Role of powers with colonial legacy, abetting contemporary Sinhalicisation, requires scrutiny

[TamilNet, Sunday, 22 July 2018, 20:33 GMT]
The National Housing Development Authority (NHDA), which comes under the occupying unitary state of genocidal Sri Lanka, is silently transferring 5 acres of lands to the notorious British-trained ‘Special Task Force’ (STF) to expand its commando post into a permanent camp to defend the controversial Sinhala colony at the strategic entrance to Jaffna at Naavat-kuzhi. The colonisation scheme, initiated during the rule of Rajapaksa brothers, received state-patronisation after the regime change backed by the West. The colony is planned to control the arteries of the city and to Sinhalicise Jaffna city itself. The trend is also evidenced in the latest move by the occupying Colombo to station its troops at the Jaffna Fort, which is ‘developed’ with the blessings, funding and research coming from the Netherlands and the United Kingdom.
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British archaeologists, Indian contractors abet Colombo's concealment of mass graves in Jaffna

[TamilNet, Saturday, 21 July 2018, 21:44 GMT]
Human skeletons, including that of children, believed to belong to the massacred Eezham Tamils during the times of genocidal war, have been discovered at two separate locations in the city of Jaffna between 15th and 20th of July. At the Jaffna Fort, bones of a child along with a golden ring engraved with the initials ‘SA’ has been recovered. Following this discovery, the officials of Colombo's Archaeological Department have sent Tamil excavators home while allowing the Sinhala and the British excavators to proceed with the work. On Friday, another alleged mass grave discovered at Naayanmaar-kaddu in Ka'l'liyang-kaadu in Jaffna seems to be an extension of the Chemma'ni killing fields from the times of Chandrika Kumaratunga's genocidal rule of Jaffna in the mid-1990s.
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New Delhi fails to update Jaffna on Palaali airport plans

[TamilNet, Friday, 20 July 2018, 22:09 GMT]
SL Prime Minister Ranil Wickramasinghe has repeatedly been claiming that Colombo was proceeding with its plans to renovate the runway at Palaali in Jaffna with Indian assistance allowing flight services from South India to Jaffna. There were also reports that New Delhi was reviewing a plan for “regional airport” as before the times of war. In the meantime, the occupying military of Colombo, which has been deploying Palaali runway as its airbase since 1977, is rushing ahead with planting coconut and palmyra saplings in the lands seized from the uprooted Tamils in five GS divisions. The SL authorities have taken the lands citing a war-time Gazette notification from 07 August 1987. However, the office of the Consulate General of India (CGI) in Jaffna, has no information from New Delhi regarding India's plans on the airport, informed sources at the Northern Provincial Council said.
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Skulls with bullet-like holes excavated in Mannaar mass grave, women and children among victims

[TamilNet, Thursday, 19 July 2018, 23:22 GMT]
Human skeletons of massacred people including children and women embracing each other have emerged in the 37 day-long excavations of the brutal massacre site discovered at the entrance to the Tamil-speaking city of Mannaar island, which has been under the control of the Sinhala military. There was no doubt the slain victims were subjected to a brutal massacre, said an excavator on condition of anonymity. The excavators have discovered gunshot holes in the skulls. A young person's skeleton was found along with the skeleton of an embracing adult, visibly exposing the brutality of the massacre. So far, the unearthed skeletal remains give a head count of 29. However, the extent of the killing field is still expanding, possibly reaching out of the premises.
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Uprooted Mu'l'lik-ku'lam Tamils adopt Ira'nai-theevu approach, enter their lands seized by SL Navy

