Colombo's landgrab unrelenting in Mannaar district

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 30 October 2018, 14:13 GMT]
The SL departments of Forest, Wild-Life and Archaeology have seized 30,272 acres of lands in Mannaar district while the occupying SL Army and Navy continue to retain 2,583 acres of public and private lands, the officials of Mannaar District Secretariat said. The occupying military of genocidal Sri Lanka is less willing to release lands in Mannaar in comparison to other districts in the North. At the same time, SL Departments of Forest and Wildlife conservation have emerged as the most aggressive agents seizing lands of Eezham Tamils in the district. 32,855 acres of lands have been absorbed into the so-called sovereignty of the SL State from the country of Eezham Tamils.
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UNP promoted Sinhala colonisation of Vanni allocating housing scheme

[TamilNet, Monday, 29 October 2018, 09:25 GMT]
The United National Party (UNP) has allocated more than 10% of houses provided to resettling people in Mullaiththeevu district to Sinhala colonisers in Ma'nal-aa'ru, which is Sinhalicised into Weli-Oya and is functioning as a separate division within the district, civil sources at the District Secretariat said. The houses have been provided within the past three years, the sources further said.
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Professor Boyle calls for BSD Campaign against genocidal Sri Lanka

[TamilNet, Sunday, 28 October 2018, 17:14 GMT]
Transitional Justice does not work with genocide. The Eezham Tamils must now conceive a Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) campaign against genocidal Sri Lanka, Professor Francis Boyle, an eminent American expert in international law at the University of Illinois College of Law, told TamilNet after SL President Maithiriapala Sirisena installed Mahinda Rajapaksa as the SL Prime Minister in the island. “Now with Rajapaksa back in power, we are going to need BDS. In today’s New York Times his son said he is going to run for President next year and they will win. We will be back to where we were in 2009, a Decade ago. As I argued in my lecture, Transitional Justice is not going to work here. Time for BDS!,” Professor Boyle said on Sunday.
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Let Sinhala nation decide its fate, keep focus on Tamil struggle

[TamilNet, Saturday, 27 October 2018, 23:51 GMT]
The constitutional coup is an outcome of a fierce competition raging between UPFA and UNP agents, who want to exploit the accelerating trade-war between the two powers, the USA and China. The USA has already established its strategic military access to the island through India. The current dispute is not aimed at taking military or diplomatic side with a particular actor, Tamil political observers in Jaffna said. The right-wing populistic SLPP led by Rajapaksa, the strongman from Hambantota and the centre-left SLFP chaired by Sirisena, another strongman from Polonnaruwa, are staunch Sinhala nationalist parties having the blessings of the Buddhist establishment. The SL military is excited by their unity. Tamils, having no leadership after the LTTE, are puzzled. They are deceived to believe that China is behind Rajapaksa and that the USA is sticking with Wickramasinghe.
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Sirisena stages constitutional coup, installs Rajapaksa as SL Prime Minister

[TamilNet, Friday, 26 October 2018, 23:39 GMT]
The executive president of genocidal Sri Lanka, Maithiripala Sirisena, has suddenly installed former SL President Mahinda Rajapaksa as the SL Prime Minister after withdrawing his UPFA from the so-called ‘good governance’ alliance on Friday night. The soft parliamentary coup, which seems to be a carefully planned secret move, has been justified by Mr Sirisena as adhering to the constitutional provisions of the unitary state. Mr Sirisena, who is the Commander-in-Chief of the armed forces, had this already in mind when he addressed the UN General Assembly last month in the USA, political observers in Jaffna commented. Maithiripala was praising his troops on the ground during his UN visit to Donald Trump's USA. The UNP is now reaping what it sowed 40 years ago in 1978 when the late J.R. Jayawardene introduced the executive presidency.
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Justice Wigneswaran decides to launch new political party

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 24 October 2018, 21:37 GMT]
Naming his new initiative as Thamizh Makka'l Koodda'ni (TMK), former Chief Minister of Northern Provincial Council Justice C.V. Wigneswaran on Wednesday summarised the raison d'etre for the new party in a well-attended meeting at Nalloor in Jaffna. The political goal of the TMK would be aimed at achieving a political solution on the basis of Tamils' right of self-determination and shared sovereignty, he said. The party would be prepared to accept a federal solution with undivided North-East as its basic unit, he said. The former Supreme Court Justice came with an initial list of 10-points and urged the people to shape the strategy of the party through public debate.
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SL Police steps up harassment of Tamils after Sinhala extremist MPs heritage-trip

