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LTTE leader calls for Norwegian engagement

Mr Velupillai Pirapaharan, the leader of the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE), in a letter addressed to the Norwegian Prime Minister Mr Kjell Magne Bondevik, called for Oslo's continuous engagement as the facilitator between the LTTE and the new Sri Lanka government to find a peaceful settlement to the ethnic conflict. more

Norwegian team to meet Balasingham

A Norwegian delegation headed by Mr Helgeson, the Deputy Foreign Minister will meet Mr Anton Balasingham, the official spokesman and chief negotiator for the LTTE in London on the 4 January, Tamil Guardian learns. Mr Erik Solheim and Ms Kjersti Tromsdal will also participate at the meeting. The Norwegian delegation will discuss the latest political developments in Sri Lanka and explore the ways and means of advancing the peace process. Mr. Solhem and Ms. Tromsdal, along with Norway's Ambassador to Sri Lanka, Mr. Jon Westborg formed the Norwegian delegation that met with the LTTE leader Mr. Pirapaharan in the Vanni in November 2000. more

Tamil Tigers slam new Defence Minister’s threats

The Liberation Tigers this week registered a strong protest to the Sri Lankan government over a statement made by Defence Minister Tilak Marapana over the weekend, vowing his government would do its utmost wipe out the LTTE. more

“Lift the ban before talks,” says TNA

Sri Lanka's Tamil parties this week called for India to lift its ban on the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE), the Sunday Leader newspaper said. A Tamil National Alliance (TNA) and Wanni district MP, A. Adaikalanathan told The Sunday Leader that any Indian involvement in efforts to solve the conflict would be futile if that country fails to de-proscribe LTTE. more

Military preparations continue

As the ceasefire with the Liberation Tigers continues into its second week, Sri Lanka's military stepped up recruitment and training, press reports said. The military also expanded its supply lines in the northern Jaffna peninsula and the eastern province. more

Sri Lanka seeks economic integration with India

Sri Lankan Prime Minister Ranil Wickremasinghe returned to Colombo after his trip to India with the satisfaction that his plans for a fast track economic integration had been well received. In talks with Indian Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee and his Cabinet colleagues in New Delhi, Mr Wickremesinghe had won unstinting support for the initiatives taken back home both on the political and economic fronts. The move to closer economic integration comes at a time when there are close ties between both countries, and even a personal friendship between Mr Wickremasinghe and Mr Vajpayee. more

Sri Lanka seeking to build bridge to India

India has agreed to a feasibility study on building a bridge across the Indian ocean to Sri Lanka, Prime Minister, Ranil Wickremesinghe, said last Wednesday. He said New Delhi would join the studies on his proposal for linking the two South Asian neighbours with a 30-mile bridge reported AFP. Wickremesinghe said the bridge link could benefit both nations. more

Central Bank cuts lending rates

The Central Bank has reduced its lending rate to commercial banks (Bank Rate) from 23 percent to 18 per cent with effect from last Thursday reported the Daily Mirror newspaper. The margin between the Bank's Discount and Rediscount rates has also been reduced, to make them compatible with the reductions in other interest rates used by the Central Bank for monetary policy purposes and facilitate the currently declining trend in the market, interest rates, the Central Bank said Thursday. more

Bread prices to go up

With the Prima company raising the price of flour by Rs. 3 to 18 rupees a kilo, the prices of bread and other flour-based products are likely to be increased from next month, bakers warned. Leading bakers told the Daily Mirror the prices of flour-based products would definitely increase. An official of top bakers Perera and Sons said they would be increasing the price of a loaf of bread by Rs.1.50 from January 1. He said other products including short eats would also go up. more

More troops held over killing of Muslims

Sri Lankan police last Wednesday arrested 16 soldiers for alleged involvement in the massacre of 10 Muslim youths during parliamentary elections earlier this month, officials said. The victims aged between 20 and 27, who included three brothers, were gunned down just after voting finished on December 5 in the worst case of violence on polling day reports AFP. more

