High Court acquits PTA accused

[TamilNet, Saturday, 16 April 2005, 18:13 GMT]
The Colombo High Court last week acquitted Tamil youth John Mariyaseelan, indicted under the Prevention of Terrorism Act (PTA) with the possession of a suicide jacket and a hand grenade, due to lack of evidence against the accused, legal sources said.
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LTTE meets with MEP in Dublin

[TamilNet, Saturday, 16 April 2005, 11:06 GMT]
Current LTTE mission to Europe is to communicate to the international community ground realities of the humanitarian crisis created by the tsunami and to expose the lack of progress towards establishing a Joint Mechanism to undertake post-tsunami reconstruction in an equitable manner, Head of LTTE Political Wing, S.P.Thamilchelvan, told the Mr.Eoin Ryan, Member of European Parliament (MEP) and Committee on Economic & Monetary Affairs, Committee on Development when the LTTE delegation met him in the Irish Parliamentary complex Saturday, LTTE sources said.
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Muslim Council, TRO jointly build shelters in Kinniya

[TamilNet, Saturday, 16 April 2005, 02:03 GMT]
Kinniya Muslim Theologian Council (Jamiethul Ulama Sabah- JUS) and Tamil Rehabilitation Organization (TRO) are jointly building 207 temporary shelters in the Muslim dominated Kinniya division for the tsunami affected families, civil sources said. The District Task Force assigned 207 shelters for Kinniya division, out of which TRO handed over construction of 100 units to JUS.
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"All Mullaitivu tsunami affected are in transit camps"- Maaran

[TamilNet, Saturday, 16 April 2005, 01:12 GMT]
"Of the 5905 families displaced by tsunami in Mullaitivu district, all 2124 families which needed a place to live have been transferred to transit camps [from welfare centers] and the rest are living with friends and relatives in a temporary setting. We are waiting for funds to start our third phase of resettling the families in permanent state land," said Mr Maaran, Head of Mullaitivu district Emergency Task Force (ETF), when TamilNet spoke to him recently in his offices in Mullaitivu.
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Polannaruwa magistrate visits Karuna Group / ENDLF camp

[TamilNet, Friday, 15 April 2005, 13:31 GMT]
Acting magistrate for Polannaruwa visited the place where the Karuna Group/ENDLF camps were attacked in the early hours of Friday morning. She inspected the five bodies, including that of a man identified as 'Vijayan', which were in huts in Vannaanthuraiyadi in the general area of Aralanganwila. However Informed sources in Sorivil said there were nine bodies in Vannaanthuraiyadi early Friday morning. Police said the attackers got away. ENDLF is a paramilitary based in South India.
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Nine killed in attack on paramilitary camp

[TamilNet, Friday, 15 April 2005, 02:22 GMT]
At least nine were killed in an attack on the camps of a paramilitary group in Sorivil in the Welikanda area, 80 kilometres northwest of Batticaloa Thursday morning, civilians in the area said. "We can neither confirm nor deny the reports of the attack", a senior military officer in the east said. The bodies of nine paramilitary cadres who were killed in the assault were lying near a river in Sorivil (Soruwila in Sinhala), an interior village in the Polannaruwa district. The ENDLF/Karuna Group set up five camps in the area recently, according to civilians in the area. Three paramilitary camps in Vannathuraiyadi near Sorivil were attacked. The other camps had supplies, according to villagers.
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LTTE delegation in Dublin: Thamilchelvan meets Irish Minister Conor Lenihan

[TamilNet, Thursday, 14 April 2005, 23:24 GMT]
Lack of consensus in Colombo, even in sharing resources to meet a natural disaster, has confounded the already existing humanitarian crisis, Mr. S.P. Thamilchelvan told Mr. Conor Lenihan T.D, Minister of State in Ireland with Special Responsibility for Overseas Development & Human Rights. Colombo is yet to respond to the Joint Mechanism proposals.
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SC holds State responsible for two disappeared youths

[TamilNet, Thursday, 14 April 2005, 12:01 GMT]
TSri Lanka's Supreme Court (SC) held last week that the State was responsible for the disappearance of two Tamil youths who were brothers after their arrest by soldiers of the Sri Lanka Army fifteen years ago on 6th July, 1990 in Trincomalee, legal sources said. The three member bench of the Supreme Court ordered the State to pay the petitioner who is the father of the two youths a sum of Rupees 300,000/= as compensation. The SC directed the State to pay the compensation within three months before the end of June, legal sources added.
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IDPs, tsunami victims celebrate New Year in camps, tents

[TamilNet, Thursday, 14 April 2005, 10:59 GMT]
Hundreds of thousands of internally displaced Tamil families affected by tsnunami and two decade old war Thursday celebrated another New Year in camps, welfare centres and make-shift structures as their own houses and agricultural lands in the Jaffna district are occupied by soldiers of the Sri Lanka Army (SLA), civil society sources said.


