Landless Tamils in Maanthai West should be given new lands: senior grassroots activist

[TamilNet, Thursday, 06 October 2016, 16:25 GMT]
Various acts enacted by the colonial British rulers before 1948 had brought the public lands in the entire island into the domain of the Colombo-based State structure and its constitution, which was enacted without the democratic mandate of the nation of Eezham Tamils in the North-East. It was the so-called ‘Crown Lands Encroachment Ordinance’ that brought these lands, for which private ownership could not be documented, into Crown property in 1840. Later, in 1972, after the Sinhalese unilaterally enacted the genocidal State of ‘Sri Lanka’, amidst protests and without the democratic mandate of Eezham Tamils, a series of ‘land reforms’ were introduced by Colombo. Even these reforms brought after 1972 are now being violated by the SL State itself in seizing the lands of Tamils, says Seemanpillai Sountharanayakam, the deputy chairman of Maanthai West Divisional Council.
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UN refugee agency discriminates against stateless Eezham Tamil refugees

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 04 October 2016, 22:43 GMT]
Around 100,000 uprooted and poverty-stricken refugees from the country of Eezham Tamils are staying in the camps in Tamil Nadu State in India. Apart from them, more than 200,000 Eezham Tamils, who are also uprooted due to the conflict in the island, are also living outside the camps in Tamil Nadu. Only 4,564 people, belonging to 1,854 families have returned back to Northern Province. Most of the people returned to the island within the last five years the UN refugee agency UNHCR complain that they have been abandoned by the agency and the authorities. People who have returned to Vavuniyaa complain that Sinhala colonisers had seized their lands and that they are now let to look after themselves without any programmes of resettlement. The UN agency was only interested in paying the travel expenses. The returnees complain that they have not heard anything from the UNCHR after that.
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Colombo stands further exposed by contradictory messages from SL President, Foreign Minister

[TamilNet, Monday, 03 October 2016, 23:20 GMT]
The continued seizure of pasturelands in Koa'ra'lippattu South (Kiraan) division in Batticaloa, where dairy farmers with more than 150,000 are forced to take to the streets. The land grab is a wide-scale issue across North-East, causing increased ethnic tension. Social problems are on increase as many families in the district have fallen victims to the vicious circle of bank loans and debts after 2009. In the meantime Colombo government’s poverty alleviation ‘Samurdhi’ programme stocks savings of people amounting to 2,500 millions of rupees at the banks without being utilized. And the war-affected people are being told that their perpetrators will not be subjected to criminal investigations even if they were to be identified. SL President and SL Foreign Minister speak differently. Justice is far from the island, says S. Sivayoganathan, the president of NGO Forum in the district.
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Sinhala colonisers in Batticaloa challenge officials with Sirisena-issued land permits

[TamilNet, Sunday, 02 October 2016, 23:01 GMT]
A group of government officials belonging to various departments including the officials from Mahaweli ‘development’ authority, which comes under the SL President Maithiripala Sirisena, were confronted by the Sinhala settlers, who claimed the lands were given to them by none other than Mr Maithiripala Sirisena, when he was serving under Mahinda Rajapakasa a few years ago. The officials were on a fact-finding mission to Mayilaththa-madu and Maathava'nai pasturelands, situated in the interior Koa'ra'laip-pattu South (Kiraan) division in Batticaloa district. The visit took place on 25 September after repeated complaints coming from Tamil dairy farmers in the division. However, there was no sign of action from the authorities, the farmers told TamilNet on Sunday.
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People rise up against occupation of Vidaththal-theevu at DDS meeting

[TamilNet, Saturday, 01 October 2016, 23:36 GMT]
Former Deputy Chairman of Maanthai West Divisional Council S. Soundaranayagam and rural representatives of various organisations across Maanthai West division in Mannaar on Friday confronted the co-chairs of Divisional Development Committee meeting and the Divisional Secretary of Maanthai West against the structural genocide prevailing in their division. Unable to defend the Colombo system, the co-chairs were forced to conclude the meeting with the decision of instructing the Divisional Secretary M. Sriskanthakumar to officially inform the SL Navy to immediately vacate Vidaththal-theevu jetty and the properties belonging to resettled Tamil fishing families.
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Colombo steps up hate campaign against Wigneswaran

[TamilNet, Friday, 30 September 2016, 21:29 GMT]
The Chief Minister of Northern Provincial Council was only raising questions in a cautious speech at Ezhuka Thamizh uprising on Saturday. Justice C.V. Wigneswaran didn't even refer to the Genocide Resolution passed unanimously by the elected NPC assembly. Further, the resolution drafted by the organisers was limiting the scope of the Tamil aspiration just at self-rule, an out-dated demand which was abandoned by the late Tamil leader S.J.V Chelvanayakam in favour of Tamil sovereignty-centred aspiration as he realised that Colombo would never reconcile with Tamils without any compulsion beyond the parameters of SL parliamentary politics. Now, Wigneswaran asking simple questions with a mobilised mass, is being intentionally projected as ‘extremism’ by Colombo, commented Tamil activists in Vavuniyaa, who witnessed a hate campaign by Sinhala Buddhists in their town on Friday.
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Monk sets ablaze Hindu temple as Maithiripala proclaims ‘Buddhist Sri Lanka’ at UN

