Seeman’s arrest draws media attention in Tamil Nadu

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 13 July 2010, 17:01 GMT]
The arrest by a special team of Chennai police of Seeman, a popular film director and leader of Naam Thamizhar movement at Chepauk in Chennai Monday night along with thirteen of his supporters have drawn the attention of the media in Tamil Nadu including The Hindu, Deccan Chronicle and Expressbuzz.com. The gruesome way the Tamil Nadu fisherman Sellappan was beaten to death by the Sri Lanka Navy on 09 July had provoked strong reactions in Tamil Nadu. Sri Lanka Navy has killed 537 Tamil Nadu fishermen either by shooting or beating to death, according to Mr. Seeman.
Full story >>

Tamil doctor among victims killed in Uganda blast

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 13 July 2010, 13:44 GMT]
A Tamil doctor from Colombo was among the 74 people killed in the bomb attack in Uganda, claimed by al-Shabaab, a group with links to al-Qaeda. The victim, Ramrajah Krishna, a father of two girls, had returned to Uganda after visiting his family in Colombo.
Full story >>

MIA's album-release grabs US headlines

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 13 July 2010, 10:24 GMT]
Washington Post called Jaffna born music phenom, Maya Arulpragasam (popularly known as MIA) the "most innovative and dynamic pop star of her generation" as it covered the story of MIA's release of her third album "Maya" Tuesday. The British Guardian, writing about the British singer's popularity before the release of her album said that "she speaks out in support of Tamil citizens," and that "[h]er assertions that the Sri Lankan government is guilty of the genocide of local Tamils have not been going down well."
Full story >>

Tamil Nadu Naam Tamilar party leader Seeman arrested, detained

[TamilNet, Monday, 12 July 2010, 12:21 GMT]
Tamil Nadu police arrested and detained popular film director and the leader of Naam Tamilar political party Seeman Monday noon allegedly for inciting violence, sources in Chennai said. Seeman had condemned the killings of Tamil Nadu fishermen by Sri Lanka Navy (SLN) in a demonstration held in front of Chennai Government Secretariat and is alleged to have said that if SLN continues to attack Tamil Nadu fishermen Sinhalese in Tamil Nadu will not be allowed to live in Tamil Nadu, the sources added. Consequently Tamil Nadu police filed a case against Seeman for inciting violence and searched for Seeman to arrest him before he could meet the press in Chennai Press Club. The police arrested Seeman when he came to Chennai Press Club after the demonstration.
Full story >>

450 voluntary teachers in Vanni struggle for permanent appointment

[TamilNet, Monday, 12 July 2010, 10:11 GMT]
Four hundred and fifty volunteer teachers serving in schools in the districts of Ki'linochchi and Mullaiththeevu are still awaiting permanency in their posts even after ten years of service under trying condition, education sources said.
Full story >>

War crimes and human civilisation

[TamilNet, Monday, 12 July 2010, 08:19 GMT]
A war will not end without the delivery of political justice to the core issue. Even the winners who waged World Wars for the monopoly of colonies couldn’t escape conceding independence to colonies. USA and India bungling political justice to the national question in the island will have a bearing on Afghan War, Western Civilisation and on Indian integrity. The solidarity of Eezham Tamil diaspora is as important a trump as the geopolitical trump of Sri Lanka. In its historic duty to its nation and to civilisation, the diaspora without succumbing to lures should intensely align with the people of Tamil Nadu and progressive Sinhalese in realising political justice and in seeing no others ever suffer like Eezham Tamils. The last diplomatic chance for the USA and India to make ‘strategic partnership’ a smooth affair is to jointly uphold the balance of nations in the island.
Full story >>

Indian Film actress Asin visits Jaffna

[TamilNet, Monday, 12 July 2010, 06:43 GMT]
Leading Indian film actress Asin paid an unannounced visit to Jaffna Sunday along with the wife of President Mahinda Rajapaksa and took part in the events in Eye Treatment Centre in Jaffna Teaching Hospital, sources in Jaffna said. Despite warning that her films will be boycotted in all South Indian States if she participates in shooting in Sri Lanka, by the Federation of South Indian Film Industry Unions, Asin is in Sri Lanka to act in a Hindi film. Asin had reportedly told media in Colombo that she is not in anyway connected to South Indian politics adding that the warning will not affect her.
Full story >>