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 18 July 2018, 19:21 GMT]
More than 200 Tamil families were living in Mu'l'lik-ku'lam eleven years before, in 2007, when the Sinhala military of genocidal Sri Lanka seized the coastal village facing towards the Gulf of Mannaar. Last year, the occupying SL Navy said it would consider handing over a small pocket of 77 acres of the total 5,000 acres back to the people, after ten years of protests and finally the people waging a continuous protest for 38 days in March and April 2017. However, the SL Navy didn't clear the lands and hand them over to the people despite repeated requests. The promise was a deceptive move aimed at containing the protest. However, around 50 of the 200 families have now chosen to enter the lands by themselves. They are now confined to the lands, which the SL Navy said it was prepared to release, Catholic priests in Mannaar told TamilNet on Wednesday.
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SL Forest Department seizes agricultural lands of Eezham Tamils in Paduvaan-karai

[TamilNet, Monday, 16 July 2018, 22:48 GMT]
The so-called Forest Conservation Department of occupying Colombo has seized a small pond, known as Ka'lik-ku'lam, and almost 500 acres of lands in the vicinity of Unnichchai 6th Mile Post. The Eezham Tamil villagers have been using the area for Cheanai (slash-and-burn) cultivation for decades. The villagers, who have resettled after the end of war and who also received housing through the ‘National Housing Development Authority’, complain that they are unable to continue with their livelihoods of agriculture, fresh-water fishing and animal farming as a direct consequence of the latest occupation, which has been carried out by the SL Forest Department.
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Families of enforced disappeared vehemently oppose OMP sittings in North

[TamilNet, Sunday, 15 July 2018, 19:14 GMT]
The sittings by the deceptive ‘Office of the Missing Persons’ (OMP) held in Jaffna and Ki'linochchi this weekend received strong opposition as the families of enforced disappeared, who have been protesting for more than 500 days, conclusively rejecting the OMP as a farce. The protesters in Jaffna did not stop with their symbolic protest outside the building. They also protested inside the hall where the sitting went on with a few attendees. Finally, the SL police were invited to control the situation.
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SL High Court in Vavuniyaa tricked again into postponing hearings on TPP case

[TamilNet, Saturday, 14 July 2018, 19:35 GMT]
The Attorney General Department of the unitary state of genocidal Sri Lanka has once again managed to get the SL High Court in Vavuniyaa to postpone the long-awaited hearing on a case involving three Tamil political prisoners (TPP) by two months. After re-transferring case back to Vavuniyaa from the so-called Special Court in Anuradhapura, a previous hearing at the Vavuniyaa was also postponed at the request of the SL Attorney General's Department, which was arguing that it needed time to locate a witness, who was supposed to appear for the hearing in Vavuniyaa. In the meantime, Vavuniyaa High Court Judge Sasi Mahendran, well versed in the particular case, has been transferred away from the High Court in Vavuniyaa. Judge Mahendran has been critical of the role played by the AG Department.
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NPC CM declines participation in Colombo's unilateral task force for so-called Development

[TamilNet, Friday, 13 July 2018, 23:20 GMT]
“National Unity and Integration cannot be forged by foisting so-called development on the politically affected people of the North and East. The political settlement of the problem of the Tamil speaking people of the North and East should precede any such development processes,” said Chief Minister of Northern Province Justice C.V. Wigneswaran in a reply sent to SL President Maithiripala Siriena on Monday. He was declining to accept being nominated to the overwhelmingly Colombo-controlled 48-member SL Presidential Task Force to direct, coordinate and monitor ‘development activities’ in the Northern and Eastern Provinces.
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Collaborationist sections of TNA lose significance, Wigneswaran holds key to unified Tamil polity

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 11 July 2018, 18:20 GMT]
The policy outlook adopted by the US-led bandwagonism of the West and that of India is tightly in sync with each other. Their modus operandi is nothing else than pure appeasement of the accelerating Sinhala-Buddhist chauvinism in the South. They would be prepared to sacrifice the democratic aspirations of Eezham Tamils as their manoeuvrings are aimed at gaining strategic access to this island. However, they find themselves in a delicate situation today as they could no longer dictate the terms of Tamil political debate through the collaborationist sections of the TNA, says Political Analyst S.A. Jothilingam in an exclusive interview to TamilNet on Friday. Thanks to the role played by Justice C.V. Wigneswaran, the mainstream discourse is getting shaped to the point that it is now practically possible to forge a unified Tamil polity for Tamils once again, he says.
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SL Military Intelligence recommences recruitment of notorious ex-paramilitary operatives

