SL military extends HSZ in Jaffna, evicts resettled people from Kuppuzhaan North

[TamilNet, Friday, 22 June 2012, 23:46 GMT]
The occupying Sri Lanka Army in Jaffna has re-confiscated more than 250 acres of land in Kuppuzhaan North in Valikaamam South division of Jaffna district in recent days, evicting resettled families from their land, complain the uprooted families. The Sinhala Army has been putting up permanent concrete fences and has instructed people not to cross the fence. The news of the latest land grab by the SL military and the news of people being evicted again from the resettled areas of the former ‘High Security Zone’, on top of the news that the SL military planting land mines in de-mined areas of Maathakal, have slashed hopes of resettlement among the 40,000 people, who still remain as uprooted people after their eviction from Valikaamam HSZ.
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SL Navy plants land mines again, steps up genocidal land grab of Maathakal

[TamilNet, Thursday, 21 June 2012, 17:51 GMT]
Uprooted Eezham Tamils from Maathakal West in Valikaamam South-West, who went to check their lands this week, have been chased away from entering the coastal village by the occupying Sinhala Navy, which still regards the area as it's so-called High Security Zone. The uprooted people, who have been periodically inspecting their houses in the border areas of the HSZ, usually escaping the scrutiny of the SL Navy, have now witnessed the SL Navy planting land mines again inside the HSZ where de-mining had been completed earlier. While the uprooted have been continuously staging protests against the genocidal land grab, the entire coastal stretch has been snatched away from the people by the colonial SL military that has fenced the beach for the construction of military cantonment, erecting houses for SL Navy.
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Colombo stands exposed after attack on democratic protesters: Tamil politicians

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 20 June 2012, 16:35 GMT]
The General Secretary of Democratic Peoples Front (DPF), Kumaraguruparan, who participated in both the protests in the city and in Thellppazhai in Jaffna this week told media that the way the Sri Lankan legal system and the police were deployed, and the way the peaceful protesters were attacked while they were returning home, raised questions whether the SL State wants the people to opt for an armed struggle again. Such suppressive and violent responses by the SL state apparatus has justified the armed struggle waged by Tamils in the past, he said. “You don't attack buses carrying participants of a peaceful protest,” he said. In the meantime, grassroot political activists in Jaffna also recalled that the participants who went in a bus to attend the annual meeting of the Ilangkai Thamizh Arasuk Kadchi (ITAK), which was held in Batticaloa were also subjected to a similar attack.
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Colombo deploys riot police, blocks protest against land grab in Jaffna

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 19 June 2012, 11:47 GMT]
Riot control commandos of the Sri Lankan Police were deployed in large numbers Tuesday morning confronting hundreds of peaceful protesters, who objected the land grab being undertaken by the occupying SL military inside the so-called High Security Zone. The protesters were demanding immediate resettlement in Valikaamam North. Parking several vehicles across the road and deploying armed riot commandos, the officers of the SL police told the protesters that they would not be allowed to march on the KKS Road to hand over a petition at the Divisional Secretariat in Thellippazhai. The protestors have given one month for the SL authorities to respond and have warned to step up the protest campaign unless there was no favorable response by the SL government to their demands.
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Civil disobedience against occupying SL military's land grab gains momentum

[TamilNet, Monday, 18 June 2012, 15:14 GMT]
The Sri Lankan Police in Jaffna on Monday blocked a protest that gained momentum receiving wider participation against the occupying SL military's land grab in the peninsula. As hundreds of activists gathered in front of the Jaffna Bus Stand, the SL Police appealed to the Judge of the District Court stating that the Police had information that 'destructive elements' were about to use the protest to disturb normalcy in the city and blocked the protest at last minute. The protest, initiated by the Tamil National Peoples Front (TNPF) and attended by the Tamil National Alliance (TNA), Mano Ganesan's Democratic Peoples Front (DPF) and the leftist parties from the South as well the support it received from the Jaffna University Students Union (JUSU) and the trade unions including the teachers trade union, marked the protest as first of its kind in the post-war scenario in the peninsula.
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Planned omission of Tamils from voters registry alleged in East

[TamilNet, Sunday, 17 June 2012, 20:20 GMT]
As part of its tactics in demographic manipulations, the Colombo government has deleted the names of a section of Tamil voters from the village of Aa'rumukaththaan-kudiyiruppu in Chengkaladi DS division of Batticaloa district, a civil official told TamilNet Sunday. Around 300 names of voters belonging to 138 Tamil families of the village have been deleted from 2011 voters’ register, the official said.
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Defender of Tamil sovereignty selected for Queen's Jubilee medal in Canada

[TamilNet, Saturday, 16 June 2012, 11:13 GMT]
Krisna Saravanamuttu, a second generation Eezham Tamil youth activist in Canada, is set to receive the Queen Elizabeth II Diamond Jubilee medal next month. The 26-year-old Mr. Saravanamuttu, who was nominated for this award for his work within the Tamils in Canada and the broader Canadian community by Cabinet Minister in charge of Training, Colleges and Universities Mr. Glen Murray, has been in the forefront advocating the need for an independent international investigation into the war crimes and genocide of Eezham Tamils by Sri Lanka. He has also been demanding a referendum among the Eezham Tamils on the basis of historical, earned and remedial aspects of Tamil sovereignty as the only means to check the protracted genocide of the Eezham Tamil nation.
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Declare for referendum in any unity meeting

