Condemn Colombo for targeting Human Rights defenders: LTTE urges IC

[TamilNet, Monday, 21 April 2008, 06:51 GMT]
"The Sri Lankan State has targeted a human rights defender who worked for the welfare of the people," Political Division of the Liberation Tigers of Tamileelam (LTTE), charged in a statement issued on Monday, and urged the international human rights bodies and the international community to condemn the continued gross human rights violations of the Sri Lankan state, and take actions without further delay to bring an end to the continuing human rights violations by the State.
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NESoHR condemns Fr Karunaratnam's assassination

[TamilNet, Sunday, 20 April 2008, 20:38 GMT]
Expressing "profound shock and loss," officials at the NorthEast Secretariat on Human Rights (NESoHR), in a press release issued Sunday, condemned the assassination of NESoHR's chairman, Fr. M. X. Karunaratnam, and said, he "worked tirelessly championing the Human Rights of the Tamil people. He travelled to the United States, Canada and Geneva meeting with Foreign Governments and Organizations concerned in Human Rights. Rev. Fr. Karunaratnam pioneered the work of NESoHR in the field of psychological counseling of the war and tsunami affected people in the Tamil Homeland."
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NESoHR Chairman Fr. Karunaratnam killed in DPU attack

[TamilNet, Sunday, 20 April 2008, 07:57 GMT]
Rev. Father M X Karunaratnam, the chairman of the NorthEast Secretariat on Human Rights (NESoHR), was killed in a Claymore attack carried out by a Deep Penetration Unit (DPU) of the Sri Lanka Army on Sunday, according to initial reports from Tamileelam Police. The attack took place on Mallaavi - Vavunikku'lam Road in Vanni around 12:30 p.m. Sunday, according to initial reports.
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India should organize peace talks: Karunanidhi

[TamilNet, Friday, 18 April 2008, 16:46 GMT]
"India should organize negotiations between the warring parties in Sri Lanka to bring peace to the island nation," said Tamil Nadu Chief Minister Kalaignar Karunanidhi in an exclusive interview to the Times of India on Friday. His statement comes at a time when India has chosen to ignore all calls to mediate between Colombo and the Tamil Tigers and has satisfied itself with playing behind-the-scene roles.
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Liberate Calendar

[TamilNet, Monday, 14 April 2008, 23:57 GMT]
A Calendar is conceived and designed by logic and astronomy rather than emotions and myths of politics. If people don’t understand the calendar they follow, educate them. If any section of the society thinks that the calendar is its prerogative, liberate the calendar, rather than mutilating it or abandoning it. If there is any problem in the calendar it has to be investigated and corrected by a forum of astronomers, climatologists and environmental scientists, sitting along with traditional astronomers historians and Tamil scholars. Any society, which doesn’t care to investigate and understand its own heritage of science, is not going to make any progress. It will always remain in slavery.
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Tamil New Year

[TamilNet, Sunday, 13 April 2008, 02:30 GMT]
The Tamil New Year day falls on Sunday, 13th April, since 2008 is a leap year. On other years, it is 14th April. It is not only the Tamil New year, but also the New Year of Sinhalese and Malayalis. It is not appropriate to call it a Hindu New Year since vast majority of Hindus in India don't celebrate it a New Year. It is only an auspicious day called Mesha-samkraanti for them. But, the Sikhs celebrate it a New Year. It is equally inappropriate to call it a Buddhist New Year, as Buddhists don’t celebrate it universally. The calculation for the commencement of this New Year and the calendar based on it are entirely astronomical.
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Jeyaraj Fernandopulle killed in bomb blast

[TamilNet, Sunday, 06 April 2008, 03:14 GMT]
Sri Lanka's Minister of Highways & Road Development, Jeyaraj Fernandopulle, was killed in a bomb blast at the public playground in Weliweraya, located in the Gampaha district of Western Province, around 8:00 a.m. Sunday. 13 persons were killed and 60 wounded in the attack that took place while the minister was waving a flag to start off a marathon race in connection with the Tamil and Sinhala New Year celebrations. 16 of the wounded have sustained serious injuries, Police said.
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Ramadoss urges Karunanidhi for timely action

