Tamil message goes contrary to realpolitik of world powers: Premachandran

[TamilNet, Sunday, 17 November 2019, 13:29 GMT]
Tamil people have cast their votes indicating their sharp opposition to génocidaire Gotabhaya Rajapaksa, who is the SL president-elect. The voting pattern of Tamils must be interpreted as a message to the South as well as to the international community, said EPRLF Leader Suresh Premachandran in a comment to TamilNet on Sunday. However, the USA and India are preoccupied with the thought of how best they could engage with the new SL President, because they consider China as having established deeper inroads into the island through trade, infrastructure-development and the 99-year lease of Hambantota harbour in the South, he said. Suresh Premachandran was implying that the powers that embrace the new president must be regarded as accountable for continued injustices against the Eezham Tamils in the island.
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Shivajilingam responds to Sampanthan: no withdrawal without written assurance

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 13 November 2019, 09:13 GMT]
If the TNA Leader negotiates with Sajith Premadasa and secures a written assurance in which the SL presidential candidate commits to fulfil two specific demands, Tamil presidential candidate M.K. Shivajilingam was prepared to withdraw from the race for SL presidential candidate. However, such a move has not taken place, said Mr Shivajilingam in a comment to TamilNet on Wednesday. He was responding to Mr Sampanthan’s public appeal to Mr Shivajilingam to step down from the presidential race without any preconditions.
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SL Police detains Tamil trustees of Saiva temple in Vavuniyaa

[TamilNet, Saturday, 02 November 2019, 21:03 GMT]
The Archaeological Department of the unitary state of genocidal Sri Lanka has moved the SL Police to act against the chairman and the secretary of the board of trustees of Kaaddu-vinayakar temple at Maa'likai in Oamanthai, Vavuniyaa after they started to clear the bushes of their village deity. Recently, the resettled Tamils of the village got together in a Shramadana campaign at the war-destroyed ancient temple in the former no-man zone.
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Sand mining mafia intimidates Divisional Secretary in Batticaloa North

[TamilNet, Thursday, 31 October 2019, 15:05 GMT]
Three Sinhala sand mining traders, scooping sands in Kathirave'li in Koa'ra'laip-pattu North (Vaakarai) division, have threatened the Divisional Secretary M. Karan saying that they were capable of transferring him away from his division. One of the Sinhala sand mining traders from Kanthaa'laay in Trincomalee is demanding to increase the extent of the sand permit to cover the expenses to sponsor one of the leading presidential candidates, the officials further said. The latest threat has come as the DS was trying to limit the extensive scooping. The traders operate with the backing of the Geological Survey and Mines Bureau, which comes under the unitary State system in Colombo.
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Occupying Colombo resumes military land grab in Jaffna peninsula

[TamilNet, Sunday, 27 October 2019, 20:14 GMT]
The occupying military of the unitary state of genocidal Sri Lanka has resumed appropriation of lands at several locations in Jaffna peninsula. The SL Survey Department officials have been instructed to carry out surveying activities on Monday and Tuesday for the SL Navy that wants to grab lands at Chuzhi-puram. The tendency is notably worse at Neduntheevu (Delft), the farthest islet off Jaffna, said Shageevan Shangmugalingam, an elected councillor of Valikaamam North and the chairman of Resettlement Committee in that division.
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Sajith Premadasa intensified heritage genocide against Tamils through departments in his ministry

[TamilNet, Friday, 25 October 2019, 23:36 GMT]
The successive governments of the occupying unitary state of genocidal Sri Lanka have gazetted 167 ancient heritage monuments, which they want to convert as ‘Sinhala only’ Theravada Buddhist monuments in the traditional homeland of Eezham Tamils in the North-East after 2010. Rajapaksa government gazetted 123 sites in two notifications in May and August 2013. The regime led by Maithiripala and Wickramasinghe has gazetted forty-four monuments in May 2015 and March 2016. The heritage genocide accelerated under Sajith Premadasa as minister of cultural, housing and construction affairs. A range of departments from the SL Department of Archaeology to Central Cultural Fund, which sophisticatedly undermines Tamil heritage involving Tamil and foreign academics function under him, Tamil civil officials and activists in Jaffna and Mullaiththeevu told TamilNet.
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Sinhala supporters of Gotabhaya encroach into pasturelands in Batticaloa

