SL military operatives issue death threat to Catholic priest in Trincomalee

[TamilNet, Thursday, 28 November 2013, 08:06 GMT]
Pointing their gun at the parish priest of Our Lady of Gaudalupe church, unidentified persons who came in motorbike that had no number plate, issued death threat to Fr. S.S. Johnpillai in Trincomalee city. The incident took place around 9:00 p.m. on 26 November. The gunmen blamed that the priest was praying on the birthday of LTTE leader V. Pirapaharan.
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Allow people to give way to their emotions, Wigneswaran warns Colombo on Heroes Day

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 27 November 2013, 16:01 GMT]
The occupying Sri Lankan military in Jaffna on Tamil Heroes Day blocked the Northern Provincial Council (NPC) from planting trees at the public venue of Thanthai Chelva's memorial square. However, three provincial ministers, including the NPC Chief Minister CV Wigneswaran and three councillors went ahead planting tree saplings in the premises of the secretariat of the provincial education ministry, which is located in a private land. “This is about our emotions and feelings. If the [SL] government didn't allow us to proceed with this, the outcome would be much more drastic,” the chief minister of NPC warned Colombo.
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Sri Lankan TID involvement in attacks on Tamil councilors exposed

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 27 November 2013, 01:16 GMT]
A vehicle registered in North Central Province was used in the attack on the houses of Tamil councillors in the early hours of Tuesday in Vadamaraadchi. The attackers’ vehicle number was noted down by one of the neighbours and passed to a rights activist. On Wednesday, the same vehicle was observed at the Sri Lankan Terrorist Investigation Division camp at Nelliyadi.
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SL military operatives attack houses of Tamil councillors in Jaffna

[TamilNet, Monday, 25 November 2013, 22:30 GMT]
Sri Lankan military operatives who came in vehicles to the houses of Mr Sathees, the deputy head of Valveddith-thu'rai Urban Council and Mr Viyakes, the chairman of Karaveddi South-West Piratheasa Chapai attacked the houses threatening the family members, who were at sleep in the early hours of Tuesday. The squad smashed the windows of the houses and the vehicles at the houses threatening the families of the elected representatives. The councillors were targeted for their floral tributes in remembrance of the tens of thousands who have sacrificed their lives for the liberation of the nation of Eezham Tamils. The attacks come a few hours after the SL military spokesperson in Colombo stating that all remembrance activities were banned.
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Elected civic members in Jaffna pay tribute to Tamil Heroes, SL military retaliates

[TamilNet, Monday, 25 November 2013, 21:46 GMT]
The elected civic members of Karaveddi South-West Piratheasa Chapai (PS) on Monday paid floral tribute to the fallen Tamil Heroes, who were remembering the fallen fighters in the independence struggle of Eezham Tamils. The courageous move comes on the same day as Colombo’s military establishment issued a ban on commemorating the fallen Tamil fighters on November 27. Within a few hours, alleged SL military squads smashed the windows of two Tamil councillors. This year, the moral responsibility to mark the Heroes Day has fallen on the shoulders of the members of the Tamil National Alliance as they had gone seeking votes from the public in the recent elections to the Northern Provincial Council promising the people to restore their democratic right of remembering those who sacrificed their lives in the war.
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SL military threatens Tamil Catholic priests in Jaffna, Mannaar

[TamilNet, Saturday, 23 November 2013, 19:38 GMT]
The intelligence operatives of the occupying Sri Lankan military have threatened Tamil Catholic priests in Mannaar and Jaffna, who have been active in exposing the genocide of Eezham Tamils by the Sri Lankan State. The threats against the priests in escalated following the visit by UN Human Rights Commissioner for Human Rights and have topped after British PM visited North on 15 November. The Catholic priests were active in exposing the recent genocidal experiment of birth control carried out by the Sri Lankan authorities and the priests joined the peaceful march by the kith and kin of the missing persons when they wanted to berate their plight to the visiting British PM and the foreign journalists who accompanied him to Jaffna.
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Colombo arrests visiting Tamil poet, bans gatherings ahead of Heroes Day

[TamilNet, Saturday, 23 November 2013, 13:53 GMT]
The operatives of the occupying Sri Lankan military on Friday arrested VIS Jayapalan, a well-known Eezham Tamil poet and an award-winning actor in Indian Tamil cinema, while the Norwegian passport holder was visiting the island on a tourist visa. The arrest took place in abduction-style. By arresting Jayapalan, Colombo was sending a message to Eezham Tamil diaspora that Tamils visiting the island should not address any meeting or gathering. Colombo's TID operatives could claim any meeting as a ‘gathering causing communal unrest,’ academic circles in Jaffna said. In the meantime, the SL Police in Ki'linochchi, on Friday told 40 people it detained that all gatherings and meetings have been banned until further notice in the district.
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Australian PM's conduct at CHOGM shameful: Bishop Pat Power

