SLMC Chairman: Time for joint Tamil-Muslim efforts

[TamilNet, Monday, 22 June 2020, 18:17 GMT]
Intellectuals, civil society activists and politicians among the Tamils and the Muslims should jointly design a joint programme if their people are to exist with self-respect, said A.L. Abdul Majeed, the chairman of Sri Lanka Muslim Congress (SLMC). The Tamils and Muslims are confronting an existential threat. The tendency is going to worsen further with dire consequences to their collective rights. His party favoured a merged North-East Province, Mr Majeed, who once served as a councillor in the merged province, said. The majority of the Muslim people in the de-merged North and East will follow suit if a convincing formula was to be conceived for their coexistence within the merged unit. India needs to be reminded of its historical responsibility in ensuring the merger, he added.
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Tamil man killed, Sinhala Army opens fire at motorbike rider at Mukamaalai in North

[TamilNet, Saturday, 20 June 2020, 23:53 GMT]
Occupying Colombo’s Sinhala soldiers opened fire at a 24-year-old Tamil man, who didn’t stop his motorbike when the SL Army stopped him at Mukamaalai in Pazhai in Ki'linochchi district on Saturday evening. The victim, Nakarasa Ramakrishnan, was seriously wounded with four gunshots hitting his head and neck, the residents said. Then, the SL soldiers denied transportation to medical treatment for the seriously injured man for one hour, resulting in his death on the way to the hospital. In the meantime, SL Police was trying to twist the incident as something that happened when Mr Ramakrishnan attempted to grab the weapon of an SL Army soldier. A total lie, the villagers claim. The gunshots were fired targeting the victim’s head when he failed to stop, they said. The incident has occurred 300 meters away from A9 Highway near the war-time Forward Defence Line.
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Dr Amir Ali: SL Archaeology aims to obliterate Tamil traces, shrink territory of Muslims in East

[TamilNet, Friday, 19 June 2020, 23:30 GMT]
In Israel and India, archaeology is used as a weapon to disenfranchise a whole community, writes Dr Amir Ali, a renowned academic based in Australia, in a guest column of the Colombo-based Daily Financial Times on Friday. “What the Sri Lankan archaeologists did was no different from what Israeli and Western archaeologists accomplished in Palestine,” he observes. “From the time of independence, archaeology has been a powerful tool in the hands of Sinhalese nationalists to obliterate any vestiges of an ancient Tamil civilisation in Sri Lanka,” writes Dr Ali from the School of Business and Governance in Murdoch University, Western Australia.
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Former NPC Councillor urges mobilisation to protect contiguity of Tamil homeland

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 16 June 2020, 11:58 GMT]
Occupying Colombo’s Department of Forest is silently demarcating thousands of acres of lands in Mullaiththeevu in addition to what it has seized already the district. The latest land grab aims at converting 13,000 hectares (32,000 acres). One-third of the lands have been already demarcated, informed civil sources in Mullaiththeevu said. In the meantime, former Northern Provincial Councillor Thurairasa Ravikaran blamed the latest appropriation as being part of a broader agenda of genocidal demographic proportions that aim to wedge the geographic contiguity of the Tamil homeland in the North-East of the island.
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Sea cucumber poachers from South enter Jaffna triggering tensions once again

[TamilNet, Sunday, 14 June 2020, 23:01 GMT]
A group of eighty Sinhala poachers from South, backed by the SL military and the occupying Colombo's fisheries authorities have camped at the coastal public grounds at Koddadi in Point Pedro since Thursday. In the meantime, another group has arrived in Kudaarappu, Vadamaraadchi East in eight boats violating the Court order on Sunday, said Anantharasa Sureshkumar, a divisional councillor representing Naakarkoayil in Point Pedro Piratheasa Chapai. The intruding poachers claim that they have permits issued by the SL Department of Fisheries in Colombo. However, the practice is legally forbidden in the Beach Seine Fishing seashore from where dragnets (Karai-valai) are laid by the local fishers. The encroachment by sea cucumber divers was opposed by Tamil fishermen who fear environmental destruction as well as ethnic unrest and there have been violent episodes in 2018 in Vadamaraadchi East.
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Sinhala media questions Gotabaya’s alleged pro-MCC ‘connections’ with US

