newslanka.org

A Tamil driver of a three wheeler was found hanging from the
roof in his house at Oor Veethi in Kalladi in Batticaloa district
Thursday morning. The body was covered with bleeding injuries and Kaaththaankudi Police on investigation ruled out the possibility of suicide.

A delegation of government ministers including, Sri Lanka’s President Mahinda Rajapaksa’s eldest son, Parliamentarian Namal Rajapaksa, have offered gratitude to the Saiva gods at the Nallur Kovil in Jaffna for helping Mahinda Rajapaksa to complete the Hambantota Port project on schedule, the state owned Dinamina newspaper said in a front page article. The article pointed [...]

A delegation of government ministers including, Sri Lanka’s President Mahinda Rajapaksa’s eldest son, Parliamentarian Namal Rajapaksa, have offered gratitude to the Saiva gods at the Nallur Kovil in Jaffna for helping Mahinda Rajapaksa to complete the Hambantota Port project on schedule, the state owned Dinamina newspaper said in a front page article. The article pointed [...]

Alliance for People’s Right in South Asia has called for demonstration at the Indian High Commission in London on India’s independence day, August 15, protesting the murder of Communist Party of India (Maoist) Polit Bureau member and Central Committee spokesperson Azad along with Delhi-based journalist Hem Chandra Pandey by Andhra Police in July. Indian Workers [...]

Malaysian Tamil leader and Deputy Chief Minister of the Penang State Prof P. Ramasamy came hard on some industrial circles of Ceylonese in Malaysia buttressing Colombo in the name of ‘development. Speaking to media Thursday he urged global Tamils to boycott commercial pursuits of Karunanidhi family. Party decisions announced by him urged Malaysian government to [...]

Malaysian Tamil leader and Deputy Chief Minister of the Penang State Prof P. Ramasamy came hard on some industrial circles of Ceylonese in Malaysia buttressing Colombo in the name of ‘development. Speaking to media Thursday he urged global Tamils to boycott commercial pursuits of Karunanidhi family. Party decisions announced by him urged Malaysian government to [...]

Two special police units have been dispatched to apprehend the culprits who attacked UNP Parliamentarian Ravi Karunanayake and a group travelling with him in Beliatte early this week. According to the state owned Dinamina Sinhala daily newspaper, the attack against Ravi Karunanayake and members of the party were initiated by a group close to UNP [...]

Armed gangs comprising solely Sinhala men posing as personnel of the
Criminal Investigations Depart (CID) of the Sri Lanka Police are on
the prowl in the South robbing Tamil passengers travelling from North
and East to Colombo, according to complaints made by the victims to
the police.

Two unidentified men stopped a youth on motorcycle Tuesday night in Thellippazhai, located next to the High Security Zone (HSZ) of occupying Sri Lanka Army (SLA) in Valikaamam North and abducted him on his motorcycle. The youth managed to escape the abductors and sought protection at Thellippazhai police station, sources in Thellippazhai said. The men [...]

Fishermen of Oalaiththoduvaay in Mannaar police division Wednesday morning saw the highly decomposed body of a male person on their beach and informed the nearby Sri Lanka Navy (SLN) sentry point personnel. Mannaar police, informed by SLN, recovered the body and handed it over to Mannaar general hospital for identification and postmortem examination, Wednesday evening.

Sri Lanka Army (SLA) soldiers occupying Vanni are forcibly evacuating resettled uprooted families from their houses and lands on charges that they are supporters of Liberation Tigers and demand money to be allowed to live in their properties which they have managed to make livable, according to many complaints made to Vavuniyaa Human Rights Commission [...]

Karuththurimaikk Kazhakam (Union for Freedom of Expression), an umbrella organization consisting of several poltical and humanitarian organizations in Tamil Nadu passed resolutions condemning the Central Government of India and the State Government of Tamil Nadu for willingly maintaining silence over for Sri Lanka’s Mahinda Rajapaksa regime’s blatant violation of democracy related to its war crimes [...]

The Lesson Learnt and Reconciliation Commission (LLRC), consisting of eight members, chaired by the former Attorney
General C. R. de Silva, commenced its sittings Wednesday morning at the Lakshman Kadirgamar Institute in Colombo 7, according to Commission’s Secretary S. M. Samarakoon.
Bernard Goonatillake, former head of Sri
Lanka’s Peace Secretariat that was operational during the period [...]

Sri Lanka’s President Mahinda Rajapaksa finally Wednesday took a stern
disciplinary action to control displeasure brewing in the Sri Lanka
Freedom Party (SLFP), main constituent of the ruling United Peoples
Freedom Alliance (UPFA) over the failure of taking tough stand against
Mervin Silva for tying a Samurdhi official to a tree last week. Mervin
Silva Tuesday evening was removed [...]