[TamilNet, Friday, 22 November 2013, 16:45 GMT]
As Australian media on Friday reported that 79 Tamil asylum seekers were being sent back to Colombo amidst the controversial ties between the Sri Lankan Government and the Australian Government were further exposed in ‘Sri Lanka CHOGM’ last week, Canberra-based retired Bishop Pat Power, long an outspoken critic of Rome, has criticised both the Prime Minister of Australia Tony Abbot and the Catholic Church on the controversial Sri Lanka policy.
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Family of Tamil activist threatened in Mannaar after ‘Sri Lanka CHOGM’

[TamilNet, Friday, 22 November 2013, 14:05 GMT]
Sri Lankan Military Intelligence operatives have threatened the wife of a Tamil activist in Mannaar, while she was at her house with her 2 months old baby and a 5-year-old child on Thursday. Her husband, Jude Bashil Sosai (Sunesh) was at forefront in the demonstration held in Jaffna on 15 November demanding the attention by the visiting British PM David Cameron. The threat by alleged SL military operatives was reported on Thursday when Mr Sunesh was on his way to attend a meeting in Colombo. The president of the Citizens' Committee of Mannaar District, Rev. Fr. E. Sebamalai, in a letter addressed to SL President Mahinda Rajapaksa on behalf of the citizens' committee, on Friday said the Committee suspected Sri Lankan armed forces for the threat issued on Mannaar District Coordinator of National Fisheries Society Organization (NAFSO) Mr Sunesh and his family.
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Sinhala military colonization escalates further north in Mullaiththeevu

[TamilNet, Thursday, 21 November 2013, 21:35 GMT]
The occupying Sri Lankan military has seized 3,200 acres of lands belonging to Eezham Tamils in Odduchuddaan DS division situated in the heart of Mullaith-theevu district, civil sources in Vanni told TamilNet on Thursday. The latest military land grab aims to hurriedly Sinhalicise the ancient Tamil villages in Othiyamalai GS area situated in the south of Odduchuddaan division, where a genocidal massacre was carried out by the occupying Sinhala military in 1984. The colonisation is being done while the recently elected Northern Provincial Council and its Chief Minister are yet to take up the burning issue of Sinhala colonisation in Mullaiththeevu. The Tamil people also blamed the global powers for providing funds to Sri Lankan State system, enabling it to channel the funds and resources, in continuing to commit a demographic genocide, permanently wedging the North and East.
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Court in Jaffna dismisses SL military claim on Tamil memorial site at Theeruvil

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 20 November 2013, 22:18 GMT]
District Court of Point Pedro in Jaffna on Wednesday dismissed the claim by the Sri Lankan military that the land, which the Urban Council of Valveddith-thu’rai (VVT) had chosen to build a public park at Theeruvil was a property that should belong to the SL military. Legal sources in VVT said the civic body could now proceed with building the park which is situated at a key memorial site, where three significant monuments stood in remembrance of key LTTE leaders and commanders who sacrificed their lives under the occupation of Indian and Sri Lankan militaries and civilians massacred by the Indian military at VVT in 1989.
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Reports of disappearances surface in wake of Sri Lanka CHOGM

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 19 November 2013, 19:54 GMT]
A 35-year-old Tamil activist, who was actively involved in mobilising support to the victory of Tamil National Alliance (TNA) in the Provincial Council elections, has been reported missing since Friday in Ki'linochchi. Meanwhile, in Jaffna, an alert public apprehended two culprits, allegedly operated by the occupying Sri Lankan military, when the squad attempted to abduct a 21-year-old Tamil girl in broad daylight on Hospital Road in Jaffna on Monday. When the public caught the two Sinhala-speaking operatives, tens of occupying Sri Lankan soldiers and policemen protected the squad and assaulted the civilians, who had caught the abductors. The fate of another woman recently abducted by a similar squad at Punnaalaik-kadduvan in Jaffna is not known.
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Indian Foreign Secretary thanks Sampanthan for Jaffna invitation to Indian PM

[TamilNet, Monday, 18 November 2013, 23:37 GMT]
Indian Foreign Secretary Sujatha Singh who accompanied Indian Foreign Minister Salman Khurshid to the Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting (CHOGM) in Colombo, when she met the Tamil National Alliance parliamentarians last Wednesday repeatedly thanked R Sampanthan, MA Sumanthiran and Suresh Premachandran of the Tamil National Alliance (TNA) for having extended an invitation to the Indian PM to visit the island appreciating the ‘usefulness’ of the invitation that had coincided with the controversial Indian delegation’s attendance to the CHOGM, informed sources within the TNA told TamilNet on Monday.
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Colombo forced Tamil doctors to lie: Dr. Varatharajah

[TamilNet, Monday, 18 November 2013, 13:14 GMT]
Former Regional Director of Health Services (RDHS) for Mullaiththeevu, Dr. Thurairajah Varatharajah, currently in exile in the U.S, says in video documentary aired in India's NewsX TV station that Colombo, after keeping him and four other doctors in prison at the end of the war, forced the doctors to lie to foreign media and to the Organizations accusing Sri Lanka of allegations of committing war-crimes to neutralize the allegations. Dr Varatharajah said that living under such conditions had become unbearable that he had to seek ways to get out of Sri Lanka with his family. The doctors were accused by Colombo of giving false accounts of civilian deaths during the war, and were forced to recant the figures in a well publicized news conference. Dr Varatharajah, said he is talking voluntarily to set the record straight now that he does not have to fear for his life.
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Mass struggle, joint action with Tamil Nadu and Diaspora to advance Tamil cause: TNPF