Ministers clash over canned fish

New Fisheries Minister Mahinda Wijesekera - a controversial figure in the former PA government - appears to have plunged into troubled waters within weeks of his new job by reportedly saying he hoped to ban the import of canned fish, dried fish and Maldive fish in a bid to boost the local fishing industry reported the Daily Mirror newspaper. more

New Indian High Commissioner

Amidst the Indian backed Norwegian bid to bring the Sri Lankan government and the LTTE back to the negotiating table, a senior Indian diplomat who had been based in Colombo during the deployment of the IPKF in the north-east is expected to return again - this time as the High Commissioner, informed sources told The Island Saturday. more

Record haul of heroin captured in Sri Lanka

The Police Narcotic Bureau and Terrorist Investigation Unit (TID) have recorded the biggest haul of heroin detections valued at Rs. 82 million for the first time in history carried out within a year reported The Island newspaper. Of them 42 kilograms of heroin have been detected by PNB while TID had detected 40 kilograms in this year. more

Colombo plans audits to tackle corruption

Sri Lanka's new government said on Thursday it planned to carry out more audits in ministries in a bid to tackle large-scale corruption and wastage reported Reuters. "We want to set up committees in every ministry to look into corruption and wastage," W.J.M Lokubandara, the new minister for justice and law reform, told a news conference. more

LTTE leader calls for Norwegian engagement

Ceasefire holds amidst tensions

The month long ceasefire between the Liberation Tigers and the Sri Lanka Army (SLA), which commenced on the eve of December 24, 2001 and is intended to last for a month, has so far passed unbroken despite some anxious moments. more

132,328 mines and shells recovered

The de-mining division of the Liberation Tigers has removed 132,328 anti-personnel land mines (APLM), artillery shells and booby traps left behind by the Sri Lanka army in the villages and towns of the Vanni region in northern Sri Lanka according to the Voice of Tigers news broadcast Tuesday. Amongst the recovered ordinance were almost two thousand 152mm artillery rounds. more

Students want gunmen disarmed

The Jaffna University Students' Union (JUSU) Friday requested the Prime Minister to take immediate steps to disarm all paramilitary Tamil groups including the Eelam Peoples Democratic Party (EPDP) in areas held by government troops, reported TamilNet on Friday.
"The retention of arms by such para military groups, including EPDP constitutes imminent danger to Tamil civilians and journalists in the Jaffna district," the JUSU said in a memorandum sent Friday to the Prime Minister Mr.Ranil Wickremasinghe. more

EPDP attacks TNA office

A grenade was lobbed on the Tamil National Alliance (TNA) office for the Vadamaradchi division of Jaffna last week, damaging the buiding. The TNA's chief organiser for the Vadamaradchi division, Mr. S. Aravindan told Tamilnet that he was the target of the grenade attack. more

Senior Tamil journalists assaulted in Batticaloa

The international media watchdog, Reporters Sans Frontières (RSF - Reporters without Borders) last week urged the Sri Lankan government to investigate the assault on two Tamil journalists in Batticoloa. more

TNA says lift Indian ban

Heavy flooding in Mullaitivu

Residents living on the Mullaitivu coast, from Maththaalan to Chemmailai, have been forced to flee their homes due to heavy rain and flooding and have taken refugee in schools and temples, reported Tamilnet last week. The flooding is the worst to hit the North and East of the island in many years. The Tamil Rehabilitation Organisation says it is struggling to get supplies to the region as much of the road network, which is in a poor condition anyway, has been flooded. more

Mutur medical services scarce

No proper medical and health service has been provided to Tamil villages in Mutur east areas which are controlled by the Liberation Tigers in the Trincomalee district, said a report issued Thursday by the Trincomalee regional office of the Human Rights Commission of Sri Lanka (HRCS), reported TamilNet. "83 percent of the would be mothers in LTTE held villages in Trincomalee district deliver their babies in their homes without the assistance of trained midwives due to transport problems", said the report compiled by the regional office of the HRCS. more