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 10 June 2020, 23:39 GMT]
Sinhala media in the South have started to raise questions on SL President Gotabaya’s intermediaries connected to Milinda Moragoda’s Pathfinder outfit, which wants to promote a slightly modified Millennium Challenge Corporation (MCC) project. The issue also gained focus, especially in connection with SL Police brutally suppressing a George Floyd protest held outside the US Embassy in Colombo on Tuesday. The role of four personalities, Senior SL Presidential Advisor Lalith Weeratunga, Additional Secretary to SL President Admiral (retd) Jayanath Colombage, SL Presidential Secretary P. B. Jayasundera and SL Ports Authority Chairman Lt Gen (retd) Daya Ratnayaka was taken up in the live political programme, “Salakuna” on Hiru TV already on Monday.
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Pursue all legal avenues to confront encroachment of heritage sites: Former Land Commissioner

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 09 June 2020, 21:17 GMT]
Former Land Commissioner of Eastern Province Kathirgamathamby Kurunathan has urged Tamil politicians to confront illegal encroachments that violate the laws of SL State itself. The Divisional Secretaries are also duty-bound to take action against erecting Buddha statues and temples in Tamil and Muslim religious sites and in localities where no Buddhists reside. He was citing his own experience of legally thwarting the attempt by an intruding Sinhala-Buddhist monk. The latter had put up a Buddhist temple at Kaayang-kea'ni, where no Buddhists reside. The former Land Commissioner urged Tamil politicians and activists to pursue all legal avenues available to confront the encroachments.
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Colombo pushes for Indian dispossession of Trincomalee oil tanks

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 03 June 2020, 22:20 GMT]
Colombo’s Minister of Power, Energy and Transport, Mahinda Amaraweera has met with Indian High Commissioner Gopal Baglay requesting India to obtain a few of the oil tanks from the Indian Oil Corporation (IOC), according to a Daily Mirror report on Wednesday. “I requested Mr Baglay to help us obtain a few of the tanks from the IOC and received a positive response from him. He is of the view was that there needs to be an official-level dialogue between the two parties with the blessings of the Indian government because IOC is a private company,” the Daily Mirror quoted Mr Amaraweera as saying. In the meantime, a piece of news filed by the SL government-owned Broadcasting Corporation (SLBC) on Monday said that Mr Amaraweera, in a meeting with the trade unions, was blaming Mr Baglay for not giving positive responses to a letter sent to him earlier in this regard.
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Sixteenth remembrance of journalist Nadesan marked amidst harassment by SL Police

[TamilNet, Monday, 01 June 2020, 09:03 GMT]
SL military intelligence personnel in civilian clothes and SL Policemen in uniform were deployed at the entrance of Jaffna Press Club (JPC) on Sunday morning when Tamil journalists marked 16th-year remembrance of Tamil journalist, Naaddup-pattaa'lar Aiyathurai Nadesan. Around fifteen policemen and intelligence personnel were guarding the entrance of the JPC and the Stanley Road - Raasaavin Thoaddam junction for four hours, from 8:30 to 12:30, in rotation, journalists who attended the event in Jaffna said. The journalists had already gathered inside the premises and managed to proceed with the remembrance as planned.
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Pakistan’s military HC meets Sinhala nationalist SL Governor of Trincomalee

[TamilNet, Sunday, 31 May 2020, 23:09 GMT]
Pakistan’s High Commissioner Major General (retd) Muhammad Saad Khattak was visiting Trincomalee on Thursday to discuss economic assistance to Eastern Province from Pakistan, media reports in Colombo said. Khattak was posted to Colombo in January 2020 after Gotabaya Rajapaksa became the SL President. Khattak met with the extreme Sinhala nationalist SL Governor to East, Mrs Anuradha Yahampath at her office. The news was Colombo’s geopolitical message to the West and India, Tamil political observers in Trincomalee said.
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SL Army’s 231 Brigade sexually abuses Tamil women in Batticaloa suburb

