hunger strikes had not been taken into consideration despite promises by legal authorities that their cases will be taken for trial in two months time, sources in Colombo said. The fasting prisoners said the President of Sri Lanka has granted general amnesty to the soldiers who had deserted their posts during the war, in the past few months and hence it would be an easy matter for the President to use his executive powers at least to order to take up our cases immediately for trial as we had only been arrested on suspicion.
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'Business can’t escape responsibility'

[TamilNet, Thursday, 17 September 2009, 12:37 GMT]
Britain as a country bears a big responsibility to the plight of Tamils in the internment camps of Sri Lanka. Because it was one of the major powers that had repeatedly asked the Tamil civilians of Vanni to go to the side of the Colombo government, knowing very well what awaited them were barbed-wire camps. The British business cannot shun its responsibility of freeing them through economic measures. British Retail Consortium sympathising Colombo government and campaigning against EU sanctions amounts to only encouraging the method of concentration camp as an effective tool of structural genocide in the island, blame Tamil activists in UK.
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UN top official arrives in Colombo, due to visit NE Thursday

[TamilNet, Thursday, 17 September 2009, 10:28 GMT]
Mr. Lynn Pascoe, United Nations Under-Secretary General for Political Affairs, arrived in Sri Lanka Wednesday night. He is expected to visit the North and East Thursday to assess the progress and development therein and the situation of the displaced people. Mr. Pascoe is expected to meet President Mahinda Rajapakse Friday after his visit to the North and East, sources in Colombo said.
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Butenis sworn in as new U.S. Ambassador to Sri Lanka

[TamilNet, Thursday, 17 September 2009, 08:23 GMT]
Patricia A. Butenis, a career member of the U.S. Senior Foreign Service, who served as the Deputy Chief of Mission at the U.S. Embassy in Baghdad from 2007-2009, presented to her credentials as U.S. Ambassador in Colombo Thursday, according to a press statement issued by the U.S. Embassy in Colombo.
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Tamil national aspirations, TNA and transnational governance

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 16 September 2009, 23:36 GMT]
The Tamil National Alliance (TNA) or any other political party claiming that they represent Tamils have no right to proclaim that they have moved away from the 1977 mandate for independence and sovereignty of the Eezham Tamil nation, to satisfy India, Mahinda Rajapaksa or any other power. They may negotiate but without dropping the fundamentals, until any acceptable formula is freshly mandated by all Tamils including those who are now in the diaspora. Meanwhile, the emerging novel concept of transnational governance will be misled if it is orientated merely with an idea of negotiation. It is not just a negotiation platform. There is no need to show Tamils have ‘democratically’ dropped their aspiration just because some powers want it as a pre-requisite for negotiation.
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Journalist Tissainayagam files appeal against jail sentence

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 16 September 2009, 15:23 GMT]
Senior journalist S. Tissainayagam, through his lawyer, filed an appeal in the Court of Appeal Tuesday seeking to set aside the conviction and the sentence imposed on him by the Colombo High Court on August 31, 2009. Tissainayagam was convicted for blaming the Government of Sri Lanka, inciting racial hatred and for having monetary dealings with the LTTE, a terrorist organization prohibited by the State, according to the prosecution led by the Attorney General.
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M K Narayanan declares war on Tamil diaspora

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 16 September 2009, 11:54 GMT]
Addressing Director Generals and Inspector Generals of Police Monday, India’s National Security Advisor and one of the architects of Indian Establishment’s policy towards Eezham Tamils, M K Narayanan, told them of the need to keep watch against Tamil diaspora reviving the LTTE and cautioned them to be prepared for any eventuality. “The funding lines of the LTTE are still intact and there is always a possibility that disgruntled elements in the Tamil diaspora across the globe could get together to help the terror outfit regroup and rearm,” said M K Narayanan, according to The Economic Times, Tuesday. His fear stems from his own policy 'haunting him back,' commented Tamil circles in the diaspora.
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Court further remands 4 returnees from Fiji

