Divisional Secretary, TNA MPs must act to release Chegnchoalai lands: civil activist

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 08 October 2019, 18:43 GMT]
The Human Rights Commission of Sri Lanka (HRCSL) seems to have blindly applied the 2013 Circular of the SL State to arrive at its recommendation to reverse the ownership of Chegnchoalai orphanage lands at Malaiyaa'la-puram in Ki'linochchi. The circular proposes that the original landowners, displaced during the times of war, were the rightful owners to their properties. However, the HRCSL has failed to take all the facts regarding the Chegnchoalai lands, says civil activist from Karaichchi, Mr Murugiah Thamilchelvan. The Divisional Secretary and Tamil National Alliance Parliamentarians should take responsibility and cancel the decision mooted by the HRCSL, he said.
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Heinous act by HRCSL: former orphans of Chegnchoalai on the brink of losing lands

[TamilNet, Monday, 07 October 2019, 23:12 GMT]
The so-called Human Rights Commission of genocidal Sri Lanka (HRCSL) has proposed to the Divisional Secretariat office in Karaichchi in Ki'linochchi to evict the resettled former orphans of Chengchoalai who are living at the lands which were bought by the orphanage from the original landowners during the times of war. Cheng-choalai was one of the civilian orphanages operated by the LTTE run de-facto state of Tamil Eelam. It was well known for bringing up children in an exemplary way producing artists and experts within various fields. The lands were allocated to the former orphans through proper purchases during the de-facto civil administration of the LTTE. However, the grounds are now being claimed by greedy elements with vested interests and the SL Human Rights Commission in Jaffna has proposed to do away the arrangement.
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No place for human rights in China’s white paper for future world

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 02 October 2019, 22:28 GMT]
The People’s Republic of China (PRC), with its ambition as a rising global power, showcased this week its 70th anniversary of the founding of the republic staging big celebrations and a massive military parade in Tiananmen Square in Beijing. Along with the fanfare, the RPC also spelt out its worldview for future China and the world combined in a white paper titled “China and the World in the New Era.” Although the Xi Jinping doctrine was upholding the principles of the UN Charter, the term ‘human rights’ was totally missing in the document, which perceives state-to-state relations as the bedrock of international relations. Even the term civilisation was used to defend the states-centric narrative. There were no specific concerns about stateless nations and peoples that don’t fit into the states-centric status quo of the so-called world order.
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UN employed former Sri Lanka Army officer alleged of killing Tamils in Madu Church

[TamilNet, Friday, 27 September 2019, 16:50 GMT]
The United Nations Department of Safety and Security (UNDSS), tasked with providing security services to the UN system in delivering its programmes globally, has had a former Sri Lanka Army officer among its rank and file the security staff in the recent years. The ex-SLA officer has previously “killed Tamils in Madu church,” during the times of war, according to allegations made by New York based Inner City Press (ICP), a non-profit organization, which has critically exposed the wrongdoers within the UN system for almost 15 years. The former SL Army officer in question, Lt Col Parakrama Siriwardana, is currently the Head of Security and Emergency Unit at the China-led Asian Infrastructure and Investment Bank (AIIB), since May 2018.
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Lt Col Thileepan’s 32nd commemoration gains momentum across North-East

[TamilNet, Thursday, 26 September 2019, 17:49 GMT]
Eezham Tamils in the North and East marked the 32nd annual commemoration of the sacrifice of LTTE’s Jaffna Political Head Lt Col Thileepan (Rasiah Parthipan), who sacrificed his life in a historical dry hunger-strike in 1987, which exposed India’s interests-oriented invasion at that time. Tamil National Peoples’ Front organised a march from Vavuniyaa to Nalloor in the North mobilising the youth with significant participation of women. The Tamil National Alliance marked the event in Ki’linochchi and Batticaloa while the former NPC Chief Minister Justice C.V. Wigneswaran’s Tamil Makkal Kootani commemorated the remembrance at Point Pedro. The Remembrance event at Nalloor, where Thileepan sacrificed his life, was marked as a joint remembrance event beyond group affinities.
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SL military, police intervene in temple affairs in Champoor

