Kalmunai MC deplores attack on Lebanon, Palestine

[TamilNet, Saturday, 29 July 2006, 01:13 GMT]
The Kalmunai Municipal Council (KMC) Friday at its monthly meeting unanimously adopted a resolution condemning the indiscriminate attack by the State of Israel on Lebanon and Palestine. Mr.K.M.A Razak, councillor of the Sri Lanka Muslim Congress (SLMC) proposed the motion and seconded by Mr.Henry Mahendran, leader of the Ilankai Tamil Arasu Kadchchi (ITAK) members in the council, sources said.
Full story >>

SL Government must be held accountable for violence - Canadian Parliamentarian

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 26 July 2006, 11:05 GMT]
“We [Canada] should be using our influence as an aid donor, as a fellow Commonwealth nation to hold the SL government to a standard of conduct where extra judicial killings, bombing of civilian villages and human rights abuses do not continue with impunity.” said Albina Guarnieri, an opposition parliamentarian addressing a ten thousand strong crowd gathered in Dundas Square, Toronto on Monday July 24th to commemorate the anniversary of Black July. Raymond Cho, a Toronto city councilor, spoke about the need to redefine terrorism while Tim Dobson, from the Conservative Party, underscored the importance of educating people about the Tamil people’s struggle.
Full story >>

Black July remembrance held in Australian cities

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 26 July 2006, 10:55 GMT]
Candle light vigils and 24-hour fasts were held in several cities across Australia in the 23rd year anniversary remembrance of the victims of 'Black July.' Nearly thousand people assembled in the heart of Sydney at Martin Place to attend a candle light vigil held between 5 pm and 7 pm on Tuesday 25th July. In Melbourne Tamils were joined by their Australian friends and parliamentarians in a 24 hour fast. A vigil was also held in Brisbane City Centre where leaflets were distributed.


Full story >>

UN High Commissioner visits Kilinochchi

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 26 July 2006, 09:06 GMT]
António Guterres, the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), on Wednesday visited Kilinochchi, the de facto administration centre of Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) administered Tamil territories and met with LTTE's Political Head, S. P. Thamilchelvan and M. Pavarasan, the Director of UN and NGO affairs of the Tamil administration, LTTE officials in Kilnochchi said.
Full story >>

Thousands gather in Hyde Park remembrance

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 25 July 2006, 13:11 GMT]
Thousands of British Tamils are gathering in London’s Hyde Park to remember the thousands of fellow Tamils massacred in the July 1983 pogrom. The event, organised by the Tamil Youth Organisation (TYO) on behalf of the expatriate Tamil community, is taking place in the centre of the Royal park Tuesday afternoon.
Full story >>

"Death Won't Deter Us," - Diaspora Tamils mark 83 Black July Genocide

[TamilNet, Monday, 24 July 2006, 09:28 GMT]
The 1983 Black July anti-Tamil pogroms in which more than 3000 Tamils were killed and billions of rupees worth of property were destroyed by Sinhala thugs, sections of Sri Lankan armed forces, and ruling UNP party cadres, fuelled the Tamil armed struggle towards a defensible Tamil homeland. Thousands of Tamils fled the island to Tamil Nadu state in India, Europe and elsewhere. The recent extra-judicial killings in Sri Lanka Army (SLA) controlled areas in the NorthEast, during the Cease Fire Agreement (CFA), have added significance to the widespread observance by the Tamil diaspora of the 23rd year remembrance of the anti-Tamil pogroms.
Full story >>

Black July awareness campaign in South Africa

[TamilNet, Sunday, 23 July 2006, 10:48 GMT]
Expatriate Tamils in Kwazulu Natal, South Africa, began a three day awareness campaign of the July 1983 events in Sri Lanka, Tamil Coordinting Committee officials in South Africa said. The event starting from 22nd July is being organized at the Chatsworth Shopping Center in Kwazulu Natal, with poster displays and screening of July 1983 and current events in Sri Lanka, organizers said.
Full story >>

Two Mannar Tamils reported missing

[TamilNet, Friday, 21 July 2006, 12:34 GMT]
Fourteen year old student, Anton Reginald of Murugan Kovil Road, Keeri, and Soosaippar Victor Cross, 44, of Pesalai in Mannar district are reported missing, according to complaints lodged with the Mannar regional office of the Human Rights Commission of Sri Lanka (HRCSL) by their relatives, civil sources said.


Full story >>

Constitutional safeguards proved inadequate – High Commissioner

[TamilNet, Friday, 21 July 2006, 00:57 GMT]
Britain’s trust in the safeguards built into the constitution of Ceylon at independence was misplaced and their weakness is to blame for the island’s present problems, the British High Commissioner to Sri Lanka, Mr. Dominic John Chilcott, said in an interview with the Sunday Virakesari. In a wide-ranging interview last weekend, Mr. Chilcott said that LTTE and the Sri Lanka government must now negotiate an end to the conflict. The UK and the United States were in agreement on their policies on Sri Lanka, he also said, adding that India also wants a negotiated solution to the conflict.
Full story >>

APC, a political drama to dress-up unitary constitution - LTTE

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 19 July 2006, 10:26 GMT]
The All Party Conference (APC) on constitutional reforms initiated by Sri Lanka’s President Mahinda Rajapakse follows the same approach used by previous Sinhala Presidents, Jeyawardhene, Premadasa, and Chandrika Kumaratunge. APC is a recurring tactic used by Sri Lanka's Presidents to present a peace posture to placate the international community while refusing to reconfigure the polity from the rigid and majoritarian Unitary constitution, said the latest edition of the official periodical of the Liberation Tigers, “Viduthalaipulikal,” printed in Kilinochchi.
Full story >>

