Court further remands 4 returnees from Fiji

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 16 September 2009, 11:09 GMT]
Colombo Chief Magistrate Nishantha Hapuarachchi Tuesday ordered further remand till September 22 for three Tamils and a Sinhalese who were arrested by the Criminal Investigation Department (CID) officials at the Katunayake International Airport on their return from Fiji islands, rejecting their bail applications. CID told court said that the suspects had immigrated to the Fiji Islands for employment and the Fiji Islands authority had deported them.
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War and disregard make Tamils hard and determined

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 16 September 2009, 08:44 GMT]
“After looking at the people dying and dead bodies everywhere, it is like nothing threatens me any more, it is like I have had the hard time in my life and I think I am prepared to take up whatever happens in life now,” says Damilvany Gnanakumar, an Eezham Tamil of British citizenship, who witnessed war and internment camp in the island of Sri Lanka. "I'm not that old Vany that sits down and cries for little things. I'm stronger now after going through and seeing all that problem. My mind is clear now," she told Gethin Chamberlain of The Guardian in an interview Tuesday, asking at the same time, what have the people done wrong? Why are they going through this, why is the international government not speaking up for them?
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English Bishops condemn conditions in Sri Lanka camps

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 16 September 2009, 02:31 GMT]
Two English Catholic bishops who recently returned from Sri Lanka are calling for the end of forced confinement of nearly 300,000 Tamil survivors of the government’s final offensive against the Tamil Tigers. Bishop John Rawsthorne of Sheffield and Bishop John Arnold of Westminster have just returned from an eight day tour of the country, where they were looking at work of CAFOD with partner Caritas Sri Lanka. A report by the Independent Catholic News (ICN) quoted the Bishops noting the “serious overcrowding and inadequate food and health services” in the camps and the need to hold the Sri Lankan government to account.
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Colombo's paranoid secrecy

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 15 September 2009, 16:20 GMT]
"Why must the military be in control of the camps, why not civilian agencies? Why can't visitors enter the camps? Why are journalists barred? Why are international agencies kept out? Why is it taking the courts so long to make a straightforward order to allow members of parliament to visit the camps?" and quoting Mangala Samaraweera, "I can walk into any prison at will and meet any criminal, but I am not allowed to meet these people held in detention for no reason," Prof Kumar David, in an opinion column in Sunday's Lakbima, writes, "[t]he reasons offered for this paranoid secrecy varied from the need to hide human rights violations to calculations relating to the upcoming elections. I think it will be some time before the real reason comes seeping out."
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US's war crimes report, a canary in coalmine - Rapp

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 15 September 2009, 11:44 GMT]
With United Nations remaining impotent to act carry out investigations into the conduct of Sri Lanka military during the last several months of the war, a report to be released by the United States State Department on September 21, remains, perhaps the last credible instrument in the hands of the West to begin to find the truth on the allegations of war-crimes by the Sri Lanka Government and the Liberation Tigers, a spokesperson for a US-based activist group said. Stephen Rapp, US's ambassdor at large for War Crimes Issues (WCI) told Time that his office is responsible "to collect information on ongoing atrocities... [and] give a signal [when] something serious is occuring."
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8 Tamil civilians arrested in Thanthirimalai

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 15 September 2009, 10:57 GMT]
Anuradhapura Police Monday arrested eight Tamil civilians in Thanthirimalai area in Anuradhapura district on suspicion. Police said a police party rushed to the site and took them into custody on information from the Sinhala villagers that some strangers were seen in the area.
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8 SL media organizations urge President to release journalist Tissanayagam

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 15 September 2009, 08:07 GMT]
Eight media organizations comprising Sri Lanka Working Journalists Association (SLWJA), Editors’ Guild of Sri Lanka (EGSL), Free Media Movement (FMM), Sri Lanka Tamil Journalists Alliance (SLTJA), Sri Lanka Muslim Media Forum (SLMMF), Federation of Media Employees’ Trade Union (FMETU), South Asian Free Media Association (SAFMA) and Sri Lanka Newspaper Publishers’ Association (SLNPA) Monday unanimously decided to request President Mahinda Rajapakse to release senior journalist Mr.J.S.Tissanayagam using his executive powers, sources in Colombo said. Mr.Tissanayagam was recently sentenced to twenty years rigorous imprisonment under the Prevention of Terrorism Act (PTA).
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500 Vanni IDPs to be settled in the islets of Jaffna against their wish