[TamilNet, Saturday, 14 September 2019, 21:37 GMT]
The SL Police is unnecessarily intervening in the internal affairs regarding the consecration (Kumbhabhishekham) ritual of Champoor Sri Siththiviyaakar temple in Moothoor-East, Trincomalee, say Eezham Tamil residents in the village. The SL Police, along with the military intelligence wing of the occupying SL Army, have deployed their personnel to widen an ongoing rift concerning the consecration ceremony of the rebuilt temple. The Kumbhabhishekham is scheduled to commence on Sunday.
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Colombo-centric ‘development’ threatens Tamil as medium of instruction in North

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 11 September 2019, 22:29 GMT]
Jaffna Fisheries Societies Federation has expressed concerns over the looming danger of Sinhalicisation of Fisheries Education in the North. The Sinhalicisation is done through making English as the medium of instruction and populating the students from the South. The move should also be seen with the Sinhala colonisation of the jetties and ports in the Tamil homeland through the so-called mega-development schemes such as the recently started construction of the fishing port in Point Pedro and projects such as the “Enterprise Sri Lanka,” spearheaded by various ministries, departments and authorities of the occupying unitary state in Colombo, according to V. Thavachelvan, the president of Jaffna Fisheries Federation.
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EPDP resumes harassment against families of Tamils subjected to enforced disappearances

[TamilNet, Thursday, 29 August 2019, 22:43 GMT]
Douglas Devananda, the leader of the paramilitary-cum-political party, Eelam People's Democratic Party (EPDP), has again resorted to harassment against the mothers of Tamils subjected to enforced disappearances at the hands of the military of genocidal Sri Lanka and his EPDP outfit. Mr Devananda was an SL minister during the regimes of Chandrika Kumaratunga and Mahinda Rajapaksa. The SL military deployed his group to abduct Tamil activists, journalists and those who were working with the LTTE. Recently, he told the press that he had lodged a complaint with the SL Police in Colombo against the open and public statements made by Mrs Mariasuresh Easwary, the wife of a person reported missing at the hands of the SL military. Mrs Easwary, who heads the district organisation of missing persons in Mullaith-theevu, was making the open allegation on behalf of the members of her organisation.
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Military minds of New Delhi, Colombo stage ‘book fair’ in Jaffna though quisling Governor

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 27 August 2019, 23:36 GMT]
The SL Governor to North Suren Raghavan, who is the Tamil agent of Maithiripala Sirisena, the SL President and Commander-in-Chief of the armed forces, has organised a book fair in Jaffna this week. The military intelligence outfits of New Delhi and Colombo were collaborating behind the scene to sophisticatedly mix selected books from Tamil Nadu with publications depicting the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) as ‘terrorists’. The target audience of the book fair is the younger generation of Eezham Tamils. The officers of the occupying military of genocidal Sri Lanka were invited as the special guests to the event along with the Mayor of Jaffna and the Tamil children wearing Sinhala costumes were garlanding the guests at the event held under the patronage of the SL Governor at the Veerasingam Hall.
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Widespread logging backed by SL military in Mannaar continues to escape scrutiny

[TamilNet, Monday, 26 August 2019, 23:35 GMT]
The commanders of the occupying Sinhala military stationed in three of the five divisions of Mannaar district have been partnering with millionaire wood traders from the South in a widespread and systematic illegal logging going on for a long time after 2009, Tamil officials in Mannaar District Secretariat said. The massive-scale exploitation has reached dangerous proportions and was causing severe environmental effects, the officials told TamilNet. The SL Forest Conservation Department or the SL Police do not act against the conduct of the SL military officers. Now, the SL military is also enjoying the police powers, overriding the authority of the SL Police, the officials further said.
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Wigneswaran warns of bleak future for Tamils, urges planning for next step