Seventy percent of the familes uprooted during war and resettled in Jaffna peninsula depend on the dry food relief ration redistributed by agencies which obtain the contract of distribution through Sri Lanka government tenders. Jaffna Traders’ Assocaition (JTA) circles allege that a particular trader acting as an agent of Sri Lanka minister Douglas Devananda, leader [...]

Enabling people to seek economic opportunities, improving the quality of basic services across all regions, and targeting interventions to stimulate economic growth in selected lagging areas can lead to rapid and geographically inclusive growth in Sri Lanka, says a new World Bank report “Sri Lanka: Reshaping Economic Geography: Connecting [...]

As the Commission on Lessons Learnt and Reconciliation appointed by Sri Lanka’s President Mahinda Rajapaksa commenced its inaugural sittings on Wednesday morning at the Lakshman Kadirgamar Institute for International Relations and Strategic Studies, No 24, Horton place, Colombo, 57 law makers of United States Congress urged the Obama administration to push for an independent [...]

A consortium of foreign media organizations led by Reporters Without Borders has demanded the Sri Lankan government to return Sri Lankan journalist Prageeth Ekneligoda who disappeared two hundred days earlier.
The consortium includes, Cartoonists Rights Network International, Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ), International Media Support, Journalists for Democracy in Sri Lanka, Media Legal Defence Initiative, Reporters [...]

Talks between Sri Lanka President Mahinda Rajapakse and Ranil
Wickremesinghe, the leader of the main opposition United National
Party (UNP) resumed Tuesday morning unexpectedly. Both met at the
Presidential Secretariat and discussed about the proposed
constitutional reforms, informed sources said.

Work on the construction of a Buddhist Vihare on land close to the
Sri Lanka police station along A9 highway in Maangku’lam area has begun and the new
Vihare has been named Sugatha Vihare, according to media sources. The
construction is in progress amid claims by Sri Lanka’s
Prime Minister D. M. Jayaratne who is also the Minister of [...]

Armed men who came in a white van abducted a 30-year-old Tamil man in the early of Thursday from his house in Akkaraippattu in Batticaloa district, according to a complaint lodged by the wife of the victim at Akaaraippattu Police on Monday

Promoting extremism of defeatism is the latest ‘counterinsurgency’ weapon Colombo and those who abetted it in the war are trying on Eezham Tamils and especially on their diaspora in recent times. They do it for different purposes but none of them are prepared to come out with solutions other than subservience. Individual extremists of defeatism, [...]

Two key officials of the Indian High Commission to Sri Lanka in Colombo visited Jaffna Monday and held talks with high officers of Sri Lanka Amy (SLA) and police in Jaffna Secretariat. Northern Province Governor Major Gen. G. A. Chandrasiri and Jaffna Government Agent, Ms. Imelda Sukumar participated in this meeting, sources in Jaffna said. [...]

A minor violent incident, resulting from a dispute over parking car at a Tamil religious festival on Sunday in Oslo, Norway, was wrongly reported by BBC Sinhala as a clash between “rival factions supporting the Tamil Tigers.” Even though there was undue highlight, the Norwegian media reported the incident properly along with police report. [...]

Around 2,500 hundred students from the districts of
Vavuniyaa, Mannaar, Ki’linochchi and Mullaiththeevu in Vanni sitting for the GCE A/L examination which commenced Monday are among the 2,45,000 students appearing for the examination throughout the country. 367 students from the districts of Vanni arrested and detained under Prevention of Terrorism (PTA) claimed as members of Liberation [...]

Sri Lanka’s External Affairs Minister G. L. Peiris left Sunday on a
three day official visit to China. He is scheduled to meet his
counterpart in Peking and hold talks to strengthen ties between the
two countries. He is also tipped to meet several top Chinese
government officials in Peking, according to Colombo external affairs
ministry.

The family members of Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eezham (LTTE) key persons gone missing after arrest by Sri Lanka Army (SLA) or surrender at the end of the war on Vanni are to file Habeas Corpus (HC) applications next week, sources Jaffna said. According to Sri Lanka minister D. Gunasekara the wives of LTTE senior [...]

Hundreds of uprooted Tamil families from Champoor north and east,
Kooniththeevu and Navarathinapuram in Trincomalee district are accommodated in temporary shelters made up of tin sheets and cadjan leaves in Ki’liveddi, Ma’nalcheanai and Paddiththiddal in Moothoor division. They are agitating for their early resettlement in their villages. They fled from their villages following the military offensive [...]

The main opposition United National Party (UNP) issued an
ultimatum Sunday to Sri Lanka government to release the proposals on constitutional reforms and the 17th amendment and to reconsider its decision to abandon further talks with Sri Lanka’s President Mahinda Rajapakse, amid Colombo media reports that three more UNP parliamentarians are likely to join the ruling [...]