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 15 September 2009, 05:05 GMT]
500 Internally Displaced Persons (IDPs) detained in the Sri Lanka Army (SLA) internment camps in Vaviniyaa were brought to Jaffna Monday and efforts are being made to settle them in the abandoned houses in the islets of Jaffna that are in the full control of Sri Lanka Navy (SLN), sources in Jaffna said. In the name of resettlement Vanni IDPs are being just relocated from the internment camps in Vavuniya against their wish to another area which is strictly controlled by another armed force, the SLN, civil society sources in Jaffna said.
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Rajapakses' incipient personality cult would shame a Chinese communist - Guardian

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 15 September 2009, 03:20 GMT]
In the second article in two days, UK's Guardian, warned Monday that by making Tamils feel newly repressed Sri Lanka is sowing seeds of future rebellian, noting that "in the months that have followed [the military victory] there has been little magnanimity, let alone reconciliation. Tens of thousands of Tamil civilians are still being kept in camps surrounded by barbed wire." The article further said that "Colombo's streets are littered with so many pictures of president Mahinda Rajapaksa and his brothers that the incipient personality cult would shame a Chinese communist. The triumphalism in Colombo means those who dare to question the government are deemed Tiger collaborators, terrorist sympathisers or Tamil secessionists."
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3 Tamil youths arrested in Mathavaachchi

[TamilNet, Monday, 14 September 2009, 13:19 GMT]
Criminal Investigation Department (CID) officers took into custody three Tamil youths in the last three days at the Sri Lanka Army (SLA) Mathavaachchi checkpoint, sources in Vavuniyaa said. The youths were arrested for not being able to provide a valid reason for their travel to Colombo, the sources said.
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Starvation, rape, killings, torture in Sri Lanka camps, Murphy tells Australia parliament

[TamilNet, Monday, 14 September 2009, 12:04 GMT]
Noting that "hundreds of thousands of innocent Tamils displaced by the military offensive are living in camps in appalling conditions. Moreover, foreign media channels have reported horrifying evidence of the worst violations of human rights, including starvation, rape, killings and torture. International agencies are calling for full access to these camps in order to provide life-saving treatment and medical supplies and to allow free and independent media access," parliamentarian, John Murphy, appealed at the House of Representatives Thursday, "to all governments of the world who have respect for human rights, the rule of law and free speech to join together and call on the government of Sri Lanka to right the wrongs forthwith."
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Police arrest 5 Tamil, Muslim civilians in Puththa’lam

[TamilNet, Monday, 14 September 2009, 10:29 GMT]
Puththa'lam Police Sunday arrested six civilians including three Tamils and two Muslims who were staying in a house at Thampapanni in Puththa’lam police division. Police said they rushed to the site and arrested them on reports that a group of unidentified persons from Murungkkan in Mannaar district were staying in Thampapanni.
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Blood stained body of woman recovered in Vavuniyaa

[TamilNet, Monday, 14 September 2009, 10:27 GMT]
Vavuniyaa Police on information from public, Sunday afternoon recovered the blood stained body of a woman around fifty years of age inside the kitchen (madapa’l’li) of Kaa’li Koayil located at Kzhlumaaddu Junction in Vavuniyaa. The body was handed over to Vavuniyaa general hospital for postmortem examination and identification.
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Documentation of Norwegian Tamil mandate released

[TamilNet, Monday, 14 September 2009, 07:49 GMT]
Comprehensive documentation of a referendum conducted among Eezham Tamils of Norway is now released in the form of a 48-page publication by Utrop newspaper, which conducted the poll on 10th of May this year. In the referendum, 99 percent of the voters endorsed the Vaddukkoaddai Resolution of 1976, calling for an independent and sovereign Tamil Eelam in the traditional homeland of Eezham Tamils in the North and East of the island of Sri Lanka. 90 percent of eligible voters in Oslo, and an average 80 percent of them in entire Norway turned out for the voting, a first of its kind exercise in that country and among the world diaspora of Eezham Tamils. The documentation is widely seen inspiring global democratic efforts of Eezham Tamils for their liberation.
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Rivers of sewege cascade through tents in Menik farm - Guardian

