Colombo High Court postpones “White Flag” hearing

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 20 April 2011, 12:44 GMT]
The Colombo High Court Wednesday allowed an application by the accused Sarath Fonseka, retired Commander of the Sri Lanka Army (SLA), to reconsider his decision to give evidence on behalf of the defense in the controversial “white flag” case due to the current tense situation in the island following the release of a portion of the UN Experts Panel report to the UN Secretary General, legal sources in Colombo said.
Full story >>

‘Saving a state that refuses to be saved’

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 20 April 2011, 02:40 GMT]
A perusal of the leaked UN report would show that the outlook is to ultimately save the Sri Lankan state by providing it with an escape avenue through a minimum penalty of accepting a ‘concurrent’ international mechanism to investigate the war crimes. But the reactions coming from Colombo only show that such an undue consideration on the part of the UN and the IC towards Sri Lanka is futile as state has never been orientated in the island for peaceful unity or for being genocide-free. Perhaps a chance has now been given especially to the Sinhala masses to demonstrate their choice between supporting a criminal regime that tries to save its skin by citing love to a genocidal `mother country´ and recognizing the love of both the Sinhalese and Eezham Tamils towards their mother countries in order to pave way for true reconciliation, writes A. Vijayshankar of Tamil Nadu who is now in Norway.
Full story >>

TNA urges GoSL not to miss the opportunity to engage in equality process

[TamilNet, Monday, 18 April 2011, 18:38 GMT]
R. Sampanthan, the parliamentary group leader of the Tamil National Alliance (TNA), in his response to the leaked recommendations of the UN Panel, on Monday said that the TNA urged the Rajapaksa regime not to miss the opportunity to "constructively engage in a process which would result in all the Peoples of Sri Lanka being the beneficiaries of genuine democracy, equality and justice."
Full story >>

Rajapaksa wants May Day rally against UN report

[TamilNet, Monday, 18 April 2011, 06:18 GMT]
Sri Lanka’s President Mahinda Rajapaksa has appealed to organizers of the Sri Lanka Freedom Party, main constituent of the ruling United Peoples Freedom Alliance (UPFA) to turn the May Day rally into a massive show of strength against the UN Experts Panel report and the people are with him despite accusation that the government had committed war crimes, according to a news report of the Sunday Times.
Full story >>

UN Panel gives Colombo a lesson on "Theory of Justice"

[TamilNet, Sunday, 17 April 2011, 21:12 GMT]
The three-member UN panel rejected Sri Lanka's two-pronged notion of accountability that focussed on the responsibility of past Governments and of the LTTE, saying that the approach "does not envisage a serious examination of the Government’s decisions and conduct in prosecuting the final stages of the war or the aftermath, nor of the violations of law that may have occurred as a result." International standards mandate that any approach to accountability should "place the rights and dignity of the victims of the conflict at the centre," the panel said, and explained to Colombo that "[a]ccountability for serious violations of international humanitarian or human rights law is not a matter of choice or policy; it is a duty under domestic and international law."
Full story >>

"Prepared to go to gallows to save Motherland" - Rajapakse

[TamilNet, Saturday, 16 April 2011, 20:01 GMT]
Sri Lanka's President Mahinda Rajapaksa, during a meeting held at Temple Trees today with electoral officers, declared that he is willing to go even to gallows to safeguard his motherland. "Certain groups with vested interest are still hell bent on bringing disrepute to Sri Lanka, almost two years after the war was ended," Rajapakse said according to political sources in Colombo. Rajapakse made these statements in reference to the UN-panels report on Sri Lanka war crimes which was submitted to UN Secretary General Ban Ki-Moon. Sri Lanka-based paper Island leaked the executive summary of the report in an attempt to soften the damages before the UN releases the full report, a political observer in Colombo said.
Full story >>

UN panel admits international failure in Vanni war, calls for investigations

[TamilNet, Saturday, 16 April 2011, 08:22 GMT]
"During the final stages of the war, the United Nations political organs and bodies failed to take actions that might have protected civilians," said the United Nations Panel on Sri Lanka in its final report to Secretary General Ban-ki Moon. The report has also admitted that the UN system knowingly failed to release the casualty figures of the civilians. Although the report didn't touch the hot topic of serious allegations against the role the UN officials and certain responsible personalities associated with world powers, it said: The Secretary-General should conduct a comprehensive review of actions by the United Nations system during the war in Sri Lanka and the aftermath, regarding the implementation of its humanitarian and protection mandates.
Full story >>