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 20 August 2019, 20:23 GMT]
SL President Maithiripala Sirisena appointing Shavendra Silva as the SLA commander is the logical outcome of the Sinhala thinking that remains unchanged. “Secondly, he may also be thinking that if Gotabhaya Rajapaksa were to come in as the president next, Shavendra Silva would be an ideal lieutenant to him, because they have worked together in the past,” commented former Chief Minister of North Justice C.V. Wigneswaran. The Sinhala political leaders would not grant any political rights to the Tamils in the future because, in their position there had been no genocide, no war crimes and they maintaint that those killed were all ‘terrorists’. “We may expect a very difficult time ahead. Tamils, both internationally and locally, must start thinking as to what should be our next step in the event of such people becoming very violent against our people,” the former chief minister told TamilNet.
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SL TID detains outspoken Tamil doctor at Pazhai hospital

[TamilNet, Sunday, 18 August 2019, 23:50 GMT]
The notorious ‘Terrorist’ Investigation Division (TID) of occupying Colombo’s SL Police has detained a Tamil doctor, 41-year-old Sinniah Sivaruban, who is the medical superintendent of the Divisional Hospital of Pazhai in Jaffna peninsula on Sunday night. The father of three was on duty and was on his way to hospital from a field trip around 10:00 pm., when the SL Army intelligence wing detained him at Elephant Pass and handed him over to the TID. The doctor was taken to the hospital where a raid was carried out. The TID was alleging that the devoted doctor was engaged in ‘reviving the LTTE’ with Tamil diaspora links, eyewitnesses at the hospital told TamilNet.
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SL Archaeology Department resumes plans to construct controversial ‘chaitya’ at Koonith-theevu

[TamilNet, Friday, 16 August 2019, 13:25 GMT]
The Acting Assistant Director of SL Archaeology Department WHA Sumanadasa, who is in charge of the regional office in Trincomalee, is pushing ahead with the plan of constructing a controversial ‘Buddhist chaitya’ at Maththa’la-malai hill-top in Choodaik-kudaa at Koonith-theevu, located to the south of Trincomalee. While all the attention is focused on Kanniyaa, Mr Sumanadasa has started to plan the reconstruction through various field trips to the disputed hill-top as well as to the lighthouse area, the trustees of the Saivaist “Kun’raththoor Maththa’la-malai Thiru-murukan temple” told TamilNet this week.
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PTA-threats against constructing memorial arch for student victims of 2006 aerial massacre

[TamilNet, Sunday, 11 August 2019, 20:32 GMT]
The occupying SL Army and its Intelligence have warned the workers, who were engaged in setting up a memorial road arch in Mullaith-theevu on Sunday. The arch was being constructed in memory of 51 school-girls and four staff members, whom the SL Air Force had brutally killed in a targeted aerial massacre at Chengchoalai compound on 14 August 2006 at Va'l'li-punam in Mullaiththeevu. The SL military personnel who came to the site on Sunday and instructed the workers to cease all the work threatened to detain them under the Prevention of Terrorism Act (PTA). In the meantime, the SL Police, which took the workers to the station told them that there should be no photographs of the school children, who were slain in the aerial massacre carried out by the SL Air Force. The workers were engaged in completing the construction before the 13th Commemoration on Wednesday.
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SL Forest Department retains 8,034 hectares of pasturelands in Paduvaan-karai, Batticaloa

[TamilNet, Friday, 09 August 2019, 14:28 GMT]
Eight thousand and thirty-four hectares of grass plain in Paduvaan-karai region of Batticaloa district was tentatively traced in a map to demarcate the area as pastureland in 1976 by the SL Survey Department. However, the process didn't complete into accurate demarcation, said Rajbabu Suntharamoorthy, the divisional secretary of Koa'ra'laip-pattu South (Kiraan). The SL Forest Department retains the area as belonging to Thopik-kal (Thoppigala) thick forest. The incumbent Government Agent has taken necessary steps to get the pastureland secured as demanded by the farmers, the Divisional Secretary maintained. TamilNet contacted the DS on Friday following the report on Thursday that more than one thousand cows had died since January as the SL authorities were dragging their feet concerning the allocation of the pasturelands and access to the drinking water reservoir to the cattle.
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Book on Santhiya becomes narration of Tamil struggle incorporating Marxist ideas in early 80s

