Academic exposes ideological shift in DMK

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 18 August 2009, 11:59 GMT]
Discerning students of Tamil Nadu politics, especially those analysing the role of the state in Sri Lankan ethnic conflict, are intrigued by the transformation that has taken place in the DMK perception on Sri Lanka, writes V. Suryanarayan in an article last week appeared in New Indian Express. “The tragedy of the situation must be underlined; the Sri Lankan Tamils became pawns in the electoral politics of the state. What is more, their struggle for justice, equity and dignity has been pushed back by several decades. A long winter of discontent is ahead of Sri Lankan Tamils,” he concludes the article.
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Floods threaten Tamils in Sri Lanka’s detention camps - HRW

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 18 August 2009, 10:31 GMT]
Floods and disease are threatening the health and lives of hundreds of thousands of Tamils detained enmasse in violation of international by the Sri Lankan government, HRW said Tuesday. The floods have caused emergency latrines to flood or collapse, causing sewage to flood several areas of the camps, heightening the risk of outbreaks of contagious diseases. The camps are located in places that are known to flood during the onsetting monsoon season.
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US Tamil boycott campaign targets Victoria Secret, Macy's

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 18 August 2009, 01:46 GMT]
U.S. Tamil expatriate groups in New York as part of their continuing campaign urging U.S.companies to avoid trade with Sri Lanka, targetted Victoria Secret, the lingerie giant with $5.6b net sales in 2008, and the retail giant Macy's which had $26.3b sales in Fiscal Year 2007, Saturday 15th August in Manhattan at 34th street and Broadway junction, between 3:00 to 6:00 p.m.
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Tamil Nadu government erases the word 'Eezham'

[TamilNet, Monday, 17 August 2009, 23:08 GMT]
Tamil Nadu Police was seen pasting white papers on the word 'Eezham' and on the picture of LTTE leader V. Pirapaharan, figured in the banners and posters of Viduthalai Chiruthaigal Kadchi (VCK) organised uprising in Chennai attended by more than 100,000 people Monday. The VCK's annual uprising day, conducted on the birthday of its leader Thol Thirumavalavan, has chosen the theme 'Ezhum Thamizh Eezham' for this year. The phrase can either mean the 'rising Tamil Eelam' or 'Tamil Eelam will rise'. The word 'Eezham' is the earliest reference to today's island of Sri Lanka, found in Tamil literature and inscriptions of pre-Christian centuries.
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US urged to go beyond clichés

[TamilNet, Saturday, 15 August 2009, 01:18 GMT]
The very phrase ‘political reconciliation’ is partial and diabolical as it only upholds the integrity of a genocidal state and artfully nullifies the nationalist perspectives of the Tamil struggle, writes TamilNet political commentator in Colombo, responding to US stand discussed with groups of diaspora Tamils. Any genuine political approach to the age-old nationalist conflict in the island begins from recognising the nations involved in the conflict and engaging them as equal parties having full right to self-determination, the commentator writes, adding: “If willingness for positive political engagement is not forthcoming from the Sri Lankan state, the state can be induced and Eezham Tamils could be encouraged to participate willingly, by US and India in particular acknowledging the nation of Eezham Tamils and its absolute right to self-determination without mincing words.”
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US stresses ‘political reconciliation’ with Tamils for peace in Sri Lanka

[TamilNet, Friday, 14 August 2009, 17:38 GMT]
The US State Department met Tuesday with US-based Tamil Diaspora groups to discuss the ongoing humanitarian crisis and the prospects for “political reconciliation” in Sri Lanka, a government press release said. US Assistant Secretary of State Robert Blake and Chargé d'Affaires in the US embassy in Colombo, James Moore (participating by video link) held discussions with representatives of sixteen Tamil groups. The US officials had welcomed the opportunity to discuss the Tamils' concerns and perspectives and had "underscored the importance of political reconciliation," the US statement said. The US government has meanwhile stressed to the Sri Lanka government that "to achieve a lasting peace, it must promote justice and political reconciliation for all parties" the statement also said.
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12 Tamil youths arrested in Colombo

[TamilNet, Friday, 14 August 2009, 05:13 GMT]
Sri Lanka police took into custody 12 Tamil youths in a search conducted in the suburbs of Colombo on information received from the Intelligence Department that a suicide bomber has infiltrated into Colombo, sources in Colombo said. The arrested youths are said to be from North, East and the Upcountry.
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Conscience of Swaminathan should touch India, IC: Tamil circles

