Film producer, director Ratnam released without charges

[TamilNet, Monday, 31 May 2010, 08:27 GMT]
Chandran Ratnam, internationally famed Tamil film producer was released Monday the Gangodawila Magistrate without any charges against him.Ratnam was arrested by the police last week for allegedly possessing explosive materials in his former residence in Nugegoda.
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3rd death anniversary of slain journalist Thevakumar observed in Moo’laay

[TamilNet, Sunday, 30 May 2010, 20:01 GMT]
Public organizations in Moo’laay in Jaffna observed Sunday the third death anniversary of Jaffna correspondent of Sakthi TV station, Paranirupasingam Thevakumar, 34, abducted while he was returning to his residence in Moo’laay and hacked to death in Kaakkaitheevu, a barren land near Naavaanthu’rai in Jaffna on 28 May 2008, in Ganesha Community Centre Hall in Moo’laay, sources in Jaffna said. Immediately after the killing, his wife in her statement to three Sinhalese journalists from Colombo had said that men of Eelam People’s Democratic Party (EPDP), a constituent of ruling United People’s Freedom Alliance (UPFA), were directly involved in her husband’s assassination.
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Minister Douglas Devananda to launch a new Tamil daily in Jaffna

[TamilNet, Sunday, 30 May 2010, 16:32 GMT]
The leader of Eelam People’s Democratic Party (EPDP) Douglas Devananda, a cabinet minister in the ruling United People’s Freedom Alliance (UPFA), who continues to publicly accuse the three Tamil dailies published in Jaffna of having denied him and his party equal opportunity and sufficient cooperation during the last parliamentary elections, is actively engaged in launching a new Tamil daily in Jaffna, sources in Jaffna said. Minister Devananda had in person offered higher wages to the members of the editorial boards of the three dailies published in Jaffna in an attempt to lure them to his new daily, the sources added.
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Corpses located in toilet pit in Ki’linochchi to be exhumed Monday

[TamilNet, Sunday, 30 May 2010, 16:01 GMT]
The plastic bags containing six corpses found dumped in a toilet pit of a house in Kaneasapuram in Ki’linochchi are to be dug out Monday in the presence of the Judicial Medical Officer (JMO) from Vavuniyaa Government Hospital, on the directive of Ki’linochchi magistrate who visited the site. Members of the family resettled in the said house in February had located Saturday dead bodies of massacred victims, buried inside their toilet pit. Ki’linochchi parliamentarian Sritharan who visited the house and saw the toilet pit said that the killings must have been a planned affair.
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Chandran Ratnam arrested for "possession" of explosives

[TamilNet, Sunday, 30 May 2010, 11:04 GMT]
A well known film producer and director of several films Chandran Ratnam was taken into custody by the Sri Lanka police Sunday on an allegation that he had been in possession of explosive materials in his former residence in Nugegoda, according to police media spokesman Preshantha Jayakody. In a recent video interview Chandran, who comes from a mixed parentage, explains that he is not averse to risk taking, and prides in the reconciliation theme he has advanced in his movies.
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Sinhala names given to junctions in Mullaiththeevu district by SLA

[TamilNet, Sunday, 30 May 2010, 09:59 GMT]
Sri Lanka Army (SLA) forces that occupy Vanni after the recent war have put up new name boards in Sinhala language only with new Sinhala names for many road junctions and streets in Mullaiththeevu district. SLA, besides erecting special camps and High Security Zones in strategic places in Mullaiththeevu, is engaged in changing the entire district like any other typical Sinhalese area in the country, sources in Vanni said. The photos here were taken a few weeks ago and the SLA soldiers posted at the junctions explained what the Sinhala names mean and why they had been chosen.
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Treaty discussion, reminder for appointing Sri Lanka War Crimes panel, says Boyle

