Amuthu Pulavar, veteran of Christian Tamil literature passes away

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 24 February 2010, 14:57 GMT]
Chevalier Dr. S. Adaikalamuthu, Tamil pundit and poet from I’lavaalai, Jaffna, known by his pseudonym Amuthup-pulavar, passed away at the age of 92 in London, Tuesday. Studied classical Tamil at the prestigious Kaaviya Paadasaalai (School of Classics), which was functioning in the Arumuga Navalar School in Jaffna, Amuthup Pulavar was one of the few surviving authors of Christian Tamil literature of the traditional genre. Born in 1918 and beginning his poetic pursuits in 1938, his most known literary work was Madu Maathaa Kaaviyam, a poetic composition on the famous Catholic pilgrim centre at Madu in Mannaar. He was knighted (Chevalier) by the Late Pope John Paul II in Rome in 2004 and in the same year was awarded honorary doctorate by the University of Jaffna.
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2 more independent groups pay deposit money to contest Jaffna district

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 24 February 2010, 12:52 GMT]
The number of independent groups contesting parliamentary election in Jaffna district has risen to six with two more groups depositing money at Jaffna Secretariat Wednesday, sources in Jaffna said. The political parties which had submitted their list of candidates to contest Jaffna district so far are Tamil National Alliance (TNA) and Tamil Makkal Viduthalai Pullikal (TMVP), the sources added.
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ITAK submits candidates’ list to contest Jaffna district

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 24 February 2010, 12:39 GMT]
Mavai Senathirajah, General Secretary of Ilankai Thamil Arasuk Kadchi (ITAK) along with Appathurai Vinayagamoorthy of All Ceylon Tamil Congress (ACTC) submitted the list of Tamil National Alliance (TNA) candidates contesting the general election Wednesday around 11:15 a.m in Jaffna Secretariat. This nomination list has excluded many of the TNA former parliamentarians causing dissatisfaction among several Tamil circles in Jaffna including Jaffna University community, the sources added.
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US Supreme Court hears constitutional challenge to anti-terrorism laws

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 24 February 2010, 02:31 GMT]
Supreme Court of the United States, during Monday morning session, heard arguments on the constitutionality of material support provisions in the anti-terrorism laws which the plaintiffs alleged, and 9th circuit court and later Federal Court of appeals of the 9th circuit, partially agreed, as constitutionally vague in a series of law suits during the 1998-2007 period. Professor David Cole of the Georgetown University argued for the Humanitarian Law Project and several Tamil Organizations, the plaintiffs, and Obama appointee for Solicitor General, and former Harvard Law school dean Elena Kagan, argued on behalf of the U.S. Department of Justice.
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TMVP submits nominations to contest in Trincomalee district

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 24 February 2010, 01:56 GMT]
Tamil Makkal Viduthalai Pulikal (TMVP) Tuesday submitted its list of candidates at the Trincomalee Election Office to contest in the Trincomalee electoral district in the forthcoming parliamentary election scheduled to be held on April 8.
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SLA harrasses former Jaffna parliamentarian

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 23 February 2010, 20:16 GMT]
Sri Lanka Army (SLA) soldiers Tuesday evening harassed former Member of Parliament from Jaffna Selvarajah Kajendren and a group of civilians who were discussing with him near a temple in Thirunelveali, media circles in Jaffna said.
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2 more independent groups pay deposit to contest parliamentary election in Jaffna

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 23 February 2010, 03:37 GMT]
Murugesu Arumainayagam and Kasipillai Senthilvel from Jaffna paid their deposit money at Jaffna Secretariat Monday to contest as independent groups in Jaffna electoral district in the forthcoming parliamentary election. Meanwhile, Gajendrakumar Ponnambalam, former Tamil National Alliance (TNA) parliamentarian paid a visit to Jaffna where he met Jaffna University society members to discuss the need to form an alternative political party in place of TNA, sources in Jaffna said.
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Myth of Sri Lankan state and the historic responsibility of Tamil leadership

