Heroes Day observed in Tamil homeland under gagged conditions

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 27 November 2013, 08:38 GMT]
Sri Lankan military intelligence operatives were monitoring the activities of the grassroots political activists and the elected councillors of the provincial council and the civic bodies in North and East. However, the Teachers Union of Jaffna University observed a memorial event Wednesday noon by lighting candles of sacrifice and paying a floral tribute braving the SL military harassments. Handwritten and printed posters in memory of those who sacrificed their lives in Tamil struggle have been put up at several places throughout the peninsula where the occupying Sri Lankan soldiers were seen removing them. This year, the student community in the occupied country of Eezham Tamils has been active in remembering the Tamil Heroes.
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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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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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Cut-out of Rajapaksa burnt in Jaffna

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 20 November 2013, 23:35 GMT]
A large cut-out of SL president Mahinda Rajapaksa, has been burnt down in Jaffna city in the early hours of Wednesday. Coinciding with this incident, the SL military has beefed up the presence of armed soldiers in the streets of Jaffna. The cut-out was put up in connection with Mahinda Rajpaksa’s widespread campaign of the deceptive Vadakkin Vasantham ‘development’ campaign.
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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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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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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 war-crimes culpability raised in Australian Parliament

[TamilNet, Saturday, 16 November 2013, 14:21 GMT]
Lee Rhiannon, a Greens Party Senator from New South Wales, during a debate in the Australian parliament following her return from Sri Lanka on the eve of the Commonwealth meeting [CHOGM], said that the situation in the NorthEast under Mahinda Rajapakse regime is dire, that the Sri Lanka army's involvement in civilian life is pervasive and Australia is turning a blind eye to credible allegations of continuing torture, rape and crimes against humanity reported by respected Rights groups and by several video documentaries from Channel-4. Rhiannon pointed out the increasingly voiced broad consensus from several countries for an international investigations into the war-crimes by the Rajapakse regime, and praised the CHOGM boycott of several Prime Ministers in spotlighting the Sri Lanka's continuing dismal rights record and lack of accountabililty for war-crimes.
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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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Protests across Tamil Nadu condemn Indian participation in 'Sri Lanka CHOGM'

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 13 November 2013, 09:51 GMT]
Apart from a state-wide shutdown in Tamil Nadu called by the leading trader’s association, several political parties and grassroots movements on Tuesday staged protests across the state condemning the hosting of CHOGM in Sri Lanka and Indian participation in the same. Protests were reportedly intense in Chealam, Thiruppoor, Mathurai, Kadaloor and Naakarkoayil.
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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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Mauritius conference calls for referendum, transitional administration

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 12 November 2013, 17:19 GMT]
International Conference for Tamil Diaspora Solidarity (ICTDS) held in Mauritius, and was officially opened by the President of Mauritius, resolved on Sunday urging the international community, to conduct independent international investigation into genocide, crimes against humanity, ethnic cleansing and war crimes committed by the Sri Lankan state; to set up a transitional administration in the Tamil homeland to stop on-going structural genocide and to conduct a referendum within the Tamil homeland and the diaspora for the Tamil nation to exercise its right to self-determination.
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Tamil Nadu assembly reiterates call for total Indian boycott of Sri Lanka CHOGM

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 12 November 2013, 16:06 GMT]
At a special session convened on Tuesday, the Tamil Nadu assembly unanimously passed a resolution moved by Chief Minister Ms Jayalalitha calling on India to completely boycott CHOGM in genocide-accused Sri Lanka. “By participating in the Commonwealth meeting, India will be sending a message that it stands by the dishonourable and inhumane actions of the Sri Lankan state,” the resolution read, also expressing regret over the Indian government’s decision to send a delegation to Sri Lanka disrespecting sentiments in Tamil Nadu.
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Uprooted Tamils in Jaffna brave harassment to protest militarisation land grab

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 12 November 2013, 16:04 GMT]
Amid prevailing intimidation, threats and blockade by the occupying Sri Lankan military and its intelligence operatives, the uprooted people of Valikaamam North in Jaffna on Tuesday launched a protest at Thellippazhai, demanding resettlement in their own lands. The organisers have vowed to continue the protest till 18 November to get their demands across the foreign media through visiting journalists to the peninsula. The protest is being held in front of Maaviddapuram Kanthaswamy temple in Thellippazhai, just 200 meters from the barbed wire fence of the former 'High Security Zone'. The fenced area is being transformed into a permanent 'Sinhala Military Zone'.
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Prime Minister of Mauritius to boycott Sri Lanka CHOGM

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 12 November 2013, 12:18 GMT]
Navin Ramgoolam, the Prime Minister of Mauritius, the country slated to host the next CHOGM at the conclusion of Sri Lanka's two year tenure, has reportedly decided to boycott the CHOGM meet in Colombo. Prime Minister Ramgoolam said that he made ​​the decision because "he is a man of principle,” and added that he had received information that the situation in the north of the island of Sri Lanka has not improved in the four years after the war ended, Le Défi Media Group, a news media based in Port Louis reported Tuesday.
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