Deputy Chief Minister of Penang, and human rights advocate, Prof. Ramasamy, is to form an international committee to collect evidence on the genocide of Tamils in Sri Lanka, with the aim of presenting a case to the United Nations (UN) Human Rights Panel, a Malaysian companian site to the Sun newspaper said Sunday. “The group [...]

Sri Lanka Department of Geological Survey & Mine Bureau (GSMB) officials who arrived in Jaffna to conduct a survey in Vadamaraadchi East where indiscriminate excavation of sand causes seepage of sea water had to stop their work due to interference by Sri Lanka minister Douglas Devananda, leader of Eelam People’s Democratic Party (EPDP), sources in [...]

With the United States announcing a fresh aid amounting to US$ 5.4 million to assist the demining activities in the northern province, steps have been taken to expedite demining and make the Jaffna peninsula an area free of demining by September this year, Jaffna Commanding Officer Major General Mahinda Hathurusinghe is reported to have said. [...]

Sri Lanka’s health department is in a fix over the delay in the
import of the first consignment of BTI bacteria from Cuba as the number
of deaths due to dengue has risen to 149 Friday. Meanwhile, the health
ministry has failed to get a positive response from Cuban Embassy in
Colombo. The Daily Mirror of August 8 said [...]

Monkeys in Vanni having multiplied in numbers after the war on Vanni invade into the temporary sheds of uprooted families hastily resettled by Sri Lanka government without clearing the area of the overgrown shrubs and jungle, sources in Vanni said. The resettled uprooted families in Vanni left to fend on their own without the needed [...]

Thamizh Arasuk Kadchi (ITAK) party Jaffna parliamentarian N. A. Sumanthiran appeared Friday on behalf of ITAK and filed a petition seeking the withdrawal of the injunction order served by Jaffna District Court on the expulsion of three of its members from the party by ITAK. The three ITAK members had filed a petition 02 August [...]

Sri Lanka’s Transport Minister, Kumar Welgama, has revealed in the parliament that the Sri Lanka Government has decided to demolish some 671 unauthorized constructions located on either side of the railway tracks in Colombo and in other parts of Sri Lanka, Colombo-based Sinhala daily, Lankadeepa, said Saturday. Welgama had also said court approval has been [...]

A bus carrying Sri Lanka Army (SLA) personnel travelling from Jaffna to the South on vaccation met with an accident Friday morning at Ee’ratperiyaku’lam in Vavuniyaa injuring 22 SLA personnel, Vavuniyaa hospital sources said. Over speeding is said to be the cause of the accident.

Akkaraippattu Magistrate Friday refused permission to a Tamil youth to
sit the Advanced Level as he was detained under the Prevention of
Terrorism Act (PTA). The youth, A. Suthaharan, arrested April last year, is
detained in Batticaloa prison.

Prime Minister D.M. Jayaratne (79) has been admitted to a private
hospital in Colombo Friday afternoon suffering from high blood
pressure and sugar, the relatives of the Prime Minister told media.

The future of talks between the ruling United Peoples Freedom
Alliance (UPFA) led by Sri Lanka’s President Mahinda Rajapakse and the
main opposition United National Party (UNP) led by Leader of the
Opposition Ranil Wickremesinghe is bleak, according to Jayawickrema Perera, a senior UNP parliamentarian and the Chairman of UNP. Commenting on the cross over of opposition [...]

Jaffna High Court released on bail Thursday Eelam People’s Democratic Party (EPDP) Thenmaraadchi organizer Allexander Soosaimuthu alias Charles, a suspect in the killing of student Thiruchelvam Kapilnath in Chaavakachcheari, detained in Jaffna prison. The magistrate ordered the suspect not to leave the country and to sign at Jaffna police station every Sunday, sources in Jaffna [...]

The Democratic Peoples Front (DPF) led by Mano Ganesan has suspended the membership of parliamentarian Praba Ganesan who joined the government in a surprising move Thursday. DPF termed the cross over as one which has ‘betrayed’ the party and Tamil people during “these trying times.”

Two key officers of China military paid a sudden and secret visit to Vanni where they met the occupying Sri Lanka Army (SLA) top officers in the important bases in Vanni, sources in Vanni said. Even the key SLA officers based in Vanni had not been informed of the sudden visit of the Chinese military [...]

Praba Ganeshan, Colombo district parliamentarian of the Democratic
Peoples Front (DPF) and P.Digambaram, parliamentarian of Workers
National Congress representing Nuwareliya district Thursday joined
the ruling United Peoples Front Alliance (UPFA) after meeting Sri
Lanka President Mahinda Rajapakse at Temple Trees, according to
President’s media unit. Praba Ganesan and P. Digambaram later crossed over to the government
side in Parliament Thursday afternoon.