[TamilNet, Monday, 22 February 2010, 18:49 GMT]
Why Tamil political leadership should never on its own surrender sovereignty, why Tamils are coerced to surrender it by all quarters concerned, what are the historical and legal bases for claims of Tamil sovereignty in the island – these are questions every Eezham Tamil, whether politician or layman has to put to serious perusal at this historic juncture, writes TamilNet political commentator in Colombo. Just like the Sinhalese, Tamils also lost their sovereignty to the Portuguese but through a separate legal convention. The Tamils have not regained it like the Sinhalese but proved it de facto. After an unfair war, TNA or any other Eezham Tamil leadership should not make the historic blunder of again surrendering Tamil sovereignty and also proving that surrender in a ballot, he further writes.
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Ex-TNA parliamentarian Thangesvary to contest in UPFA ticket

[TamilNet, Monday, 22 February 2010, 18:02 GMT]
Kathiraman Thangesvary, Tamil National Alliance (TNA) parliamentarian in the dissolved parliament is to contest in the ruling United Peoples Freedom Alliance (UPFA) with five new faces in the Batticaloa electoral district, media circles in Colombo said Monday.
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Pasadena firm assists in Alston's execution video analysis

[TamilNet, Sunday, 21 February 2010, 20:59 GMT]
Evidence from reputable and established forensic firms on the authenticity of the Channel-4 execution video continues to accumulate, and the latest is a Pasadena, California, forensic firm which disclosed Friday that one of the firm's technical representative, Jeff Spivak, assisted Professor Philip Alston, UN Special Rapporteur on extrajudicial, summary or arbitrary executions, in analyzing the video for authenticty. The firm claimed that "[i]n part, due to the image processing results performed with the Cognitech Video Investigator software, UN Rapporteur Professor Phillip Alston, has requested a full scale investigation into the incident," indicating a positive conclusion that video was authentic.
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India to screen academics of Sri Lanka attending conferences

[TamilNet, Sunday, 21 February 2010, 20:25 GMT]
Participants from Sri Lanka to conferences in India require advance security clearance from the Home Ministry of India. The restrictions are applicable to peoples of eight countries, Afghanistan, Bangladesh, China, Iran, Iraq, Pakistan, Sri Lanka, Sudan, and to people of Pakistani origin and stateless persons, media reports said Friday, citing instructions sent to all Central Ministries, Departments and Chief Secretaries of all State Governments and Union Territories. India’s foreign policy necessitating six-weeks scrutiny for academics of one half of the countries of South Asia is shocking, political observers said adding that while governments collaborate in state terrorism at higher levels they prevent their peoples uniting against it. Some of the countries now red-flagged for academics were India’s staunch partners in abetting Sri Lanka’s war crimes and defending them at the UNHRC.
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Sri Lanka enters Information dark age?

[TamilNet, Sunday, 21 February 2010, 03:28 GMT]
Commenting on Sri Lanka's plans for additional cyber censorship, and the invitations extended to Chinese Information Technology experts for assistance in formulating Sri Lanka's internet policy framework, Prof. Kumar David, in the weekend edition of Lakbima says, "This [Rajapakse Government] is a frightened regime, truth and transparency give it diarrhoea; this country [Sri Lanka] has never before been threatened with despotic thought control replicating Chinese or any other Stalinism as the norm; no not ever before. The worst is that once this rotten lot start it, the next government and the ones thereafter, UNP, SF or whoever, will never roll it back; they too will exploit these despotic powers to the full, till one day the people throw out the whole putrid system."
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Sportsmen join election run

[TamilNet, Saturday, 20 February 2010, 21:52 GMT]
Former Cricket captain Sanath Jayasuriya and Sri Lankan sprint queen and Melbourne Olympic silver medallist Susanthika Jayasinghe have received nominations to contest in the forthcoming parliamentary elections under the UPFA ticket.
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Fundamentalism versus totalitarianism in Sri Lanka

[TamilNet, Saturday, 20 February 2010, 03:22 GMT]
Religious fundamentalism and state totalitarianism, which contribute to each other in the island of Sri Lanka is now at loggerheads, when state totalitarianism wants to have complete reins over the other, is the interpretation of a leftist academic in Colombo over the Maha Sangha controversy this week. Meanwhile, BBC Sinhala reported Friday, that "the main opposition in Sri Lanka has accused the government of violating the constitution by trying to destroy the Theravada Buddhism in the island."
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Anniversary of Murugathasan’s death marked in Geneva

