Canadian Tamils demonstrate against China’s support to Sri Lanka

[TamilNet, Thursday, 27 August 2009, 11:27 GMT]
Several hundred Canadian Tamils gathered outside the Chinese Consulate in Toronto, Wednesday, August 26, 2009 to protest against China’s financial, economic, and diplomatic support of the Sri Lankan government. Many Tamils attending the protest have their relatives or friends in the Sri Lanka military supervised internment camps in Vavuniyaa where more than 300,000 Tamil civilians.
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HRW: UN must investigate Sri Lanka atrocities

[TamilNet, Thursday, 27 August 2009, 11:16 GMT]
In the wake of a mobile-phone footage of Sri Lankan soldiers executing bound, blindfolded, and naked prisoners, Human Rights Watch (HRW) has again called on the United Nations Secretary General Ban Ki-Moon to create an independent international commission of inquiry to investigate atrocities during Sri Lanka’s war against the Tamil Tigers. “Ban should stop relying on the [Sri Lankan] president's promises [to the UN] of domestic action and make it clear that an international commission is needed if the victims of Sri Lanka's bloody war are to find justice," Steve Crawshaw, UN director at HRW said in a statement Wednesday.
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Tamil youth abducted in Puththa'lam

[TamilNet, Thursday, 27 August 2009, 10:45 GMT]
A gang of unidentified persons arriving in a three-wheeler abducted a Tamil youth from his house Monday night in Maampuri in Puththa'lam district, according to a complaint lodged by his wife with Puththa'lam police Tuesday evening.
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Tamil civilian reported missing in Vavuniyaa

[TamilNet, Thursday, 27 August 2009, 10:31 GMT]
A Tamil civilian from Ukku’laangkulam in Vavuniyaa is reported missing since Tuesday after having left home on his motorbike to obtain a pass to travel to Jaffna from Sri Lanka Army (SLA) Public Relation Office located in Vavuniyaa town, according to complaints lodged by his wife Sellamahal Gowrishankar to Human Rights Commission (HRC) Vavuniyaa office and the police.
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Hatton National Bank donates computers to Jaffna Public Library

[TamilNet, Thursday, 27 August 2009, 05:57 GMT]
Executive Director of Hatton National Bank (HNB), R. Thiyagarajah, officially handed over Wednesday a set of computers to Jaffna Public Library Chief Librarian, S. Thanabalasingham and Deputy Commissioner of Jaffna Municipal Council, K. Rajadurai for the benefit of school leavers in Jaffna peninsula. Meanwhile, a new branch of HNB was opened Wednesday in Point Pedro by R. Thiyagarajah. Senior Regional Manager of North East for HNB, A. V. Beeadle, was present at the opening ceremony, sources in Jaffna said.
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STF shoot 2 Tamils dead in Batticaloa

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 26 August 2009, 14:08 GMT]
The Special Task Force (STF) of the Sri Lanka Police Tuesday night shot dead two Tamils along Thuraineelavanai lagoon in Batticaloa district.
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Colombo Police arrest 3 upcountry Tamil youths

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 26 August 2009, 10:29 GMT]
Sri Lanka Police arrested three Tamil youths in the Colombo suburb of Minuwangoda Wednesday morning in a search operation, sources from Colombo said. The youths are being detained in the Negombo Police station, according to relatives of the youths.
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SLA war crimes eerily similar to Srebrenica Scorpions' terror, says Boyle

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 26 August 2009, 00:27 GMT]
Summary executions violate Common Article 3 to the Four Geneva Conventions of 1949, to which Sri Lanka is a contracting Party, prohibiting in subsection I(d) "... the carrying out of executions without previous judgment pronounced by a regularly constituted court...." Violations of the Geneva Conventions are war crimes, said Professor Francis Boyle, after watching the video on the cold-blooded extra-judicial killings carried out by the Sri Lanka Army (SLA) soldiers, published by a German-based group 'Journalists for Democracy in Sri Lanka (JDS)' Tuesday.
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Video shows style of extra-judicial killings in Sri Lanka

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 25 August 2009, 20:34 GMT]
A video clip received from Journalists for Democracy in Sri Lanka (JDS) evidences the way extra-judicial killings are executed in the island. The video captured in January show the behaviour of Sri Lanka’s soldiers during the war that is claimed ‘humanitarian operation’ to rescue the Tamils, JDS reported Tuesday. The conversations of the killers are in Sinhala. “From the casual nature of the conversations and from the fact that it is taking place in an open area in broad daylight – it can be surmised that these are not ordinary acts by rogue elements carried out without the permission from the top leadership. The soldiers egging each other on, the insulting jokes and the laughter show that there is a consensus that these cold blooded killings should take place,” JDS further reported.
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Special search operations conducted in Wellawatte

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 25 August 2009, 19:24 GMT]
Wellawatte, where Tamils are living in majority in Colombo was subjected to search operations from morning till evening Tuesday following reports that the police had seized suicide kits and explosives from a place. Special Task Force (STF) personnel were deployed in every nook and corner of Wellawatte.
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Boyle: India a moral failure, Colombo's monstrosity matched only by Nazis

