Uprooted Vaakarai Central residents identify SL military-seized lands after 13 years

[TamilNet, Monday, 08 October 2018, 11:15 GMT]
The occupying SL military, which has seized the lands of Tamils in former LTTE-administered Vaakarai central area, is running a resort for southern visitors in the properties confiscated from Tamil villagers, the people who were allowed to identify their lands for the first time on 01st October after 13 years, told TamilNet. SL Survey Department officials were present at the site when almost 26 of 55 land-owners were allowed to identify their lands at the presence of Ooriyan-kaddu Village Officer of Ooriyan-kaddu and the officials of the Divisional Secretariat.
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Rajapaksa ally vows to erect Buddhist viharas in Vanni

[TamilNet, Friday, 05 October 2018, 09:29 GMT]
Sinhala parliamentarians belonging to Jathika Nidahas Peramuna (JNP) or National Freedom Front, an extreme Sinhala nationalist JVP-breakaway group, which is aligned with former SL President Mahinda Rajapaksa, visited Mullaiththeevu and Vavuniyaa on Thursday confronting the Tamil residents. The Tamil villagers opposed the group, but it vowed to erect Buddha statues confronting the Eezham Tamils. The JNP parliamentarians were accompanied by an extremist Buddhist monk who has been blocked by Mullaiththeevu Magistrate from erecting Buddha statues under cover of so-called conservation.
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Sinhala colonists resume occupation of pasture lands in Batticaloa

[TamilNet, Saturday, 29 September 2018, 21:45 GMT]
The Secretary of Dairy Farmers Association in Kiraan and Chengka'ladi, Nimalan Kanthasamy, said the Tamil farmers were facing the recurrence of violence from Sinhala colonists who have started to encroach into to Periya-maathava'nai and Mayilaththa-madu, a pasture land located in the interior Ko'ra'laip-pattu South (Kiraan) division of Batticaloa district. Sinhala colonists from Polonnaruwa, Badulla and Moneragala were withdrawn last year after repeated protests. The interior land was under the control of the LTTE before 2007.
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Thileepan Remembrance in Jaffna underscores need for new emancipation strategies

[TamilNet, Thursday, 27 September 2018, 08:24 GMT]
All Tamil parties and movements that orientate their politics on the national liberation of the nation of Eezham Tamils actively took part in an emotional event participated by hundreds of Eezham Tamils on Wednesday at Nalloor in Jaffna. Lt Col Thileepan (Rasaiah Parthipan) sacrificed his life through a 12-day fast-unto-death without food and water in 1987. He was the political head of the LTTE in Jaffna when New Delhi intervened with its military force after entering a State-to-State agreement with Colombo. Thileepan's sacrifice was a crucial historical event in the political emancipation of Eezham Tamils as it exposed the real agenda of the intervening power, which was calling the shots in the island during the times of the Cold War.
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Two more TPPs join hunger-strike at Anuradhapura

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 25 September 2018, 10:07 GMT]
Two political prisoners, including a Tamil-speaking Mulsim, recently transferred to Anuradhapura from Colombo have joined the hunger strike on Sunday. The SL military intelligence has alleged the Muslim prisoner, Abdul Hameed Umar Hattaaph, as being involved in the assassination carried out by the LTTE on a former commander of the genocidal military, Major General (retd) Janaka Perera in 2008.
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USAID-funded project renders exploitation of Tamil farmers by export conglomerate

[TamilNet, Monday, 24 September 2018, 20:03 GMT]
Poverty-stricken Eezham Tamil household farmers from Koa'ra'laip-pattu North (Vaakarai) division of Batticaloa, complain that they are systematically exploited by the SL State-owned Bank of Ceylon (BOC), which has threatened to seize their lands if they complained about exploitation by Hayleys Agriculture, the largest exporter of fruits in the island. The farmers were given technical assistance to commence Gherkin Cucumber farming with USAID assistance. The BOC maintains that the farmers have to pay back the initial funding by binding their sales to Hayleys. The produce is purchased at a low price, and if they complained about the exploitation, they would risk losing their lands, the BOC officials have threatened they said.
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SLA commander in Jaffna admits counter-insurgency agenda of Colombo

[TamilNet, Thursday, 20 September 2018, 21:21 GMT]
An armed movement threatening the sovereignty and the ‘national security’ of the SL State originated in Jaffna. Even though almost ten years have elapsed since that movement was destroyed, the military is present in Jaffna to make sure that such an organisation doesn't rise again, said the commander of the SL military in Jaffna Major General Darshana Hettiarachchi at a PR conference he organised at Palaali on Thursday. The PR meeting organised as one of the first kind turned into a flop as the SL commander was exhausted facing an array of questions to which he was either dodging response or contradicting himself.
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TPP on hunger-strike in Anuradhapura shifted to Welikade prison