[TamilNet, Thursday, 13 August 2009, 23:27 GMT]
M S Swaminathan, internationally renowned agriculturalist, regarded as the father of India’s Green Revolution, declined to involve with Colombo “unless there is some kind of political settlement,” IANS reported Wednesday. “There are people who feel unless Tamils in Sri Lanka can live in dignity, other things are subsidiary. This is a viewpoint. I have no plans to go to Sri Lanka in the immediate future,” Swaminathan told IANS. In February, another prominent Indian and a Kannadiga from Mysore, N R Narayana Murthy of Infosys, refused IT advisory to Colombo. “Development is not exploitation of the plight of people facing structural genocide,” Tamil circles said pointing to the attitude of the Indian Establishment and sections of IC blindly abetting Colombo and officially rationalising genocide, just to make inroads into the island.
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A roadmap to liberation

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 11 August 2009, 22:30 GMT]
What is currently seen as the biggest threat of destabilisation by Colombo and by some powers is not the militancy of Tamils. Militancy of a small nation can be crushed by ganging up and by fabricating all excuses, as has already been witnessed by us. But what exactly threatens the establishments is the effort of Tamils organising themselves politically. What they expect is the ‘defeated’ Tamils to play political stooges. Tamil national question today appeals to an array of oppressed masses deprived of political justice all over the world. It is a topic that appeals to progressive minds thinking of restructuring the polity of human civilisation. The responsibility of Eezham Tamils and their diaspora is to present the case with a progressive political theme and language.
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Reconcile with Tamils or risk terrorism - US

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 11 August 2009, 16:40 GMT]
The top US diplomat for South Asia says Sri Lanka's refusal to share power with the Tamils following the end of a bloody 25-year civil war in May could lead to renewed violence. US Assistant Secretary of State Robert Blake also said that Sri Lanka should allow more freedom of movement for the nearly 300,000 Tamils displaced by the war and confined to government camps. However, the hardline government of President Mahinda Rajapaksa questioned the US official’s right “to speak on behalf of the Tamils.” The US has been providing emergency assistance to the displaced, but longer term reconstruction assistance depends on Sri Lanka’s progress in resettlement, Mr. Blake said.
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Tamils confined against their will – US

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 11 August 2009, 14:04 GMT]
The United States, which has provided aid to the camps and is ready to offer more to help the displaced Tamils go home, was dismayed so many were being held against their will, Eric Schwartz, US assistant secretary at the Bureau of Population, Refugees and Migration, said. Sri Lanka’s claim that they plan to settle 75,000 of the 280,000 Tamil civilians now held in military run camps before the end of August was “encouraging news," but Colombo should move faster, he told Reuters Friday.
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Chinese identify Tamils conducive in breaking up India

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 11 August 2009, 04:36 GMT]
A recent article that appeared in a Chinese strategic think tank saying “[i]f China takes a little action, the so-called Great Indian Federation can be broken up,” and its argument that China in its own interest, and the progress of whole Asia, should join forces with different nationalities like Assamese, Tamils, and Kashmiris, and support the latter in establishing independent nation-states of their own, out of India, has ruffled the Indian counterparts. Responding to the article in Chinese, D S Rajan, Director of Chennai Centre for China Studies wrote, “an approach of panic towards such outbursts will be a mistake, but also ignoring them will prove to be costly for India.”
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Sri Lanka is laying foundations for renewed war – paper

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 11 August 2009, 02:56 GMT]
“Sri Lanka's conflict is anything but over. On the contrary, it has clearly entered another period of gestation,” the Tamil Guardian newspaper warned in its latest editorial. “Unless the international community acts decisively to end Sinhala oppression of the Tamil people and ensures a robust political solution that guarantees the equality of the two nations, there will be neither 'reconciliation' nor peace. Instead, the violent tyranny of the state will lead inevitably to violent resistance anew,” the paper, published last week, said.
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Sri Lanka on way back to Tamil rebellion - FT

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 11 August 2009, 00:54 GMT]
Sri Lanka is careering back to where it was when the conflict began, with Tamil grievances being ignored amid a triumphalist wave of Sinhalese chauvinism, the Financial Times warned in its editorial Tuesday. Rather than share power with the Tamils, US and British officials fear the Sinhala state is seeking to scatter them, the paper said. “Unless the Sinhala majority shows magnanimity and gives the Tamils control over their lives, their cause will surely reignite from the embers of this war,” the paper said.
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U.S. youths launch campaign against Microsoft Investment in Sri Lanka