[TamilNet, Sunday, 20 October 2019, 23:58 GMT]
Former Sinhala paramilitary affiliated colonists (also known as home-guards), who encroached into the pasturelands in Paduvaan-karai region of Batticaloa during the Rajapaksa regime, have again started cultivation activities in the area, Tamil dairy farmers complain. When contacted by TamilNet, Nimalan Kanthasamy, the secretary of Dairy Farmers Association in Koa'ra'laip-pattu South division, confirmed the intrusion. At least fifteen encroachers have sown seeds clearing the pasturelands in Mayilaththa-madu within the last ten days, he said. The activity comes in the wake of killing around 1,500 cattle that belonged to Tamil dairy farmers in the area during the past ten months, he said.
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SL Governor's latest land grab poses danger to archaeological traces of Eezham Tamils

[TamilNet, Sunday, 13 October 2019, 22:15 GMT]
SL Governor to North Mr Suren Raghavan is attempting to alienate 115 acres of lands at Kauthaari-munai in Ma'na'niththa'lai sandbar of Poo-nakari (Pooneryn) division to a private Tamil diaspora business person from Australia before his Governor term expires. Mr Raghavan is deceptively suppressing objections from the Tamil civil sources and the grassroots activists in Ki'linochchi district, informed grassroots activists in Poonakari told TamilNet. The 25 km long sandbar, which extends towards the Jaffna Peninsula from Poonakari in the main island, is of immense natural beauty and archaeological value to the Eezham Tamils. The area is dotted with archaeological remains ranging from microlithic/megalithic times to the times of the Dutch, covered by massive sand dunes.
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Monks step up campaign against Muslims, want to carve out Sinhala colony in Ampaa'rai

[TamilNet, Saturday, 12 October 2019, 22:23 GMT]
Sinhala Theravada Buddhist monks in robe have again started to escalate a land dispute along the coast in Poththvuil division of Ampaa'rai district in the East. The elected Divisional Council (PS) was prepared to allocate three acres of lands to the Buddhist vihara, which the monks had put up in illegally seized plot of three-quarter of an acre. The vihara was erected four years ago with the backing of the SL Navy and the presidential election in 2015. Now, the monks want a large tract of land, up to 42 acres and more, MS Abdul Wazeeth, the chairman of the elected Divisional Council told TamilNet on Saturday. The Tamil-speaking Muslims in Poththuvil fear that the monks were scheming a Sinhala colony at the locality, which is known as Mathuragn-cheanai in Tamil. Using the presidential race, the monks seek to secure additional resources for a future Sinhala colony there, they complained.
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Vote for Self-Determination, reject major candidates for more effective boycott

[TamilNet, Friday, 11 October 2019, 22:07 GMT]
A section of civil activists in the North-East jointly promoted the idea of fielding a common Tamil candidate in the SL Presidential Election this time. The idea looked genuine and the process went on until the last minute deadline to find a contestant. The hidden hands of India and West were trying to influence the choice of the candidate through remote control manipulations. The process didn't succeed to the disappointment of the genuinely involved as well as the indirect actors. At the same time, some Tamil sections also argued the case for a boycott of the presidential elections. However, none of them expected the manoeuvre of two former provincial councillors with independent intuition to propose a better solution to the Eezham Tamils. M.K. Shivajilingam of TELO legacy and Ananthy Sasitharan of former LTTE affiliation have nailed it this time. Now the Establishments are after them.
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SL Archaeology, Police continue to disturb Tamils’ right to worship at Vedukku-naa'ri hilltop

