Abetting genocide for ‘conflict termination’

[TamilNet, Thursday, 09 July 2009, 15:36 GMT]
“Rwanda, Sudan and now Sri Lanka, it is another wake up call to the World”, says a blog-writer Richard Dixon, questioning why no world leader is declaring “War on Genocide”. The article in Independent Minds blog, Wednesday, said “An internal conflict in Sri Lanka has now been made worse by its greedy neighbours. They are now lining up with spanners and hammers to fix the problems in Sri Lanka. The ones that are now trying to fix Sri Lanka are helping the strong party to the conflict to destroy the weaker one completely. Arrogant voice from Sri Lanka in the recent times is to do with its close bonding with India and China. These two countries have both been involved in high level PR-campaigns to hide the war crimes committed by Sri Lanka. […] Such method can’t be called as conflict resolution but it is an unfair conflict termination by eliminating one party to the conflict.
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Sri Lanka orders ICRC to reduce operations

[TamilNet, Thursday, 09 July 2009, 11:05 GMT]
The International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) said Thursday it had been ordered by Sri Lanka to scale down relief operations. As a result, the ICRC said it was withdrawing expatriate staff from the battle-scarred northeast, where it has been helping civilian war victims, AFP reported. The ICRC has had a strained relationship with the Sri Lankan government which accused the Geneva-based charity of inciting panic over civilian deaths, AFP added. As a first step, the ICRC will pull out of the Eastern Province, where rights abuses by government forces and allied paramilitaries are continuing.
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Graves of Peter Percival, R B Foote, discovered at Yercaud

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 08 July 2009, 18:33 GMT]
A team of archaeologists located the graves of two illustrious scholars, Rev. Dr. Peter Percival (1803-1882) and his son-in-law Robert Bruce Foote (1834-1912), at Yercaud, a hill station near Salem in Tamil Nadu, reported The Hindu, Wednesday. Peter Percival was a former principal of Jaffna Central College, with whom Arumuga Navalar was associated with in his early days in translating the Bible into Tamil. The discovery was made when Prehistoric archaeologists Shanti Pappu, Kumar Akhilesh and V R Pappu set out on a mission to find the grave of Robert Bruce Foote (1834-1912), who is regarded as the pioneer of studies in Geology and Prehistory in India. Dr Shanti is working on a monograph on R B Foote, who first spotted evidence for Palaeolithic culture dating back to 500,000 years, in Tamil Nadu.
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Do not weaken the goals and direction of Eelam struggle: Father S.J. Emmanuel

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 08 July 2009, 18:02 GMT]
"Let us not betray the struggle nor its goals as evolved, formulated and consolidated by the sacrifice of many thousands of combatants and civilians under the leadership of the LTTE," says Rev. Dr. S.J. Emmanuel, the former Vicar General of the Catholic diocese of Jaffna, in the second part of the open appeal to the Eelam Tamil diaspora. "Let the change of phase in the struggle from the last militant-cum-political phase to a political and international phase, not in any way weaken or water down the goals and directions of the struggle."
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Vanni doctors forced to give false statement

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 08 July 2009, 17:36 GMT]
5 Tamil doctors being held by the Sri Lankan authorities say they expect to be released, after being paraded to local and international media on Wednesday when they were made to claim that they had exaggerated civilian casualty figures in the final phases of the war at the request of the LTTE. Meanwhile, health workers who have escaped Vanni have slammed the international community for allowing the detainment of the doctors and questioned the validity of their statements in light of the 'precarious position' they face.
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More Moothoor IDPs transferred to Ki’liveddi

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 08 July 2009, 09:37 GMT]
Aaraiyampathi Vayiravar Koayil welfare centre in Batticaloa district was closed down Tuesday following the transfer of the final batch of 51 members of eighteen Tamil families displaced from Tamil villages located in the Sri Lanka Army (SLA) High Security Zone (HSZ) in Moothoor east in Trincomalee district during 2006 April military operation. They were transported in three State sector buses via Vaakarai and Verukal to Ki’liveddi Tuesday morning. They would be sheltered in welfare centres located in Ki’liveddi, Paddiththidal and Thillaangkear’ni till alternative lands are found for them, civil authority sources said.
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Second election related violence reported in Jaffna