‘All roads lead to Mahinda Rajapaksa’

[TamilNet, Sunday, 11 July 2010, 19:24 GMT]
The Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh advised the visiting Tamil National Alliance (TNA) parliamentarians to work with Mahinda Rajapaksa to find political solution, according to media reports Friday. The TNA parliamentarian A. Vinayagamoorthy was cited saying: "Prime Minister Dr Singh advised us to take along with us the Muslims, the upcountry Tamils and others and work unitedly with President Rajapaksa to evolve a solution to the Tamil problem. We told him we will try to do so." The MP further said: "We depend hundred per cent on India for help to find a political solution acceptable to our people. We will be happy if President Mahinda Rajapaksa gives us what India thinks is reasonable."
Full story >>

Champoor uprooted Tamil villagers demand early resettlement

[TamilNet, Sunday, 11 July 2010, 16:31 GMT]
The Champoor Division Uprooted Tamil Villagers’ Association has decided to request relevant authorities to allow them to cultivate during the forthcoming Maha season about three thousand acres of paddy fields belonging to them located in the High Security Zone (HSZ). Sri Lanka Army (SLA) demarcated large areas as HSZ after the SLA captured Champoor and adjacent villages of Koonitheivu and Soodaikudha in the military operation in April 2006. The Association took this decision at the general meeting held recently.
Full story >>

Fifty Tamil Nadu fishermen wounded in new SLN attack

[TamilNet, Sunday, 11 July 2010, 12:38 GMT]
Fifty fishermen from Tamil Nadu were injured when they were attacked allegedly by Sri Lankan Naval (SLN) personnel while fishing off Katchathivu Island, PTI reported Sunday, citing Indian Fisheries department officials. The attack comes hours after the ruling DMK in Tamil Nadu staged a demonstration near the Sri Lankan deputy high commission in Chennai to protest the recent death of a fisherman in an SLN attack off the Kodiakarai coast on Wednesday. Hundreds of Indian fishermen, and many more Tamil fishermen in Sri Lanka, have been killed or wounded in SLN attacks over several years.
Full story >>

Boat refugees ‘not Tigers’, Canada admits

[TamilNet, Sunday, 11 July 2010, 00:08 GMT]
The Canada Border Services Agency (CBSA) now admits it has no proof that 25 Tamils boat refugees that it labelled as terrorists and kept behind bars for months were members of the Liberation Tigers, The Vancouver Sun reported Friday. Last month, The Vancouver Sun obtained a secret CBSA report that stated there were "reasonable grounds" to believe a third of the 76 migrants who arrived on the Ocean Lady migrant ship last October were members of the Tamil Tigers.
Full story >>

Sinhala doctor alleged of killing Tamil nurse in Jaffna transferred to safety

[TamilNet, Saturday, 10 July 2010, 14:55 GMT]
The Sinhala doctor alleged of killing a Tamil female nurse in Veala’nai government hospital in the island off Jaffna Saturday morning has been suddenly transferred to a hospital in Changkaanai in Jaffna peninsula. Meanwhile, Oorkaavattu’rai police said that they found evidence indicating that the nurse had been killed. The doctor had been taken to Changkaanai escorted by Sri Lanka Army. Meanwhile, Veala’nai residents who had protested against the killing said that they will continue their protest.
Full story >>

Sexual abuse of resettled women in Vanni by SLA soldiers escalates

[TamilNet, Saturday, 10 July 2010, 07:46 GMT]
Sri Lanka Army (SLA) soldiers occupying Vanni continue to sexually abuse women among recently resettled civilians, according to complaints made to a Christian priest now living in Vanni. Meanwhile, a journalist from Tamil Nadu who returned Friday from a visit to Vanni also said that the resettled people in Vanni had told him about SLA soldiers sexually abusing women besides intruding into their privacy under the pretext of search and checking. The journalist who wishes to remain anonymous said that he will write in detail the sufferings of resettled civilians in Vanni in Tamil Nadu papers when he returns home.
Full story >>