[TamilNet, Thursday, 29 September 2016, 23:01 GMT]
A Sinhala Buddhist monk from the so-called ‘Pashana Pabbatha Rajamaha viharaya’, which has been put up with a Sinhala name in the occupied Tamil village of Kalladi in the Eastern province by occupying Colombo after 2009, set ablaze the building of a Madam (mutt) of Malai-neeli-Amman temple (the dark goddess of the hill) on Tuesday. It happened within a week after the SL President Maithiripala Sirisena addressed the UN General Assembly in New York claiming the island as a Buddhist country. Eechchilam-patttai (Verukal) is the south most coastal Tamil division in the Trincomalee district bordering Batticaloa and was under the de-facto Tamil Eelam civil administration during the times of the LTTE. The division is now facing Sinhala-Buddhist occupation from Seruvila and Welikanda. Sirisena's ‘Mahaweli’ ministry is spearheading the structural genocide in the area.
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Criticism emerges in Jaffna over USA training SL military, IC soft-pedalling Tamil genocide

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 28 September 2016, 23:18 GMT]
In spite of all the accusations against the Sri Lankan government of war-crimes and other atrocities committed during the war, USA and other governments continue to have naval and military exercises with the Sri Lankan forces, as they also had these trainings with the SL military during the regime of the Mahinda Rajapaksa, said Rev Fr S.V.B. Mangalarajah, the chairman of the Commission for Justice & Peace of the Catholic Diocese in Jaffna in a follow-up video interview to TamilNet after the Ezhuka Thamizh uprising held in Jaffna. The implied message coming from the veteran human rights activist based in Jaffna was that the international community and its approach towards the national question of Tamils in the island was lopsided and unless that problem is seriously addressed by Tamils, the SL Government and the South would not deliver anything substantial for Tamils.
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Hīnaṭi-pana, Kīra-panē, Nāraň-panāva

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 28 September 2016, 16:13 GMT]
The place or field of Hīnaṭi paddy

The place or field of leaf vegetables

The place or field of orange trees
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Ezhuka Thamizh has sent sharp message to all corners: Fr Ravichandran

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 27 September 2016, 18:36 GMT]
The main message coming from the ‘Ezhuka Thamizh’ uprising, especially from the people, who participated in their thousands, was that Tamils on the ground were not prepared to compromise their collective demand for self-rule in a merged North-East, said Jaffna-based human rights and civil activist Rev. Fr. M.V.E. Ravichandran in a video interview to TamilNet on Monday. Tamils reject the unitary system and the message has now been conveyed clearly to all the corners, he said. “Tamils want to live as a People and they don't want their cultural and national identity erased in any way. They are opposed to structural genocide,” the director of Jaffna Diocesan Catholic Youth Federation further said. Tamils should be given the right to appoint international judges to ensure the credibility of any model of investigations with international participation, he said.
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Sin of US, UN in Eezham War sets paradigm for Russia in Syrian War

[TamilNet, Monday, 26 September 2016, 18:12 GMT]
If the US bandwagon and the UN are really keen in seeking peace and justice in Syria, they should first set their paradigm right, by bringing in expeditious international justice to the war crimes and genocide committed on the nation of Eezham Tamils and by openly acknowledging the sin of their sponsorship in the Vanni War. Without that, shedding crocodile tears for the grave sufferings of the Syrian civilians, or coming out with empty threats against Russia and Syria that follow just the same model set by US bandwagon and ‘Sri Lanka’, would neither help world humanity nor would bring in any credibility to the UN or to the US bandwagon, commented Tamil activists for alternative politics in the island.
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SL military, Buddhist monk bring Sinhala ‘War Heroes’ project to Batticaloa

[TamilNet, Sunday, 25 September 2016, 23:27 GMT]
The so-called ‘Ranaviru Seva Authority’ (War Heroes Welfare Authority), an outfit operated by the Defence Ministry of genocidal Sri Lanka to support the families of war-dead soldiers and the wounded soldiers of the occupying Sinhala military has expanded its work to Batticaloa in close association with the Sinhala extremist monk Venerable Ampitiye Sumanarathna Thera, informed civil sources in the city of Batticaloa said. The main intention is to bring in poverty-stricken families of ‘Sinhala war heroes’ to occupy the country of Eezham Tamils through so-called ‘welfare settlements’ in the Tamil-speaking district.
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15,000 Tamils attend historic uprising in Jaffna, reject Unitary Constitution, ITAK draws flak