[TamilNet, Friday, 28 March 2008, 08:23 GMT]
The ruling Congress of India has no policy alternatives towards Sri Lankan affairs. The DMK should take 'a cue' from the Communist Party of India in denouncing Indian arms to Sri Lanka, said Dr. S. Ramadoss, leader of Paaddaa'li Makka'l Kadchi (PMK, Toilers' Party) while speaking to media on the occasion of a demonstration in Chennai on Thursday. "The Tamil Nadu State Assembly should come out of its slumber and pass a resolution in this respect. The Centre should be reminded of the strength of Tamil parliamentarians. Tamil Nadu people are ready to pay any price for the Eezham cause," said Ramadoss whose party is an ally of the ruling Congress coalition government of India, along with DMK.
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U.S. Rights report fortifies moral, legal entitlement of Tamil state- Fein

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 26 March 2008, 17:11 GMT]
Contrasting U.S. State Department’s institutional bias in favor of governments, and Bush administration’s willingness to overlook abuses by foreign governments in the name of fighting terrorism, with the recent U.S report on Human Rights in Sri Lanka, Bruce Fine, an attorney for a Tamil activist group in the U.S., in a statement released to the media Wednesday, asserts that, “[t]he fact that the United States would savage the human rights record of the GOSL [Government of Sri Lanka] means that its [Sri Lanka’s] actual terrorism record is far more gruesome than represented. The report thus fortifies the moral and legal entitlement of Tamils to a separate statehood.”
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It needs a mandate to prod them to justice

[TamilNet, Thursday, 20 March 2008, 11:52 GMT]
"Anyone who wishes to see a peacefully united Sri Lanka has to begin from separation. Separation for unity is the appropriate paradigm today. The Sri Lankan situation has transcended the 1987 formula. It is time the Tamils in India have to take care of a policy shift in the Indian establishment. The suggestion is that the political parties of Tamil Nadu who aspire for power in the forthcoming elections have to boldly adapt a policy upholding a Tamil Nation in Sri Lanka in their election manifesto and get the mandate from the people. Only such a mandate can silence the antagonists and direct the foreign policy of India to serve the interests of Tamils, India as well as a peaceful Sri Lanka."
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Assault on media

[TamilNet, Sunday, 16 March 2008, 16:08 GMT]
While the 2007 Country Report on Human Rights Practices in Sri Lanka released by the Bureau of Democracy, Human Rights, and Labor of the U.S. State Department catalogued the deteriorating climate for media freedom in Sri Lanka, State intimidation of, and violence on journalists continue in 2008. Unidentified men have broken into the houses of journalists Munusamy Parameshwari in Gampola, and Sashi Kumar and Sunetra Athugalpura in Gonawela, Kelaniya in three separate incidents in the last two days, according to media reports. Parameshawari's relatives were assaulted before the attackers got away, reports added.
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Colombo irked by US Rights report

[TamilNet, Friday, 14 March 2008, 14:53 GMT]
The 2007 Country Report of Human Rights Practices in Sri Lanka released by the Bureau of Democracy, Human Rights, and Labor of the U.S. State Department has created shockwaves within the Rajapakse Government according to Media reports in Colombo Friday. Sri Lanka’s Foreign Minister Rohitha Bogollagama had called on the US Ambassador in Colombo, Robert O Blake, to register “Sri Lanka’s serious concerns” on the report, Colombo media reported.
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Dinamani: Tamil Nadu should shape Center’s policy towards Sri Lanka

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 12 March 2008, 15:02 GMT]
Referring to Chief Minister Karunanidhi’s letter to the Indian Prime Minister which protested Sri Lanka Navy (SLN’s) hostile actions including regular incidents of firing against Tamil Naadu fishermen fishing near Kachchatheevu, Dinamani, a mainstream Tamil Nadu daily, in an editorial on Tuesday assailed India’s insensitivity and Chief Minister Karunanidhi’s meek response to the serious violations of the SLN.
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LTTE ending use of child soldiers - US

