Jaffna APLMs mostly Chinese and Pakistan made

[TamilNet, Friday, 10 September 1999, 19:56 GMT]
Ninety nine percent of the anti-personnel land mines detected and removed by the UNDP so far in Jaffna were made in Pakistan and China said sources in the north today.
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Chemmani: alleged rape victim's body found

[TamilNet, Thursday, 09 September 1999, 14:15 GMT]
Three human skeletons, including one suspected to be that of a woman allegedly raped and beaten to death by a Sri Lanka Army (SLA) officer, were found today in a grave pointed out by ex-corporal Somaratna Rajapaksha, the key witness in the investigation into the mass graves at Chemmani and Ariyalai near Jaffna.
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Two skeletons found at Chemmani

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 07 September 1999, 11:03 GMT]
(Corrected) Investigators digging the alleged graves of civilians killed and buried by Sri Lankan security forces at Chemmani found two human skeletons this afternoon at a spot in which Forensic expert Prof. Chandrasiri Niriella, had earlier found evidence of human remains.
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Mass graves judge reprimands Jaffna SLA commanders

[TamilNet, Monday, 06 September 1999, 12:58 GMT]
The Jaffna district judge Manikkavasagam Ilancheliyan severely reprimanded the Jaffna Sri Lankan Security Forces Commander Lohan Gunawardana and the Sri Lankan Army's 51 division General Officer Commanding (GOC) Maj.Gen.Nihal Marambe this afternoon for interfering in the Chemmmani court proceedings and investigations into the alleged mass graves of civilians arrested and believed to be killed by the army in the peninsula in 1996-97.
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Excavators fail to find bodies

[TamilNet, Monday, 06 September 1999, 12:49 GMT]
No bodies or human skeletal remains were found today by investigators who cleared and dug the area in Chemmani near Jaffna town where ex-corporal Somaratna Rajapksha had earlier claimed were four graves in which eight bodies of civilians arrested and allegedly killed by the Sri Lankan army were buried.
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Batticaloa mass graves investigation urged on massacre anniversary

[TamilNet, Sunday, 05 September 1999, 10:29 GMT]
Prayers and token fasts were held in Tamil temples and churches in many parts of the Batticaloa district today to mark the memory of the 158 Tamil refugees who went missing after they were arrested and dragged away by the Sri Lanka Army from the Eastern University campus at Vanthaarumoolai on September 5, 1990.
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Kopai businessman abducted

[TamilNet, Friday, 03 September 1999, 11:38 GMT]
A businessman, Ratnam Nadarajah, 46, was abducted by unidentified men in a white van around 9 a.m. on Wednesday, August 1. He was later released at Navaly cemetery after being severely assaulted, his relatives said.
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Claymore mine killed PLOTE leaders

[TamilNet, Thursday, 02 September 1999, 19:47 GMT]
(Adds photos)Police investigators confirmed this evening that the blast which killed the Deputy Leader of the People's Liberation Organisation of Tamil Eelam (PLOTE), N.Manikkadasan, was a claymore device fixed inside the ceiling of the group's office in Vavuniya Town.
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PLOTE to file legal action

[TamilNet, Thursday, 02 September 1999, 03:37 GMT]
The PLOTE said today that it is contemplating legal actions against police in Vavuniya for assaulting one of its members for helping two children who were wounded in retaliatory fire by the Sri Lankan Security Forces.
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Chemmani exhumations next week - AG

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 01 September 1999, 20:01 GMT]
Sri Lanka's Attorney General's Department said in a news release issued Tuesday night that the exhumations of alleged graves in Chemmani, Jaffna of civilians murdered by Sri Lanka Army troops would recommence on September 6.
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Ex-SLA troops identify further graves

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 01 September 1999, 16:04 GMT]
Former Sri Lanka Army Corporal Somaratna Rajapaksha and ex-soldier S.A.Perera today identified five more grave sites in the Ariyalai area in Jaffna where Tamil civilians arrested by Government troops were allegedly killed and buried.
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Ex-soldiers identify more Jaffna grave sites

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 31 August 1999, 18:35 GMT]
Fourteen places where scores of arrested Tamil civilians were allegedly killed and buried by the Sri Lanka Army in and around Chemmani near Jaffna town in 1996 and 1997 were identified today by ex-soldiers convicted in the rape and murder of the Jaffna school girl Krishanthy Kumarasamy.
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Chemmani witness points out rape, murder scene

[TamilNet, Monday, 30 August 1999, 18:47 GMT]
Somaratna Rajapaksha showed investigators today the house of the couple who were dragged from their home and allegedly murdered by SLA soldiers while watching a video movie with their two children at Mulli in Ariyalai.
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Key witness identifies Jaffna grave sites

[TamilNet, Monday, 30 August 1999, 12:28 GMT]
Ex. Sri Lanka Army Corporal Somaratna Rajapaksha identified five places near Jaffna town today in which, according to him, about forty-three civilians arrested and killed by Sri Lankan Security forces may lie buried. The Jaffna press was briefed on the developments by state counsel Yasantha Kothagoda this afternoon at Chemmani.
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Ex-soldier goes to identify Jaffna mass graves

[TamilNet, Monday, 30 August 1999, 07:15 GMT]
Somaratna Rajapaksha, the SLA corporal convicted in the rape and murder of the Jaffna school girl Krishanthi Kumarasamy, told the district judge in the northern town this morning that Police investigators who questioned him on the alleged mass graves in Chemmani did not record the names of SLA officials who, according to him, were involved in the arrest and killing of more than six hundred civilians in the peninsula in 1996-97.
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Government to provide food for malnourished students

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 24 August 1999, 14:42 GMT]
The Presidential Secretariat announced today that free milk biscuits will be distributed among grade one students in four districts of the island.
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NAP calls for cease-fire

[TamilNet, Monday, 23 August 1999, 14:22 GMT]
The National Alliance for Peace (NAP), a group of NGOs, religious leaders and academics, called on the Sri Lankan government and the Liberation Tigers today to observe a three day cease-fire from August 27 to 29.
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Electrified fences for Vavuniya Transformers

[TamilNet, Saturday, 21 August 1999, 12:02 GMT]
Electricity transformers in the suburbs of Vavuniya are to be protected by electrified fences according to a decision reached at a special meeting convened this afternoon at the Sri Lanka Army's (SLA) Vavuniya headquarters.
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Madhu Feast in pictures

[TamilNet, Monday, 16 August 1999, 02:15 GMT]
(Photographs) TamilNet correspondents' views of the Madhu Feast held over the weekend and attended by over 50,000 people.
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Madhu Feast proceeds peacefully

[TamilNet, Sunday, 15 August 1999, 14:21 GMT]
Over fifty thousand devotees participated in the Madhu Feast which took place today, said church sources. The Bishop of the Ratnapura diocese conducted the festival mass in Tamil and Sinhala at 6.30 a.m. this morning, along with Rev.Fr. A. Xavier Croos, the Vicar General of Mannar and Rev.Fr.D.B.Derarajah.
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