Thanthirimalai

[TamilNet, Saturday, 20 November 2010, 09:15 GMT]
The hill of Thanthiri (Tinospora cordifolia) creepers.
The hill of a priest or shaman priest.
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Sinhala persons from other districts appointed as minor employees in Batticaloa – MP

[TamilNet, Saturday, 20 November 2010, 06:57 GMT]
Tamil National Alliance (TNA) Batticaloa district parliamentarian P. Selvarasa has sent a letter to Sri Lanka President Mahinda Rajapaksa protesting against the appointment of 17 Sinhala persons from other districts as minor employees in the government departments and in divisional secretariats in Batticaloa district. Meanwhile, Ven. Ampitiya Sumanaratne Thero, the chief monk of the Mangalaramaya in Batticaloa fasted unto death in August demanding Sri Lanka government to appoint Sinhala officers to the government departments in Batticaloa and to appoint a Sinhala person as the SLFP organizer for Batticaloa district besides demanding first preference to Sinhala people and Buddhist temples in Batticaloa district. He gave up the fast on assurances made by SL government that his demands will be met.
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Ramanathan Trust endows land to Upcountry Tamil tenets in Vanni

[TamilNet, Friday, 19 November 2010, 17:39 GMT]
In a significant move Friday, the president of Sir. P. Ramananthan Trust, former senior professor S.K. Sitrampalam, donated the lands of the Trust in Ki'linochchi to 60 families of Upcountry Tamils who were long-term tenets of those lands. The families uprooted in the recent war were unable to claim housing aid supposed to come through an Indian aid programme in the absence of ownership-documents of the lands, which they were inhabiting for a long time. The Ramanathan Trust was owning 330 acres of productive farmland in Ki'linochchi, which was settled by the Upcountry Tamils for several decades.
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SLA intensifies surveillance on ‘outsiders’ visiting Vanni

[TamilNet, Friday, 19 November 2010, 17:19 GMT]
Sri Lanka Army (SLA) authorities in Vanni have instructed all schools and other such public institutions and organizations in their areas to inform them in advance if any political persons, representatives of volunteer organizations and Non-government Organizations (NGOs) from outside Vanni visiting their places. On such occasions SLA being informed beforehand sends its men to watch and record the proceedings of the meetings and events conducted or attended by the above ‘outsiders’, according to complaints made by some school heads in Vanni to a Tamil National Alliance (TNA) parliamentarian.
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TNA parliamentarians to study present political situation

[TamilNet, Friday, 19 November 2010, 16:40 GMT]
The Tamil National Alliance (TNA) parliamentary group is to meet Saturday and Sunday in its party office in Colombo to study the latest development in regard to finding a political solution and to the problems now faced by Tamil people in the North and East after the war. Meanwhile, the leader of the TNA and Trincomalee district parliamentarian R .Sampanthan has sent a congratulatory message to Mahinda Rajapaksa who was sworn in as Sri Lanka President for second term on Friday morning.
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TNA opposes move to appoint a Sinhala Vice-chancellor to Eastern University

[TamilNet, Friday, 19 November 2010, 15:57 GMT]
Batticaloa district Tamil National Alliance (TNA) parliamentarian C. Yogeswaran in a letter to Sri Lanka Higher Education Minister S. B. Dissanayake has brought to his notice that steps are being taken to appoint a Sinhala person to the post of the Vice-chancellor of the Eastern University of Sri Lanka replacing the Tamil Vice-chancellor. Tamil academics in the East are perturbed over the alleged move by the University Grants Commission of Sri Lanka to appoint a Sinhala person as the Vice-chancellor of the Eastern University that is located in Vantharumoolai in Batticaloa district.
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British Tamil journalist arrested in Sri Lanka

[TamilNet, Friday, 19 November 2010, 13:32 GMT]
Sri Lanka State Intelligence officers arrested a London based Tamil journalist Wednesday at the Colombo Airport, while the journalist was on his way to visit his family, Journalist for Democracy in Sri Lanka (JDS), a dissident exciled journalist group that first released the Channel-4 execution video said in an urgent alert.
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China urged to respect Tamil place names

