U’rukaamam, Urugamuwa, Urumutta

[TamilNet, Thursday, 23 December 2010, 01:02 GMT]
The big village
The big hill or peak
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Nambiar, UN, undermine war crimes investigation on Sri Lanka, Burma

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 21 December 2010, 08:48 GMT]
Unchecked for the role he played in the genocide of Eezham Tamils last year, Vijay Nambiar’s UN villainy is now targeting ethnicities struggling in Burma. The Burmese military now plans to adopt the Rajapaksa doctrine of military solution to the national question in Burma, with the backing of the same establishments that backed Rajapaksa, and Vijay Nambiar is in the scene again, facilitating the agenda and shielding the war crimes. A few days ago, UK has urged the UN to replace Vijay Nambiar by another fulltime envoy to deal with Burma. According to Mizzima News Wednesday, the London-based Burma Campaign expressed extreme disappointment on the approach of Nambiar befriending military generals and ignoring nations struggling for liberation. Meanwhile, the UN panel on Sri Lanka meeting Colombo’s LLRC has raised eyebrows in the human rights circles.
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World Bank backs Rajapaksa

[TamilNet, Monday, 20 December 2010, 19:12 GMT]
The Managing Director of the World Bank, Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala, on Saturday said she was granting Sri Lanka with an annual funding of US$465 million from 2011, increasing around 300 million of annual grants by the World Bank. Meanwhile, Political observers in Colombo described the offer by Washington-based Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala, who was attending Central Bank of Sri Lanka's 60th anniversary celebrations, as an attempt by the West to win Colombo that has been extensively borrowing from China. The visiting World Bank director also paid a courtesy visit to the Eastern University in Batticaloa and to Thiraaymadu, a Tamil village affected by 2004 Tsunami, with Sinhala dancers from South.
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Yogeswary obstructs Sherine’s human rights workshop in Jaffna

[TamilNet, Sunday, 19 December 2010, 11:21 GMT]
The Jaffna Mayor Mrs. Yogeswary Patkunam, allegedly receiving ‘instructions’ from some ruling circles, cancelled permission to use the Jaffna Public Library auditorium by a human rights group called Home for Human Rights run by Sherine Xavier to conduct a workshop Saturday. The booking made for the auditorium on December 3 was cancelled in the last minute on Friday. Some academics of the Jaffna University and visitors from the south, altogether numbering more than 100, were scheduled to participate in the workshop on human rights violations after the Vanni war. While the Colombo-based Home for Human Rights is said to be liaising with a power that was a party to the war crimes, the Jaffna Mayor is said to have acted on the instructions of a minister who perceives local political mobilisation sponsored by that power a threat to him.
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Imelda, Daya Master, felicitate Asian ‘peace laureate’ Hathurusinghe

[TamilNet, Sunday, 19 December 2010, 01:51 GMT]
The commander of Sri Lanka’s colonial military in Jaffna, Maj. Gen. Mahinda Hathurusinghe, was felicitated by SL government circles in Jaffna, Thursday, for the Guci Peace Prize given to him in Philippines, which according to SL military web sites, ‘Asian equivalent of Nobel Peace Prize’. Mrs. Imelda Sugumar, the SL Government Agent of Jaffna was the chief guest for the felicitation that was coordinated by Daya Master, former LTTE spokesperson and now executive director of a paramilitary-backed television supporting Colombo. In a press meet the previous day, Hathurusinghe accused former LTTE members conniving with SLA as responsible for the robberies and other atrocities committed on people in Jaffna. While felicitating Hathurusinghe, Imelda attacked the editors of diaspora media for their bias and said that SL government and its military only help people in Jaffna.
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'Post-Tsunami failure of Co-Chairs promoted Colombo on genocidal war path'

[TamilNet, Thursday, 16 December 2010, 12:02 GMT]
The main event of remembering the victims of 26 December 2004 that claimed the lives of 41,000 people in the island, most of the victims from eastern and northern coasts of the Tamil homeland, is to be held at Veerasingkam Hall in Jaffna. Around 1.5 million people lost their homes in the Tsunami. Most of the victims along the coastal belts of Vanni and elsewhere have been denied of proper resettlement as Colombo waged a genocidal war on them, killing and maiming thousands of the Tsunami victims. The West, which had equal humanitarian access to North-East as well as to the South, failed to course correct the Sri Lankan state in addressing the post-Tsunami reconstruction. Instead, it relied upon appeasement tactics towards Colombo at that time and is still harping on the same string, said TamilNet commentator in Colombo responding to the latest comment by US spokesman, P J Crowley.
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Colombo directs closure of Northern UN, ICRC offices