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 08 July 2009, 05:07 GMT]
Unidentified armed men on motorcycles followed the Thamizharasuk Kadchi party contestant in the forthcoming Jaffna Municipal Council (JMC) elections and forcibly took away Tuesday the wall posters and handbills from him at gunpoint at Hospital Road-Old Railway Station Road junction in Jaffna, an area guarded by Sri Lanka Army (SLA) soldiers day and night, according to the complaint made to Jaffna Election Officer. Meanwhile, Sunday night, on ‘Black Tigers Day’, unknown persons had smashed the temporary election office of the ruling United Peoples Freedom Alliance (UPFA) located near Jaffna Bishop’s House in Kurunakar, sources in Jaffna said.
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SL parliament extends Emergency for another month

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 08 July 2009, 04:40 GMT]
Sri Lanka’s parliament Tuesday adopted a motion to extend the State of Emergency for another month by a majority of ninety two votes. One hundred and three parliamentarians voted for the motion. Only eleven members of the Tamil National Alliance (TNA) voted against. The Jathika Hela Urumaya (JHU), Janatha Vimukthi Peramuna (JVP), Ceylon Workers Congress (CWC) and National Freedom Front (NFF), a splinter group of the JVP voted with ruling United Peoples Freedom Alliance (UPFA).
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Indian High Commissioner on pulse reading mission in Jaffna

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 07 July 2009, 15:10 GMT]
Indian High Commissioner to Sri Lanka, Mr. Alok Prasad, arrived at Palaali Military Airport Tuesday morning accompanied by his deputy and political wing head and held several meetings in Jaffna with the representatives of academic circles, political parties, interreligious associations and civil organizations in Jaffna peninsula in an effort to read the pulse of the people of the peninsula, sources in Jaffna said. “The Sinhalese people in Sri Lanka have faith only on China while the Tamils had absolute faith on India which had committed a historical blunder by betraying the Tamils in Sri Lanka,” one of the civil society representative participant said, commenting on Alok Prasad’s visit to Jaffna.
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Devotees to Nainaatheevu temple inconvenienced, delayed

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 07 July 2009, 09:55 GMT]
Around a thousand devotees on their way Monday to attend the annual Thear (charriot) festival of Nainaatheevu Nakapoosha’ni Amman temple, a historically famous Saiva temple in the islets of Jaffna, had to undergo severe checking and undue delay at the Sri Lanka Navy (SLN) check post at Allaippiddi, sources in Jaffna said. Only around 50 ordinary boats were used by SLN to sail the devotees from Allaippiddi to the Nainaatheevu, the devotees said.
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Former Tamil policeman knifed to death in Batticaloa

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 07 July 2009, 09:30 GMT]
Unidentified persons forcibly entering the house of a former Tamil policeman attached to Batticaloa police station Tuesday early morning dragged him away and knifed him to death at a place around 100 m from his house in Thaazhangkudaa in Batticaloa district, his relatives said.
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SL Minister participates in Jaffna Technical College event

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 07 July 2009, 09:12 GMT]
With Jaffna Municipal Council (JMC) election in a month’s time, Sri Lanka government ministers and its key officials continue to visit Jaffna in an effort to gather support to the ruling United People’s Freedom Alliance (UPFA) candidates in Jaffna and Minister Piyasena Gamage was in Jaffna Monday to participate in an event at Jaffna Technical College (JTC) related to the governments ‘180 Day Programme’ under its much publicized ‘Spring of the North’ project, sources in Jaffna said.
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Unclaimed 14 Vanni IDPs corpses to be buried at state cost

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 07 July 2009, 03:12 GMT]
Corpses of fourteen displaced Vanni Tamil civilians including three children brought from Puthumaathth’alan in Mullaiththeevu district two months ago to Anuradhapura Teaching Hospital are to be given a common burial at State costs as none had come forward to identify or to claim them, according to a decision taken by the hospital authority Sunday.
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The onus is on the diaspora