[TamilNet, Friday, 19 February 2010, 04:03 GMT]
Tamils from across Europe gathered in Geneva Saturday to commemorate the life Murugathasan Varnakulasingham, who immolated himself in February last year to draw attention to the plight of hundreds of thousands of Tamils being starved and killed in the Vanni, Sri Lanka. The commemoration coincidentally followed soon after former UN official, Gordon Weiss, admitted that the Sri Lankan government was responsible for the deaths of up to 40,000 Tamil civilians in the last days of the war alone. This is a figure far larger than the 7,000 the UN had previously claimed as being the number killed in the Vanni, but even that figure was disputed by the Sri Lankan government.
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TNA considers opening offices in Delhi, Colombo

[TamilNet, Friday, 19 February 2010, 02:39 GMT]
On being asked whether Tamil National Alliance (TNA) has plans to open its party offices in Delhi and Colombo, Suresh Premachadran, TNA spokesman and MP, said that efforts are being taken to open the two offices but they will be opened only after the parliamentary election. In response to a question whether the Indian Government has granted permission to open an office of TNA in Delhi, he did not give a clear answer. However, he added that there is no need to obtain permission to open an office in Colombo.
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Facilitating transnational government needs to be democratic: NCET

[TamilNet, Thursday, 18 February 2010, 15:55 GMT]
For the successful formation of Transnational Government of Tamil Eelam (TGTE), the idea should be strongly rooted in the people and there should be consensus in the transnational diaspora on the model, says Norwegian Council of Eezham Tamils (NCET) responding to the call for comments by the TGTE formation committee on a model proposed by its advisory panel. A grass root based transnational government having federal units and inter-locking mechanism is a better democratic option than a monolithic and high-powered structure conceived in the proposed model, the NCET said, adding that sectarianism and singly led formation process diminish chances of consensus on the model. In a public videoconference recently held in Oslo, Mr V. Rudrakumaran admitted that he alone was the Formation Committee of the TGTE, the observations of the NCET said.
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TNA shouldn't fail representing hearts of Tamils: Fr. Emmanuel

[TamilNet, Thursday, 18 February 2010, 13:26 GMT]
At a time when Colombo and its collaborators try their best to erase out the national aspirations of Tamils, the Tamil National Alliance has the noble responsibility to maintain its unity in being the true voice and champions of Tamil aspirations, says Rev. Prof. Dr. S.J. Emmanuel, the former Vicar General of the Catholic diocese of Jaffna in an open letter addressed to TNA leaders Sampanthan, Mavai Senathirajah, Suresh Premachandran, Selvam Adaikalanathan and Gajendrakumar Ponnampalam. Eezham Tamils have been consistent in expressing their genuine desire for independence ever since 1976 and even now it remains the underlying goal despite constitutional sanction on speaking it out openly in the island of Sri Lanka. But, their kith and kin in the free diaspora have voiced on their behalf, overwhelmingly re-confirming that desire as the standing-aspiration, he said in the appeal.
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Perception on ex-LTTE members must be revised: former Aussie diplomat

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 17 February 2010, 10:55 GMT]
Australian authorities must cease bowing to influence and pressure from the Sri Lankan Government in its handling of asylum seekers said former Australian diplomat Bruce Haigh in a letter to the editor appearing in the Australian Financial Review and Canberra Times. Condemning the Rajapaksa administrations slaughter of “anywhere between 10-40,000 civilians”, its censoring of the media and rapid descent into dictatorship, Haigh described the Sri Lanka Government “corrupt” and “tarnished”, before urging a review on the assessment of LTTE members who were merely ”soldiers on one side in a particularly brutal and nasty civil war, a war in which both sides employed terrorism as a weapon” and who do not represent a security threat to Australia as stated by intelligence organisations.
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Tamil circles urge TNA to enunciate policy

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 17 February 2010, 03:45 GMT]
Several organizations in Jaffna including those of the students and intellectuals have called upon Tamil National Alliance (TNA) to make public its proposed solution for the ethnic issue well before the forthcoming parliamentary election, sources in Jaffna said. The call comes in the wake of rumours that TNA stands divided as some of its senior parliamentarians are planning to field new candidates other than the present representatives in order to strengthen their positions, the sources added. Meanwhile, TNA is being urged to state their policy clearly as it was done in 1976 in the first National Convention of the Tamil United Liberation Front (TULF) where the Vaddukoddai Resolution was proclaimed, the sources added.
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