[TamilNet, Friday, 19 November 2010, 09:13 GMT]
The thermal power plant China builds in the Puththa’lam district is located at a Tamil village called Nuraichchoalai that simply means the grove of Nurai fruit trees (Nephelium longanum). But a corrupted and Sinhalicised form Norocholai is the one followed by Chinese official records. Even the media in India, including the media in Tamil Nadu, mutilate the name joining with Sinhalese and Chinese. Norocholai has no meaning in Sinhala or Tamil. Sri Lanka comes out with a new set of colonial names for places in the land of Tamil nation. China and India, which have cared to bring back the names of their cities such as Beijing and Mumbai from the colonial renderings Peking and Bombay should be sensitive enough for the sentiments of Eezham Tamils, urged a Tamil academic in Colombo.
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Wickramabahu to meet Diaspora Tamils

[TamilNet, Friday, 19 November 2010, 08:39 GMT]
Dr Wickramabahu Karunaratne, the leader of New Left Front and General Secretary of New Sama Samaja party, would be meeting diaspora Tamils in UK, British Tamil Forum (BTF) officials told TamilNet Friday. The meeting, scheduled to take place on 25 November in South Harrow, comes at a time when forces operating against solidarity among progressive leftist forces, were engaged in spreading false propaganda, Tamil political circles in UK said.
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SL Police arrest TMVP operative in Batticaloa

[TamilNet, Friday, 19 November 2010, 07:03 GMT]
Sri Lanka police Intelligence officers arrested Sunday an important operative of Tamil Makkal Viduthali Pulikal (TMVP) a political-cum-paramilitary party led by Eastern Province Chief Minister, Sivanesathurai Chandrakanthan alias Pillayan, in Ka’ruvaakkea’ni in Batticaloa. He was arrested for involvement in the theft of a van on information given by Vadivel Ravichandran, the Vice Chairman of the Vaazhaichcheanai Pradeshiya Saba in Batticaloa who was arrested and detained in October by police in Nuwara Eliya district, sources in Batticaloa said.
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UN must produce a Congo-type war crimes report on Sri Lanka, says Prof. Boyle

[TamilNet, Friday, 19 November 2010, 05:12 GMT]
Reviewing the recently released 550-page United Nations Report of the Mapping Exercise Documenting the Most Serious Violations of Human Rights and International Humanitarian Law Committed Within the Territory of the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), an article in the American Society of International Law (ASIL) said, "[t]he report detailing killings, rapes, destruction, and other violent attacks is alarming, not least because similar crimes continue to be committed in the DRC, where impunity still reigns large." Professor Boyle of Illinois College of Law, an expert in international law, commenting on the UN report said, "Tamils worldwide must demand the same “UN Mapping Report” of war crimes, crimes against humanity and genocide committed by the Government of Sri Lanka against the Tamils."
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UK billboard announces Tamil Eelam National Remembrance Day

[TamilNet, Friday, 19 November 2010, 04:26 GMT]
As part of the global Tamil Eelam community’s events to mark National Remembrance Day on November 27, expatriate Tamils in London have sponsored a public billboard. The Tamil Youth Organisation (TYO), an activist group comprising Tamil students and young professionals, coordinated the effort. “We wanted to express the significance of this day for Eelam Tamils, when all of us across the globe are united in remembering the sacrifices made so that the Tamil people could one day live in peace and dignity in their own homeland,” Nisha Mariyathas, TYO spokesperson told TamilNet.
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I'lavaalai

[TamilNet, Thursday, 18 November 2010, 23:07 GMT]
The small hamlet
The new hamlet
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SC determines amendment bills consistent with SL constitution