[TamilNet, Sunday, 17 November 2013, 12:34 GMT]
Citing the recent elections to the Northern Provincial Council (NPC) and projecting it as a signal of Colombo beginning to deliver something, there was an effort to make many countries attend the Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting (CHOGM). To convince the heads of governments not to hesitate attending CHOGM, a message was also passed to the effect that the NPC Chief Minister would be invited to the meet. Had the Indian Prime Minister attended the CHOGM, coupled with this propaganda, the Tamil question would have been endorsed as an internal affair of Sri Lanka. But, this didn't happen, thanks to the non-attendance by the Indian PM, said Gajendrakumar Ponnambalam, the leader of the Tamil National Peoples Front (TNPF) in Jaffna on Saturday.
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Murali steps in where angels fear to tread

[TamilNet, Saturday, 16 November 2013, 17:50 GMT]
Muthaiyaa Muralidharan, Sri Lanka's star cricketer, stepped into the Commonwealth political fray, as he commented on the conditions in the North that there is "1000% improvement in facilities," as the Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting (CHOGM) was in progress in Colombo. Muralidharan was responding to British Prime Minister David Cameron that Britain would call for an international independent inquiry through the U.N. if the Rajapakse regime fails to conduct an impartial inquiry before March into the war-crimes committed by its troops. Muralidharan, who was reported to have played cricket with Cameron said that the British Prime Minister had been "misled about the situation in the north of Sri Lanka," according to UK's Guardian. Muralidharan is routinely used by Colombo as a propaganda symbol of a "race-blind Sri Lanka."
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Uprooted Tamils in Trincomalee demand justice for genocide

[TamilNet, Saturday, 16 November 2013, 14:37 GMT]
A section of uprooted Tamil families from Champoor, now staying at one of four so-called welfare centres in Trincomalee, staged a protest on Saturday carrying slogans that demanded justice for genocide and urged global attention on the continued refusal by the Colombo government in allowing them to resettle in their own lands in Moorthoor East. On Friday, a day before the protest, the occupying Sri Lankan military intelligence operatives, went on a house-to-house and camp-to-camp round instructing the Tamils not to take part in any protest during the ‘Sri Lanka CHOGM’. Subsequently, the protest was held in the premises of Ki’liveddi camp. The SL police who came to the Ki’liveddi camp on Saturday confronted the protestors and said they should not carry any placards with slogans. However, the uprooted people were firm in staging their protest with the presence of Tamil politicians.
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Sri Lanka's Chairmanship makes mockery of Commonwealth values: NYT

[TamilNet, Friday, 15 November 2013, 03:56 GMT]
The New York Times, in an editorial appearing in the Thursday edition, accused Sri Lanka of committing "serious human rights violations" and of failing "to provide accountability for wartime abuses." Under the Rajapaksa government, the paper said, journalists have been systematically threatened, harassed, killed or forced into exile in what amounts to a war on the press, adding, that Colombo did everything it could to sabotage a free and fair outcome [in the Northern elections], including publishing a fake edition of the local newspaper Uthayan. The editorial urged the leaders attending the Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting (CHOGM) to insist that Colombo show meaningful progress in addressing human rights abuses abiding by international standards and to restore constitutional protection for freedom of expression.
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PPT to investigate British, US, Indian role in Sri Lanka's genocide of Eezham Tamils

[TamilNet, Thursday, 14 November 2013, 12:49 GMT]
The Sri Lankan state as well as Britain, India and the USA will be accused of orchestrating a genocide on the Tamil people by the International Human Rights Association Bremen (IMRV) and the Irish Forum for Peace in Sri Lanka (IFPSL). The charge will be heard by a Tribunal held under the aegis of the Rome based 'Permanent Peoples Tribunal' (PPT). The 'People's Tribunal' relies on a high profile panel of judges that has been selected by the PPT to invoke a robust moral opinion. The PPT in Rome has sent the letters to the 4 States concerned informing them of the investigation to be held in Germany in December 2013, informed sources told TamilNet.
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CHOGM presence shows Australia is blind to Sri Lanka's rights abuses - SMH

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 13 November 2013, 01:59 GMT]
Scoffing at Foreign Minister Julie Bishop's comment that Canadian Premier Stephen Harper's decision to boycott CHOGM was regrettable, Australia's popular daily, Sydney Morning Herald said, "[w]hat is more regrettable is Australia's blindness to Sri Lanka's human rights concerns," adding, "Australia seems to be reluctant to admit human rights violations as a means of deflecting asylum claims of Sri Lankan Tamils coming to Australia by boat." Bishop after a visit to Sri Lanka earlier this year said there were no rights abuses in Sri Lanka, while UN human rights chief Navi Pillay, in contrast, was damagingly critical of Colombo's rights record and of Sri Lanka's movement towards an authoritarian state.
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