[TamilNet, Monday, 17 September 2018, 22:06 GMT]
The SL Prison authorities have transferred one of the eight Tamil political prisoners who are on hunger-strike away from the prison at Anuradhapura citing the diabetic condition of the prisoner. In the meantime, Tamil National Peoples Front (TNPF) convened a press conference highlighting the significance of a mass struggle to support the protesters. University students in Jaffna are also planning to launch a wider student campaign in support of the hunger-strikers.
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Eastern University massacre was premeditated crime, UN should investigate: families of victims

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 12 September 2018, 22:46 GMT]
Twenty-eight years ago, the occupying Sinhala Army of genocidal Sri Lanka, which brought a few so-called Muslim home-guards and Tamil paramilitary operatives, entered the premises of the Eastern University at Vanthaa'ru-moolai in Batticaloa and filtered away 158 young members among the thousands of Tamils, who had sought refuge at the premises of the Eastern University on 05 September 1990. The victims, identified by the masked men, were taken away by the SL Army that had brought two CTB buses with it to the premises. The victims were taken to Naavaladi in Vaazhaich-cheanai, where they were subjected to brutal torture before being hacked to death. The families of enforced disappeared, who marked the 28th remembrance of the traumatic event this month, blamed the SL State for persistent refusal to admit the premeditated arrests, the massacre and removal of skeletal remains of the victims.
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Protest called against SL Police brutality against Tamil family in Vavuniyaa

[TamilNet, Monday, 10 September 2018, 22:37 GMT]
A Sinhala Inspector of Police, Saminda Pinthu, in charge of the SL Police stationed at Kanakaayan-ku'lam in Vavuniyaa North went amok on a Tamil family Sunday night, causing severe injuries to a 14-year-old girl. The SL Police Inspector was also attacking her elder brother who intervened to safeguard their mother, whose clothes were being torn by him. The mother was attempting to protect her husband while the police inspector was attacking her husband. Samindu targeted the family for demanding their lands back from a trader who had initially obtained the property of the family on a lease. The trader, a Muslim, is running a restaurant backed by the Sinhala police.
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Naval partnerships off Tamil Eelam coast need perusal at backdrop of structural genocide

[TamilNet, Saturday, 08 September 2018, 22:59 GMT]
Japan’s Defence Minister Itsunori Onodera visited Colombo from 20th to 22nd August and met high officials of the unitary state of genocidal Sri Lanka, discussing maritime security and development of port facilities. His visits focused on the ports in Colombo, Hambantota and in particular Trincomalee, the capital of the occupied country of Eezham Tamils. The following Week, Japan’s State Minister for Foreign Affairs Kazuyuki Nakane visited Colombo, amongst others to inaugurate the commissioning ceremony of two state-of-the-art patrol-ships worth around 11 million dollars donated by Japan to the SL Coast Guard. The Japanese collaboration with genocidal Sri Lanka comes as part of a joint U.S., India and Japanese geopolitical move, Tamil political observers in Trincomalee said.
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NPC Minister wants international excavations of war-time SL military camps in North-East

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 29 August 2018, 22:48 GMT]
Excavations must be carried out at the direct presence of international monitors wherever the SL military was stationed with camps during the times of war in the North-East, said Ananthy Sasitharan, who is the NPC Minister of Women’s Affairs and Rehabilitation. Thousands of Tamils, subjected to forced disappearance and arrests during the times of war, are still unaccounted for and their trauma and dismay has aggravated at the scale of the recent discovery of mass graves in the North, Ms Sasitharan said. The NPC Minister is one of the thousands of survivors, who are yet to receive a clear answer from the SL State on the whereabouts of their loved ones. Furthermore, Ms Sasithran said international mediation was necessary to achieve a political solution to the conflict and blamed the Colombo government for marring the NPC with a hostile attitude.
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U.S. naval partnership with genocidal Sri Lanka escalates with New Delhi's blessings

[TamilNet, Sunday, 26 August 2018, 22:50 GMT]
U.S. Navy's amphibious transport vessel USS Anchorage (LPD 23) docked at the harbour of Trincomalee, the capital city of occupied Tamil Eelam, on Friday. The “ships visits help demonstrate the value of the growing U.S.-Sri Lanka partnership,” said Capt. Dennis Jacko, commanding officer of Anchorage, according to a news release from the Public Affairs of the naval ship. Around 300 SL naval academy midshipmen and 40 ‘distinguished visitors’, were scheduled to tour Anchorage to learn about the ship’s amphibious capabilities, the news release further said. The latest US naval deployment off Trincomalee is the first one after the US Pacific Command (USPACOM) renamed itself into US Indo-Pacific Command (USINDOPACOM), incorporating India as a “major defence partner” of the USA in the Indian Ocean Region.
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Drought-stricken Tamil farmers in Vanni abandoned by authorities, politicians, NGOs

[TamilNet, Friday, 17 August 2018, 23:06 GMT]
The resettled Eezham Tamil families in Madu division of Mannaar district complain that the SL authorities have wholly abandoned them. None of the Tamil politicians has helped them to address their grievances caused by the drought that had rendered 4,300 families who are struggling without the proper livelihood in the absence of agricultural income. The families say they have been complaining since the monsoon rains failed towards the end of 2017. Now, the people are struggling even without potable water.
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Tamil Nadu police detaining leader of May 17 Movement condemned in Jaffna