Sinhalese demanding ransom captured by villages in Jaffna

[TamilNet, Friday, 15 April 2011, 16:34 GMT]
The three men, who came in a white colored van, searching for the trader, had earlier claimed that they were from Pillayan's TMVP and issued a letter to the trader for a fee of 30,000 rupees while he was visiting Trincomalee. After issuing the letter, they also informed their contacts in Vavuniyaa military check-post while the trader was travelling back to Jaffna.
Full story >>

Canada orders deportation of Mrs. Parajasingham

[TamilNet, Friday, 15 April 2011, 03:41 GMT]
Canada has ordered the deportation of the widow of Joseph Pararajasingham, the Tamil National Alliance (TNA) parliamentarian shot dead during at Christmas Mass in 2005 at packed church in the then Sri Lankan government-controlled Batticaloa town, the Toronto Star reported. Canada says 74 year old grandmother, Mrs. Sugunm Joseph, is a member “by association” of the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE), because her husband was a member of the TNA, the largest Tamil political party of Eezham Tamils in the island. Mr. Parajasingham was killed just weeks after President Mahinda Rajapaksa assumed office after the elections in November 2005.
Full story >>

SLA soldiers, para military attack local Tamil traders in Batticaloa

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 13 April 2011, 11:19 GMT]
Local Tamil traders from Vadamunai, Pendugalseanai, Oothuchcheanai, Poththanai, Tharavai and Kudumpimalai areas in Chiththa'ndy division who had gone to collect milk from dairy farms in Paduwankarai area came under attack by soldiers of the Sri Lanka Army (SLA) and cadres of para military groups. SLA soldiers and para military cadres had attacked them asking them to show the hide outs of LTTE in the area, according to affected traders.
Full story >>

Remembering Mu’l’livaaykkaal to focus on injustice of powers

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 13 April 2011, 05:16 GMT]
With all recent revelations, the most crucial question the Eezham Tamils have to now openly ask Washington and New Delhi is that like their understanding on the elimination of the LTTE, whether they have already decided that dismemberment of the Eezham Tamil nation is the ‘lasting solution’ for the national crisis in the island – whether they have already entered into an agreement with the Rajapaksa regime on this. It is folly on the part of a section of Tamil political circles to think that they should not confront the powers on this crucial question of life and death of their nation. Remembering Mu’l’livaaykkaal in the month of May should mobilise Eezham Tamils of all political shades to rise up in unison and boldly ask justice for what Washington and New Delhi had done to them. Tamils have seen enough of the ‘reconciliation and development’ hoodwink.
Full story >>

UN served a ploy to surrender killings

[TamilNet, Monday, 11 April 2011, 12:47 GMT]
Around 18 hours before the surrender of the LTTE Political Head B Nadesan and other civil officials of the LTTE that ended in their killing by the Sri Lanka Army, the UN officials served in the island met in Vavuniyaa and made plans to receive them on behalf of the UN. The UN officials were very well aware of who were coming to surrender, said a high-ranking UN worker who was involved in the arrangements to TamilNet on Monday. All the UN officers who served in the island at the time of the war are either no more in UN service or have left the island. The UN was used as a ploy in arranging and enacting the ‘surrender’ and then to kill the LTTE officials, Tamil political observers said. Vijay Nambiar, chief of staff to Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon, was in Colombo at the time.
Full story >>

Seine-net beaches in Mullaiththeevu distributed to Sinhala fishermen

[TamilNet, Sunday, 10 April 2011, 15:27 GMT]
Traditional seine-net beaches (Karaivalai-paadu) of Eezham Tamils in the coastal tracts of Mullaiththeevu district are grabbed and distributed among Sinhala fishermen from the south by a team of SL fisheries officials from the south. The excuse is that the local Tamil fishermen in the LTTE controlled areas did not register their seine-net stretches with the SL fisheries ministry. 12 stretches in A’lampil, 8 stretches in Thoo’ndaavil and 5 stretches in Chemmalai are thus grabbed and given to the Sinhalese. The Mullaiththeevu Government Agent as well as the district fisheries director had no knowledge of what the Sinhala officials from the south were doing. Meanwhile, Sinhala fishermen in Kalpiddi in the south, after seeing Tamil Nadu trawlers in their waters, are meeting on Monday to mobilise ‘Jaffna-Sinhala’ corporation against ‘Indian poaching.’
Full story >>