[TamilNet, Monday, 14 September 2009, 01:55 GMT]
Cataloguing emerging stories of families destroyed by war and separated through internment in Sri Lanka's fortified camps, UK Guardian's Sunday story describes feeble attempts by the Government of Sri Lanka to resettle refugees criticized as "chaotic and underfunded." Malnutrition-related complications have resulted in increased deaths, the paper notes, and adds that doctors in Vavuniyaa have warned of "impending disaster if conditions do not improve." Humanitarian workers recently allowed in to Menik Farm had criticized "persistent water shortage," and described precarious health, inhumane conditions as "heavy rain sent rivers of sewage cascading through tents and tin sheds," the paper said.
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Boycott Sri Lanka campaign expands to multiple US cities

[TamilNet, Sunday, 13 September 2009, 05:22 GMT]
North American Tamils expanded their boycott campaign over Sri Lanka goods to over a dozen cities across the US and Canada, targeting GAP and Victoria's Secret stores on Saturday, youth organizers of the event said. Leveraging the "No to Sri Lanka" website run by Canadian youth activists to spread the campaign message, the organizers held protests in San Francisco, Chicago, North Carolina, Boston, Atlanta, New York city and in several Canadian cities. The protesters stood inside malls, outside shopping centers, and some in the median of busy streets, urging ethical shoppers to resist buying garments made in Sri Lanka.
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UN ‘war crimes witness’ expelled - report

[TamilNet, Saturday, 12 September 2009, 12:28 GMT]
A senior UN diplomat was expelled from Sri Lanka in July for providing details to the international community of mass killings of civilians during the final battles against the Tamil Tigers, The Guardian newspaper in Britain reported Saturday. Peter Mackay, an Australian citizen, was given two weeks to leave the country for providing detailed rebuttals of Sri Lankan government’s "wartime propaganda." The diplomat is seen as a legal timebomb by the Sri Lankan government as he could personally take the stand and testify that the army shelled non-combatants – action considered to be a war crime under international law, the paper said.
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Executions: Sri Lanka refuting processed video, not original

[TamilNet, Saturday, 12 September 2009, 09:32 GMT]
Sri Lanka’s technological refutation of the authenticity of a video of Army (SLA) soldiers executing unarmed Tamil men broadcast by Channel 4 in August is based on a processed video-file taken from the broadcaster’s website, rather than the original mobile phone footage, experts said. An analysis commissioned by US-based pressure group Tamils Against Genocide (TAG) of the original video distributed by Journalists for Democracy in Sri Lanka (JDS) and Sri Lanka’s subsequent technological refutation says Colombo’s experts looked “at a second generation transcoded video to derive erroneous conclusions.”
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India denies visa to US rights activist

[TamilNet, Saturday, 12 September 2009, 03:47 GMT]
Indian embassy in New York denied a visa to US-based humanitarian worker and a critic of the Sri Lanka Government, Dr Ellyn Shander to travel to New Delhi to address the Delhi Tamil Sangam on 20th September, Deccan Chronicle reported. Shander was to address the Delhi meeting with MDMK General Secretary Vaiko, after attending meeting in Bangalore with the local Tamil Sangam on 15th of September.
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BBC: UN patience wears thin in Sri Lanka

[TamilNet, Friday, 11 September 2009, 12:59 GMT]
The United Nations says it cannot continue to indefinitely fund the sprawling, overcrowded and militarized camp in which Sri Lanka has interned hundreds of thousands of Tamil civilians. Speaking to the BBC, the UN's Sri Lanka chief, Neil Buhne, said people should be allowed to leave the barbed wire-ringed Manik Farm camp. Mr Buhne also criticised Sri Lanka’s denial of access for the International Red Cross to 10,000 Tamils whom the government calls LTTE suspects. Meanwhile the UN says it is extremely concerned for two staff members arrested by Sri Lankan authorities in June, being amid reports they were mistreated during the early days of their detention.
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