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 25 August 2009, 00:51 GMT]
"India’s support to Rajapakse Government is an atrocious crime. Tamils are undergoing unspeakable hardship, and the monstrosity is only matched by the Nazis terror on Jews. The world had simply closed its eyes....Failure to ensure safety to Sri Lanka Tamils is a moral disgrace to India and a stain in India's illustrious history," said Francis Boyle, expert in International Law and Professor at the University of Illinois College of Law, during an interview with Tamil Nadu magazine, Dalit Murasu.
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Australia reluctant to call for closure of camps, release of IDPs

[TamilNet, Monday, 24 August 2009, 11:48 GMT]
While expressing serious concern about the civilian toll of the conflict, Australian Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade (DFAT) officials conveyed to a delegation of the Australasian Federation of Tamil Associations (AFTA) that Australia’s trade relations with Sri Lanka has been very strong from time immemorial and Australia wants to maintain this relationship, and further to nurture that, Australia is keen on seeing a united Sri Lanka. While continuing to insist that the IDP camps be administered in line with international standards, Australia is reluctant to call for a closure of these camps and release of the innocent IDPs as soon as possible, DFAT officials told the Tamil delegation last week.
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MNCs flock in to get the ‘fruits’ of war

[TamilNet, Monday, 24 August 2009, 09:18 GMT]
Roman Scott of Calamander Group, who believes Tigers have been effectively contained, suppression of free expression by Colombo will not affect business, and economics is not really that strong related to democratic principles, is an early bird in the island for investment, says the latest issue of Forbes India. Sri Lanka is going to be “one of the best investment opportunities on the planet for the next two to three years,” said the Singapore based British equity manager. According to Forbes, companies from some countries have a natural advantage either because they have the trust of the Sinhalese or understand the local nuances better. China falls into the first category and India into the second. These two countries are likely to play a major role in the reconstruction.
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Police arrest Muslim youth in Puththa'lam

[TamilNet, Monday, 24 August 2009, 05:20 GMT]
Sri Lanka police Saturday arrested a Muslim youth at Wanathavilluwa in Puththa'lam distirict on reports that he was alleged to have provided information to LTTE during the conflict. The police said he was acting as an informant to the LTTE in past.
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731 IDP students in Vavuniyaa sit Year 5 scholarship examination

[TamilNet, Sunday, 23 August 2009, 17:38 GMT]
Save the Children, a non-governmental organization (NGO), provided cardboards to internally displaced Year Five students in the internment camps in Vavuniyaa who sat for the Year 5 scholarship examination Sunday due to the non-availability of desk and tables in the centres located in the camps, educational sources said.
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Mullaiththeevu medical student refused permission to enter Jaffna University

[TamilNet, Sunday, 23 August 2009, 17:27 GMT]
Sivapatham Prasath, a Tamil youth from Mullaitheivu district who gained admission to the medical faculty of the Jaffna University for the academic year 2008 but was unable to enter as he had lost his legs in an artillery shell attack in Mullaitheivu on 08.08.2008, has been detained in an internment camp in Vavuniyaa. He has been refused permission by Sri Lanka Army (SLA) to leave the camp to enter the Jaffna University to join the medical faculty for the academic year 2009 which commenced last week, sources said.
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Eelam and the new 'super power' Sri Lanka

[TamilNet, Sunday, 23 August 2009, 04:46 GMT]
In their petty geopolitical and corporate interests, India and the West have created a Frankenstein monster of a state in Sri Lanka that disgraces the whole world. What fears them now is this monster in its frenzies making their labours lost in the island. This is what impels them to tell the victims to reconcile, not to anger the monster and not to say genocide even when it takes place for decades. A general excuse they come out with is that the present world has no appetite for new nation states. Colombo makes the best use of this weakness. No justifiable norm of polity could be seen in why India and the West should labour so hard to uphold a united Sri Lanka and to appease it beyond all limits, writes TamilNet political commentator in Colombo.
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Boyle debunks Kohona's war-crimes braggadocio

[TamilNet, Sunday, 23 August 2009, 03:17 GMT]
Debunking Sri Lanka's Foreign Secretary, Palitha Kohona's statement that "no winner of a war has been tried [for war crimes] before a Tribunal," Francis Boyle, Professor of International Law at the Illinois College of Law, said, as legal counsel for the Mothers of Srebrenica and Podrinja, he had convinced the Honorable Carla Del Ponte, the Prosecutor for the International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia (ICTY), to indict Yugoslav President Slobodan Milosevic for every crime in the ICTY Statute, including genocide, war crimes and crimes against humanity.
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Ohio court rules freezing of charity's assets unconstitutional

[TamilNet, Saturday, 22 August 2009, 13:19 GMT]
Citing violatiaon of the fourth amendment that protects individuals and groups against unreasonable searches and seizures, the district court of Northern Ohio said Tuesday that the United States Department of Treasury had acted unconstitutionally three years ago when it froze the assets of KindHearts, an Ohio charity suspected of aiding terrorists, New York Times (NYT) reported.
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Australian politicians troubled by deteriorating conditions in Sri Lanka

[TamilNet, Saturday, 22 August 2009, 08:54 GMT]
A group of Australian parliamentarians have expressed concern for the plight of thousands of refugees being held in Sri Lankan military run camps at a meeting with members of the Tamil youth at Parliament House on Tuesday. In a free flowing discussion covering conditions faced by displaced civilians and a lack of independent access to refugee facilities, the panel also condemned reports of intimidation directed at the Tamil Diaspora from the Sri Lankan Government, before citing the promised resettlement of the 300,000 refugees within a 6 month period as the basis for future engagement.
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