Nagarkovil FDLs destroyed -LTTE

[TamilNet, Thursday, 19 October 2000, 15:24 GMT]
The Liberation Tigers said Thursday that they had overrun Sri Lanka Army forward defence lines protecting the key base at Nakarkovil in the heavy fighting which broke out this morning. They also said they shot down a Sri Lanka Air Force helicopter gunship and damaged another.
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SLAF helicopter shot down

[TamilNet, Thursday, 19 October 2000, 13:54 GMT]
Fighting broke out in Nakar Kovil on the south-eastern coast of Jaffna Thursday evening. Sri Lanka Army sources in the northern town said a MI-24 helicopter gunship was shot down around 5.30 p.m.
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SLA disarms TELO "in revenge"

[TamilNet, Thursday, 19 October 2000, 13:29 GMT]
Sri Lanka Army troops Thursday raided the camps of the Tamil Eelam Liberation Organisation (TELO) in Mannar town and Vavuniya around 4 p.m. and seized more than 90 assault rifles from them. Prasanna, a TELO leader in Colombo, told TamilNet that the government is taking revenge on his organisation "for refusing to compromise the national interests of the Tamil people".
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SLMC, EPDP get plum portfolios

[TamilNet, Thursday, 19 October 2000, 06:29 GMT]
The Sri Lankan President Thursday cemented her party's coalition government by offering plum portfolios to her minority allies. The leader of the Eelam People's Democratic Party, Mr. Douglas Devananda, was sworn in as the Minister for Northern Rehabilitation and Northeastern Tamil Affairs Thursday and co-leader of the Sri Lanka Muslim was given the plum portfolio of Internal, External Trade, Shipping and Muslim Affairs. Northeastern Tamil affairs is a new portfolio in the cabinet.
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SLMC split over backing PA

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 17 October 2000, 12:56 GMT]
Differences between the co-leaders of the Sri Lanka Muslim Congress, Mrs.Ferial Ashraff and Mr.Rauf Hakeem, that had been brewing this week over the nature of the party's support to the People's Alliance spilled, into the open Tuesday as the majority of the party's MPs said they backed the former's decision to join the government.
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Police shoot inside eastcoast Mosque

[TamilNet, Monday, 16 October 2000, 16:08 GMT]
Schools, shops and government offices were partly shut down Monday in the eastern Muslim town of Akkaraipattu, 64 kilometers south of Batticaloa on the southeastern coast of the island, in protest over Sri Lankan Police shooting and wounding five people in the town's main Mosque Saturday midnight. Police in Akkaraipattu claimed that a large crowd that gathered at the town Mosque in response to a special late night muezzin call had attacked a Police patrol, wounding some constables. Police arrested twenty eight persons, including the editor of a news paper, accused of taking part in the attack.
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Sinhala nationalists squabble and split

[TamilNet, Monday, 16 October 2000, 13:15 GMT]
Sihala Urumaya, the hardline Sinhala Buddhist nationalist party, split Monday over who should represent it in the Sri Lankan Parliament. The President of the party Mr.S.L.Gunasekera told a press conference in Colombo Monday that he and seven members of the Sihala Urumaya's central committee had walked out in protest Sunday from a meeting that had been convened to select one of its senior members as the national list MP of the party. The Sihala Urumaya got only one seat in the Parliament on account of the total number of votes it polled island wide at the general elections on October 10.
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Ignoring Mosque writ costly in eastern towns

[TamilNet, Sunday, 15 October 2000, 19:58 GMT]
The main mosque for Oddamavadi and Valaichenai, 32 kilometers north of Batticaloa, Sunday permanently banned seven shops owned by residents of Kattankudy from doing business in the two towns.
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Powerful cabinet portfolio offered -EPDP

[TamilNet, Sunday, 15 October 2000, 12:50 GMT]
The Eelam People's Democratic Party (EPDP) said that the Sri Lankan government has offered it a powerful cabinet portfolio and some deputy ministries in the new government. EPDP sources in Jaffna said that the party has sought a ministry that would give them power over development, rehabilitation and other key affairs of the north and east.
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SLMC gets bargain, internecine clash in east

[TamilNet, Saturday, 14 October 2000, 12:50 GMT]
The Police announced and unofficial curfew in the Muslim town of Oddamavadi,35 kilometres north of Batticaloa, from 8 p.m. Saturday and called in the army to keep the peace following a rampage by supporters of National Unity Alliance (NUA) MP, Mohideen Abdul Carder, against persons who had worked for Mr.M.L.A.M Hisbullah, former Deputy Minister for Posts and a senior leader of the SLMC. (NUA is the multi-ethnic front of the Sri Lanka Muslim Congress) Meanwhile, in Colombo, the 'co-leader' of the SLMC, Rauf Hakeem, said that his party will have two cabinet portfolios and four deputy ministries in the new government.
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Crowds stone soldiers in temple fracas