[TamilNet, Monday, 10 August 2009, 15:51 GMT]
Noting MSNBC's coverage of the conditions within the military supervised internment camps in Vavuniyaa, which said that "no one is allowed to leave the camps and few are permitted entrance," and that the camps are "at best...at the edge of all kinds of internal principles...but more likely...illegal," the U.S. based activist youth group, PEARL, urged Microsoft to reconsider investments in Sri Lanka, saying, "[t]he human rights community and Tamils all over the world are deeply concerned about the ultimate use of funds given to government of Sri Lanka. While technology transfer is important, blanket support should not be given to governments who do not respect the rule of law and basic human rights. We urge you to hear the cries of voiceless Tamils, and avoid doing business with regimes as egregious as Sri Lanka's."
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Tamil voters nullify SL Government’s expectation - TNA

[TamilNet, Sunday, 09 August 2009, 15:28 GMT]
“Tamil National Alliance (TNA) winning Vavuniyaa Urban Council (VUC) election and Tamils refraining from voting in large numbers in Jaffna Municipal Council (JMC) election prove that Sri Lanka Government was not able to achieve the success it planned for and expected. We wish to thank the Tamils for voting for Ilankai Thamizh Arasu Kadchi (ITAK) even amidst intimidation and frustration and despair caused by the war,” TNA said in a press release signed by Jaffna District TNA parliamentarian, Mavai Senathirajah, Sunday.
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2 Tamils arrested in Colombo

[TamilNet, Sunday, 09 August 2009, 09:34 GMT]
Sri Lanka police took two Tamil civilians into custody in Colombo Thursday night in two separate incidents. One was arrested in Katunayake International Airport (KIA) area and the other along D. R. Wijewardene Mawatte in Colombo town, media spokesman Ranjit Gunasekara told media.
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Elections jeopardize democracy

[TamilNet, Sunday, 09 August 2009, 00:46 GMT]
With only 20 percent turn out in the municipal elections, the clear verdict of the Eezham Tamils is no confidence in the Sri Lankan state and its institutions, said Tamil circles, commenting further that genocidal war and democratic elections mean the same for Colombo. They were citing the manner in which the elections were conducted denying entry to outside witnesses, while 40 percent of the voters not present, 50 percent of polling cards not delivered, Colombo-sponsored forgery of ID cards accused, people coerced and even the Tamil outfit with the government was forced to drop its identity. Whether war and elections against Tamils mean the same to the international community too is the question now coming from the Tamil circles which pointed out that the armed forces occupying the peninsula were more than double in number than the people voted in the elections.
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Custody of Pathmanathan raises questions about recognition to state terrorism

[TamilNet, Friday, 07 August 2009, 23:35 GMT]
The manner in which Selvarasa Pathmanathan was 'arrested' and ended up in the custody of the Sri Lankan state that is widely accused of war crimes, genocide and state terrorism, raises serious concerns about the world outlook to political justice, Tamil circles said. Mr. Pathmanathan who denounced violence was engaged in re-organising the LTTE and in consenting the formation of a transnational body for the Eezham Tamils. Meanwhile, acknowledging Pathmanathan’s custody, Colombo’s minister and spokesperson Keheliya Rambukwela said Friday: “There was some false hopes that after the LTTE was crushed that movement could be revived with Pathmanathan. But we have proved that we have the capability of getting to them from wherever they emerge.”
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Indian HC hands over 117 million rupees to Gotabaya

[TamilNet, Thursday, 06 August 2009, 21:49 GMT]
Bank drafts worth over 117 million Sri Lankan rupees were officially handed over by Indian High Commissioner to Sri Lanka, Alok Prasad to Colombo’s Secretary of Defence Gotabaya Rajapaksa, Wednesday, for the ‘rehabilitation’ project of the air force base at Palaali (Palaly) in the Jaffna peninsula. This is the second instalment of Indian assistance to the improvement of the runway, according to SL defence ministry. Meanwhile, India intends to withdraw its medical team from August 31, as most of the urgent medical needs of the war displaced in the Menik Farm zone assigned to the Indian hospital had been met, The Hindu reported.
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