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 15 December 2010, 11:45 GMT]
Following directives from Sri Lanka Government authorities to close the branch offices of the United Nation agencies and the International Committtee of Red Cross (ICRC) in the North, these agencies are reducing the number of staff, civil society sources in Jaffna said. UNICEF, UNHCR, UNDP, and WFP offices are said to be affected by the directive from Colombo. A number of offices of the said organizations in Vanni area have already ceased operations. Meanwhile, British Members of Parliament raised concerns on the closure of the ICRC offices in Jaffna.
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SLA chases away uprooted families in Ki'linochchi suburb

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 14 December 2010, 07:24 GMT]
The Sri Lanka Army has chased away a group of uprooted Tamil families when they went to temporarily reside in their own buildings in Ponnakar village, located 1.5 km in the Karaichchi DS division in Ki'linochchi district, after their temporary huts provided in low-lying lands were submerged in the floods earlier this month. They were told by the SLA to find other places than their own buildings even if it was for a temporary period of time till they were able to return to their huts. Ponnakar village is located 1.5 k.m south of Kil'linochchi town.
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War crimes ignored in East, focus urged on ‘killings’ at Eastern University

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 14 December 2010, 07:09 GMT]
While the war raged in Vanni war front, Sri Lanka Army deployed paramilitary operatives with close link to Rajapaksa quarters in Colombo, killing a female hostel warden and two female Tamil students from Vanni at the Eastern University in February and March 2009, journalists from Batticaloa said citing information from ex-paramilitary personnel and naming a key operative in Vaazhaichcheanai in Batticaloa with close links to Rajapaksa's cabinet as the man who carried out the orders from the top. In the meantime, a 54-year-old man from Paa'ndiruppu linked to Iniyapaarathi, the most feared operative of Karuna group, was found dead Friday hanging inside a building used by the group earlier.
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SLA tightens security in Jaffna

[TamilNet, Sunday, 12 December 2010, 15:56 GMT]
Sri Lanka Army (SLA) is employing new measures in the last several days to increase security in Jaffna, civil sources in Jaffna said. SLA has increased search operations during nights and has increased checking of motor vehicles including motor bikes. Passengers traveling in night buses are being subjected to delays as they searched in the proximity of four or five SLA camps. In addition, reports from Jaffna say SLA soldiers are constructing new earth bunds in the previously declared High Security Zones (HSZ) raising fears among families awaiting resettlement that return to their ancestral homes are going to be further delayed.
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More than 100,000 persons affected by rain in the North

[TamilNet, Sunday, 12 December 2010, 13:39 GMT]
More than hundred thousand people were affected by rain in Jaffna, Mannaar, Ki'linochchi and Mullaiththeevu district, according to civil society sources in the Northern province. Menik Farm camp used as an internment camp to hold Tamil civilians, is surrounded by flood. More than 20,000 remaining refugees have been struggling with toilets submerged in flood. Dengue and malaria are spreading rapidly, according to medical sources.
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FMM condemns attack on journalists

[TamilNet, Friday, 10 December 2010, 14:21 GMT]
Free Media Movement (FMM), a Colombo-based media watchdog, in a press release isssued this Thursday, condemned the attack on two journalists by a "group of BIA [Bandaranaike International Airport] employees, allegedly under [Sri Lanka] government orders while covering an attack on Dr. Wickremabahu Karunaratne, leader of the New Left Front, and his supporters. Dr. Karunaratne was returning from a visit to the United Kingdom where he delivered several lectures. His speeches were earlier criticised by ruling party members as 'traitorous,'" FMM said. FMM described the attack as a serious threat to media freedom in Sri Lanka.
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Time for Eezham Tamils to think afresh

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 07 December 2010, 02:23 GMT]
Despite two nasty wars India got involved against Eezham Tamils in crushing their national aspirations, and despite constant demonstration that whatever genocide may take place or whatever counter-Indian alliances Sri Lanka may make India would continue to hang on to any devil that is sitting in Colombo, Eezham Tamils are so far not stirred up to evolve an integrated foreign policy to meet the equation. Just as Mahinda Rajapaksa told N. Ram of The Hindu that “What we refused to give Prabakaran we won’t give to others”, what India refused to act on so far, it is not going to act, whatever exclusive dependency Tamils may continue to show. The relentless may try and everyone should be happy if there are any yields, but it is time for the mainstream to think and seriously act on other avenues that are complimentary to Eezham Tamil interests.
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Colombo plans to close UN offices in NorthEast