[TamilNet, Thursday, 18 November 2010, 17:01 GMT]
Sri Lanka Supreme Court has determined that the two bills, Local Authorities (Special Provisions) Bill and the Local Authorities Elections (Amendment) Bill presented in parliament last month on local government electoral reforms are consistent with the Sri Lanka constitution, the Speaker Chamal Rajapaksa announced Tuesday in parliament.
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Ranil Wickremasinghe leaves to India

[TamilNet, Thursday, 18 November 2010, 08:31 GMT]
Ranil Wickremasinghe, leader of the main opposition United National Party (UNP) Wednesday morning on a three-day visit to India. He arrived in Chennai, capital of Tamilnadu state during his first leg of the tour. He is expected to meet Tamilnadu political leaders during his stay in Chennai.
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‘Quiet diplomacy’ does not work with Sri Lanka – Tissainayagam

[TamilNet, Thursday, 18 November 2010, 03:01 GMT]
Economic aid should be linked to press freedom in Sri Lanka, veteran Tamil journalist J. S. Tissainayagam, who was released from government custody by international pressure earlier this year, said Wednesday. In his first interview since his release, Mr. Tissainayagam rejected arguments that ‘quiet diplomacy’ would achieve better conduct from President Mahinda Rajapakse regime, and said “the more pressure that is put publicly, the more the government is willing to act”. He linked his own release directly to the government’s then efforts to retain the EU’s GSP+ trade concessions. Tissainayagam is currently a Nieman Fellow at Harvard University Journalism School in Boston.
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Swiss Tamil council arranges safe custody for war crimes evidence

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 17 November 2010, 22:53 GMT]
The Swiss branch of the Society for Threatened Peoples (GfbV), a human rights organisation that speaks up for voiceless peoples and communities, has come forward to act as an independent custodian of evidence material and in working out submissions on behalf of individuals and organisations, who need assistance in making submissions to the UN Panel, Tharsika Pakeerathan, the president of Swiss Council of Eelam Tamils (SCET), told TamilNet Wednesday. The GfbV will begin by conducting interviews on 28 November, 2010 in Bern, aiming for submission to UN Panel before 15 December.
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Tamil journalist attacked in Colombo

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 17 November 2010, 10:17 GMT]
Unidentified gang of eight persons severely assaulted a Tamil journalist Lenin Raja, 28 in Wattala area in Colombo when he was returning home after duty at Vetri FM electronic media operating from Colombo Tuesday night around 11:00 p.m. Lenin Rajah rushed with the injuries to Wattala Police Station made a complaint in this regard.
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Saudi academic questions Nafeek's death sentence

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 17 November 2010, 03:53 GMT]
Raising questions on the treatment afforded by the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia (KSA) justice system to the Sri Lankan maid, Rizana Nafeek, accused of choking to death an infant while under her care, a King Saud University academic appealed to the "judicial Authorities concerned to reconsider this matter sympathetically" and to remove the death sentence. "She has come from Mutur in East Sri Lanka, where majority are Tamil people. She belongs to the Muslim minority which were caught in the midst of the Tamil’s civil war against the state. She comes from a family who has suffered for over 3 decades due to terrorism," the academic who works in the History Department said in the appeal.
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Military fortresses and colonisation in Jaffna choke Tamils, threaten India

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 16 November 2010, 10:26 GMT]
The selection of locations for building new military fortresses and for colonising Sinhalese in the Jaffna peninsula is sinisterly schemed by colonial Sri Lanka to permanently squeeze the Tamil heartland. Casual visitors don’t perceive it. Tamils of collaborative politics helplessly defend it. Indian policy planners of habitual bungling compare it with what they do in Kashmir, tribal belt and northeast India and agree with it. They think that if the nation of Eezham Tamils is permanently erased and if they get one or two harbours there that is enough for the security of India. The military cum colonisation complexes come up with the full blessings of India and with Chinese material help. But eventually they are going to be trained on India, said an academic in Jaffna, citing the complexes that squeeze the peninsula at strategic locations.
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