SL military, Sinhala monk exploit poverty among Tamils in East for religious conversion

[TamilNet, Friday, 05 July 2019, 23:12 GMT]
A Sinhala Buddhist monk, Ven Katugastota Mahindalankara thero, stationed at Mayilang-karaichchi village in Vaazhaich-cheanai, 31 km north of Batticaloa city, has been operating a Theravada Buddhist Dhamma School targeting conversion of poverty-stricken Tamil children into Buddhism since 2014. The Sunday school, named ‘Mahindalangkara Dhamma School’ is functioning at the Buddhist temple called Sri Bodhirajaramaya (also named Sri Mahindarama Viharaya). The monk has also arranged a Sinhala lady teacher, L Sisiliya, to teach Sinhala language to the Tamil children in Mayilang-karaichchi for some years. For the last one month she is also teaching Sinhala at her residence, Tamil rural society activists told TamilNet adding that the Sinhala Buddhist vihara establishment was systematically attracting the poverty-stricken Tamil children at a village where all other facilities remained neglected.
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Tamils vow to stage feast at Naayaa'ru, disregard ‘advice’ on not to provoke monks

[TamilNet, Sunday, 30 June 2019, 10:37 GMT]
How about Tamils considering an approach of collaborating with the Sinhala Buddhist establishment and adopting a line without provoking the monks, the US Ambassador in Colombo recently asked a Tamil minister, informed sources in Colombo said. The SL minister was also working hard to contain the escalating dispute at Neeraaviyadi in Mullaiththeevu and at Kanniyaa in Trincomalee in an attempt to strike a compromise. However, the monks were not listening. They came with expanding plans of Neeraaviyadi and stepped up their hostile protests. The militant monks started to threaten the Tamils by naming and shaming a prominent activist of the anti-Mahaweli protests at a demonstration they staged recently at Neeraaviyadi. Now, the Tamil grassroots activists in Vanni have vowed to carry 108 Pongkal pots to the Pi'l'laiyaar temple at Neeraaviyadi on 06 July 2019 to stage a feast to their deity.
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Anti-Muslim harassment escalates in Mannaar

[TamilNet, Thursday, 27 June 2019, 23:51 GMT]
The occupying Sinhala Navy and Army along with the SL Police are harassing the Tamil-speaking Muslims in two hotspots in Mannaar district as never before, and the trend is worsening every day without anyone to voice for the rights of the affected innocent people. The predominantly Sinhala soldiers, particularly the SL Navy personnel at Thaaraa-puram in Mannaar island and those stationed in the mainland in Musali division, are humiliating the residents of more than 20 colonies. These settlements were put up by the controversial politician, Rishard Bathiudeen, who was serving the successive regimes in Colombo while creating a voter base for himself with the funding he facilitated from the Arabic world. The former SL Minister's opportunistic political behaviour has not only backfired against him but also against the Muslim residents of Thaaraa-Puram, which is his native village in Mannaar.
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Ploy of monks and bigotry of politicians critical to TNA's Quisling politics

[TamilNet, Saturday, 22 June 2019, 17:05 GMT]
A section of Tamil politicians, who claim that they are opposed to the Tamil National Alliance (TNA) on principles grounds regarding Tamil rights, have fallen right into the sophisticated trap laid by the extremist Sinhala Buddhist establishment in the district of Ampaa'rai. The Tamil politicians, who were attending the hunger-strike in which the role of Ven Ranmuthugala Sangharathana Thero had become the ‘foremost’ attention-drawer, were contributing to severing the ties between the Tamils and Muslims in the future. By making their presence at the platform promoted by the Bodu Bala Sena General Secretary Gnanasara Thero, JHU Parliamentarian monk Athuraliye Rathana Thero and Vinayagamoorthy Muralitharan alias Karuna, they were betraying the legitimate cause, including their objective criticism of the Quisling hierarchy of the TNA.
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Time for Canadian Eezham Tamils to chart next course of diaspora action

[TamilNet, Thursday, 20 June 2019, 23:39 GMT]
The political parties in Canada have unanimously called upon the UN to “establish an international independent investigation into the allegations of genocide against Tamils committed in Sri Lanka including the last phase of the armed conflict in 2009” along with two other demands to Colombo. A resolution was unanimously adopted extending condolences to all of the victims of violence while demanding the SL government to deliver justice to the Easter Sunday attacks, including protection of all religious places of worship and to fulfil its obligations made in Geneva within a clearly specified timeframe. Welcoming the move, the Tamil activists in the island urged the Canadian Tamil diaspora to concentrate on educating their host country on the unworkability of transitional justice in the island without international investigations on the genocide taking precedence over the other two demands.
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Tamil land-owners suppressed from mobilising against ethnic land-grab in Thiriyaay