[TamilNet, Saturday, 30 May 2020, 22:38 GMT]
There have been allegations of soldiers of the occupying SL Army’s 231 Brigade Headquarters at Kalladi sexually abusing Tamil women for some time. In recent weeks, the issue has become a menace of increasing threat, community leaders in the area complain, on condition of anonymity. The SLA soldiers, who are predominantly Sinhalese, exploit the poverty-stricken families by providing minor jobs and seeking the households. Higher ranking officers and commanders are also involved in the exploitation, and some women are taken to the military quarters and abused by more than two or three soldiers during the nights, reliable sources said. The soldiers have started to collect details of female-headed households triggering widespread fear, the sources further said.
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Sinhalicisation targets Mu'l'li-vaaykkaal and Nanthik-kadal

[TamilNet, Thursday, 28 May 2020, 22:03 GMT]
Before 2009, there were no Buddhist viharas in Vadduvaakal and the areas surrounding the lagoon of Nanthik-kadal in Mullaiththeevu. In 2010, a Buddhist vihara was erected at Vadduvaakal, especially after the genocidal onslaught in 2009. Occupying Colombo's Sinhala colonisation was aimed at permanently wedging the demographic contiguity of the Northern and Eastern Provinces by seizing the coastal stretch from Kokkuth-thoduvaay to Kokku'laay and the interior lands. Now, the move is systematically expanded also to include the last tract of the coast, where the genocidal onslaught took place, namely Mu'l'li-vaaykkal and the banks of Nanthik-kadal, says Thurairajah Ravikaran, a former councillor of Nothern Province.
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Occupying Colombo resumes Sinhala colonisation in Batticaloa’s interior

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 27 May 2020, 22:21 GMT]
Tamil dairy farmers in Batticaloa complain that SL Mahaweli ‘Development’ Authority has recently resumed Sinhala colonisation of Paduvaan-karai region of Batticaloa, particularly the pasturelands at Periya-maathava’nai and Mayilaththa-madu in the administrative divisions of Koa'ra'laip-pattu South (Kiraan) and Ea'raavoorpattu (Chengkalai). The Mahaweli authority has identified land plots to settle more than one thousand Sinhala colonists, and a preparatory meeting has taken place in this regard on Tuesday, said Nimalan Kandsamy, the president of the association of dairy farmers. Sinhala officials belonging to the Mahaweli authority have stepped up their visits into the region. Chamal Rajapaksa, a sibling of SL President Gotabaya Rajapaksa, is the SL Minister of Mahaweli as well as the State Minister of Defence in the ‘caretaker’ cabinet of the Rajapaksa regime at the moment.
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Gotabaya’s 19 May speech, outcome of defeatism, irresponsibility, say Colombo-based Tamils

[TamilNet, Saturday, 23 May 2020, 18:34 GMT]
The political struggle of the Tamil people in the North-East was waged independent of the external powers, and it continues to remain so as the people who braved the military restrictions demonstrated it on 18 May. It is Gotabaya Rajapaksa, who is talking from the political backyard sustained by the external powers, notably the powers at loggerheads, the US and China. His speech on 19 May was a defeatist response to the political resolve demonstrated by the Tamils on the previous day, commented veteran human rights activist and Colombo-based Tamil Catholic priest Fr M. Sakthivel. In the meantime, Colombo-based Tamil politician Mano Ganesan questioned whether Mr Rajapaksa was transforming the SL State into a rogue state as Myanmar, North Korea and what Zimbabwe. He characterised Rajapaksa’s threat to withdraw from global bodies as an irresponsible stance.
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Eight SL Navy personnel test positive in controversial quarantine centre in Vanni

[TamilNet, Friday, 22 May 2020, 23:11 GMT]
At least eight SL Navy personnel among the five-hundred individuals brought from South to SL military-operated quarantine centre at Keappaa-pulavu of Mullaiththeevu district in the North have tested positive for COVID-19. Two SLN sailors tested positive on Thursday and six more on Friday, according to the Mullaiththeevu office of the Regional Director of Health Services. The grassroots organisations and civic representatives have condemned the SL military for converting the small building of Pilak-kudiyiruppu primary health care centre, located in an area where Tamil people have been resettling after the area was released back to the people in 2011.
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TYO-UK pushes back on British Foreign Secretary's May 18 tweet

