Curb activities of paramilitaries, SLMM urges SL Government

[TamilNet, Thursday, 22 July 2004, 12:01 GMT]
''The SLMM has strongly urged the government to take meaningful and effective action to curb the activities of paramilitary groups including that of Karuna faction and the EPDP'', Major General (retd) Trond Furuhovde, Head of Sri Lanka Monitoring Mission told LTTE Head of Political Wing, S.P.Thamilchelvan, when both met in Kilinochchi Thursday morning, LTTE peace secretariat website said.
Full story >>

SLA officer says he arrested missing Jaffna youth

[TamilNet, Thursday, 22 July 2004, 09:43 GMT]
Sri Lanka’s Attorney General (AG) Thursday informed the Jaffna High Court that Lt. Col. T. M Mahindarathne, a Sri Lanka army officer who is the first respondent in a habeas corpus application, has written to the AG’s department acknowledging that he had indeed taken into custody Mr. Velupillai Uthayakumar on 17 June 1997 in Kodikamam, a town in the northern peninsula. Mr. Uthayakumar is among more than 600 Tamil persons who went missing after they were arrested by the Sri Lanka army in 1996-97.
Full story >>

SLMM head to meet LTTE political leadership Thursday

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 21 July 2004, 23:31 GMT]
The Norwegian Head of the Sri Lanka Monitoring Mission (SLMM), Major General (retd) Trond Furuhovde, is scheduled to hold talks with Political Head of the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE), Mr.S.P.Thamilchelvan, Thursday morning at Killinochchi Peace Secretariat, SLMM sources said.
Full story >>

Jaffna fishing production increases amid poaching, security restriction

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 21 July 2004, 19:13 GMT]
Jaffna district last year recorded a fish production of about 21,206 metric tones amid poaching and restrictions imposed by the Sri Lanka security forces on fishing by local population. Currently about 14,515 fishermen from 14,780 families are engaged in fishing in the peninsula, fisheries sources said.
Full story >>

SLA opposes student participation in LTTE events

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 21 July 2004, 00:46 GMT]
Major General Susil Chandrapala, Jaffna area commander of the Sri Lanka Army (SLA), has requested the Human Rights of Commission of Sri Lanka (HRCSL) to take steps to stop students participating in events organized by the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) in future, sources said.
Full story >>

Two men shot in Eravur

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 20 July 2004, 15:20 GMT]
Two persons were shot by unidentified gunmen around 8.30 p.m. Tuesday in Eravur, 16 kilometres north of Batticaloa town. Police said the two were left for dead by their assailants. Both survived the shooting with wounds, they said. One of the wounded was formerly a member of the LTTE, according to Eravur Police.
Full story >>

Tamil MPs slam SLA, paramilitaries for threats to media

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 20 July 2004, 14:14 GMT]
“Journalist Nadesan was murdered because the Sri Lankan government did not disarm paramilitary groups working with the military as it agreed to do under the cease-fire agreement. A paramilitary group in Batticaloa killed Nadesan and is threatening other independent journalists with death. This group cannot roam Batticaloa with weapons and intimidate and murder journalists without the military’s permission”, said Mr. Senathirajah Jeyanandamoorthy, Tamil National Alliance MP for Batticaloa speaking Tuesday during a debate in the Sri Lankan Parliament on the state of the media in the island.
Full story >>

Japan funds Surgery Unit in Kilinochchi

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 20 July 2004, 10:15 GMT]
Japanese Government funded new Intensive Care Unit (ICU)was opened at the Kilinochchi Hospital Tuesday, sources from Vanni said. Dr. Yugi Miahara from the Economic Division of the Japanese Embassy unveiled the name plate and opened the new building during the opening ceremony.
Full story >>

Fall of SLA’s Mullaithivu base remembered

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 20 July 2004, 03:36 GMT]
The public in Mullaithivu conducted a special rally Sunday to mark the capture eight years ago of the Sri Lanka Army’s Mullaithivu base by the Liberation Tigers, press reports from the North said.
Full story >>

No date fixed for parliamentary debate on ISGA

[TamilNet, Monday, 19 July 2004, 17:12 GMT]
No date has been fixed for the proposed three day debate on the Interim Self Governing Authority (ISGA) proposal of the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) during the fourth session of the parliament which is scheduled to begin Tuesday amid confusion and controversy as the minority United People’s Freedom Alliance (UPFA) government is still struggling to secure parliamentary majority, political sources said.
Full story >>