[TamilNet, Saturday, 15 June 2019, 23:37 GMT]
The present SL Government Agent (District Secretary) of Trincomalee district, NAA Pushpakumara, as well as his predecessor Major General (retd) Ranjit de Silva, both Sinhalese, have transferred more than 300 acres of fertile lands of Eezham Tamils to Sinhala politicians and officials. The Divisional Secretary serving under them has been forced to subject the properties for long-term lease, said M. Konesan, the chairman of Thiriyaay Farmers’ Organisation.
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SL authorities plan to seize 50 acres as ‘Buddha Pooja Boomi’ in Thennai-maravadi

[TamilNet, Sunday, 09 June 2019, 20:39 GMT]
Tamil civil sources at Kuchchave'li said the controversial monk Galgamuwa Sandhabodhi thero has been harassing the Divisional Secretariat to demarcate fifty acres of lands at the temple site of Eezham Tamils along the strategic border between the Northern and Eastern provinces. The monk has claimed that the properties were needed to generate income for a future Buddhist temple. SL Archaeology Department and the occupying Sinhala military are planning to erect a Sinhala Buddhist temple at the locality after destroying the Hindu temple, the sources further said.
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Kokku'laay-centric united action needed to counter Colombo wedging North-East

[TamilNet, Saturday, 08 June 2019, 20:36 GMT]
The resettled Tamil residents of the strategic Thennai-maravadi village bordering the Northern and Eastern Provinces in the Trincomalee district are facing Sinhala colonisation and Sinhala Buddhicisation of Tamil heritage sites on two fronts, at Pa'nikka-vayal to its west and at Kanthasaami-malai, which extends eastwards into Kokku'laay lagoon. The Sinhala colonisation and the Buddhicisation of Tamil heritage site of Kanthasaami-malai are being accelerated under the Emergency Regulations and the situation prevailing after the Easter Sunday attacks that have triggered the extremist monks to escalate their chauvinistic schemes in the occupied country of Eezham Tamils. The two-pronged attack, which is being stepped up in the recent days, is part of a larger design of permanently wedging the territorial contiguity of the Tamil homeland along the narrow border between the North and the East.
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Tamils, Muslims need strategic alliance to protect heritage rights in North-East

[TamilNet, Friday, 07 June 2019, 17:16 GMT]
The Tamil Saiva Priest of Then-Kayilai Aatheenam, Thavath-Thiru Akaththiyar Adika’ laar, has urged legal activists to find ways to contain the hostile acts of the Sinhala Buddhist monk from the Velgam Vihara, who has dismantled the foundation of Hindu Pi’l’ laiyaar temple at the heritage site of Kanniyaa hot springs in Trincomalee. The Saiva priest said it was not merely a religious dispute, but rather a cause of preserving the heritage rights. The best option, in his opinion, was to address the issue through the courts. In the meantime, TNA Leader R. Sampanthan was taking up the burning question with the SL President and the Prime Minister. However, both the legal avenue and the political appeals made with collaborative orientation only have minimal impact in the unitary system of genocidal Sri Lanka, especially under the Emergency Regulations, commented legal activists in Trincomalee.
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Prejudiced Archaeology Dept escalates ethnic tensions in Trincomalee: Civic Councillor

[TamilNet, Saturday, 01 June 2019, 23:18 GMT]
Chandirarajah Vipooshan, a member of Trincomalee Town and Gravats Predesiya Saba, says that the overtly prejudiced behaviour of the SL Archaeology Department which selectively promotes the interests of the Sinhala Buddhists has escalated ethnic tensions between the Tamils and the Sinhalese in Trincomalee district. The civic member said it was the SL Archaeology Department, which was instigating construction projects of the monks to accelerate the Sinhala Buddhisication in Thennai-maravadi and in Kanniya. The monks were from different temples. It is the Archaeology Department that coordinates the activities timing the situation prevailing the in the island, he said.
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Colonising Sinhala Buddhist monks, officials provoke Saiva Tamils in Trincomalee

