Perpetrating civilian starvation is violation of all norms of war: LTTE

[TamilNet, Thursday, 05 March 2009, 13:51 GMT]
"The brutalities committed by Colombo's armed forces on civilians have no precedence in any conventional war," said LTTE's Puthukkudiyiuruppu area political head C. Ilamparithy on Wednesday describing that the offensive by the Sri Lankan government denying food and medicine to civilians whom it claims as its citizens as an "abnormal violation of all norms of war." He urged direct presence of the International Community to witness the gravity of the situation by itself and urged the Tamil diaspora to engage with the IC in order to make it look at the crisis through the perspective of the affected people and to work for sending international journalists to visit and report the plight of the civilians besieged in Mullaiththeevu.
Full story >>

Woman killed in Vellave’li not the mother of raped girl

[TamilNet, Thursday, 05 March 2009, 12:40 GMT]
Ka’luvaangchchikkudi Base hospital Medical Officer said Wednesday that it was Viveakaananthapuram Women’s Deveolpment Society treasurer who was found killed with her neck wrung and dumped in a well Monday night in Vellaave’li police division in Batticaloa district and not the mother of the raped 14-year-old girl, Y. Punithavathy, as Ka’luvaangnchchikudi hospital sources had earlier reported. The mother of Punithavathy is alive and being treated now in Batticaloa Teaching Hospital, said the MO Dr. P. Vaseekaran.
Full story >>

Emergency extended in Sri Lanka for another month

[TamilNet, Thursday, 05 March 2009, 05:58 GMT]
The Sri Lanka Parliament Wednesday adopted a motion to extend the state of emergency for another month by a majority of 62 votes. 74 parliamentarians of the ruling United Peoples Freedom Alliance (UPFA) and its allied parties, Ceylon Workers Congress (CWC), Upcountry Peoples Front (UPF), National Freedom Front (NFF), Janatha Vimukthi Peramuna (JVP) and Jathika Hela Urumaya (JHU) voted for the motion, parliamentary sources said.
Full story >>

ICRC worker killed in SLA shelling

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 04 March 2009, 17:15 GMT]
A staff worker of the ICRC in Vanni was killed Wednesday around 5:00 p.m. while he was returning after sending some of the seriously wounded patients from Maaththa'lan hospital in ICRC ship, reported TamilNet correspondent from Vanni. The victim was identified as Vadivel Vijayakumar, 36.
Full story >>

SLN arrested Vanni civilians held back in Point Pedro

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 04 March 2009, 16:08 GMT]
Only five of the 92 civilians fleeing war in Vanni and arrested Tuesday by Sri Lanka Navy (SLN) on the seas of Point Pedro have been handed over to the Sri Lanka Army (SLA) detention camp in Kodikaamam Government Tamil Mixed School (GTMS) while the fate of the rest 87 civilians remains unknown, Kodikaamam sources said. None of the arrested civilians has been produced in Point Pedro Magistrate Court either until Wednesday evening. Independent sources in Jaffna said that civilians fleeing war from Liberation Tigers held areas coming into Vavuniyaa and Jaffna peninsula and arrested are subjected to intensive screening by the SLA and that many of them have disappeared without any trace, a trend that continues.
Full story >>

US Congressman supports review of Gotabaya, Fonseka indictment

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 04 March 2009, 11:59 GMT]
Congressman Walter B Jones representing North Carolina's 3rd District, in a letter of support sent to the United States Attorney General, Eric Holder, said that the "Department of Justice must take care to review all issues brought to its attention," in the model indictment submitted early February, and requested that the Justice Department to "review this document thoroughly." Congressman Jones serves in the House Committee on Armed Services and in the Committee on Financial Services.
Full story >>

Arrests of Tamil young people in Colombo escalate

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 04 March 2009, 11:05 GMT]
23 Tamil youths including 8 women have been arrested in the past week alone in the city of Colombo and its suburbs and most of the arrested are from the districts of Jaffna, Trincomalee and Batticaloa, Colombo sources said. Democratic People’s Front (DPF) led by Mano Ganeshan, Colombo District parliamentarian and Deputy Minister, P. Rathakrishnan of Upcountry People’s Front (UPF), said that complaints are made to them every day of arrests of Tamil youths in Colombo, by their relatives.
Full story >>

SLEB employees demonstrate against passing of amendment motion, in Colombo

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 04 March 2009, 03:39 GMT]
Sri Lanka Electricity Board (SLEB) employees staged a protest demonstration in front of Fort Railway Station in Colombo Tuesday against the SLEB amendment bill being passed in Sri Lanka Parliament, sources in Colombo said. The bill, which has been a subject of controversy and vehemently opposed by the opposition United National Party (UNP) and Sinhala nationalist Janatha Vimukthi Peramuna (JVP), was presented on Tuesday by Sri Lankan Minister of Power and Energy, John Seneviratne, in the parliament where it was debated on before allowed to vote on.
Full story >>

SLA shells hospital environs, 13 killed including 4 children

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 03 March 2009, 13:04 GMT]
Sri Lanka Army fired artillery shells targeting the environs of Maa'ththa'lan makeshift-hospital within the 'safety zone' from 5:00 a.m. to 11:30 a.m. Tuesday. The shells hit the IDP settlement, located 200 meters near the hospital, claiming the lives of 13 Tamil civilians. Four of them were children, including a 1-year-old baby. 56 civilians have sustained injuries, according to medical sources. Two children below the age of 10 were reported missing. Meanwhile, Sri Lanka Air Force fighter bombers were seen bombing north of the 'safety zone' twice Tuesday morning.
Full story >>