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 12 March 2008, 04:22 GMT]
The Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) “is eliminating the recruitment and use of child soldiers,” the US State Department said this week in its annual human rights report. The LTTE had not complied with its promise to end the practice by end of 2007, but its policy of recruiting one person from each family targeted those 18 years or older, the report said. Sri Lankan government forces were complicit in conscripting children for the TMVP (Karuna Group), “which used coercion, extortion, rape, and murder to force children and adults to join their ranks,” the report said.
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Karunanidhi urges Indian PM to protect fishermen from unprovoked SLN attacks

[TamilNet, Sunday, 09 March 2008, 08:01 GMT]
Tamil Nadu Chief Minister M. Karunanidhi on Saturday wrote to the Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh urging him to "instruct the [Indian] Coast Guard and the Navy to carry out effective patrolling and surveillance to protect Tamil Nadu fishermen from unprovoked firing" by the Sri Lankan Navy since the situation was "becoming alarming day by day and unprovoked attacks are taking place often", according to reports in the Indian media. "It is necessary to contain the arbitrary activities of the Sri Lankan Navy," his letter noted.
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Expression of support to LTTE not an offence: Karunanidhi

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 19 February 2008, 16:55 GMT]
Tamil Nadu Chief Minister M Karunanidhi on Monday reiterated that mere expression of support to the LTTE was not an offence as per an observation of the Indian Supreme Court. He admonished Opposition leader Jayalalithaa for misleading the people on this issue.
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Justification for Tamil statehood compelling under international law- Fein

[TamilNet, Saturday, 16 February 2008, 15:10 GMT]
Accusing a Sri Lanka website of "surrender[ing] the honorable role of scrutinizing and criticizing [Sri Lanka] government to become an obsequious courtier daily genuflecting to the GOSL and the Tamil quislings Karuna and Pillaiyan group," Bruce Fein, an attorney based in Washington D.C, in responding to questions posed by the website, challenged the site to publish a list of Americans killed or threatened by the LTTE, saying "[O]ne statutory requirement is proof that an organization threatens Americans or impairs the national security of the United States."
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Jayalalitha to Centre: Take action against Karunanidhi for LTTE support

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 13 February 2008, 16:57 GMT]
Jayalalitha, leader of All India Anna Dravida Munnetta Kazhakam (AIADMK), the major opposition party in Tamil Nadu on Wednesday urged the Centre to take action against Chief Minister M Karunanidhi for his "support" to the LTTE. A resolution adopted at the party's General Council said that Mr. Karunanidhi, after coming back to power, not only remained silent over LTTE supporters, but also went a step ahead and eulogized the death of S P Thamilchelvan, LTTE's former political head. It labeled Karunanidhi's elegy "an act of treason" and alleged that it would pave way for secessionism.
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Karunanidhi condemns Sri Lanka Navy for killing Tamil Nadu fisherman

[TamilNet, Monday, 11 February 2008, 14:42 GMT]
Sri Lanka Navy personnel shot and killed a fisherman from Tamil Nadu by firing on his boat on the Palk Strait on Sunday. Tamil Nadu Chief Minister M. Karunanidhi was the first to condemn the "indiscriminate firing" by the SLN. The Chief Minister has "taken steps to draw Sri Lankan Government's attention to the issue through the Centre," according to an official press release from Chennai.
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Karunanidhi offers to step down, challenging false allegations over Tiger issue

[TamilNet, Monday, 04 February 2008, 18:03 GMT]
Tamil Nadu Chief Minister M Karunanidhi hit back at Congress leaders and announced on Sunday that he was even ready to face a change of power in the state over false allegations of supporting the LTTE. Speaking at a marriage function at the DMK headquarters, well-attended by several Congress leaders, Mr. Karunanidhi alleged that some people were trying to topple his government by indulging in a 'conspiracy' and requested Congressmen not to become a party to it.
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