Robert Blake’s ‘reconciliation’ is farming in Tamil land for SL military

[TamilNet, Sunday, 10 April 2011, 12:02 GMT]
While the US Asst Secretary of State Robert O Blake testified before the US Foreign Affairs Committee on the “reduction of the reach of High Security Zones” (HSZ) in the island to support his vision of progress that is taking place towards the US State Department-conceived paradigm of ‘reconciliation,’ evidences that come from Jaffna show that the occupying genocidal SL military is engaged in full-fledged farming and horticulture in the largest HSZ in Jaffna Peninsula, reportedly by using slave labour of the captured LTTE cadres. The Valikaamam HSZ, created after uprooting villages, is in the best of the fertile lands and the occupying military has already leased out large tracts of them to Sinhala businessmen. If farming could take place why mines are an excuse to hand over the lands to the owners, ask Tamils.
Full story >>

HRW demands accountability for wartime disappearances

[TamilNet, Friday, 08 April 2011, 05:19 GMT]
Human Rights Watch, a New York based rights organization, said in a press release issued Friday that "[t]hrough interviews with relatives of the missing and witnesses, published testimony, and media reports, Human Rights Watch found that more than 20 people who were taken into army custody between May 16 and 18, 2009, appear to have been forcibly disappeared. Most of them are known to have been detained in the Vadduvaakal area, just south of the strip of land in northeastern Sri Lanka where the final battle between the LTTE and government forces occurred. At the time, the area was controlled by the Sri Lankan army’s 59 Division," and demanded that Colombo "should account for everyone who was taken into custody."
Full story >>

Heavy competition in capturing Tamil media in the island

[TamilNet, Friday, 08 April 2011, 00:42 GMT]
Shares of a leading all-island Tamil daily, Thinakkural, published simultaneously in Colombo and Jaffna, were for ‘sale’ recently for hundreds of millions, and the competitors ranged from a former LTTE bigwig in the Rajapaksa camp and a Sinhala media house to circles close India. Ultimately, another leading Tamil daily in the island, The Virakesari, succeeded in purchasing 41 percent of the shares for 240 million rupees, informed media circles in Colombo said. Meanwhile, Sri Lankan state-owned media establishment Lake House has started publishing a Jaffna edition of its Tamil daily Thinakaran. Colombo soon plans to bring out this edition of Thinakaran using the facilities of Eezhanaatham, the only daily that was earlier coming from Vanni and the building of which is now occupied by the SL colonial military.
Full story >>

SL parliament debates emergency extension motion

[TamilNet, Thursday, 07 April 2011, 11:27 GMT]
While moving a motion to seek the approval of House to extend the State of Emergency for another month, Sri Lanka’s Prime Minister D.M. Jayaratne Thursday claimed in parliament that LTTE’s international network remain intact even after LTTE's defeat two years ago in the battlefield. Jayaratne referred to the talks between with US Assistant Secretary of State and the representatives of the Global Tamil Forum (GTF) and the British Tamil Forum (BTF) recently. The State of Emergency is being extended every month with the approval of the parliament since August 2005.
Full story >>

Forced registration in Batticaloa

[TamilNet, Sunday, 03 April 2011, 19:07 GMT]
Sri Lanka Army (SLA) has instructed residents of Vellaveli in Batticaloa district to register with the village level officers (Grama Niladhari-GN), civil society sources in Batticaloa said. The SLA has directed the GN to submit all names of residents of the village in forms supplied to them. SLA has also directed the villagers to indicate whether the household members include ex-cadres of the LTTE and disabled due to conflict. This has caused tension and fear among the villagers.
Full story >>

US initiated ‘contact groups’ to militarily weaken Eezham Tamils

[TamilNet, Friday, 01 April 2011, 12:04 GMT]
Two international ‘contact groups', one each to check LTTE fund-raising and arms purchases were initiated by the U.S, in the first half of 2006, says The Hindu article Friday, based on the US cables accessed by The Hindu through Wikileaks. A cable sent in August 2006 from the US Embassy in New Delhi discloses the composition of the contact groups for the first time: representatives of Australia, Belgium, Canada, France, Germany, India, Indonesia, Italy, Japan, Malaysia, the Philippines, Singapore, Switzerland, Thailand, the United Kingdom and the United States, The Hindu feature further said.
Full story >>

300 Tamils, Muslims appeal to LLRC to locate missing relatives

[TamilNet, Sunday, 27 March 2011, 15:16 GMT]
The Lessons and Learnt Reconciliation Commissioner (LLRC) Sunday morning commenced its sittings at the auditorium of the Kalmunai (Tamil) Divisional Secretariat and recorded statements from over three hundred persons including Tamils and Muslims who have lost their children and spouses due to the arrest, abduction and killing by the Intelligence Unit of the Sri Lanka Army (SLA) and cadres of para military groups led by Karuna and Pilliayan, sources in Ampaa'rai said.
Full story >>