Grenade attack kills soldier, injures wife in Trincomalee

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 28 December 2005, 04:29 GMT]
Mr. Sunil, a Sri Lanka Army (SLA) soldier, was killed, and his wife and brother-in-law were injured when unknown assailants hurled a grenade and opened fire inside the soldier's house located in Sangamam, a suburb located about five km northeast of Trincomalee town along Kandy-Trincomalee highway Tuesday night around 9 p.m, sources in Trincomalee said.
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Military uniforms discovered in Batticaloa church

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 28 December 2005, 00:55 GMT]
Two pairs of military fatigue jackets and trousers, two pairs of shoes and a bag were recovered Tuesday morning around 11:00 a.m. from a rest-room attached to St. Anthony's church located close to the St. Mary's church where the Tamil National Alliance MP Joseph Pararajasingham was murdered on Sunday.
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Pirapaharan pays tribute to slain TNA MP

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 27 December 2005, 22:43 GMT]
The leader of the Liberation Tigers, Mr. V. Pirapaharan, on Tuesday, paid tribute to the slain senior Tamil politician Mr. Joseph Pararajasingham in the Vanni. The body of the Tamil National Alliance paraliamentarian, who was shot inside Batticaloa St. Mary's Co-Catherdal during Christmas mass on Sunday, was taken to LTTE controlled Kokkadicholai on Monday and to Kilinochchi on Tuesday. The funeral service of the MP is to take place in the church where he was slain Thursday after receiving Holy Communion from Bishop Kingsley Swampillai.
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Rajapakse leaves for India on his first visit abroad

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 27 December 2005, 13:06 GMT]
Sri Lanka's President Mahinda Rajapakse, accompanied by his wife Shiranthi Rajapakse, Foreign Minister Mangala Samaraweera, Ministers Ferial Ashraf,Jeyaraj Fernadopulle and the Secretaries to various Ministries, left for India Tuesday in his first visit abroad at the invitationof the Indian President Abdul Kalam, government sources in Colombo said.


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Trincomalee observes hartal in protest against Pararajasingham's killing

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 27 December 2005, 13:01 GMT]
Trincomalee Tamil speaking people Tuesday observed a general shut down in response to the call by the Trincomalee district Tamil Resurgence Committee condemning the assassination of Mr. Joseph Pararajasingham and killings of Tamil civilians in their homeland, and demanding the withdrawal of government armed forces deployed in Trincomalee violating the Ceasefire Agreement, sources said.
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Kallady tsunami victims get permanent houses

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 27 December 2005, 12:36 GMT]
Thirty permanent houses constructed by the Tamil Rehabilitation Organization (TRO) with the financial assistance from the Operation-USA, an international non-government organization, were handed over to tsunami affected families in Kallady, at an event held Monday to mark the first year remembrance of tsunami disaster. Kallady is a remote village in the Eachchilampathu division, down south of Trincomalee district.
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US Tamils call for sanctions against SL Government

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 27 December 2005, 11:24 GMT]
Expressing anger and sadness at the killing of Senior Parliamentarian Joseph Pararajasingham, US based Tamil Organizations, in a press release issued Monday, pointed out that "Tamils killings are never investigated...and armed forces in Sri Lanka operate with complete impunity," and urged the international community to "show political and moral courage and impose sanctions on the government of Sri Lanka in order to put an immediate end of this deliberated and calculated violence."
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Eleven SLA soldiers killed in Claymore attack

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 27 December 2005, 07:36 GMT]
Eleven SLA soldiers were killed and six wounded in a Claymore ambush on a Sri Lanka Army convoy near the Regional Bus Depot, 1 km south of Point Pedro town on Jaffna-Point Pedro road at 12:50 p.m. Tuesday, Police said. Three civilians who were shot by the SLA troopers following the ambush were rushed to Point Pedro Teaching Hospital, medical sources said. Tension prevails in Point Pedro.
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Colombo's bona fides for peace, suspect- TNA

[TamilNet, Monday, 26 December 2005, 17:11 GMT]
The Tamil National Alliance (TNA) in a press release issued Monday said the assassination of Mr. Joseph Pararajasingham raises serious doubts in regard to the genuineness of the Government's commitment to the honest and purposeful pursuit of the peace process. "We consider it our duty to point out that the assassination of Mr. Pararajasingham, a Tamil leader unequivocally committed to the resolution of the Tamil question by peaceful means is a serious blow to the credibility of the peace process," the statement said.


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"How will International Community respond?"

[TamilNet, Monday, 26 December 2005, 13:27 GMT]
"A critical question looming large in Tamil Peoples' mind is how the International Community is going to express its reaction to the Government of Sri Lanka on the slaying of the senior Tamil democratic leader, Mr. Joseph Pararajasingham," Jaffna daily Uthayan said in its editorial Monday. The paper described the slaying of Joseph Pararajasigham as an attempt to "throttle the voice of Tamil Nationalism."
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Youth shot, seriously wounded in Akkaraipattu

[TamilNet, Monday, 26 December 2005, 13:02 GMT]
A 24-years-old Tamil youth, Mr. Satheeskumar, was shot and seriously wounded by unindentified gunmen Monday evening around 5:30 pm. at Pisthar Road in Akkaraipattu, 58 km south of Batticaloa town.
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Two Tamil youths shot and killed by SLA soldiers