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 07 July 2009, 00:22 GMT]
The military outcome of the crisis has emboldened a bunch of people to chant that ‘we told you so’ and now collaborate with thy oppressors. This group is not new to Eezham Tamils, writes TamilNet's political commentator in Colombo. "Ever since universal suffrage was introduced in the ethnically divided island in 1931, there was always a section willing to play stooges to the majority. Yet the struggle of the freedom seekers also remained alive. If the fighters are accused of not achieving any, so are the collaborators and the ‘we told you so’ groups," the commentator writes. "The onus of facing the situation now entirely rests on the Eezham Tamil diaspora, as it is the only entity that has the freedom of expression. Response to Karunanidhi has to come from the diaspora through reaffirming the Vaddukkoaddai resolution," he further writes.
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Plight of Tamils hidden behind Sri Lankan Diplomacy: Bruce Haigh

[TamilNet, Monday, 06 July 2009, 17:52 GMT]
Western countries must look beyond government to government relations with Sri Lanka in order to grasp the Tamil issue, said former Australian diplomat Bruce Haigh in an address in Parliament. Highlighting three decades of reporting “skewed very much in favour of the Sri Lankan government” that has made it “possible all through the years to demonise the Tamils”, Haigh said commonwealth nations should have played a larger role in establishing permanent peace in Sri Lanka and needed to see beyond the post 9/11 spheres of politics to independently deal with the conflict.
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Time for diaspora to stand up for homeland Tamils: Father S.J. Emmanuel

[TamilNet, Monday, 06 July 2009, 14:44 GMT]
Former Vicar General of the Catholic diocese of Jaffna, Rev. Dr. S.J. Emmanuel, in an open appeal issued from Germany on Monday urged the diaspora Tamils to hasten to help the Tamils suffering in the island Sri Lanka. "Neither the Tamils who are suffering in silence have the strength to stand up or speak up for themselves nor the few Sinhalese are able to give their voice for the Tamils because these are quickly labelled as non-patriots, if not, traitors. The only people who can help them in some way or other are the Diaspora Tamils," he writes in his first part of the article. The second part will deal with the need to unite and organise the diaspora for further Struggle.
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Sri Lanka ‘siphoning off’ refugee aid money – The Times

[TamilNet, Monday, 06 July 2009, 11:59 GMT]
The Sri Lankan Government is trying to siphon off millions of pounds of humanitarian aid by imposing a tax on all funding for aid groups, The Times newspaper reported Monday. Aid workers told the paper that Burma was the only other country that they could remember imposing such a tax — one of several new measures hampering their efforts to help victims of Sri Lanka’s civil war. Colombo is backdating taxes to 2005, the paper also said.
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Mullaiththeevu town declared HSZ: GA

[TamilNet, Monday, 06 July 2009, 10:31 GMT]
The Government Agent of Mullaiththeevu, Imelda Sukumar, on Sunday reportedly told a section of the uprooted Tamils of Vanni sheltered at the internment camp situated at "Sahanagama" in Pulmoaddai that the town of Mullaiththeevu has been declared High Security Zone by the Sri Lankan military, dashing any hope of resettlement in the coastal township of Vanni.
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Sinister thinking behind Tamil incarceration: Doctor John Whitehall

[TamilNet, Sunday, 05 July 2009, 17:22 GMT]
The Sri Lankan Governments thinking that “the concept of Tamil autonomy or freedom or even culture should be beaten to its knees and never rise again” can be compared to the actions of Joseph Stalin, said leading Australian Pediatrician Dr John Whitehall, describing government internment facilities as “concentration camps”, and saying the imprisonment of 300,000 refugees was much more sinister than he originally thought. "The concept that you can indefinitely incarcerate a population to change their thinking is frightening," he observed.
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33 Tamil detainees held without inquiry for 13 years

[TamilNet, Sunday, 05 July 2009, 11:19 GMT]
Thirty-three Tamil political prisoners detained under the Prevention of Terrorism Act (PTA) in Welikada magazine prison for the last thirteen years without any inquiry or charges against them in the courts of law have appealed to human rights organizations to take up their cases with authority concerned and obtain their early release. All of them, including some women, are residents of North, East and upcountry areas. Their appeals are said to have been forwarded to the relevant government authority for immediate consideration, sources said.
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