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 07 August 2019, 23:28 GMT]
Ben Hillier, the editor of Australia’s leading socialist publication, Red Flag, wanted to recount the life of Santhiya, a former LTTE cadre who had perished in an Indonesian detention centre in late 2017. Her tragic death occurred as a result of the anti-refugee and anti-Tamil struggle policies practised by Australia. In his efforts to trace her life the editor of the Red Flag travelled to Jakarta, Indonesia and then to the occupied country of Eezham Tamils with the support of the Tamil Refugee Council (TRC) a grassroots diaspora group in Australia. Ben Hillier, who travelled to the occupied country and learned more about the sacrifices made by the Eezham Tamils, particularly the Tamil women, authored his book “Losing Santhiya: On Life and Loss in the Struggle for Tamil Eelam” in July.
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State discrimination causes death of 1000 cows, milk production drops by 5,500 litres in Batticaloa

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 06 August 2019, 23:27 GMT]
The drought has taken a big toll on dairy farmers as the SL State has been systematically neglecting their repeated requests for drinking water reservoirs for the cattle. The occupying Colombo has also been desisting from safeguarding the pasture lands in the interior Ko'ra'laip-pattu South (Kiraan) division of Batticaloa district targeting Sinhala colonisation through the Mahaweli scheme. Nimalan Kanthasamy, the Secretary of Dairy Farmers Association in Kiraan and Chengka'ladi, told TamilNet on Tuesday that the milk production supplied to the SL State-owned dairy Milco (Pvt) Ltd from the region has dropped from 6,000 litres to just 400 litres on average between January and July 2019. It is a human-made disaster intended to obliterate the particular livelihood, say the grassroots activists in the district.
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Pirapaharan’s statements between 1984 and 1993 reproduced in book form in Europe

[TamilNet, Monday, 05 August 2019, 23:55 GMT]
A Switzerland-based Eezham Tamil youth group, ‘Phoenix - the Next Generation’, has photostatically reproduced the rare 314-page compilation officially published by the Headquarters of the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) in September 1993 in Jaffna. The book contains selected letters, interviews and statements of LTTE Leader Velupillai Pirapaharan starting from his first media interview in March 1984. The compilation consists, amongst others, of a letter that declines LTTE representation at a meeting held in New York in May 1985, appeals to the leaders of India and Tamil Nadu during the LTTE-IPKF war in 1987, and a letter of solidarity addressed to South African (ANC) leader, the late Oliver Tambo, in July 1988. The reproduction has been made from a book obtained at the public library of Jaffna in the past. The book, with ID 9907, is no longer accessible at the library.
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Mother dies after searching for missing son for 11 years

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 24 July 2019, 22:54 GMT]
A 74-year-old mother of a Tamil male subjected to enforced disappearance eleven years ago in Mannaar has passed away after suffering a heart attack in Mullaiththeevu on Wednesday. The representatives of the district organisation of the families of persons subjected to enforced disappearances said that the mother, Thresamma Sebamalai, was an active member in their continuous protest during the past 869 days. She was trying to trace the whereabouts of her son for the past 11 years. Mrs Sebamalai was living at Ira'naip-paalai in Puthuk-kudiyiruppu.
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Fishing by intruding colonists hampers livelihood of Tamils in Batticaloa North

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 03 July 2019, 21:17 GMT]
Sinhala colonists from the Trincomalee district are intruding into the territorial waters of Eezham Tamils in Vaakarai located to the north of Batticaloa (Koara'laip-pattu North division). The occupying Sinhala navy and the SL fisheries authorities are backing the illegal deployment of purse seines by the Sinhala fishermen. In the meantime, the SL military is harassing the Tamil fishers who engage in fishing using legally allowed methods, the Head of Vaakarai Fishers Society T. Baskaran told TamilNet. The SL military is also backing the former TMVP paramilitary (Pi'l'laiyaan faction) personnel to engage in the exploitative fishing activities, he further said.
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