US should think of ‘gunboat diplomacy’

[TamilNet, Thursday, 07 May 2009, 03:31 GMT]
It is the last chance for US to strike a political balance in the island, if it is really keen in seeing meaningful ‘post-conflict’ process, said TamilNet’s political commentator in Colombo. Neither the present Indian Establishment, which by its role played as a war partner irredeemably lost its positive leverage on the affairs of the island, nor the UN bogged down with Security Council deliberations may able to act swiftly to respond to the emergency, he said. Colombo is on one hand aiming at creating a political and military vacuum for Tamils and on the other hand is aiming at the incarceration of all Tamils either in internment camps or in open prisons. The balance disturbed by US has to be set right by US itself by a timely action such as sending the fleet without waiting for political changes in India, the commentator said.
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Canadian academics support self-determination, ask direct US action

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 06 May 2009, 19:53 GMT]
Stressing on the recognition of the self-determination of Tamils as the basis for any solution to the crisis in the island of Sri Lanka, Canadian Academics for Tamil Rights in a press conference Wednesday in Toronto said that the proscription of the LTTE had affected the peace initiatives and Canada was a party to be blamed. “As an immediate remedy to the grave situation at the moment, the IC and UN should take food and medicine directly to Vanni and if not possible they should pressure the US to do it. It may look strange, but it is the only option if any one wants to save the lives of the people in Vanni”, was the opinion expressed in the press conference, citing the urgency.
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Critical medicine shortage, alarming number of casualties - Ambassador Rice

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 06 May 2009, 16:52 GMT]
Dr Rice, U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations, in a press release issued early last week expressed deep concern at the "growing and grave humanitarian crisis," and pointed pointed to "serious allegations against both parties of violations of international humanitarian law." While indicating that shelling by the Sri Lanka Army (SLA) continues despite assuarances by Colombo, Ambassador Rice also expressed concern at the shortage of "critical medicines," and disappointment at the refusal by Sri Lanka to allow "UN humanitarian team into conflict zone to facilitate relief operations and safe evacuation of civilians."
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Tamil couple arrested in Mannaar

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 06 May 2009, 04:08 GMT]
Sri Lanka Army (SLA) and police arrested a Tamil couple in Ezhuthoor in Mannaar district claiming that a claymore mine and some explosives were recovered from a bare land next to their house, in a search operation conducted in the area on 27 April, sources in Mannaar said.
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SLA forcibly removes youths from its detention centres in Jaffna

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 05 May 2009, 17:24 GMT]
Sri Lanka Army (SLA) soldiers have forcibly taken away young men and women among the Vanni civilians held in the SLA detention centres in Thenmaraadchi and Vadamaraadchi, according to NGO representatives who visited the detention centres. The family members who raised protest against the abduction of their children in Mirusuvil detention centre have been taken away from the centre for ‘interrogation’ by SLA soldiers, the sources added. SLA officials say that the youths taken away are to be placed in the SLA Special Rehabilitation Camp (SRC) located in Thellippazhai High Security Zone (HSZ).
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US responsible, least humanitarian is dropping food: Vanni civilians

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 05 May 2009, 17:07 GMT]
If there is any meaning for the word humanitarian, the minimum humanitarian act right now is to drop food to the civilians of Vanni without wasting a minute, repeatedly appealed health officials in Vanni on Tuesday, as an unprecedented humanitarian catastrophe caused by Sri Lankan government enforced starvation engulfs the civilians of Vanni. “The US government and the world should realise that the situation culminating in the most inhuman act of Colombo calculatedly inflicting starvation death on civilians is ultimately a consequence of the lopsided application of a US policy, and the US has every responsibility to remedy it. Failure amounts to connivance to the crime. US has to immediately airdrop food”, said a relief official in Vanni.
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2 elderly women die of starvation in Jaffna SLA detention centres

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 05 May 2009, 16:59 GMT]
A 79-year-old woman detainee in the Sri Lanka Army (SLA) detention centre in Mirusuvil Roman Catholic Church and a 75-year-old woman in Kathadi Saiva Children Home SLA detention centre are reported dead due to starvation, sources in Jaffna. Jaffna magistrate court, being informed of the deaths, is awaiting post mortem examination reports from medical authorities for further legal action, the sources added.
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Tamil IDP abducted in Moothoor