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 10 July 2018, 21:53 GMT]
SL President Maithiripala Sirisena, who is also the Commander-in-Chief of the occupying military, and SL Prime Minister Ranil Wickramasinghe have given green signals to the respective intelligence services under their control to recommence recruitment of former Tamil paramilitary operatives in the occupied country of Eezham Tamils in the North and East, informed ex-paramilitary sources in Jaffna said.
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SL Police in Champoor blocks remembrance of Tamils massacred by SL military

[TamilNet, Saturday, 07 July 2018, 19:56 GMT]
The occupying Sinhala Army of genocidal Sri Lanka indiscriminately massacred more than 130 Eezham Tamils in Moothoor East in Trincomalee district on 07th and 08th of July in 1990, launching a so-called cordon and search operation. The people of Champoor and other villages commemorate the massacre victims every year. Last year, they marked the event on 07 July at the presence of TNA Parliamentarian K Thurairatnesingham putting up a basic structure in remembrance of those who perished. This year, the SL Police informed the people on Friday that it has prohibited the memorial event, which was scheduled to take place on Saturday. The United States Indo-Pacific Command is grooming the marine force of genocidal Sri Lanka at Champoor.
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Jaffna University silent to Colombo's pressure, motives behind Fort excavation questioned

[TamilNet, Friday, 06 July 2018, 23:17 GMT]
The Colombo-based Archaeology Department of the unitary state of genocidal Sri Lanka is pushing for the presence of the SL military inside the Jaffna Fort. The move hints a deep-rooted motive of checkmating the native Tamil academics and their institutions from engaging in independent research. Mainly depending on the funds and the academic focus of the UK-based ‘UNESCO Chair on Archaeological Ethics and Practice in Cultural Heritage’ of the Durham University, which is flowing through the Colombo-centric unitary mechanism, the academics of the Faculty of Arts and the Department of History, avoid opposition to the Sinhala militarization of the Jaffna Fort, they further commented. In the meantime, the occupying SL military has started to put up foundation structures for a military point, just 100 meters close to the archaeological excavation site, on Friday.
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Tamils need native movements to confront Colombo-centric environmental exploitations

[TamilNet, Thursday, 05 July 2018, 23:49 GMT]
Many recent reports from the eastern coast of the North-East indicate a widespread pattern of various corporate and state-centric exploitations targeting the natural resources of the territorial sea and the coast of the North-East. Colombo-based corporates and traders are exploiting export-related businesses, be it sea cucumber export to China, fake mangroves and minerals to the USA and Japan, or mining sand for shipping to the neighbouring state of Maldives. On top of this, Colombo-centric State-to-State relationships originating from geopolitics-driven ‘development’ narrative, as well as military to military ‘exchanges’, are challenging the sovereignty of Eezham Tamils in a big-scale along the territorial sea and the strategic cost.
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Geneva-based human rights regime is big disappointment: Tamil political prisoners

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 04 July 2018, 20:29 GMT]
Tamil political prisoners languishing in Anuradhapura prison have questioned the role of the international community, particularly the UN human rights regime based in Geneva, in defending their rights. The successive High Commissioners of Human Rights, as well as the council mechanism of the UNHRC, have failed to exert pressure on the unitary state of genocidal Sri Lanka to release the prisoners of the times of war. The comment comes from the Tamil prisoners, who learned on Monday that the so-called Special High Court in Anuradhapura, which was set up to address their cases, transferred their cases back to Anuradhapura High Court, after dragging the cases for five more years.
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Macro-level approach needed to confront genocidal land grab in Mullaiththeevu