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Joint Mechanism a must for NorthEast reconstruction- Hindu Congress

[TamilNet, Thursday, 14 April 2005, 10:41 GMT]
The All Ceylon Hindu Congress (ACHC) in its New Year message said that the proposed Joint Mechanism is a must for the effective implementation of a relief, rehabilitation and reconstruction programme in the tsunami +destroyed coastal areas in the northeast province. It further expressed confidence that all efforts taken in regard to the establishment of a Joint Mechanism would prove fruitful with the dawn of the Tamil New Year " Paarthipa".
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TECH assists tsunami affected Muttur east, Vaakarai

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 13 April 2005, 16:22 GMT]
Trincomalee Economic Consultancy House (TECH) in collaboration with a non-governmental organization "SUSTAIN-United Kingdom" distributed ten sewing machines to women who lost their husbands in the tsunami disaster in the Muttur east villages. The donation was channelled through the Muttur East Women Development Association, TECH co-ordinator Mr.N.Kalaisangar said.
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"Mortar training confined to our area" - LTTE

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 13 April 2005, 15:13 GMT]
Responding to Sri Lanka Army (SLA) statement that pieces of artillery shells fired by LTTE fell on the army controlled area where Thoppur army camp is located, Mr.S.Elilan, Trincomalee district political head of the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) said Wednesday, "LTTE cadres conducted normal military training in our controlled area in the Muttur east in the Trincomalee district on Tuesday morning," sources said.
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Thamilchelvan meets Archbishop Desmond Tutu in South Africa

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 13 April 2005, 07:40 GMT]
LTTE Political Head Mr. S.P.Thamilchelvan and his delegation met Tuesday Human rights activist, Nobel laureate and Retired Archbishop Desmond Tutu of South Africa in Cape Town. The LTTE Political Head, who briefed the Nobel laureate on the current state of the CFA and post-tsunami humanitarian situation of the NorthEast, said that international engagement is significant for the proposed Joint Mechanism to become a reality. Desmond Tutu, who appreciated the LTTE for its commitment to the Norwegian facilitated Ceasefire Agreement (CFA), expressed his desire to visit NorthEast and see the plight of Tamil people, LTTE sources said.
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Trinco tsunami victims hold protest campaign

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 13 April 2005, 05:00 GMT]
About three hundred members of sixty four Tamil families in Salli, a fishing hamlet, eleven km off north of Trincomalee town Tuesday morning held a protest that the Sri Lanka government has not provided any relief after tsunami destroyed their fishing boats and houses. Protestors including men, women and children prevented vehicular movement from Sambaltivu village to Trincomalee, sources said.
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Politically motivated focus on child soldiers said detrimental to peace

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 12 April 2005, 19:41 GMT]
Addressing the 61st Session of UN Commission on Human Rights (CHR 61), Ms. Karen Parker, J.D., a human rights lawyer and chief delegate for International Educational Development - Humanitarian Law Project, an NGO accredited by the United Nations Economic and Social Council, warned Monday that politically motivated focus on child soldiers without genuine consideration for the children themselves is detrimental to peace. Ms. Parker urged the UN Commission to give full support to Sri Lankan peace process facilitated by the Norwegian Government.
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Media watchdog says JVP inciting violence against journalists

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 12 April 2005, 16:20 GMT]
Sri Lanka’s main press watchdog, Free Media Movement FMM, Tuesday expressed grave concern that a speech by Mr. Wimal Weerawansa, the powerful propaganda secretary of the Janatha Vimukthi Peramuna (JVP), could incite violence against journalists and media institutions. In a letter addressed to the Patriotic National Movement, a JVP affiliate which organized the meeting where Mr. Weerawansa spoke, FMM said “stop this hate campaign your organisation has launched against journalists and media institutions and to keep criticisms within the limits of democratic freedoms."
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Kilinochchi protest condemns delay in Joint Mechanism, ISGA

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 12 April 2005, 09:38 GMT]
Large number of Tamil civilians participated in the protest march held Monday morning in Killinochchi condemning the Government of Sri Lanka for its delay in establishing the joint mechanism to provide relief and rehabilitation to tsunami affected people and for the delay in setting up the interim self governing authority (ISGA) in the northeast. It also condemned the Sri Lanka Army (SLA) for carrying out a shadow war in the east, sources said.
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LTTE Political Head meets South African Deputy President

[TamilNet, Monday, 11 April 2005, 19:29 GMT]
Mr Thamilchelvan, head of LTTE political wing, told South African Deputy President Mr.Jacob Zuma that LTTE is committed to the CeaseFire Agreement and has expressed its readiness to recommence negotiations on the basis of the proposals submitted for the formation of an interim administration, when they met in Durban Monday, sources close to the LTTE said.


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Kumaratunga urged to organise ship service for Tamil returnees from India

[TamilNet, Monday, 11 April 2005, 15:07 GMT]
Mr.Selvam Adaikalanathan, Vanni district Tamil National Alliance (TNA) parliamentarian appealed Monday to Sri Lanka's President Chandrika Kumaratunge to take immediate steps to arrange a ship for the transportation of Sri Lankan Tamil refugees from South India to Sri Lanka. The refugees frequently risk their lives by illegal travel from Thanushkodi in South India to Talaimannar in Sri Lanka- a stretch of 18 km sea- in their anxiety to return to their motherland, the MP said.
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Thousands march in Vavuniya for peace

[TamilNet, Monday, 11 April 2005, 08:35 GMT]
More than three thousand people marched through Vavuniya town Monday demanding that the government of Sri Lanka restart the long stalled peace talks with the Liberation Tigers, set up a joint mechanism for Tsunami relief in the island's northeast and stop using its paramilitaries to attack LTTE activists . A public rally was held on the Vavuniya Urban Council grounds at the conclusion of the march. The march and rally were organised by 84 civil society groups in Vavuniya.
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