[TamilNet, Friday, 04 October 2019, 21:50 GMT]
The Sinhala Police stationed in Nedungkea'ni in Vavuniyaa North has stepped up its harassment of selected members of the trustee board of Vedukku-naa'ri Sivan temple. The SL Police, citing a case lodged by the ‘Sinhala Only’ SL Archaeology Department against the use of ladder during the recent temple festival, has asked the selected members to appear at the station for investigations. The SL Police was already harassing the organisers of the festival against the use of loud-speakers playing Saiva devotional song and issued instructions to remove the ladder, specifying deadlines for the removal.
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No to alternative lands, original lands must be released with compensation, say Tamil activists

[TamilNet, Sunday, 29 September 2019, 18:19 GMT]
SL Governor to North Suren Raghavan is deceiving the Tamil land-owners by proposing to consider accepting alternative properties in return for the fertile lands, which the occupying SL military wants to retain under its control in Valikaamam North in Jaffna. Out of 47 GS divisions, 21 are affected by SL militarisation. It is the most fertile soil in the entire peninsula. The SL military has continued widespread cultivation, dairy farming and fishing by utilising the resources of the uprooted Tamils even after the end of the war in 2009. It is not justifiable, said Nallathamby Ponrajah, the member of Valikaamam South Divisional Council. In the meantime, grassroots activists are planning to launch a renewed campaign to free their lands said SL State must return the properties and also compensate for the loss of income caused by the unjustified occupation of their areas so far.
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Sinhala extremist monks assault Tamils, say Buddhism stands above Law in Lanka

[TamilNet, Monday, 23 September 2019, 18:38 GMT]
A group of violent Sinhala Buddhist monks and a mob led by Bodu Bala Sena’s Secretary Gnanasara Thero, carried the remains of the late Kolamba Medhalankara Thero to cremate the controversial monk within the premises of the Tamil Saivite temple at Neeraaviyadi in Mullaiththeevu. They were violating the court ruling that specified a separate locality to mark the ritual. “Sri Lanka is a Buddhist country. Buddhism stands above the Law here,” proclaimed one of the Buddhist monks, who assaulted the Tamil lawyers and the students near the Neeraaviyadi Pi’l’ laiyaar temple at Naayaa’ru in Mullaiththeevu on Monday. The lawyers were present to convey the information. Elected Tamil politicians and the young generation of Tamil students were witnessing the lopsided behaviour of the SL military and the police, who were only defending the interests of the monks.
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More Sinhala settlers brought to Muslim village in East

[TamilNet, Sunday, 22 September 2019, 21:53 GMT]
The 27th Battalion of the Gajaba Regiment of the occupying Sinhala Army, stationed at the 13th Mile Post on Anuradhapura - Pulmoaddai Road, continues to bring Sinhala settlers into the lands, which it had seized from twenty-four Tamil speaking families at the Muslim village of Maalaanoor in Pulmoaddai, the native residents told TamilNet on Sunday. They blamed UNP's Deputy Leader Sajith Premadasa, who is aspiring to become the party's presidential candidate in the forthcoming elections as backing the controversial colonisation scheme through the National Housing Development Authority (NHDA), which comes under his ministry of housing and construction. Thirteen Sinhala settlers have already received houses through the NHDA.
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Colombo rushes ahead with exploitative expansion of salterns in North

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 17 September 2019, 23:50 GMT]
The occupying Colombo’s unitary state mechanism is alienating large tracts of lands, both officially and unofficially, for commercial actors from the South of the island. Tamil agents, including one paramilitary organiser of Karuna Group, are being used as the proxies to showcase that the SL State is ‘ethnically impartial’ in the allocations, informed Tamil servants at the Ki'linochchi District Secretariat said. They suspect the involvement of SL military corporatism in the schemes. In the meantime, Chairman of Karaichchi Divisional Council (PS), A. Velamalikithan, when contacted by TamilNet, described the extent of illegal construction work that has already commenced without securing the required permissions from the elected Council and the Divisional Secretariats concerned.
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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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UNF schemes Sinhalicisation as ‘development’ transforming Jaffna into ‘megacity’