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 05 May 2009, 15:44 GMT]
Unidentified armed men entering Ki’liveddi Internally Displaced Persons (IDPs) welfare centre in Moothoor division in Trincomalee district Saturday night forcibly took away a man in the centre amid protests by fellow IDPs, sources in Moothoor said. The IDPs, displaced due to Sri Lanka Army (SLA) offensives, have been waiting for resettlement in their own villages.
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Claymore attack kills youth in Buttala

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 05 May 2009, 12:43 GMT]
Unidentified men launched a Claymore attack Tuesday morning on a tractor belonging to Pelawathe Sugar Factory in Weliyara village in Buttala in Monaragala district, killing a youth and seriously injuring another man, sources in Puththa’lam said. Meanwhile, Monoragala police arrested two Tamil youths in Monoragala town and have detained them for interrogation, the sources added.
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3 alleged suspects of Thinusika killing found shot dead: Police

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 05 May 2009, 05:44 GMT]
Sri Lankan Police officials in Batticaloa said they have located Tuesday morning three bullet-riddled dead bodies of men who were alleged suspects of involvement in the abduction and murder of 8-year-old Thinusika Satheeskumar Saturday.
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Sri Lanka’s conflict has ancient roots – UK minister, Bishop

[TamilNet, Monday, 04 May 2009, 22:25 GMT]
Sri Lanka’s ethnic conflict is ““obviously … a quarrel that has ancient roots. It is also an extremely violent quarrel, with appalling things being done by both sides,” Britain’s Foreign Office minister Lord Malloch-Brown said Monday. He was agreeing in the House of Lords with the Bishop of Portsmouth who objected to the President of Sri Lanka describing the island’s conflict as part of the “war on terror,” the website Religious Intelligence reported.
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Colombo SLHRC restricts its Jaffna office functions

[TamilNet, Monday, 04 May 2009, 14:16 GMT]
Sri Lanka Human Rights Commission (SLHRC) Colombo Head Office Secretary, Ms. Chandra Ellawela, has instructed Jaffna office not to admit anyone seeking protection to their lives into the office but to get the assistance of the police to check them and not to take them to Court in HRC vehicles but in private vehicles, civil society sources in Jaffna said. Meanwhile, it has been decided to instruct persons seeking protection to their lives to do so in one of the five Magistrate Courts in Jaffna peninsula, in a high level meeting between Jaffna Additional Magistrate, T. Wicknarajah and Sri Lanka Army (SLA) Jaffna Commander, according to directions released by the Additional Magistrate, the sources added.
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76 Vanni civilians taken to SLA Thellippazhai Rehabilitation Centre

[TamilNet, Monday, 04 May 2009, 06:10 GMT]
Seventy-six Vanni civilians held in Sri Lanka Army (SLA) detention centres in Jaffna peninsula have been forcibly taken by SLA to Thellippazhai SLA Rehabilitation centre, according to complaints made by the persons’ relatives in the detention centres to NGOs in Jaffna. Meanwhile, Jaffna Government Agent (GA), K. Ganesh, in a press notification Sunday, said that the 76 Vanni civilans have volunteered to be placed in Thellippazhai SLA Rehabilitation Centre, sources in Jaffna said.
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World Press Freedom Day observed in Jaffna

[TamilNet, Sunday, 03 May 2009, 16:15 GMT]
“It is of great importance that the World Press Freedom Day is celebrated in Jaffna peninsula where press freedom is completely restricted,” Chief guest of the event, C. V. K. Sivagnanam, the president of Jaffna peninsula NGOs Federation, said in the event organized by North Ceylon Journalists’ Association (NCJA) Sunday around 10:30 a. m in Jaffna University Media Training Centre, chaired by NCJA President, V. Kathirkamathamby. The portraits of the slain journalists of Jaffna peninsula and Tharmaratnam Sivaram, Tharaki, from Batticaloa and late senior journalists were unveiled in the NCJA office in the Media Training Centre at the beginning of the event, sources in Jaffna said. Veteran media photographer, Changkarakambar Kahiravelu, 76, was honoured for his continuing dedicated service to the media for the past 45 years, in the event.
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Colombo builds up for imminent massacre