[TamilNet, Monday, 06 December 2010, 13:35 GMT]
Sri Lanka Government has directed the United Nations officials to close the UNICEF, UNHCR offices in Ki'linochchi district in the North, and Trincomalee in the East before the end of this year, and to move the administrative functions to offices located outside NorthEast, civil society sources in Jaffna said. The sources fear that Colombo's action is part of its longer term strategy to rid of all NGO offices in the NorthEast.
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New evidence emerges on war crimes committed on Isaippiriyaa

[TamilNet, Sunday, 05 December 2010, 19:26 GMT]
The gruesome killing of 27-year-old LTTE journalist Shoba (Isaippiriyaa) is a clear case of war crime committed by Sri Lanka Army, as evidences come forth indicate. Isaippriyaa never went for any kind of military training. She was exempted by the LTTE from such training, as she was a patient of Rheumatic Heart Valvular Disease, says a medical practitioner who was working in Vanni and who has personally seen her taking Echo Cardiogram test conducted by visiting US and Australian cardiologists. Until 8 May 2009 she was working as a volunteer in the Mu’l’livaaykkaal makeshift hospital. She was taken by SLA on 23rd or 24th of May 2009, while staying in D8/ Zone 4 of the Cheddiku'lam internment camp, according to the wife of the medical practitioner, a media worker who was also interned in the camp at that time.
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Sri Lanka’s police stations get own buildings in Ki'linochchi, Maangku'lam

[TamilNet, Sunday, 05 December 2010, 12:34 GMT]
Sri Lankan Prime Minister D.M. Jayaratne on Friday opened two new buildings for two key police stations in Vanni, which have been functioning the buildings of LTTE-run administration, at Maangku'lam and Ki'linochchi.
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Unidentified person found dead in Jaffna bus stand

[TamilNet, Sunday, 05 December 2010, 12:28 GMT]
Jaffna Police Sunday morning removed an unidentified body of a 40 year old male person found dead under a passenger shelter in the Jaffna central bus stand on receipt of information from the public. The body was handed over to the mortuary of the Jaffna Teaching Hospital for identification and inquest. This discovery, following the killing of a mentally deranged Tamil youth at Puththoor junction by the Sri Lanka Army Saturday on Friday, has fuelled tension and fear in Jaffna.
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Ira'naimadu tank spills due to heavy rain

[TamilNet, Sunday, 05 December 2010, 05:55 GMT]
Ira'naimadu irrigation tank in Ki'linochchi district, currently under control of the Sri Lanka Army (SLA), has reached 28.6 inches above its spill level of 28 feet following one week continuous rain, sources in Vanni said. Due to efforts taken by the agricultural sector organizations in the district to ensure the safety of the tank, sluice gates had been opened on December 3 to release the excess water.
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Musali lawyer to fill vacancy in parliament

[TamilNet, Sunday, 05 December 2010, 00:09 GMT]
The name of Attorney-at-Law U.L. Muthaliph Farook is to be gazetted by the Commissioner of Elections to fill the vacancy created in the parliament with the demise of Noordeen Mashoor, political sources in Colombo said. The new parliamentarian is a resident of Musali in the Mannaar district and polled second highest preferential votes in the United National Party (UNP) list at the last general election held in April this year.
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Rajapaksa vengeance orchestrates political shield of captive Tamils in Vanni

[TamilNet, Saturday, 04 December 2010, 11:45 GMT]
Sri Lanka’s president Mahinda Rajapaksa, crest fallen in London, tried to simulate support for him Saturday, by intimidating Eezham Tamils living in captive conditions under his military in Vanni. On Saturday early morning, amidst heavy rains, Sri Lanka army rounded up ‘re-settled’ Tamil civilians in Vanni, including pregnant mothers, elderly and children, and brought them to Ki’linochchi forcing them to carry placards in a ‘demonstration’ that Rajapaksa was doing good to them and it was wrong for the diaspora Tamils in London to reject him. About 500 civilians were caught in the military harassment and those who resisted were attacked by the military. Rajapaksa is determined in demonstrating that the genocidal conditions set by him is the reality to comprehend with, as opposed to diaspora articulations, and he is backed in it by the position taken by India, observers said.
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