[TamilNet, Friday, 10 August 2018, 21:43 GMT]
Thirumurugan Gandhi of May 17 Movement, who has been in Europe for almost three months closely working with Eezham Tamil diaspora and exiled Sinhala activists in Europe, was detained twice in India this week when he returned home from Europe. The right of Tamil Nadu activist is being oppressed in his own country because he was standing up for the rights of Eezham Tamils and other oppressed nations, said Gajendrakumar Ponnambalam, the president of Tamil National Peoples Front. The TNPF organised a protest to raise awareness on the matter among Eezham Tamils in front of the bus stand in the city of Jaffna on Friday.
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Kalaignar Karunanidhi passes away at 94

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 07 August 2018, 16:58 GMT]
Former Chief Minister of Tamil Nadu State and the Chief of the Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (DMK), Muthuvel Karunanidhi, popularly known as ‘Kalaignar’, has passed away at the age of 94 in Chennai, TamilNadu, on Tuesday. Apart from his acumen in adjusting policy to the prevailing circumstances and persistent role in dialectically shaping the politics of Tamil Nadu, Kalaignar was also a veteran writer, playwright, scriptwriter, poet and an orator contributing to Tamil literature and cinema. His demise marks the end of a political era, represented along with the late former chief minister personalities such as C.N. Annadurai (Anna), M.G.Ramachandran and J Jayalalithaa, all of whom originated from the secular Dravidian movement, which emerged as a counter-hegemonic force in Tamil Nadu politics in the early 20th century.
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Occupying Colombo's persistent psyops banishes ex-LTTE members into a social outcast in East

[TamilNet, Saturday, 04 August 2018, 17:53 GMT]
Former LTTE members in the district of Batticaloa are facing increased harassments from the military intelligence of the occupying genocidal state of Sri Lanka, the grassroots rights activist told TamilNet on Saturday. The former LTTE members who were attached to the formations, which were close to the LTTE leader, members of the Sea Tigers or those who served the intelligence wing of the LTTE, are particularly exposed to the systematic harassments, the sources said providing particulars of those affected.
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Tamil man murdered in Polonnaruwa, Sinhala farmers exploit poverty-stricken Tamils

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 25 July 2018, 19:24 GMT]
A Sinhala farmer at Welikanda of the Polonnaruwa district in the North Central Province has allegedly beaten to death a Tamil houseworker, who hailed from Vaazhaich-cheanai of Batticaloa district in the Eastern Province. The Sinhala authorities in Polonnaruwa have managed to suppress the news of the brutal incident from the focus of the Tamil politicians, the journalists and the rights activists for almost three months. This week, the Mathivathy, the wife of the 35-year-old victim, Pathmanathan Muruguppillai, revealed the details to Tamil rights activists in Batticaloa. Pathmanathan was a father of three. After the time of the LTTE, the poverty-stricken sections of Tamils in Batticaloa are being treated much worse than second-class citizens as there is nobody to defend their interests, the rights activists who are looking into the case since Tuesday, told TamilNet on Wednesday.
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Remembering 35th Black July with Tamil resolve

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 24 July 2018, 07:51 GMT]
This week, Eezham Tamils in the homeland and the Tamil Diaspora mark the 35th anniversary of the collective trauma of the ‘Black July’, the SL state-sponsored genocidal pogrom that claimed the lives of more than 3,000 Tamil residents in the south of the island in 1983. The key lesson learned throughout the years of the pogroms, massacres, genocidal war and finally the post-war structural genocide, which is aimed at dismantling the existence of Eezham Tamils as a nation, is a hard reality. The genocide originating from the Mahawansa mind-set always gets its way, not because of the strength of the Sinhala nation, but mainly because the external State actors sustaining the Colombo-centric approach, is that lesson. Thus, the collaborationists and the negotiators among the Eezham Tamils were always doomed to failure, Tamil political observers in Jaffna commented.
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Role of powers with colonial legacy, abetting contemporary Sinhalicisation, requires scrutiny

[TamilNet, Sunday, 22 July 2018, 20:33 GMT]
The National Housing Development Authority (NHDA), which comes under the occupying unitary state of genocidal Sri Lanka, is silently transferring 5 acres of lands to the notorious British-trained ‘Special Task Force’ (STF) to expand its commando post into a permanent camp to defend the controversial Sinhala colony at the strategic entrance to Jaffna at Naavat-kuzhi. The colonisation scheme, initiated during the rule of Rajapaksa brothers, received state-patronisation after the regime change backed by the West. The colony is planned to control the arteries of the city and to Sinhalicise Jaffna city itself. The trend is also evidenced in the latest move by the occupying Colombo to station its troops at the Jaffna Fort, which is ‘developed’ with the blessings, funding and research coming from the Netherlands and the United Kingdom.
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