[TamilNet, Saturday, 16 June 2012, 00:06 GMT]
All groups of Eezham Tamils in the island and in the diaspora, seeking various shades of political solution beyond the present constitution of Sri Lanka, should meet together to present a joint stand of them, is an opinion currently pressurising all of them, mainly the TNA, both the factions of the TGTE, GTF and the Country Councils in various Western countries. While it is well known that the pressure ultimately comes from dubious international crisis management forces that are keen in diffusing the national question of Eezham Tamils through ‘tangent’ approaches, Eezham Tamil political groups could make use of the move to solidly present certain fundamentals to the edification of the so-called international community and India. The most fundamental, democratic and irrefutable stand is to demand for getting an answer from the concerned people through a referendum.
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Eezham Tamil football players take part in Viva World Cup for first time

[TamilNet, Friday, 15 June 2012, 21:13 GMT]
Competing with other nations without states, “Tamil Eelam Football Association”, an Eezham Tamil diaspora football club participated in VIVA 2012 World Cup for the first time this year. Making it’s debut on 6th June, TEFA, a football team comprising of players from across the world, participated in the tournament at Erbil, Kurdistan, scoring the first victory for Tamil Eelam in football on Saturday in a match against Raetia. The newly assembled football team of young Eezham Tamils won one match out of four, rank seventh in the tournament. The tournament was won by Iraqi Kurdistan, with Northern Cyprus as runners up and Zanzibar in the third position.
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1033 lands, houses to be permanently appropriated for SL military in Jaffna

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 13 June 2012, 23:41 GMT]
After appropriating thousands of acres of land in Mullaiththeevu, Ki'linochchi, Mannaar and Vavuniyaa districts of the Northern Province, the SL military establishment in the North has accelerated its drive of appropriating 1033 properties, most of them privately owned lands and buildings, for the three SL armed forces outside the already seized ‘High Security Zone’ in the peninsula, civil officials in Jaffna told TamilNet, giving statistical breakdown of figures from the internal records of the occupying military. Colombo has passed the responsibility of land appropriation in Jaffna to its colonial military governor Maj. Gen. (retd) GA Chandrasri, according to the informed officials. In the meantime, the commander of the occupying SL military in Jaffna, Maj. Gen. Hathurusinghe, has defended the military move to maintain permanent camps in areas outside the so-called High Security Zones.
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Emerging pattern of SL judicial proceedings needs perusal

[TamilNet, Monday, 11 June 2012, 19:26 GMT]
When gunmen killed the Changkaanai temple priest in 2010, the commander of the occupying Sinhala military in Jaffna, Maj. Gen. Hathurusinghe, first accused former LTTE cadres, later said SL Army gun borrowed from corrupt troops was used by former LTTE carders, and subsequently all the arrested - two SLA personnel and two alleged former militants were released by the courts. A pattern is now seen in producing cases in the courts related to the murder of two Eezham Tamils, a UK deportee and a Canadian citizen in Trincomalee and in Ki'linochchi. Media in Colombo is busy in highlighting the SL prosecution version of personal motivation, once again involving SL military personnel in one case and former militants in the other, to exclude the responsibility of top SL military command.
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Sinhala militarisation expanded in Jaffna contrary to claims: Jaffna Paper

[TamilNet, Thursday, 07 June 2012, 23:30 GMT]
Contrary to news reports released by Colombo that it has drastically reduced the number of troops in the North, the occupying Sinhala military in Jaffna peninsula has been stepping up land grab for military purposes in recent days even outside of the so-called High Security Zone and former Forward Defence Lines in the Jaffna peninsula. Uthayan Tamil daily, published in Jaffna, on Thursday broke a front-page story that SL military has begun to appropriate 61 acres of land in the peninsula from the civic bodies and private owners in three divisions. After already grabbing thousands of acres of land, the genocidal SL military has now set afoot to appropriate 35 acres in Thellippazhai division, 24 acres in Jaffna division and 2 acres in Nalloor division of the peninsula.
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Canadian Tamils join protesting Queen hosting Rajapaksa

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 06 June 2012, 23:53 GMT]
Eezham Tamils in Canada protested the hosting of Sri Lankan President Mahinda Rajapaksa at the British Queen’s Diamond Jubilee Celebrations on Wednesday. The demonstration took place in front of the British Consulate-General in Toronto. The Queen of England is also the head of State and Queen of Canada. The protesters displayed placards calling SL President Mahinda Rajapakse as a war criminal and shouted slogans against the ongoing genocide against Eezham Tamils. They also condemned Sri Lanka's membership in the Commonwealth.
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Chennai British mission insults protestors, say grassroot Tamil organisations