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 16 September 2009, 11:09 GMT]
Colombo Chief Magistrate Nishantha Hapuarachchi Tuesday ordered further remand till September 22 for three Tamils and a Sinhalese who were arrested by the Criminal Investigation Department (CID) officials at the Katunayake International Airport on their return from Fiji islands, rejecting their bail applications. CID told court said that the suspects had immigrated to the Fiji Islands for employment and the Fiji Islands authority had deported them.
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War and disregard make Tamils hard and determined

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 16 September 2009, 08:44 GMT]
“After looking at the people dying and dead bodies everywhere, it is like nothing threatens me any more, it is like I have had the hard time in my life and I think I am prepared to take up whatever happens in life now,” says Damilvany Gnanakumar, an Eezham Tamil of British citizenship, who witnessed war and internment camp in the island of Sri Lanka. "I'm not that old Vany that sits down and cries for little things. I'm stronger now after going through and seeing all that problem. My mind is clear now," she told Gethin Chamberlain of The Guardian in an interview Tuesday, asking at the same time, what have the people done wrong? Why are they going through this, why is the international government not speaking up for them?
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Colombo's paranoid secrecy

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 15 September 2009, 16:20 GMT]
"Why must the military be in control of the camps, why not civilian agencies? Why can't visitors enter the camps? Why are journalists barred? Why are international agencies kept out? Why is it taking the courts so long to make a straightforward order to allow members of parliament to visit the camps?" and quoting Mangala Samaraweera, "I can walk into any prison at will and meet any criminal, but I am not allowed to meet these people held in detention for no reason," Prof Kumar David, in an opinion column in Sunday's Lakbima, writes, "[t]he reasons offered for this paranoid secrecy varied from the need to hide human rights violations to calculations relating to the upcoming elections. I think it will be some time before the real reason comes seeping out."
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US's war crimes report, a canary in coalmine - Rapp

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 15 September 2009, 11:44 GMT]
With United Nations remaining impotent to act carry out investigations into the conduct of Sri Lanka military during the last several months of the war, a report to be released by the United States State Department on September 21, remains, perhaps the last credible instrument in the hands of the West to begin to find the truth on the allegations of war-crimes by the Sri Lanka Government and the Liberation Tigers, a spokesperson for a US-based activist group said. Stephen Rapp, US's ambassdor at large for War Crimes Issues (WCI) told Time that his office is responsible "to collect information on ongoing atrocities... [and] give a signal [when] something serious is occuring."
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SSP’s wife, son, further remanded in Malabe abduction, assault case

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 15 September 2009, 11:01 GMT]
Kaduwala Magistrate Amal Ranarajah Tuesday ordered further remand until September 29 for the wife and son of former Colombo Crime Division Director, Senior Superintendent of Police, Vass Gunawardena and eight others accused in a case where a student of the Malabe IT campus was abducted and assaulted.
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8 SL media organizations urge President to release journalist Tissanayagam

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 15 September 2009, 08:07 GMT]
Eight media organizations comprising Sri Lanka Working Journalists Association (SLWJA), Editors’ Guild of Sri Lanka (EGSL), Free Media Movement (FMM), Sri Lanka Tamil Journalists Alliance (SLTJA), Sri Lanka Muslim Media Forum (SLMMF), Federation of Media Employees’ Trade Union (FMETU), South Asian Free Media Association (SAFMA) and Sri Lanka Newspaper Publishers’ Association (SLNPA) Monday unanimously decided to request President Mahinda Rajapakse to release senior journalist Mr.J.S.Tissanayagam using his executive powers, sources in Colombo said. Mr.Tissanayagam was recently sentenced to twenty years rigorous imprisonment under the Prevention of Terrorism Act (PTA).
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Rajapakses' incipient personality cult would shame a Chinese communist - Guardian

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 15 September 2009, 03:20 GMT]
In the second article in two days, UK's Guardian, warned Monday that by making Tamils feel newly repressed Sri Lanka is sowing seeds of future rebellian, noting that "in the months that have followed [the military victory] there has been little magnanimity, let alone reconciliation. Tens of thousands of Tamil civilians are still being kept in camps surrounded by barbed wire." The article further said that "Colombo's streets are littered with so many pictures of president Mahinda Rajapaksa and his brothers that the incipient personality cult would shame a Chinese communist. The triumphalism in Colombo means those who dare to question the government are deemed Tiger collaborators, terrorist sympathisers or Tamil secessionists."
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