Tamil three-wheeler driver shot dead in Batticaloa

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 03 March 2009, 13:01 GMT]
Unidentified persons who hired a three-wheeler Tuesday around 12:30 p.m at the auto-stand in Arasadi in Uppoadai police division shot and killed the driver near Lourdes Mary Church, sources in Batticaloa said. The killers had then escaped on motor cycles.
Full story >>

SLA arrests 10 civilians in Chilaw

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 03 March 2009, 12:06 GMT]
Ten civilians, majority of them Tamils were taken into custody in a joint cordon and search operation conducted by the Sri Lanka Army (SLA) and Police in Chilaw town from dawn to dusk on Monday. Hundreds of houses and vehicles were searched, media sources said.
Full story >>

2 STF commandos killed, SLA soldier, policeman injured, in claymore attack in Batticaloa

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 03 March 2009, 11:11 GMT]
Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) launched a claymore attack on a team of armed forces patrol Tuesday around 8:00 a.m at Ma’ndoor in Vellaave’li police division in Batticaloa district, killing 2 Special Task Force (STF) commandos and seriously injuring a Sri Lanka Army (SLA) soldier and a policeman, Batticaloa district LTTE said. Additional STF commandos and police deployed at the site of the attack jointly engaged in a search assaulting some Tamil youths in the area, the sources added.
Full story >>

Woman recovered dead in Batticaloa

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 03 March 2009, 11:04 GMT]
Vellaave’li police recovered the body of the mother with the help of neighbours and handed it over to Ka’luvaangnchchikudi hospital. The victim was identified as Sivakumar Mahathevi, 32, the treasurer of Viveakaananthapuram Women’s Development Society.
Full story >>

Vanni IDPs starving due to acute shortage of food

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 03 March 2009, 05:04 GMT]
The plight of people herded into the narrow strip of ‘safe zone’ assigned by the Sri Lanka government is growing worse with each day as vegetables, food items, milk powder for babies have become so scarce that they are starving, TamilNet correspondent reported Tuesday from Vanni. Liquid cash is not available as many are unable to withdraw from their savings in the banks, most of them gone out of function due to continuing indiscriminate attacks by Sri Lanka Army (SLA) artillery barrage and Sri Lanka Air Force (SLAF) bombings.
Full story >>

U.S. Tamil group urges Pacific Command not to abet Colombo's war on Tamils

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 03 March 2009, 01:53 GMT]
Citing "credible reports" from Colombo, a U.S. based activist group, People for Equality and Relief in Lanka (PEARL), on Monday said the U.S. Pacific Command (PACOM) was planning to lead an evacuation of nearly 200,000 Tamil civilians in Vanni. The plan would only serve to "exacerbate the crisis for these civilians and support ethnic cleansing in this region," the statement said and added: "Instead of an evacuation, the 'safe zones' these civilians are currently in should be strengthened, with full access for aid workers, journalists and human rights monitors."
Full story >>

Sri Lanka Police arrests 13 youths in Gampaha

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 03 March 2009, 01:09 GMT]
Thirteen youths, majority of them Tamil and residents of north and east, were taken into custody in several cordon and search operations conducted by the Sri Lanka police Sunday from dawn to dusk. Police said majority of them were working in business establishments, failed to prove their identity during the operation.
Full story >>

SLA shelling kills 122 within 3 days in Mullaiththeevu

[TamilNet, Monday, 02 March 2009, 22:36 GMT]
Sri Lanka Army (SLA) fired artillery shells have claimed the lives of more than 45 Tamil civilians Monday within the 'safety zone' at Mu'l'livaaykkaal, Valaignarmadam, Pokka'nai, Maaththa'lan and the adjoining Ira'naippaalai. On Sunday, around 37 civilians were killed and the day before around 40 were reported killed in SLA barrage and Sri Lanka Air Force (SLAF) bombardment.
Full story >>

Police arrest 8 Tamil youths in Colombo

[TamilNet, Monday, 02 March 2009, 17:39 GMT]
Sri Lanka police arrested eight Tamil youths in Kalubovilla and Kohuwella, suburbs of Colombo in a search conducted Monday morning and have detained them in Dehiwala police station, according to complaints lodged with Deputy Minister P. Rathakrishnan by the youths’ relatives.
Full story >>

Unitary Ceylon was an error: British Politician

[TamilNet, Monday, 02 March 2009, 15:45 GMT]
A Conservative Party politician in the United Kingdom, Dr. Rachel Joyce, apologised Sunday for the error of Colonial Britain in making a unitary Ceylon out of two nations, the Tamils and the Sinhalese. “The Tamil people have lived on the island currently called Sri Lanka for millennia - in their own contiguous, distinct, geographical territory. They lay claim only to the territory they have historically lived in. In fact, the 3 million Tamils of the island constituted a self governing nation until invaded and occupied by Colonial powers – in particular Britain, who amalgamated them with the Sinhala nation purely for convenience. In retrospect, this cultural naivety was a mistake that has caused problems since independence,” she said in a meeting held at Harrow, where Bruce Fein, a constitutional expert from the United States was the guest speaker.
Full story >>

Hunger claims lives in Vanni

[TamilNet, Monday, 02 March 2009, 15:43 GMT]
Four children below the age of 15 and their parents were admitted to Maaththa'lan makeshift-hospital Monday in serious condition after consuming Adampan leaves (Beach Morning Glory) as nothing else was available for them to eat, according to medical sources. Meanwhile, at least six people have already died due to hunger inside the 'safe zone' in recent days, the sources further said adding that many more are feared dead due to starvation but not accounted for. "What prevents the world powers to set aside their diplomatic maneuvering and arrange enough food and medicine to reach us immediately," ask the people of Vanni reports TamilNet correspondent.
Full story >>