[TamilNet, Monday, 26 December 2005, 09:59 GMT]
Sri Lanka Army troopers shot and killed two Tamil youths at Santhiveli 9 km north of Eravur in Batticaloa district around 10:30 a.m. Monday. The SLA soliders have told Eravur Police that they opened fire following gunshots fired at their troopers. The youths shot dead by the Lankan troopers are yet to be indentified, Eravur Police said.
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Housing for war, tsunami affected Trinco families

[TamilNet, Sunday, 25 December 2005, 17:20 GMT]
Twenty-six war affected Tamil families among several hundreds displaced from villages in the Kuchchaveli division, north of Trincomalee district and sheltered in a refugee camp, located in Alles Garden, sea coast of Trincomalee, moved to permanent houses built under the tsunami rehabilitation at Kumburupiddy east village Saturday. Some families have been living in temporary accommodation for more than twenty years, officials said.
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Rajapakse, SL Military Intelligence responsible for MPs murder - IFT

[TamilNet, Sunday, 25 December 2005, 16:39 GMT]
The Geneva based International Federation of Tamils (IFT), a consortium of more than 150 expatriate Tamil organizations, on Sunday urged the International Community, to condemn without delay, the brutal murder of the Tamil Parliamentarian and human rights activist Mr. Joseph Pararajasingham during the midnight Christmas cathedral service. The Federation urged the International Community to hold Sri Lanka government and President Mahinda Rajapakse responsible for the murder. IFT said Joseph Pararajasingham was a pragmatist, advocating for over a decade, even before the signing of the CFA, a direct dialogue between the government and the LTTE.
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LTTE confers "Maamanithar" title to Pararajasingham

[TamilNet, Sunday, 25 December 2005, 15:17 GMT]
Leader of Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam, Velupillai Pirapaharan, bestowed the title Maamanithar (Great Humanbeing) on the slain Senior Parliamentarian Joseph Pararajasingham Sunday. "Steadfast and honest, he is an excellent political leader. The Tamil people affectionately hailed him as a formidable fighter for human rights. His extra-ordinary attachment to the Tamil cause gravitated all towards him. The demise of Mr.Joseph Pararajasingham is an irreparable loss to the Tamil Nation," Pirapaharan said in the statement conferring the award.
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NESOHR mourns killing of Pararajasingham

[TamilNet, Sunday, 25 December 2005, 14:59 GMT]
Praising Joseph Pararajasingham as a human rights activist ready to take up human rights violations against his community in Batticoloa disregarding risks to his life, the Northeast Secretariat on Human Rights (NESOHR) in a press release issued Sunday said, " A land where human rights defenders’ life can be taken away so cheaply is a damned land. It is also a damning indictment on those who are charged with the responsibility of protecting them."
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Identity of Jaffna victims raises questions

[TamilNet, Sunday, 25 December 2005, 12:43 GMT]
One of the five bodies recovered by the Sri Lanka Army (SLA) and transferred to Jaffna Teaching Hospital claiming to be those of LTTE fighters, after the firefight near Jaffna Fort Saturday, was identified as belonging to Krishnar Vimaleswaran (31), a watcher at Jaffna Central College, located 300 meters from where the bodies were found. Relatives identified another body as belonging to Balasingham Santhirakanthan (24) who owns a motorbike repairshop in Kottadi Jaffna.
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One dead, another injured in separate incidents in Trincomalee

[TamilNet, Sunday, 25 December 2005, 12:25 GMT]
Mr.Weerakody (65), retired employee of the Sri Lanka Port Authority was shot dead Saturday night around 8.30 p.m. by unidentified men close to his house located in Orr's Hill area, a suburb in Trincomalee town. Large number of soldiers of the Sri Lanka Army and Sri Lanka Navy rushed to the site and took several Tamil civilians residing close to the scene for questioning. They were released Sunday afternoon by the Police, sources said.
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Tigers condemn the killing of Pararajasingham

[TamilNet, Sunday, 25 December 2005, 08:37 GMT]
Condemning the "appalling and vicious murder" of the Tamil National Alliance MP Mr. Joseph Pararajasingham, the Political Wing of the Liberation Tigers, on Sunday, charged the Sri Lankan military intelligence and the paramilitaries working with them for the killing of Mr. Pararajasingham, a Tamil nationalist and human rights activist. The Tigers also said the killing at the Christmas mass symbolised the "long hand of the chauvinistic forces such as the Jathika Hela Urumaya," was working through the Sri Lankan military intelligence wing.
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Pararajasingham slaying, a barbaric act - fellow Batticaloa MP

[TamilNet, Sunday, 25 December 2005, 01:19 GMT]
"The slaying of the senior and experienced politician from Batticaloa, Mr. Joseph Pararajasingham, while at prayer inside the church on the holy day of Christmas, was a barbaric act affecting the collective Tamil psyche," said the fellow Batticaloa District Tamil National Alliance (TNA) Member of Parliament Mr. S. Jeyananthamoorthy, who was on a political tour to Europe. The Batticaloa MP said that the time has come for the International Community, specially the EU and the Co-Chairs, to prevail upon the Sri Lankan Government to fully comply with the Ceasefire Agreement.
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