PTA was big blunder by Tamil politicians - TNA MP

[TamilNet, Monday, 19 July 2004, 16:46 GMT]
“Tamil Parliamentarians committed a great blunder by not opposing the Prevention of Terrorism Act (PTA). It was wrong on our part for not objecting or raising our voices against the draconian bill”, said Mr. Nadarajah Raviraj, Tamil National Alliance MP for Jaffna, speaking Monday at a public meeting in Colombo to mark the 25th anniversary of the PTA and to launch a campaign for its repeal. The meeting was organised at the Sri Lanka Foundation Institute in Colombo jointly by the Centre for Policy Alternatives (CPA) and the Centre for Human Rights and Development (CHRD).
Full story >>

World Bank team holds workshop in Kilinochchi

[TamilNet, Monday, 19 July 2004, 10:50 GMT]
World Bank Country Director for Sri Lanka, Mr. Peter Harrold, and a team of World Bank officials held a workshop on humanitarian delivery at the Planning and Development Secretariat in Kilinochchi Monday, LTTE's peace secretariat website said. Head of LTTE Political Wing, S.P.Thamilchelvan also separately met with Mr.Harrold, the report added.
Full story >>

Paper examines growing relevance of Tamil Diaspora

[TamilNet, Sunday, 18 July 2004, 23:19 GMT]
A policy paper prepared for the Berghof Foundation for Conflict Management, Germany by the Department of Sociology and Centre of Refugee Studies, York University, Toronto, Canada, recommends diaspora circulation "as an effective tool for engaging the diaspora in a meaningful way in the reconstruction and development of war-torn areas in Sri Lanka," and urges home countries to reformulate "citizenship, migration and development policies in order to facilitate the constructive involvement of diaspora."
Full story >>

CWC blows hot and cold

[TamilNet, Sunday, 18 July 2004, 12:46 GMT]
The Ceylon Workers Congress (CWC), a member of Sri Lanka’s opposition, blew hot and cold on joining the President Chandrika Kumaratunga’s minority government, according to reports in the Tamil press last week. Meanwhile, the Sunday Times said that the plantation workers’ party was still undecided on the switching sides, while the Sunday Leader said this week “joint opposition was buoyed by information the CWC for the foreseeable future will not join the government.”
Full story >>

Dates for parliamentary debate on ISGA to be decided Monday

[TamilNet, Sunday, 18 July 2004, 11:32 GMT]
The dates for the three-day debate on the Interim Self Governing Authority (ISGA) proposal submitted by the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) last year, will be decided at the Monay meeting of the leaders of political parties represented in the current Sri Lanka parliament, parliamentary sources said.


Full story >>

Children's Home Director, aide arrested on child abuse charge

[TamilNet, Saturday, 17 July 2004, 14:46 GMT]
The administration of ''Anpu Illam,'' a leading institution providing shelter for children, majority of them victims of war in the Trincomalee district, has been handed over to the North East Provincial Department of Probation and Child Care on the orders of Trincomalee Magistrate and Additional Judge Mr.S.Thiagendran following complaints of child abuse and other irregularities, legal sources said. The Director and one of his aides have been arrested on charges of child abuse, according to the same legal sources.
Full story >>

Indian fishermen rescue refugees, get jailed

[TamilNet, Saturday, 17 July 2004, 13:09 GMT]
Mannar judge Saturday remanded until 30 July two Indian fishermen who had rescued a group of refugees stranded at midsea in an overloaded boat. The judge released the thirty four refugees after reprimanding them for giving contradictory statements to hide the identities of the 'refugee smugglers' who had brought them in the overloded boat from the South Indian coast for a fee.
Full story >>

Batti-Amparai TNA MPs meet Thamilchelvan

[TamilNet, Saturday, 17 July 2004, 11:22 GMT]
Batticaloa-Amparai Tamil National Alliance parliamentarians met with LTTE Head of Political Wing, S.P.Thamilchelvan in the LTTE Peace Secretariat premises Saturday morning, source in Vanni said. Matters related to currently prevailing situation in Batticaloa district were the focus of the discussions according sources.
Full story >>

Chinese Opera rendered in Tamil

[TamilNet, Saturday, 17 July 2004, 11:22 GMT]
Tamil version of a Chinese Opera from Peking, The Red Lantern, was staged by Veruveli Drama Group of the Fine-Arts Department of the Arts Faculty of University of Jaffna Saturday. The theme of the drama centered around a Chinese activist family that contributed to preserving and sustaining the Chinese struggle through three generations of Japanese occupation.
Full story >>

UPFA, UNF draw battle lines to prove Parliamentary majority

[TamilNet, Saturday, 17 July 2004, 00:53 GMT]
With three days to go for the next session of parliament, the minority ruling United Peoples Freedom Alliance (UPFA) and the main opposition United National Front (UNF) are making frenzied efforts to prove their majority. The UNF still claims it has 114 members of the 225 member parliament. But the ruling UPFA says that there would be a dramatic turn in the power struggle in favour of the government after its sweeping victory in the six provincial councils' poll last Saturday, political sources said.


Full story >>