The American Immigration Lawyers Association (AILA) presented Americal Civil Liberties Uniion (ACLU) Attorney Ahilan Arulanantham with the 2010 Arthur C. Helton Human Rights Award, a media release from AILA said. AILA mentioned Ahilan’s “innovative litigation and its enormous benefits for countless vulnerable non-citizens for their rights and dignity,” in presenting the award. Arulanantham, whose parents [...]

A Muslim trader was abducted on Sunday afternoon at Ginthupity area in
Colombo by a group of armed persons who arrived in a Defender vehicle.
The abductrs told the trader that they were from Sri Lanka Police and took the trader by force in their vehicle, according to a complaint by the trader’s relatives to Wolfendhal Police [...]

A Muslim trader was abducted on Sunday afternoon at Ginthupity area in
Colombo by a group of armed persons who arrived in a Defender vehicle.
The abductrs told the trader that they were from Sri Lanka Police and took the trader by force in their vehicle, according to a complaint by the trader’s relatives to Wolfendhal Police [...]

A Muslim trader was abducted on Sunday afternoon at Ginthupity area in
Colombo by a group of armed persons arrived in a Defender vehicle.
They told the trader that they were from Sri Lanka Police and took him
by force in their vehicle, according to a complaint by his relatives
to Wolfendhal Police Station Wednesday.

British public relations firm Bell Pottinger Sans Frontiers is working for the Sri Lankan government to improve Colombo’s international image, in the wake of its mass killings of Tamil civilians last year and ongoing rights abuses, The Guardian newspaper said this week in an investigative report into UK firms’ role in ‘reputation laundering’ for unsavoury [...]

Two persons including a woman were abducted in Colombo Tuesday night around 10.30 p.m. by unidentified persons arrived in white van. The couple were walking along the road between Borella and Fort when the van stopped and forcibly took them and fled, according to complaints lodged with the Borella Police.

Cautioning that “the international response to Sri Lanka’s worrying approach to human rights, good governance and accountability as a ‘deafening global silence’ that may encourage other states to act in a similar way,” Elders, an independent group of eminent global leaders, said Tuesday that “Sri Lankan government’s domestic conduct, as well as its recent [...]

Acting Military spokesman, Colonel Duminda Gamage, talking to the Colombo media Tuesday, claimed that the High Security Zone (HSZ) in the Kurunakar area in Jaffna has been removed. He further said that this step has been taken to facilitate the resettlement of civilian, and added HSZ is gradually being dismantled since Monday and [...]

Acting Military spokesman, Colonel Duminda Gamage, talking to the Colombo media Tuesday, claimed that the High Security Zone (HSZ) in the Gurunagar area in Jaffna has been removed. He further said that this step has been taken to facilitate the resettlement of civilian, and added HSZ is gradually being dismantled since Monday and [...]

A special envoy from the Indian government is scheduled to arrive in Sri Lanka shortly to monitor the progress of the rehabilitation work and resettlement of internally persons in the northern province, the state run Dinamina newspaper said in a front page news article. The visit has been announced subsequent to an appeal made by [...]

Three members of Ilangkai Thamizh Arasuk Kadchi (ITAK) filed a petition in Jaffna magistrate court Monday against the decision by ITAK to expel them from the party because they had contested in the last general election on All Ceylon Tamil Congress ticket, sources in Jaffna said. One of the petioners is the former chairman of [...]

Aunuradapura court on instructions by Sri Lanka Ministry of Defence, informed Monday that Tamil political prisoners held in Jaffna prison will be tried in Jaffna magistrate court, sources in Jaffna said. Sri Lanka government had taken steps to transfer the at least 18 Tamil political prisoners in Jaffna prison to Anurdapura prison and to take [...]

Illicit tapping of electricity by the Special Task Force (STF) of Sri Lanka
Police claimed the life of a father of seven children at Aayiththiyamalai
police division in Batticaloa district last week. The STF camp is
located at Ma’nipuram junction. STF commandos in this camp have been tapping electricity from the main line to their camp. One of [...]

Welfare organizations of Valikaamam North residents expelled by Sri Lanka Army (SLA) from their properties twenty years ago cancelled a human chain protest demanding resettlement in their places due to death threats to the key persons of the organizations, sources in Jaffna said. The persons threatened wish anonymity as they fear for their lives. Meanwhile, [...]

“Nationals settled in distant lands often nurture identities that may well be historically untenable and outdated in the culture of the home country. But they are a source of solace to the migrant in an alien culture and underline a claim to connectedness. Such identities frequently deny the plurality of South Asian civilisation and the [...]

Three landmines went off Friday morning in the surroundings of schools in three separate schools in Ki’linochchi district in Vanni where uprooted families were resettled in Vanni on Sri Lanka Army (SLA) assurance that the areas had been completely de-mined. The landmines exploded when students set fire to waste heaped after cleaning the surrounding area [...]