[TamilNet, Monday, 02 July 2018, 22:55 GMT]
The occupying military of genocidal Sri Lanka is deploying the ethnic chauvinist Archaeology Department of the unitary State with a motive to permanently Sinhalicise a private property, which is of religious significance to the native Tamils at Oddu-chuddaan in Mullaiththeevu, after being repeatedly confronted by the family of the 62-year-old landowner, V. Kanagasundaram. The SL military invited the family at the presence of the Divisional Secretary on 25 June to a meeting in which their 5-acre land was supposed to be handed back to the rightful owner. J. Indrakumar, an official at the Divisional Secretariat also confirmed that the SL military had invited the family to release the lands. However, the meeting turned out to be a different one, the family told TamilNet.
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Champoor Tamils experience trauma as Colombo trains marine forces in occupied Moothoor East

[TamilNet, Sunday, 01 July 2018, 10:20 GMT]
The occupying navy of genocidal Sri Lanka deployed its marine commandos in a convoy of 45 vehicles, including 15 armoured cars, in one of the biggest training exercises to be traumatically experienced by the resettled Eezham Tamils in Moothoor East of Trincomalee district on Friday. The war-affected families, especially the elder-generation among them, were caught in trauma due to the roaming vehicles and the live firing, which reminded them of the times of genocidal onslaught in 2007. The political observers in the East ask the question for whom the marine force is getting prepared at the physical and psychological expense of war-affected Eezham Tamils of Moothoor East.
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Colombo accelerates delinking of Tamil-speaking demographic contiguity in North-East

[TamilNet, Saturday, 30 June 2018, 22:08 GMT]
SL Governor to East Rohitha Bogollagama, conspiring with the Sinhala-Buddhist establishment and the administrative officials of the unitary state, has instructed the Divisional Secretary of Kuchchave'li to survey 400 acres of lands at Arisimalai, which is located 50 km north of Trincomalee city. The Sinhala colonial governor was arguing in favour of the extremist Sinhala Buddhist monks stating that the lands belong to the Buddhist vihara. The move, which has long been objected by the Tamil-speaking Muslims, is surfacing again at the absence of an elected Provincial Council in the East. Tamil-speaking activists in Pulmoaddai say that the Sinhala Buddhist establishment is trying to survey at least 1,300 acres of lands from Arisimalai to Thiriyaay in the division of Kuchchave'li.
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Sinhala colonisation chokes off territorial contiguity of Tamil homeland at Thennai-maravadi

[TamilNet, Friday, 29 June 2018, 23:05 GMT]
The occupying Sinhala colonists have stepped the land grab of Pa'nikkar-vayal in Thennai-maravadi, an ancient Tamil village situated in the north of Kuchcha-ve'li division of Trincomalee district. The encroachment targets the strategic border between the Northern and Eastern provinces choking off the territorial contiguity of the Tamil homeland. The move is also seen as an attempt to annex Thennai-maravadi with the Sinhala division of Padavi Sri Pura in the west to create a sea-access corridor to that division. Besides, the move also threatens the neighbouring Tamil-speaking Muslim village of Pulmoaddai, Tamil and Muslim grassroots activists in Kuchchave'li told TamilNet this week.
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Sinhalas have come in big way, as opening of Kandyan Kingdom: Rt Rev Jebanesan

[TamilNet, Thursday, 28 June 2018, 23:38 GMT]
Tamils had been the first inhabitants and an original people of this island. Although some historians accept that fact, the present Sinhala historians do not take it. Back in the old days, when H.C. Ray was the professor of history at the University of Ceylon, he used to refute the claim that Tamils were interlopers. The interlopers were the Sinhalas and not the Tamils, he used to say. However, one is unable to resonate that fact anymore, says Rt Rev Dr S Jebanesan, the former Bishop of the Jaffna Diocese of the Church of South India, in an exclusive interview to TamilNet. The tyranny of the ‘majority’ is dominating the post-colonial political discourses and the case of ‘Sri Lanka’ is a classic example of this trend, the scholar of philosophy, theology as well as the Tamil and English languages, said.
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