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 23 October 2018, 08:26 GMT]
The SL Police at Nedungkea'nii n Vavuniyaa has again harassed the trustee board of Aathilingkeasvara deity at the heritage hill of Vedukku-naa'ri in Vavuniyaa. The SL Police has told the temple trustees that even putting up a rope ladder is interpreted as construction work which is prohibited. The latest harassment comes after Sinhala parliamentarians belonging to Jathika Nidahas Peramuna (JNP) or National Freedom Front, an extreme Sinhala nationalist JVP-breakaway group, which is aligned with former SL President Mahinda Rajapaksa, visited Mullaiththeevu and Vavuniyaa earlier this month and confronted the Tamil villagers.
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SL Navy harasses resettled Tamils in Musali by blocking access road with barbed-wire

[TamilNet, Monday, 22 October 2018, 17:07 GMT]
The occupying SL Navy of genocidal Sri Lanka has blocked the access route to the pockets of released lands in the coastal village of Mu'l'li-ku'lam in Mannaar mainland on Saturday. Barbed-wire was put up blocking access along the main road, which is also the main supply route to the military base. The SL Navy base is located in 35 acres. However, it retains hundreds of acres of lands in Musali division. The coastal village of Mu'l'lik-ku'lam lies 45 km south of Mannaar city bordering with Puththa'lam district. The resettled people started to protest in front of the SL Navy base on Sunday. The SL Navy lifted the barbed-wire only after Parish Priest Fr Lawrence negotiated between the protesters and the Navy. The people said the SL Navy has started to behave in a more hostile than before.
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New Delhi owes a public apology on Jaffna Hospital massacre

[TamilNet, Sunday, 21 October 2018, 19:04 GMT]
Thirty-one years have elapsed, but the Indian state is yet to tender a public apology to Eezham Tamils for its brutal massacre of more than 60 civilians, including 21 doctors, nurses and other medical staff as well as the warded patients at the Jaffna Teaching Hospital in one of the brutal massacres witnessed in the history of Jaffna. The killings took place during the invading Indian military was at war with the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) in 1987. The war crimes committed by the IPKF on the soil of Eezham Tamils have not been adequately investigated, said the medical staff who marked the 26th year of the massacre committed by the so-called Indian Peace Keeping Force (IPKF).
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Justice for Nimalarajan should start with Tamils addressing IC paradigm of injustice

[TamilNet, Friday, 19 October 2018, 21:45 GMT]
The University community in Jaffna and the journalists in the North and East marked the 18th death anniversary of Eezham Tamil journalist Mylvaganam Nimalarajan. There is no point in demanding investigations from the Sri Lankan State anymore. Tamils should start addressing the wrongdoers in the international community first on delivering the long-overdue international justice, commented journalists in Jaffna vowing to bring the issue into a wider debate in 2019. Tamils should launch a global movement to address the paradigm of international injustice if they are serious about remembering the sacrifices made by Tamil journalists of the calibre of Nimalarajan, Nadesan and Sivaram, they said.
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Tamil heritage projects launched as NPC's last-minute manoeuvre

[TamilNet, Thursday, 18 October 2018, 20:09 GMT]
The Northern Provincial Council, which was able to advance and confront the traditional food court of Tamils successfully, has failed to challenge the larger heritage-genocide of Sinhala Theravada Buddhist establishment at a civilisational level. However, as a last-minute manoeuvre before its expiry in one week, the NPC has managed to launch two heritage initiatives on Thursday in the country of Eezham Tamils, a Heritage Centre at Nalloor in Jaffna peninsula and a model heritage village known as Tamil's Civilisation Hub at Maanthai East of the Vanni mainland.
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Tamils should form global action group on mass grave investigation

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 17 October 2018, 14:41 GMT]
Extreme racist sections of the Sinhala establishment in the south of the island would go to whatever extent possible in their attempt to cover up and suppress investigations on exhumed mass graves in the north, legal activists representing the kith and kin of enforced disappeared Tamils in Mannaar said. At the same time, the justice system of the occupying unitary state of genocidal Sri Lanka is sophisticatedly derailing every attempt to conduct forensic analyses on the exhumed human skeletons by a neutral and international third-party, they said. The legal activists urged global Tamils to form an action group to demand international legal organisations such as the International Commission of Jurists to address the issue.
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Jaffna University students urge UN to act on releasing TPPs

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 16 October 2018, 17:36 GMT]
The Jaffna University Student Union has urged the United Nations to demand the SL State to free all the political prisoners, who are languishing in the prisons of the island without any attached conditions. The oppressive Prevention of Terrorism Act (PTA), which is used to suppress the Tamils, should be abolished and the legal system should be conditioned to function impartially. The accountability of the SL State on enforced disappeared, should be addressed at an international level, the JUSU has urged the UN in an appeal handed over to the residential representative of the UN system in Jaffna on Monday.
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Colonists in Vavuniyaa North demand Sinhala-only sub-office

