India trains jet bomber support crews

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 15 November 2006, 09:46 GMT]
India is training a third batch of six Sri Lanka Air Force (SLAF) personnel at Chandigarh, Punjab to support Colombo’s plans to expand its jet bomber fleet, the Times of India reported this week. Sri Lanka plans to purchase four more jet bombers from Russia and, in preparation, SLAF personnel are being put through three months of instruction. The latest group began training on October 14, despite outrage in Tamil Nadu over the targeting of civilians by SLAF bombers in which over a hundred people have been killed this year.
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Four injured in sectarian violence at Kathankudy

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 08 November 2006, 07:57 GMT]
Unidentified armed men, alleged to be orthodox Muslims, in a white van lobbed hand grenades and opened fire Tuesday around 8:00 p.m on Abdur Rauf Moulawi, the Islamic religious teacher belonging to Sufi sect, and some others standing in front of his office near Kathankudy Bathriya Mosque in Batticaloa district injuring four, said Kathankudy police.


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India should lift ban on LTTE - Kuldip Nayar

[TamilNet, Thursday, 02 November 2006, 22:04 GMT]
Kuldip Nayar, the noted Indian journalist and head of the Indian Peace Mission to Sri Lanka called on India to lift the ban on the LTTE and engage it politically in order to bring lasting peace to the war-torn island, the Hindustan Times reported.
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Saivite priest shot dead in Vavuniya

[TamilNet, Monday, 23 October 2006, 10:35 GMT]
Unknown men shot and killed a Saivite priest in Vavuniya Sunday night around 9:30. The victim was one of the organisers of a vigil group against theft and robberies, civil sources in Vavuniya said.
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Media delegation briefed on the woes of Tamil journalists

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 10 October 2006, 11:25 GMT]
The delegates of International media, who arrived in Colombo on Monday on a fact finding mission, to assess the climate of press freedom in Sri Lanka, held a meeting with the representatives from Sri Lanka Working Journalists Association (SLWJA), Free Media Movement (FMM), Sri Lanka Tamil Media Alliance (SLTMA), Sri Lanka Muslim Media Forum (SLMMF) and Federation of Media Employees Trade Union (FMETU ) in collaboration with the Sri Lanka Press Institute (SLPI), sources in Colombo said.
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18 Tamil youths arrested in Colombo

[TamilNet, Thursday, 05 October 2006, 03:25 GMT]
Sri Lanka Police, went on board the Vavuniya-Matara train at Fort station in Colombo on Tuesday morning and checked each compartment until the train reached Matara where they arrested 10 Tamil youths travelling in the train, sources said. Police, boarding the Colombo bound train from Galle at Panadura, took into custody 8 Tamil youths when the train reached Fort Station on the same day, Deputy Police Commissioner Mr. Poojitha Jayasundara said. The searches on trains were conducted after the Police were tipped that youths suspected of links to terrorism are travelling in the trains, the commissioner added.


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Sectarian violence re-surfaces in Muslim town, Kattankudy

[TamilNet, Monday, 02 October 2006, 17:37 GMT]
Clashes between orthodox Muslims against an Islamic sect that preaches pantheism resurfaced in Muslim town Kattankudy Sunday and continued for the second day, in which 32 houses and a van were damaged and 3 motorbikes burned down. Police curfew was re-imposed Monday.
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Former RAW chief protests India’s ‘ambivalence’ over LTTE

[TamilNet, Sunday, 01 October 2006, 11:41 GMT]
India’s former spy chief has criticised Delhi for not engaging with the both the Liberation Tigers and Sri Lanka’s government to prevent the slide into conflict. "India's inability to fully comprehend the ground realities in Sri Lanka and, hamstrung by the past, its reluctance to do business with LTTE to help evolve an equitable settlement may prove to be a monumental foreign policy blunder,” J.K. Sinha, former head of India’s external intelligence agency said.
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Elections to 42 local bodies in NE postponed

[TamilNet, Saturday, 23 September 2006, 11:48 GMT]
The elections to forty two local bodies in the NorthEast fixed for September 30 this year have been put off for June next year due to the unsettled situation in the province, Department of Elections in Colombo said.
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India-bound refugees detained

[TamilNet, Friday, 22 September 2006, 17:36 GMT]
The Sri Lanka Navy (SLN) detained three boats with 40 Tamil civilians, including women and children, in Mannar sea, while fleeing to Tamilnadu in South India, Thursday evening. Navy fired warning shots to stop the boats when the boatmen failed to obey the orders of the SLN patrol craft.
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Civilian killings soaring under Rajapakse - LTTE