LTTE appeals to Trinco Tamils not to flee

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 18 July 2006, 01:12 GMT]
Trincomalee district political secretariat of the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) in a statement issued Monday appealed to Tamil people in the district "not to give room for the enemy" to forcefully occupy their own lands by leaving their homes to other areas and countries fearing violence.
Full story >>

Raiding dormant accounts makes no sense– Financial Times

[TamilNet, Monday, 17 July 2006, 00:05 GMT]
Tamils are seeing their community as the primary targets of Sri Lanka’s plans to seize money from ‘dormant’ bank accounts as the mass displacement of the conflict which has affected one in four Tamils has left many without the necessary paper work of physical access to banks. Meanwhile, the Financial Times, one of the world leading financial newspapers, in an editorial last week, criticised the notion of seizing money from dormant accounts as not making economic sense and duplicitous.


Full story >>

Diaspora invited to UN envoy’s report launch

[TamilNet, Saturday, 15 July 2006, 10:53 GMT]
Amnesty International (AI) and Human Rights Watch (HRW) have invited expatriate Tamils to participate a public meeting on human rights which they are co-hosting on August 5 in London. The chief speaker is Professor Philip Alston, UN Special Rapporteur on Extrajudicial, Summary or Arbitrary Executions, whose report on violence in Sri Lanka was issued earlier this year.


Full story >>

Two bombs recovered in Kandy

[TamilNet, Friday, 14 July 2006, 07:54 GMT]
Sri Lankan police said that they recovered two bombs near the residence of Government Spokesman for Defence and National Security, Keheliya Rambukwella in Kandy, around 10.30 p.m., Thursday. Ten Tamils were arrested during a subsequent search conducted in the area, the police said.
Full story >>

Rajapakse initiative, an elaborate theatre to appease international community - paper

[TamilNet, Thursday, 13 July 2006, 14:16 GMT]
Sri Lankan President Mahinda Rajapakse’s initiative this week to come up with power-sharing proposal is “elaborate theatre to appease international demands, particularly India’s,” the Tamil Guardian said in its editorial this week. Arguing the ‘outbidding’ which undermined previous initiatives was “guaranteed” to happen again, given the lack of support from the UNP and the vehement opposition of the JVP and JHU, the paper said: “Rajapakse’s immediate priority is not to come up with a serious proposal to offer the Tamils, but to destroy his ruling party's main rival and consolidate his grip on parliament.”
Full story >>

Tamils fear to come to Muttur town, SL President told

[TamilNet, Monday, 10 July 2006, 15:47 GMT]
The Ilankai Tamil Arasu Kadchchi (ITAK) group in Muttur Pradesiya Sabha has brought to the notice of Sri Lanka's President Mahinda Rajapakse that the day to day life of about thirty five thousand Tamil people residing in the Muttur Divisional Secretariat division in the Trincomalee district has been threatened due to abduction and killing now being taking place in the government controlled Muttur town, sources said.
Full story >>

"United Sri Lanka," cannot be accepted as a pre-negotiation parameter - Rudrakumaran

[TamilNet, Monday, 10 July 2006, 01:11 GMT]
During peace negotiations in South Sudan, Northern Ireland, Montenegro and Bougainville, the international community did not set "united country" as a pre-negotiation parameter for the expected outcome of a negotiated solution. The international community's stand that solution to the Tamil national question should be found within a united Sri Lanka, runs contrary to the current international practice, and to the law of self-determination, argued Visuvanathan Rudrakumaran, legal advisor to the Liberation Tigers, in a paper presented at a conference held in Zurich in April. The paper was released by the organizers, the Centre for Just Peace and Democracy (CJPD), Sunday.
Full story >>

Trinco displaced suffer discrimination in provision of relief- Elilan

[TamilNet, Thursday, 06 July 2006, 11:35 GMT]
Mr.S.Elilan, Trincomalee district political head of the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) Monday charged that the Sri Lanka Government, while rendering relief and other assistance to displaced Sinhalese families following Kebbitigollawa claymore blast, has totally ignored Tamil civilians displaced in Trincomalee town and other areas in providing basic relief supplies.
Full story >>

Assassinated Journalist knew perpetrators in Avissawella killings - MP

[TamilNet, Thursday, 06 July 2006, 10:28 GMT]
Sinhala journalist Lakmal Sampath was murdered because knew the suspects in the murder of five youths believed to be Tamils whose mutilated headless bodies were found in Avissawella area in the South on 27 April, alleged the Colombo District parliamentarian of the Upcountry Peoples' Front (UPF), V. Radhakrishnan, during the debate on the extension of the State of Emergency in the Sri Lanka's Parliament Thursday, parliamentary sources in Colombo said.
Full story >>

LTTE accuses Rajapakse of political duplicity

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 05 July 2006, 11:37 GMT]
The Liberation Tigers Political Head, S.P. Thamilchlevan ruled out negotiations on devolution of powers based on the Sri Lankan unitary constitution, Wednesday and charged Mahinda Rajapakse, the Sri Lankan president, for adopting a duplicitous approach, when asked to comment Colombo's move on setting up a committee to examine devolution of powers. "Colombo's call for talks based on Sri Lankan constitution, rejected by Tamils decades ago, is a deliberate act of deceivig the International Community while failing to implement practical steps to implement the fundamental terms of Cease Fire Agreement (CFA) as agreed in Geneva I."
Full story >>