[TamilNet, Thursday, 21 May 2020, 15:56 GMT]
On May 18, 2020 Dominic Raab, the British Foreign Secretary, posted a Twitter message about his conversation with SL Minister DCR Gunawardena and the “close relationship” between the UK and genocidal Sri Lanka. The Foreign Secretary’s tweet included an image of the Sinhala Lion Flag and the Union Jack. UK based activists in the Tamil Youth Organisation (TYO-UK) along with fourteen Tamil student societies responded, “[Y]our tweet regarding UK’s close relationship with the Sri Lankan government, is bittersweet to the Tamil Community,” While Boris Johnson recovered from COVID-19, Dominic Raab served as Deputy Prime Minister.
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SL TID interrogates outspoken Tamil activist VS Sivakaran in Mannaar

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 20 May 2020, 22:09 GMT]
A five-member team of the notorious ‘Terrorist’ Investigation Division (TID) that from Colombo to Mannaar carried out an intimidating interrogation of VS Sivakaran, the chairman of Thamizh Theasia Vaazhvurimaich Changkam on Wednesday. The SL TID personnel led by an inspector-rank officer were posing questions in the two-and-a-half-hour investigation about Mr Sivakaran’s role in Maaveerar-Naa’l (Heroes’ Day) marked on 27 November 2019. They also warned the outspoken critic of genocidal Colombo that he was on a watchlist for organising remembrance days for people whom the TID blamed as “terrorists”. The harassment comes two days after Eezham Tamils braved SL military and police harassments in North and East marking Mu'l'livaaykkaal Remembrance and Awakening Day against Tamil Genocide on Tuesday. Sivakaran was formerly the secretary of the youth wing of Ilankai Tamil Arasuk Kadchi (ITAK).
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IBC's sister-media Gagana used to threaten Tamil villagers in Trinco on 18 May Remembrance

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 19 May 2020, 16:23 GMT]
A Sinhala-language news website, Gagana, owned by IBC Tamil Ltd., is being used in a campaign of reporting to prompt the intelligence wing of the occupying SL military to hunt down Tamil grassroots activists at Ki'li-veddi in Moothoor division of the Trincomalee district. A news item published in gaganga.lk with screenshots of social media messages supposedly shared in the accounts of three Tamils on the occasion of 18 May Mu'l'livaaykkaal Remembrance has put the lives of three persons, particularly one of them, in great danger, rights activists in Trincomalee said. The Sinhala ‘news’ accused the Tamil youth sharing the posts as promoters of “terrorism” through social media. It went further claiming that the Tamil youth were making money from “pro-LTTE Tamil diaspora.”
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Eezham Tamil and Muslim solidarity non-negotiable in true spirit of Mu'l'livaaykkaal

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 19 May 2020, 07:42 GMT]
“The viability of the collective political goal of Tamil Eelam is the most sublime truth about Mullivaikkal. This goal of justice and freedom cannot be changed for anyone’s comfort and convenience. Nor can it be changed by New Delhi, London or Washington. It should not be changed by the imperial agendas that are designed to divide the Tamil speaking Muslims and Eelam Tamils,” observes Professor Jude Lal Fernando of Trinity College, Dublin, in his May 18 Remembrance article to TamilNet on Wednesday. “Mullivaikkal tells Eelam Tamils that they are a people who had and who have demonstrated the highest possible moral courage in resisting subjugation. Nanthikkadal lagoon connects all of us to the sea of political wisdom of numerous struggles of oppressed peoples on earth that declares no one will give us freedom, but that we have to struggle for it and gain it ourselves,” he writes further.
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Outspoken CCP called back from North, former commander appointed as top health bureaucrat

[TamilNet, Monday, 11 May 2020, 20:25 GMT]
Consultant Community Physician (CCP) Dr Murali Vallipuranathan, who raised credible scientific questions of SL military-operated COVID-19 isolation centre in Kaangkeasan-thu'rai (KKS) in Jaffna, has been transferred away from North to South. The move comes after Vallipuranathan's case studies called into question the “dormitory” type of the military-run isolation that resulted in cross infections spreading the disease among sixteen of twenty people who were isolated by the SL military at KKS. Northern Provincial Director of Health Services, Dr A Ketheeswaran, has received instructions from Colombo's Health Ministry to transfer Dr Vallipuranathan to Colombo. In the meantime, SL President Gotabaya Rajapaksa has appointed the Director-General of SL Army Health Services, Major General Sanjeewa Munasinghe as the Secretary of the Health Ministry in Colombo.
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