[TamilNet, Saturday, 29 May 2010, 21:53 GMT]
While Secretary General Ban Ki Moon extolled the contributions of the UN's International Criminal Court (ICC) as an effective instrument to uphold peace, justice and human rights, in a Washington Post article, as UN's member nations convene Monday in Kampala to formally review the Rome Treaty, Professor Francis A. Boyle criticized Ban for delaying action on establishing accountability for Sri Lanka's "massacre of about 50,000 Tamils" and urged Ban to "immediately appoint the International War Crimes Committee for Sri Lanka that he had already promised to do several weeks ago."
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Tamil civilian arrested in Pulmoaddai

[TamilNet, Saturday, 29 May 2010, 18:20 GMT]
Sri Lankan Police arrested a Tamil civilian from his house at Kaddukku'lam in Pulmoaddai village in Trincomalee district Friday and took him for interrogation.
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Rajapaksa extremism cannot be changed: Lee Kuan Yew

[TamilNet, Saturday, 29 May 2010, 17:17 GMT]
Singapore's Minister Mentor Lee Kuan Yew, in a newly released book titled "Conversations with Lee Kuan Yew,' says that Tamils have been in the island of Sri Lanka as long as the Sinhalese, and that Sri Lanka is not a happy "united" country. The present president of Sri Lanka believes he has settled the problem now that the Tamil Tigers are killed, and wants others to believe that too," and Lee observes:"I don't think they [Tamils] are going to be submissive or go away." Referring to the Sri Lankan president he said: "I have read his speeches and I knew he was a Sinhala extremist. I cannot change his mind."
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Dead bodies located inside a toilet pit in Ki'linochchi

[TamilNet, Saturday, 29 May 2010, 15:45 GMT]
Members of a family recently resettled in Ka'neasapuram in Ki'iinochchi after being displaced from their house, located Saturday dead bodies of massacred victims, buried inside their toilet pit, sources in Ki'linochchi said. The house was located 1 km west of A9.
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US awaits Sri Lanka action, despite rights groups’ warning

[TamilNet, Saturday, 29 May 2010, 12:26 GMT]
The United States will be “watching closely” Sri Lankan President Mahinda Rajapakse’s newly established ‘reconciliation commission’ to see if it lives up to Colombo’s claims, the State Department’s Assistant Secretary for South and Central Asian Affairs, Robert Blake, said Friday. Shortly after US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton described as holding “promise” the body Sri Lanka has set up to investigate war crimes – and which international human rights groups have dismissed as a sham - Mr. Blake said “they’ve now just begun this process … It’s up to them now to prove that they will be able to take on all of these responsibilities.”
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South Indian Film Industry calls for boycott against IIFA to be held in Sri Lanka

[TamilNet, Saturday, 29 May 2010, 04:40 GMT]
Representatives of the South Indian Film Industry (SIFI) unions called for a boycott of the International Indian Film Award (IIFA) ceremony to be held in Sri Lanka in June which they described as a country stained with the blood of innocent Tamils, in a meeting held Friday at the South Indian Film Chamber of Commerce premises in Chennai, according to SIFI release Friday . A request was extended to the North Indian Film Industry fraternity to boycott the IIFA function among other resolutions passed while it was stressed that the protest is not against the function but the venue chosen to hold it, the sources added.
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Tamil student reported missing in Nilaave'li

[TamilNet, Saturday, 29 May 2010, 03:35 GMT]
A sixteen year old Tamil student of Nilaave'li, a traditional Tamil village in Trincomalee district, is reported to have disappeared after he left home 10 May, according to a complaint lodged with Kuchchave'li Police by his mother.
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STF again under SL Defence Ministry

[TamilNet, Friday, 28 May 2010, 13:16 GMT]
The notorious Special Task Force (STF), a military-styled elite counter insurgency arm of the Sri Lankan Police, which has been responsible for a number of war-crimes and genocidal onslaughts against Tamil speaking people in the East, has been brought under the control of the Sri Lankan Defence Secretary Gotabhaya Rajapaksa with effect from May 12 following a decision by SL President Mahinda Rajapaksa with the approval of his cabinet of ministers. The STF was responsible for the execution-styled massacre of five Tamil students in January 2006.
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4 SLA soldiers killed by lightning during preparation for 'War Victory Day' in Colombo