[TamilNet, Saturday, 24 September 2016, 16:10 GMT]
Ezhuka Thamizh (Let Tamil rise up), the biggest uprising to take place in the country of Eezham Tamils after the Pongku Thamizh uprisings during the times of the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE), declared on Saturday that the ‘consultations’ staged by Colombo for the new constitution completely failed to include the genuine political aspirations of the Tamil people. The Ilankai Thamizh Arasuk Kadchi (ITAK) with a hijacked leadership and the powers operating it, received a serious message from the people at the grassroots, regardless of the organisers of the event, that the people on the ground are fully prepared to replace the ITAK hierarchy once a good leadership takes shape to lead the nation of Eehzam Tamils in the next phase of their struggle. It is now time for NPC Chief Minister Justice C.V. Wigneswaran to prove the case, commented Tamil political observers in Jaffna.
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Tamil POWs denounce Colombo's latest announcement, continue fast

[TamilNet, Friday, 23 September 2016, 23:35 GMT]
Tamil Prisoners of War waging a continuous hunger strike at Anuradhapura prison told TamilNet on Friday that the latest announcement of Colombo's Ministry of Prison Reforms of sending 23 of the detained Tamil prisoners under the notorious ‘Prevention of Terrorism Act’ to the so-called ‘military rehabilitation’ before their release was a deceptive move. Most of those in the announced list were mentioned together with one case per person. But, most of the detainees were facing three to four cases in different courts and relieving them of one case with the outcome of ‘military rehabilitation’ will not deliver freedom to them from the other cases, they said. In addition, the announcement also contained names of those already released and subjected to military rehabilitation, which exposed the level of ignorance on the part of Colombo in addressing their PTA cases, the Tamil prisoners said.
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Varakā-pola, Koṭikā-pola, Val-pola, Gam-pola

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 20 September 2016, 21:39 GMT]
The place or country market for jackfruit

The place or country market for dried areca nut

The jungle place

The riverine place
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Colombo deploys discrimination in housing assistance to Peasaalai war-affected families

[TamilNet, Sunday, 18 September 2016, 19:42 GMT]
Fishing families from Peasaalai in Mannaar with widows, war-dead family members and those who displaced several times to Tamil Nadu and resettled back without any assistance so far, continue to be discriminated based on their past association with the Tamil struggle, informed civil sources in Mannaar said. Colombo's ministries and its local agent Divisional Secretary Mr Subramaniam Vasanthakumar have been blamed of being selective and practicing discrimination, according to the complaints coming from the affected people themselves.
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Catholic Peace Mission in Jaffna challenges Colombo’s propaganda on ‘reconciliation’

[TamilNet, Friday, 16 September 2016, 23:16 GMT]
While the President of genocidal Sri Lanka has brushed away the objective criticisms on the utter failure of one-way-determined ‘Sinhala-Only Reconciliation’ as mere propaganda coming from ‘fundamentalist media’ in the North-East, Rev. Fr. S.V.B. Mangalarajah, the president of the Justice & Peace Commission in Jaffna, has issued a report exposing some of the fundamental failures of this ‘one-way’ determined campaign of ‘reconciliation’ and the so-called ‘good governance’. Lands of the people not returned, political prisoners not released, lack of accountability for missing persons, serious apprehensions regarding the OMP, the PTA still being enforced, denial of memorial rights, lack of official arrangements to look after the victims of war, poisonous injections causing concern, failed local investigations and unabated erecting Buddha statues are pointed out in the report.
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Maharaja TV promotes genocidal military culture through ‘welfare’ projects in North-East

[TamilNet, Thursday, 15 September 2016, 22:06 GMT]
MTV Channel Private Ltd, the largest private media operator in the island, is actively promoting the military of genocidal Sri Lanka through it in ‘community welfare projects’ in the occupied Tamil homeland. The Shakthi media, operated by the MTV Channel, has been waging a propaganda campaign of ‘caring for people’ through its TV and FM channels and has launched a ‘secretariat’ to manage the controversial ‘project’, media sources said. The move is perhaps not controversial to the corporate outfit with a shady history of seeking political and commercial influence in the South in the past, but it is highly controversial to the occupied Eezham Tamils in the sense that the people, who are deprived of their sovereignty are being told to look upon the genocidal military as an authority running civil affairs in the occupied North and East, commented Tamil political observers in Batticaloa.
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Veḷicca-vīṭu

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 14 September 2016, 07:40 GMT]
The lighthouse
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Sirisena's Forest Department escalates appropriations of lands from Tamils in Vanni

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 13 September 2016, 17:19 GMT]
Occupying Colombo's Forest Department, deploying Sinhala civil servants from South as the officers in charge of the forest affairs in Vanni, has been increasingly harassing the resettled Eezham Tamils in Mullaiththeevu and Ki'linochchi districts under the rule of SL President Maithiripala Sirisena, Tamil civil sources in Mullaiththeevu told TamilNet on Tuesday. Eezham Tamils who have been engaged in agriculture before the times of war and during the times of war and have commenced agriculture in their deed-lands have been instructed by the SL Forest Department officers not to enter their agricultural lands at Thuvaarang-ku'lam and Mooppan-ku'lam in Maanthai East. The Divisional Secretary, when contacted by TamilNet, also confirmed the take-over of lands that were even verified by the Divisional Secretary as agricultural lands belonging to people from Chiraaddik-ku'lam.
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