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 28 May 2019, 18:04 GMT]
A group of encroaching Sinhala Theravada Buddhist monks, who had illegally built a Buddhist shrine in 2013 near the Saiva (Hindu) shrine of Kanniyaa hot wells in the traditional Tamil division of Uppu-ve’ li in the Trincomalee district, have recently started to dismantle the remaining foundation-structure of the Saiva Pi’l’ laiyaar temple. The Saiva temple was destroyed during the anti-Tamil pogroms, and the occupying Colombo establishment has been blocking the Tamil landowner from reconstructing the temple. After dismantling the square-shaped foundation of the Saiva temple, the occupying Sinhala monks started to lay a circular foundation at the locality on 21 May. The controversial move has drawn strong objections from the Tamils, including the owner of the lands, Ms Ganesh Kokilaramani, triggering religious tensions between the intruding Sinhalese and the native Tamils since 22 May.
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Tamil Genocide Remembrance marked in geostrategic Pacific islands of Okinawa, Jeju

[TamilNet, Friday, 24 May 2019, 17:26 GMT]
The people of the Island of Okinawa, located between Japan and Taiwan in the East China Sea of the Pacific, marked the tenth Tamil Genocide Remembrance in two separate events reflecting their resistance to the protracted geopolitical militarisation of the islands in the Indo-Pacific. In 1945, almost one hundred thousand civilians along with an equal number of Imperial Japanese Army soldiers and 12,000 US military personnel perished as the USA went on capturing Japan’s southernmost island in one of the bloodiest amphibious invasions in the modern history. Around 30,000 US troops are now stationed there with a changed focus towards China. The grassroots movement among the Okinawan population is strongly opposed to their island being continuously militarised. Mu’l’ li-vaaykkaal Remembrance events were also held in Kyoto, Japan, and on the strategic Jeju island off the Korean peninsula.
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Metanarrative of Mu'l'li-vaaykkaal, geopolitics and secularism: Jude Lal Fernando

[TamilNet, Sunday, 19 May 2019, 00:28 GMT]
The outside powers, be it USA, UK, China or India, are always pre-occupied with the geo-strategic location of the island. During the British colonial period, the Sinhalese were made to believe that they were closer to the British than to the Tamils (Tamils were the ‘invaders’). This resulted in a religiously defined Sinhala Buddhist unitary, which sought to consolidate itself after the ‘independence’. The genocidal process was the outcome. The Tamil liberation struggle, which was a secular nationalist struggle, culminated into the Tamil Eelam state and stopped the genocide. The 2009 onslaught not only destroyed the human lives, but also the secular nationalist liberational ethos. After the Easter Sunday attack in 2019, religious conflicts have been imposed with global implications. Professor Jude Lal Fernando explains the metanarrative and proposes an action to overcome the challenges.
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Ex NPC councillor vows to mark genocide remembrance at 21 places before 18 May

[TamilNet, Sunday, 12 May 2019, 22:26 GMT]
Former Northern Provincial Council (NPC) member and ex-TNA parliamentarian M.K. Shivajilingam has vowed to mark Tamil Genocide Week from 12th to 17 May at 21 places across the eight districts in the North and East before taking part in the tenth year marking of 2009 Tamil Genocide Day on 18 May at Mu'l'li-vaaykkaal. “We have chosen 21 places where the SL military was committing genocidal acts. It is like the 21-gun salute, the highest respect paid to those who sacrificed their lives,” Mr Shivajlingam, a political leader of TELO said. After inaugurating the first event at Kappaladi along the coast near Mu'l'livaaykkal on Sunday, he blamed the SL State for detaining the student leaders in Jaffna and for harassing himself describing the moves as aiming to suppress the 10th Tamil genocide remembrance on 18 May.
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Muslim activists in Jaffna caution Tamils about sinister designs of southern chauvinism

[TamilNet, Saturday, 04 May 2019, 21:16 GMT]
Jaffna-based Muslim grassroots activists have urged Tamils to be cautious on what they read on certain Tamil-language media outlets, which show signs of succumbing to the hidden agenda of the forces in South seeking to set the Tamils against the Muslims. Senior trader and grassroots activist Mohammed Uzinar Tahir and Jaffna Municipal Council member Muththu Muhammathu Nibahir were reacting to false and twisted news reports. They were also responding to the propaganda that the SL military was wooing some ex-LTTE members to collaborate with it as informants. The SL military's latest move is seen as Colombo Intelligence establishment's political counter-insurgency seeking to create communal disharmony among the Tamil-speaking people in Jaffna and elsewhere in the island. The activists were talking to media on Friday.
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SL military, police go all out against everything ‘Thowheed’