[TamilNet, Friday, 28 May 2010, 09:21 GMT]
Sri Lanka government failed to reveal the deaths of four Sri Lanka Army (SLA) soldiers and others injured by lightning at Galle Face Green in Colombo while decorating the area for the War Victory Day celebrations, on 17, 18 April, two days prior to the event, sources in Colombo said. Though the government had concealed this incident from the public so as not to spoil the sprit of the first annual victory celebrations over Liberation Tigers, news of it had leaked through the employees of government and private offices and other establishments in Galle Face, the sources added. Tamil National Alliance and the other opposition parties had requested the government to cancell the celebration while the people was suffering but the government did celebrate the event.
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STF arrests 2 Tamil youths in Batticaloa district

[TamilNet, Friday, 28 May 2010, 09:03 GMT]
Special Task Force (STF) commandos on road patrol arrested a Tamil youth in Ka'luvaangchchikkudi and another in Kalmunai Wednesday evening claiming that the youths had mobile phones containing recent Channel-4 photos and other such film clips from some other websites, the relatives of the arrestees said. STF had told Kalmunai police where the two youths are detained that the youths are working in support of the Transnational Government of Tamil Eelam (TGTE), sources in Kalmunai said.
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Sri Lankan massacre highlights failings of IC: Amnesty International

[TamilNet, Friday, 28 May 2010, 08:34 GMT]
The Sri lankan Governments lack accountability for “one of the worst human rights crises of recent times” and the complicity of global powers and the United Nations in protecting the Sri Lankan Government highlights a failure of the international instruments of justice said Amnesty International Asia Pacific director, Sam Zafiri in an interview with Austrlian media this week. Singling out China and India as part of a “Coalition of governments” that chose not only to ignore the Rajapaksa Governments targeting of Tamil civilians, but who “passed a [U.N] resolution congratulating the Sri Lankan Government” amid attempts to block “efforts at seeking justice”, Zafiri also accused the Australian Government of violating its human rights obligations by refusing to accept Tamil refugees.
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Journalists, NGOs unsettle Peiris's US visit

[TamilNet, Friday, 28 May 2010, 00:30 GMT]
While Tamil demonstrators plan to protest in front of the State Department during Sri Lanka's Minister of External Affairs Gamini Lakshman Peiris's meeting with U.S. Secretary of State Hilary Clinton Friday, reports covering Peiris's US visit indicate an uncomfortable minister facing hostile press and questioners, and the resulting damage to the Minister's mission to block UN and US acting on the war-crimes call by several NGOs. Human Rights Watch, Amnesty, International Crisis Group and Elders this week, had called for an independent international war crimes investigation in Sri Lanka. Minister Peiris has been taking pre-emptive steps, unprecedented for a visiting Minister, to avoid facing serious journalists who have been covering Sri Lanka's war and the conduct of the protagonists during the last months of the war.
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IIFA showbiz event blamed for promoting ‘paradise of genocide’

[TamilNet, Thursday, 27 May 2010, 16:24 GMT]
As Tamils world over mark one-year of Indian abetted genocidal war against Eezham Tamils in the island of Sri Lanka, the Hindi film industry known as Bollywood and the major Indian conglomerate of trade unions, Federation of Indian Chambers of Commerce & Industry (FICCI) are joining hands with Rajapaksa regime in Colombo in staging 11th International Indian Film Academy (IIFA) awards weekend during the first week of June in Colombo. The FICCI, the largest and oldest business conglomerate of India is the flagship organiser of the business event named FICCI-IIFA Global Business Forum, where hundreds of CEOs and business heads from India would be signing various investment contracts and tie-ups in the island on the second day of the celebrity and corporate event.
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Former JVP MP questioned by the CID over meeting with Vanni parents in Colombo

[TamilNet, Thursday, 27 May 2010, 09:43 GMT]
Former JVP Parliamentarian Ramalingam Chandrasekar was questioned by the Criminal Investigation Department (CID) officials and Army Intelligence Personnel soon after he met parents of the disappeared persons from Jaffna at Narayana Mandapam in Grandpass in Colombo District on Wednesday morning.
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