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 06 June 2012, 21:31 GMT]
The Periyar Dravidar Kazhakam (PDK), the striking and pioneer section of the Dravidian movement of Tamil Nadu, on Wednesday condemned the British mission in Chennai for not receiving in person the memo of the 19 mainstream political parties and grassroot organisations of Tamil Nadu protesting the hosting of Rajapaksa by the British Queen celebrating 60 years of coronation. The diplomatic mission, despite prior intimation of a memorandum to be submitted, made the demonstrators to put their memo into the mailbox at the gate of the mission. Tamils had a relationship with British imperialism since its initial years of founding the Madras Presidency, a major constituent of today’s India. Kolathoor Mani of PDK asked whether the British government and the international community want Tamils to be anti-imperialistic in the current context.
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Rajapaksa's proposed speech at Economic Forum cancelled

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 05 June 2012, 21:16 GMT]
The Commonwealth Business Council (CBC) cancelled the morning sessions of the Diamond Jubilee Commonwealth Economic Forum where genocide accused Sri Lankan President Mahinda Rajapaksa was due to speak Wednesday. On their site, the CBC stated that “After careful consideration the morning sessions of the Forum on Wednesday 6th of June have been cancelled and will not take place.” However, informed sources told TamilNet that the event was cancelled owing to fear of massive protests at the venue of Mansion House, which is near the Bank area in London, and problems of policing a demonstration of large proportions.
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Rajapaksa visit to Queen’s jubilee evokes spontaneous responses

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 05 June 2012, 01:23 GMT]
Diamond Jubilee celebrating Queen of England hosting genocide-accused Sinhala President Mahinda Rajapaksa evokes spontaneous responses from the leadershipless Eezham Tamils all over the world. The responses emanating from dormant anger are actually addressed to the so-called international community and more than that, are directed against the mediocre claimants for leadership among Eezham Tamils who would not dare to take a step without getting ‘signals’ from the masters in the IC, commented a veteran Tamil political observer in London. Commenting further on the Sinhalese in London welcoming Rajapaksa, he said the Tamils have no qualms about it. The Sinhala nation has every right to seek recognition and it should articulate in every possible way. Our problem is the adamant refusal of the IC and India to see that there are two nations in the island, he said.
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ICC a fraud, goes only after Africa's tin-pot dictators, says Boyle

[TamilNet, Sunday, 03 June 2012, 00:09 GMT]
Commenting on the recent sentencing of Charles Taylor by the UN's Special Court for Sierra Leone (SC-SL) for 50 years and the ruling by the UN's International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda (ICTR) giving life imprisonment to Rwanda's Nzabonimana, Professor Boyle, an expert in International Law, who teaches at the University of Illinois College of Law, told TamilNet, that UN's "International Criminal Court (ICC) has become a joke and a fraud. I supported it originally. But no more. It has no credibility whatsoever. It [ICC] just goes after tin-pot dictators in Africa while real war criminals such as Bush...get off scot-free... I am keeping Rajapaksas et al on my list of things to do," Boyle said.
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Rajapaksa’s confirmed London visit elicits Tamil protests

[TamilNet, Saturday, 02 June 2012, 10:46 GMT]
Mahinda Rajapaksa’s scheduled visit to the British Monarch’s Diamond Jubilee celebrations next week and his planned speech at Mansion House, and the UK government’s endorsement of the genocide accused Sri Lankan president drew protests from hundreds of Eezham Tamils at a demonstration organized by the Tamil Coordinating Committee-UK (TCC-UK) at the Commonwealth Secretariat in London on Friday. “The invitation of Mr Rajapaksa who is manipulating geopolitical rivalries at the UN to evade international law flies in the face of the Commonwealth's claimed values of human rights and international law,” Sasithar Maheswaran from the TCC-UK told TamilNet.
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IC role in massacre of Tamils a shame for entire century: Kurdish activist

[TamilNet, Friday, 01 June 2012, 07:26 GMT]
The international players knew what was going to happen in May 2009 to the Tamils but they did nothing to prevent it, and that was a shame right at the beginning of the 21st century, and a shame for the entire century, stated Mirham Yigit, Head of Kurdish Institute in Germany, in an interview to TamilNet. Talking about the current phase of the Kurdish nationalist movement, the role of the Kurdish diaspora, the importance of ideology in the struggle, the senior Kurdish activist said that when “illegal and militarist states” cooperate with one another, it was necessary for people oppressed by such states to build greater solidarity with each other.
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Uprooted Tamils live with UXO threat, UN agencies silent on demographic ‘conquest’

[TamilNet, Thursday, 31 May 2012, 04:30 GMT]
Uprooted Eezham Tamils from the coastal villages of Mullaiththeevu district, denied resettlement in their own lands and forced to ‘resettle’ in Koampaavil resettlement-scheme, away from the radars of international media and human rights activists, have been abandoned without proper humanitarian assistance. Meanwhile, the families, clearing lands have been confronted with unexploded ordnance in the area that has been declared by UN agencies as clear of landmines. Last Sunday, 37-year-old Manoranjitham Asokkumar, a mother of three children, sustained serious injuries while clearing her plot of land. Local humanitarian workers, who gave photographs to TamilNet, alleged that the UN agencies had failed to even highlight the plight of the civilians who face the threat of landmines in the area, which the agencies have earlier verified as clear of landmines.
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