[TamilNet, Sunday, 03 May 2009, 13:41 GMT]
Sri Lanka Army (SLA) during the weekend has reportedly been engaged in heavy deployment of its troops poised for a major onslaught, reports from Vanni said citing sources close to the LTTE on Sunday. All kinds of heavy weapons, including prohibited ones, are ready for deployment on the 'No Fire Zone', the sources said. Meanwhile, denying the use of heavy weapons Sri Lanka's president and Commander-in-Chief Mahinda Rajapaksa said Saturday that he can't help for the world not believing in him. On Saturday, several artillery shells fired by the SLA on the only remaining makeshift hospital in the 'safety zone' killed at least 64 patients and attendees including a volunteer doctor and wounded 87.
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Sinhalese colonization of Tamil village in Eastern Province

[TamilNet, Sunday, 03 May 2009, 04:37 GMT]
Tamil National Alliance (TNA) Eastern Province parliamentarians accused the government of colonizing traditional Tamil villages in the border area between the districts of Batticaloa and Ampaa’rai districts with Sinhalese families, sources in Batticaloa said. Encroachment by Sinhalese families of paddy fields of Tamils in Keviliyaamadu village in Paddippazhai Divisional Secretariat in Batticaloa district takes place with government assistance, they further said.
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RSF campaigns for release of three women journalists

[TamilNet, Sunday, 03 May 2009, 01:38 GMT]
Reporters sans frontiers (RSF), a Paris-based media watchdog, in a press release issued Saturday said it is mounting a campaign for the release of three women journalists, Iranian-American journalist Roxana Saberi, who has been sentenced to eight years in prison in Iran on a charge of spying for the United States, and two American journalists employed by California-based Current TV, Euna Lee and Laura Ling, who have been held in Pyongyang since 17 March. In the 2009 report released earlier in the year the RSF said in Sri Lanka, "[m]urders, physical assaults, kidnappings, threats and censorship are the lot of Sri Lanka's journalists. Top government officials, including the defence minister, are directly implicated in the serious press freedom violations that accompanied the military offensive against the Tamil Tiger (LTTE) rebels."
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Jaffna DDC meeting postponed again

[TamilNet, Saturday, 02 May 2009, 18:00 GMT]
Jaffna Government Agent (GA) K. Ganesh informed that the Jaffna District Development Committee (DDC) meeting scheduled to take place 5 May has been postponed indefinitely. This is the second time the DDC meeting is postponed during the current year. The DDC, comprised of Sri Lanka Minister, Douglas Devananda, Governor of Northern Provincial Council and Tamil National Alliance (TNA) Jaffna district parliamentarian, Mavai Senathirajah, is responsible for the planning and implementation of development projects of Jaffna district.
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Paramilitary kills kidnapped girl in Batticaloa after ransom demand

[TamilNet, Saturday, 02 May 2009, 11:56 GMT]
Dead body of the 8-year-old Thinusika Satheeskumar, the girl reported missing since Tuesday after going to her school, was recovered inside an abandoned well in the city Saturday morning. The victims' relatives have alleged that the killers were paramilitary operatives who have been demanding 3 million rupees in ransom. Thinusika is the daughter of Satheeskumar Santhirarajah who was abducted two years ago allegedly by Karuna Group paramilitary men demanding ransom. He was reportedly slain in Welikande even after a part of the ransom was paid. Now, a former PLOTE paramilitary operative is alleged to be the man behind the abduction and murder of the girl.
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SLA massacres patients with targeted shelling, 64 killed in hospital

[TamilNet, Saturday, 02 May 2009, 08:07 GMT]
Sri Lanka Army (SLA) on Saturday attacked the only remaining makeshift hospital twice, killing 64 patients and attending relatives, and causing injuries to 87. Two artillery shells fired by the SLA hit the hospital at Mu'l'li-vaaykkaal around 9:00 a.m. killing 23 and maiming 34 and later several shells were fired at 10:30 a.m., killing 41 and maiming 53. The attack has taken place, after the Sri Lankan military was provided with the exact coordinates of the hospital premises three days back through the ICRC, and as Sri Lanka Air Force Unmanned Aerial Vehicle (UAV) was monitoring the hospital area. The massacre is calculated to coerce the civilians said a rescue worker citing leaflets air dropped Friday with Mahinda Rajapaksa's message asking civilians to come to the SLA side.
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