Navaali massacre of 147 Tamil civilians remembered

[TamilNet, Saturday, 10 July 2010, 06:11 GMT]
Relatives of the victims and Navaali Church organization observed Friday the fifteenth death anniversary of 147 Tamil civilians including men, women and children who were killed in the indiscriminate bombing by the Sri Lanka Air Force bombers and artillery attack by the Sri Lanka Army on Navaali St Peters Church on 9 July 1998, sources in Jaffna said. Hemalatha Memorial Organization set up in remembrance of Hemalatha, a Village Officer who was killed in the bombing, was jointly engaged in observing the memorial event, the sources added.
Full story >>

Batticaloa Tamils fear establishment of civil youth committees

[TamilNet, Saturday, 10 July 2010, 05:36 GMT]
Civil youth committees are to be formed in all thirty Grama Niladhari divisions in the Batticaloa police division, according to Superintendent of Police in charge of the division, I. M. Kaurnaretna. Each committee will comprise of ten youths including the Grama Niladhari of the area in charge, he said at a meeting held Monday at Batticaloa Mahajana College. Tamil residents in Batticaloa district are perturbed over the move of setting up civil youth committees in the background that Sinhalese and Muslim members of such committees earlier appointed during the war time in the Ampaarai district had engaged in burglary and robbery.
Full story >>

SLA changes traditional Tamil names of streets in Batticaloa district to Sinhalese

[TamilNet, Friday, 09 July 2010, 16:28 GMT]
People in Batticaloa district said that occupying Sri Lanka Army (SLA) authorities are substituting traditional Tamil names of streets to Sinhalese names. Alli Oadai Tamil name for the street to Kudumpimalai has been changed into Ali O’luva, a Sinhalese name, they further said. Kudumpimalai is a traditional Tamil village in Koa’ralaippattu South Divisional Secretariat.
Full story >>

Weerawansa resigns ministry portfolio, continues fast against UN

[TamilNet, Friday, 09 July 2010, 10:19 GMT]
Wimal Weerawansa, the leader of the National Freedom Front (NFF), a splinter group of the Janatha Vimukthi Peramuna and currently an ally of the ruling United Peoples Freedom Alliance (UPFA) Friday resigned from the post of Minister of Construction, Engineering Services, Housing and Common Amenities Colombo media reported quoting his ministry spokesman. However Lalith Weeratunge, the Secretary to the Sri Lankan President Mahinda Rajapakse told media that he has not received the resignation letter yet.
Full story >>

SLN kills Tamil Nadu fisherman, torture 4 others

[TamilNet, Friday, 09 July 2010, 10:11 GMT]
Sri Lanka Navy (SLN) soldiers brutally attacked Wednesday fishermen from Vethaara’niyam in Tamil Nadu killing one of them besides denuding and torturing fellow fishermen as they were fishing in Tamil Nadu seas, according to Maalai Malar Tamil daily published in Chennai. SLN continue its brutal attacks on Tamil Nadu fishermen despite protests raised by the Central and Tamil Nadu governments, Maalai Malar said.
Full story >>

Nedumaran calls for protest demanding closure of SL Mission in Chennai

[TamilNet, Friday, 09 July 2010, 10:19 GMT]
Triggered by the killing of a Tamil Nadu fisherman and violent intimidation of seven Tamil Nadu fishermen by the Sri Lanka Navy on Thursday, the leader of Tamil Nationalist Movement Pazha Nedumaran, who also coordinates the alliance of Ilangkai Tamil Protection Movement, has announced a protest in Chennai on July 14 Wednesday demanding the Indian government to close down the Sri Lankan Deputy High Commission in Tamil Nadu state. Mr. Nedumaran, in a statement issued on Friday condemned the Indian state for lack of response as the Sri Lanka Navy continues to kill Tamil Nadu fishermen while the Sri Lankan government which has been waging a genocidal onslaught of Tamils has went to the extent of propping up a campaign against the UN office in Colombo.
Full story >>

Ki'n'niyaa

[TamilNet, Friday, 09 July 2010, 00:58 GMT]
The expanse of Ki'n'nai trees (Sonneratia caselaris)
Full story >>