[TamilNet, Monday, 09 September 2019, 16:40 GMT]
SL Prime Minister Ranil Wickramasinghe and SL Finance Minister Mangala Samaraweera were visiting Jaffna during the weekend along with SL minister for Megapolis & Western Development, ‘Patali’ Champika Ranawaka, the secretary of Sinhala-Buddhist ultra-nationalist Jathika Hela Urumaya (JHU). Mr Wickramasinghe was reciting the mantra of ‘development’ and was repeating the talk of ‘devolving more powers’ to the provincial councils through securing a majority in the forthcoming parliamentary elections. However, Mr Ranawaka, who is opposed to the concept of Sinhalese sharing political power with Tamils in a federal arrangement, was claiming that a ‘megacity’ project would be transforming the city into one of the four main economic hubs in the island. Furthermore, Ranawaka contended that the plan was part of an integrated ‘national physical plan’, which conceived at Battaramulla in Colombo.
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Colombo's departments abet large-scale deforestation and hunting in Mannaar

[TamilNet, Friday, 06 September 2019, 15:19 GMT]
Widespread logging of forest trees, large-scale alienation of forest lands and hunting of spotted and sambur deers, as well as local buffaloes, continue unabated amidst persistent ignorance and possible collusion with the SL Forest and Wildlife Conservation Departments as well as the SL Police. Local Councillor Kandiah Soundararajan, who is elected from Vaddk-ka'ndal in Maanthai West Divisional Council (Piratheasa-chapai/PS), has exposed the extent of the destruction when contacted by TamilNet this week. In the meantime, the law enforcement authorities of the unitary state mechanism in Colombo are systematically depriving the resettled poverty-stricken and landless Tamils. It is the local population, which constitutes a nature-loving-society with excellent human-environment relationships, as history has witnessed in the past, Tamil activists in Mannaar observed.
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Activist women allege premeditated accidents targeting them

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 03 September 2019, 23:02 GMT]
Last week, an unknown motorcyclist hit the motorbike of a leading Tamil woman activist S. Chandraleela, who is one of the main organisers of Keappaa-pulavu continuous protest. 43-year-old Chandraleela was on her way to her house from Mullaiththeevu with her daughter seated on the bike. Both the mother and the daughter were thrown into the air during the crash. All those involved in the accident were admitted to Maagn-choalai hospital with injuries. However, the man who hit them has been either freed or transferred to another hospital in secrecy. The identity of the man being hidden from the records has raised serious doubts of the accident being a planned one, rights activists in Mullaiththeevu said. The SL military intelligence is capable of experimenting with different techniques from time to time, be it ‘white-vans’, ‘grease-devils’ or ‘intended-accidents’, they said.
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SL judiciary harasses Tamil dairy farmers in Batticaloa

[TamilNet, Saturday, 31 August 2019, 23:36 GMT]
The representatives of the largest dairy farmers association in Batticaloa complain that fifteen of their members had to spend 300,000 rupees on travelling forth and back between Dehiyattakandiya and Batticaloa throughout the last four years to face a case filed against them by the SL Forest Department in 2015. The Forest Department guards detained the cattle herders and filed a lawsuit against them at the Magistrate’s Court in Dehiattekandiya in Ampaa'rai. The representatives of the Live Stock Farmers’ Society in Mayilaththamadu and Periyamathava'nai (LSFS-MP) told TamilNet that the petitioner was failing to attend the hearings and that the case was being postponed every time. It is a form of systematic harassment meted out to Tamil dairy farmers, they complained. Every time, when the case is scheduled the group of farmers and their cattle herders have to travel 140 km both the ways.
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