[TamilNet, Monday, 15 October 2018, 12:41 GMT]
Sinhala civic councillors who represent the colonising settlers in Vavuniyaa North Civic Council are demanding a distinct Sinhala-only sub-office for the colonists in the civic council. It is a calculated move to create a new electoral divisional council for Sinhala colonisers, Tamil civil sources in Vavuniyaa North said. Already, there is a Sinhala Divisional Council and Tamil Divisional Council in Vavuniyaa South.
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Colombo's NGO Secretariat trains NGO activists to collaborate with SL military

[TamilNet, Sunday, 14 October 2018, 09:05 GMT]
The Director-General of Colombo's NGO Secretariat Shakya Nanayakkara, who was giving a lecture in Batticaloa to NGO and CBO activists on Thursday, was questioning the Tamil activists in Batticaloa why they were reluctant to collaborate with the SL military and police, NGO workers who attended the training programme said. The so-called ‘National Secretariat for Non-Governmental Organizations’ (NSNGO), also known as NGO Secretariat, has been trying to control the civil society, Community Based Organisations and local NGOs by creating ‘federations’ at district-level.
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TPPs conclude hunger-strike as University students vow to watch politicians

[TamilNet, Saturday, 13 October 2018, 18:04 GMT]
The student activists of Jaffna University who walked for four days passing 200 km from Jaffna to Anuradhapura along with the representatives of the grassroots organisations, the Tamil National Peoples’ Front politicians and the students from Eastern University met the Tamil political prisoners in Anuradhapura and urged the TPPs to end their hunger strike. The activists vowed to watch the Tamil politicians who are dealing with the SL President Maithiripala Sirisena and the SL Government authorities in Colombo to act without fail in future. The request comes after the public organisations met NPC Chief Minister Justice C.V. Wigneswaran in Jaffna on Friday and resolved to take responsibility for the advancement of the TPPs cause. Rev. Fr. S. Sakthivel, who is coordinating the mobilisation met the TPPs as part of a 10-member group, which was allowed to meet the TPPs on Saturday.
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Colombo refuses resettlement of 173 families in coastal village of Batticaloa

[TamilNet, Friday, 12 October 2018, 17:31 GMT]
SL Forest Department is refusing to release more than 200 acres of agricultural and residential lands that belonged to 173 Eezham Tamil families of Kaara-munai, a coastal village located 47 km northwest of Batticaloa city, civil sources at the Batticaloa District Secretariat said. The people were chased out from their village first during the anti-Tamil pogroms in 1983. Then, during the times of war, they were again chased out in 1990. Also after the end of the war, they were again chased out in 2015. The uprooted people are languishing without proper livelihood elsewhere in Maangkea'ni and urge their lands to be released back to them.
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TPPs vow to continue hunger-strike confronting Colombo's deceit

[TamilNet, Thursday, 11 October 2018, 14:09 GMT]
The twelve Tamil political prisoners (TPPs) on a hunger-strike in Anuradhapura prison on Wednesday said Colombo was trying to suppress the fasting protesters in Bogombara prison in Kandy and Magazine prison in Colombo by deploying Tamil politicians of the TNA to dilute their hunger-strike. Confusing messages were being conveyed from Colombo to Fr S. Sakthivel, a veteran human rights defender who is working hard to coordinate outside support to their campaign, the protesters on hunger-strike said. In the meantime, Jaffna University students, who started a protest walk on Tuesday reached Ki'linochchi on Wednesday. The hunger-strikers said they were encouraged by the outside mobilisation.
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SL military has not released 63% of deed lands seized from Tamils in Mullaith-theevu

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 10 October 2018, 13:21 GMT]
The occupying military of genocidal Sri Lanka is still keeping 4,859 acres of title-deed lands that belong to private land-owners in Mullaiththeevu district. The real extent of areas seized by the occupying Colombo and its military accounts to thousands of acres if one takes into account the permit lands, forest lands that have been captured by the SL Forest Department, SL Wildlife Department and the heritage lands that have been seized by the SL Archaeology Department, civil sources in Mullaiththeevu District Secretariat said.
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SL military launches ATMs, postal office in occupied Jaffna

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 09 October 2018, 16:01 GMT]
The occupying military of genocidal Sri Lanka wants to control the civil administration and all aspects of the civilian life in the former ‘High-Security Zone’ in Valikaamam North, Jaffna. The commander of the occupying Sinhala forces in the peninsula has instructed the military to install ATMs and to operate postal offices in Palaali. The SL military, which is running the ATM stations has also started to run a post office in Palaali. The latest move comes amidst increased criticism of SL military intervening in the civil affairs.
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