[TamilNet, Thursday, 02 May 2019, 23:54 GMT]
The occupying Sinhala military and the SL police have detained at least 21 Muslims in Mannar up to Wednesday night. Most of the arrested are members of various Thowheed Jamath groups that are different from the National Thowheed Jamath (NTJ), which was created by the Easter Sunday attacker Zahran Hashim. These are multiple organisations such as Ceylon TJ, SLTJ, All Ceylon TJ and United TJ which are not prohibited. Even the hardliners in these groups have faith-oriented difference with the NTJ. However, the SL Police and the military are going after everything that has 'Thowheed' in the name, legal sources in Mannaar said. The personnel carrying out the cordon and search operations are Sinhalese. Meanwhile, the SL soldiers are also desecrating the places of worship by wearing shoes inside the premises, the people complained.
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Unity between Eezham Tamils and Muslims key to true freedom: Exiled Sinhala academic

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 24 April 2019, 18:43 GMT]
Whoever carried out the Easter Sunday attack seems to have implemented, knowingly or unknowingly, the grand plan of fully integrating the Sri Lankan state into the geo-strategic imperial complex led by USA, UK, India and China by sharpening the globally imposed imperial faulty lines, says Professor Jude Lal Fernando of Trinity College, Dublin, in a comment to TamilNet on Wednesday. With the Easter Sunday attack on Christians (Sinhala and Tamil), many have lost their lives. The entire Muslim community has been demonized and Islamophobia has been heightened. Sinhalese do not know what they do – really like those who carried out the attack on Easter Sunday, he says. “The only wake up call can come from a strong unity between the Eelam Tamils and Muslims on the island who can truly resist the colonially carved state,” says the exiled Sinhala activist who hails from Negombo.
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People of all walks of life victims in ‘chosen island’ of geopolitics, religious extremism

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 23 April 2019, 23:12 GMT]
The families and the relatives of the victims of the serial terror attacks on Easter Sunday mourned their dead with mass burials and an island-wide day of mourning with three minutes of silence on Tuesday. At least 45 of those killed were children, according to the figures gathered by the United Nations. As the death toll from the bombings rose to 321, the Syria-based Islamic State group, which had lost all its territorial control in Syria and Iraq, claimed that it stood behind the serial terror attacks, publishing photos and a video of the attackers. In the meantime, reports also said that the US Indo-Pacific Command had wrapped up a joint naval training, four days earlier than it was scheduled to conclude in Hambantota.
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Sinhala colonisation escalated in Vavuniyaa North with a multitude of players backing infrastructure

[TamilNet, Thursday, 18 April 2019, 21:24 GMT]
Elected civic members of Vavuniyaa North Divisional Council (PS) complain that the Sinhala colonisation is relentlessly targeting the eastern side of their division. The occupying Sinhala Army and its home-guards paramilitary act as the guardians of the colony while the extremist Buddhist monks coordinate the systematic expansion. Various SL ministries provide the infrastructure. Besides, a host of actors from a leading socio-economic NGO with Buddhist philosophy to a local extremist group known as ‘Sinhala Power in the North‘ (‘Uture Hela Balaya’ or ‘Utura Rakina Raṭa Surakina Jātika Balaya - Vanni’) facilitate it through different approaches. Also, sections of expatriate Sinhalese, including a retired professor from Australia, have funded the housing projects of the scheme. The Sinhala settlers are being radicalised without any provocation or hostility from the Tamils.
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Colombo's next step of genocide: urbanising and linking Mannaar-Trinco belt with South

[TamilNet, Thursday, 04 April 2019, 23:46 GMT]
SL Prime Minister Ranil Wickramasinghe was talking about the process of urbanisation and about setting up an economic corridor linking Colombo and Trincomalee. Mr Wickramasinghe was addressing media, intellectuals, and public servants on Wednesday. “The region from Mannar to Trincomalee would be brought under development. The road network linking Mannar, Trincomalee through Kandy and Dambulla and Colombo and Hambantota, would promote developed economic zones,” Daily News reported Wickramasinghe as saying. Responding, Tamil activists for alternative politics in Jaffna said the UNP regime, after consolidating itself in Colombo and Geneva with the collaboration of ITAK, is now going to accelerate the structural genocide against the nation of Eezham Tamils through so-called urbanisation.
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