[TamilNet, Monday, 18 September 2006, 19:26 GMT]
Pointing out that the killings of Tamil civilians by Sri Lankan security forces and Army-backed paramilitary groups have shot up since President Mahinda Rajapakse assumed power last year, the Liberation Tigers said this week that in keeping with the agenda of Sinhala extremist forces, Rajapakse is determined to pursue the military option to the ethnic conflict. “All attempts by the LTTE to value, abide by and protect the CFA have been undermined by the military option pursued by the Rajapakse regime,” the LTTE said in a statement Monday.
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Terrorised Tamil traders flee to India - report

[TamilNet, Thursday, 14 September 2006, 12:20 GMT]
Several Tamil traders and businessmen have fled Sri Lanka following a spate of killings and abductions, IANS reported Thursday quoting officials and refugees. Sinhalese gangs in Trincomalee are targeting prominent Tamils and many ordinary Tamils in the capital were gripped by a "fear psychosis" the agency reported, quoting activists as saying the recent violence has led to one of the most traumatic periods for the island's Tamil community.
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Sri Lanka Navy Commander visits Jaffna

[TamilNet, Friday, 08 September 2006, 06:01 GMT]
Commander of the Sri Lanka Navy, Vice Admiral Wasantha Karannagoda, visited Thursday Northern Naval Area Command in Karainagar and inspected the SLN installations Elara at Karainagar, Uttara in Kankesanthurai (KKS) and the key officers of the six shore establishements. The SLN commander also visted Mandaithivu's Allaipiddy area where around 40 civilians were reported killed or missing in Sri Lankan artillery fire 3 weeks ago when the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) marines entered Mandaithivu. Food supplies to Jaffna islets would be transported by Sri Lanka Navy, the navy commander told a civilian audience.
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SL Navy arrests Tamil civilians fleeing to India

[TamilNet, Monday, 04 September 2006, 06:10 GMT]
Sri Lanka Navy (SLN) Sunday morning handed over 56 members of sixteen Tamil families and seven boatmen to Talaimannar Police on a report that they were taken into custody in Mannar Sea when they were attempting to flee to Tamilnadu in India to seek refuge. Forty two of them were taken into custody while fleeing in three boats. The rest were arrested while staying in a church in Thalvupadu.
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SLN arrested fleeing Sri Lankan Tamils in Mannar Sea

[TamilNet, Thursday, 31 August 2006, 12:34 GMT]
Sri Lanka Navy (SLN) Wednesday night around 11 p.m. arrested 18 Tamil civilians with four Indian boatmen while they were fleeing to seek refuge in Tamilnadu from Talaimannar coast. They were handed over to the Talaimannar Police Thursday morning. SLN has detained the Indian boat in its custody.
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Rajapakse seeking UK's help to secure India's support - Norwegian radio

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 30 August 2006, 09:07 GMT]
Sri Lankan President Mahinda Rajapakse's meeting Wednesday with British Prime Minister Tony Blair is "presumably an attempt to secure India's support in favour of Sri Lanka's policy" on the ethnic question Norwegian state radio reported, citing Oslo's Special Envoy, Jon Hanssen-Bauer.
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Judicious political pressure saves journalist

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 30 August 2006, 07:42 GMT]
Political pressure from Sri Lanka's main opposition United National Party (UNP), parties allied with Sri Lanka President Mahinda Rajapakse, including the paramilitary Eelam People’s Democratic Party (EPDP) and the timely action by the top leadership of the Asian Broadcasting Coorperation to mobilise political pressure saved the life of Kuruparan Nadarajah, the Tamil news manager of Sooriyan FM, who was being interrogated after being abducted by the Special Counter-terrorism Unit of Sri Lankan military intelligence, sources said.
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LTTE confers Maamanithar award on Sivamaharaja

[TamilNet, Thursday, 24 August 2006, 06:31 GMT]
Leader of Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eeelam, V. Pirapaharan, Tuesday, posthumously conferred Mamanithar (Great human being) award, the highest national honour granted by the LTTE, to Sinnathamby Sivamaharaja. He was the Managing Director of Jaffna Tamil daily "Namathu Eelanadu" until his death on Sunday when he was shot and killed at his residence located inside the High Security Zone (HSZ) in Tellippallai.


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RSF condemns Sivamaharajah assassination

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 23 August 2006, 20:32 GMT]
"The journalists and employees of Tamil news media continue to be eliminated at a horrific pace," said the France based media watchdog Reporters Sans Frontiers (RSF). The organisation condemned the slaying of Sinnathamby Sivamaharajah, the managing director of the Tamil-language daily Namathu Eelanadu Sunday night in Tellippalai.
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Jaffna journalists appeal to International Community for help

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 23 August 2006, 06:58 GMT]
North Sri Lanka Journalists Association (NSLJA), in a press release, issued Tuesday, appealed to the International Community's help to stop the attacks on media persons, media workers and media institutions in Jaffna Peninsula, sources in Jaffna said.
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