[TamilNet, Saturday, 14 October 2000, 09:22 GMT]
The annual festival of the Vallipuram Aalvaar temple in Jaffna was disrupted Friday evening when crowds of devotees who were angered by the Sri Lanka Army's refusal to allow them to the beach for the water cutting ceremony ('Theertham') stoned soldiers and a state radio van. The TamilNet's Vadamaradchi correspondent said that three SLA soldiers were wounded by stones hurled at them by the crowd.
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Wickramanayaka PM, UNP to sit in opposition

[TamilNet, Friday, 13 October 2000, 08:41 GMT]
People's Alliance sources said that the Mr.Ratnasiri Wickremanayaka will be sworn in as the Prime Minister of Sri Lanka at three p.m. Friday. They said that the PA is confident of obtaining the support of the majority of MPs in Parliament to form the government. Meanwhile, the leader of the United National Party Mr. Ranil Wickremesinghe told a press conference in Colombo Friday noon that his party would sit in the opposition.
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SLMC to reap numbers game advantage

[TamilNet, Thursday, 12 October 2000, 13:09 GMT]
The Sri Lanka Muslim Congress that won nine seats (five on PA list) to emerge Thursday as the key player in the numbers game to form a coalition government in Sri Lanka said it will not join the PA unconditionally. A party spokesman in the Ampara district told TamilNet that the PA should honour the conditions on which the SLMC supported the government in the elections to the Parliament. Meanwhile, Mr. A.L.M Yaseen, the SLMC's Ampara district secretary said his party would iterate the position of its late leader regarding PA strong man A.H.M Fowzie.
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Final results of polls released

[TamilNet, Thursday, 12 October 2000, 10:23 GMT]
Sri Lanka's Commissioner of Elections Wednesday officially announced the results of the elections to Parliament following the delay in the counting of votes in the Kandy district where widespread rigging was reported.
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Constitution limits bargaining chip for UNP

[TamilNet, Thursday, 12 October 2000, 09:19 GMT]
The People's Alliance and the United National Party continued to negotiate Wednesday with the Sri Lanka Muslim Congress and the Eelam People's Democratic Party to muster the majority required in the Sri Lankan Parliament to form the government. However, it is unlikely that the UNP will be able to rope in enough MPs to forge a coalition because of the limitations it may face under the Sri Lankan constitution in granting important cabinet portfolios to potential allies. The decisive negotiations Wednesday are centred on cabinet portfolios.
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SLMC crucial for PA forming government

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 11 October 2000, 17:00 GMT]
The People's Alliance and its minority allies, the Eelam People's Democratic Front and the National Unity Alliance, together have obtained enough seats to form the government in Sri Lanka. However, the decision of the Sri Lanka Muslim Congress will be crucial for the PA in forming the government this week. Six SLMC candidates, four who contested on the PA list and two on the NUA list, have been elected.
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EPDP gets four seats in Jaffna

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 11 October 2000, 12:26 GMT]
The Eelam People's Democratic Party (EPDP) won the majority of the seats in Jaffna said election officials in the north Wednesday afternoon. The pro-government Tamil group secured four seats with 41,671 votes amidst allegations of rigging. The Tamil United Liberation Front (TULF) got three seats. The United National Party (UNP) won a seat in Jaffna after 48 years. The All Ceylon Tamil Congress (ACTC) secured one seat. There are nine Parliamentary seats in the electoral district of Jaffna.
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Police curfew in Batticaloa

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 11 October 2000, 08:41 GMT]
The Sri Lankan Police declared curfew in the Muslim towns of Kattankudy, Eravur and Ottamavadi and in the Batticaloa town Wednesday following clashes between supporters and members of the National Unity Alliance (NUA) and the United National Party.
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TULF loses in Trincomalee, Batticaloa

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 11 October 2000, 08:36 GMT]
Tamils in Trincomalee lost representation in the Sri Lankan parliament for the first time since the island became independent in 1948. Despite decades of state backed Sinhala colonization aimed at altering the demographic complexion of this east coast district, Tamils still form the majority at 36.4 percent of the population. Nevertheless, no Tamil was elected to Parliament in this election.
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TULF, PLOTE claim massive election fraud

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 10 October 2000, 18:23 GMT]
"More than ninety thousand votes of the total of about two hundred thousand votes said to have been polled today in Jaffna were rigged" said the leader of the People's Liberation Organisation of Tamil Eelam (PLOTE) Mr.Dharmalingam Sidarthan, the chief candidate of the ex-Tamil militant group contesting the elections to the Sri Lankan Parliament. Mr.Sidarthan told TamilNet Tuesday evening that he has requested the Commissioner of Elections not to declare the results of the Kayts and Kankesanthurai polling divisions in Jaffna because of the massive rigging.
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