Jaffna short of vaccine

The Jaffna peninsula is suffering a vaccine shortage, especially those required for young children, the Uthayan reported Sunday. The shortage of childhood vaccines MMR and Polio are worrying health officials. "These need to be administered to infants and babies at strict intervals as injections and orally. Failure to do so may affect their futures severely," one doctor told the paper. more

Sri Lanka pressed to lift fishing ban

Sri Lanka's Minister for rehabilitation and resettlement, Dr Jayalath Jayawardana, has been asked in a letter by Appathurai Vinayagamoorthy MP to lift the ban on fishing in Tamil areas, reported the Thinakkural newspaper last week. The Tamil National Alliance MP pointed to the fisherfolk being thrust towards poverty by the army's ban on their profession in many coastal areas. more

Slain Tamil leader’s son calls for probe

The new Tamil National Alliance (TNA) MP for Jaffna, Gajendrakumar, has called for a new probe into the murder of his father, the former leader of the All Ceylon Tamil Congress Mr Kumar Ponnambalam. more

Torture on the rise in Mannar - Bishop

Mannar bishop Rt rev Rajappu Joseph told the visiting minister Maheswaran last week of the increase in torture and other human rights abuses by Sri Lanka police in the region, reported TamilNet. Police are also proving to be very obstructive in issuing travel passes, which are essential to travelling through Sri Lanka government controlled areas with out Sri Lanka Army harassment, Bishop Rajappu said. more

Scores languish under PTA

Forty-one Tamil political prisoners have been languishing in the Batticaloa prison for many years with no solution in sight under the Prevention of Terrorism Act (PTA), Mr. 'Vellimalai' Kirushnapillai, Tamil National Alliance MP for Batticaloa, told TamilNet last week. Their detention is unduly prolonged because the Batticaloa District Medical Officer is refusing to issue them medical legal certificates required by the courts to proceed with their cases, according to Mr. Vellimalai who visited the prisoners in the Batticaloa jail Tuesday. more

Trinco Tamils appeal to UN

The Tamil community in Trincomalee last week appealed to the United Nations secretary general, to exert pressure on the new government to seek a genuine peace reported TamilNet. more

Honoured curator passes away

The Jaffna peninsula's foremost Tamil artifacts collector, Kalaignani A Selvaratnam, passed away in hospital 22 December, Tamil press reports said last week. Mr Selvaratnam had spent 55 long years collecting, documenting and archiving historical antiques and archeological finds throughout Jaffna. His single-handed effort at saving icons of Jaffna's rich culture and heritage for the future generations earned him the highest civilian honour from the Tamil national leader Mr V Pirabakaran. Mr Selvaratnam was officially bestowed the 'Maamanithar' status by leader of the Liberation Tigers, Mr V.Pirabakaran, in 1991. more

Jaffna students appeal for Thivyan

The Jaffna University Students Union (JUSU) has called on the new Sri Lankan Prime Minister Ranil Wickramasinghe to allow the incarcerated student Thivyan continue his studies. In a fax to the PM, the union has pointed to the fact that Thivyan, a science faculty undergraduate, has been in custody without adequate ground for a long time, reported the Thinakkural newspaper last week. more

South Asia’s nuclear rivals mobilise along frontier

India said Saturday it would continue to mass tens of thousands of troops at its border until Pakistan cracks down on Islamic militants, rejecting a Pakistani call for the two nations' leaders to meet to try to defuse the crisis, the Associated Press reported. more

Taj Mahal to be camouflaged

The Taj Mahal, one of India's most famous landmarks, is to be covered with dark cloth as protection against possible bombing raids in the event of war with neighbouring Pakistan, officials told the BBC. Local tailors in Agra were reported to be stitching more than 400 metres of khaki, black and green cloth, to be strung across the celebrated monument to love. more

Indonesia’s demoralised troops are told “not to worry about human rights”

Indonesia's President Megawati Sukarnoputri called on her country's military not to worry about violating human rights and to act "without any doubts" to protect the sprawling nation from separatist campaigns, the Associated Press reported. "Suddenly we are aware ... of the need of a force to protect our beloved nation and motherland from breaking up," Megawati, a nationalist who rose to power in July with the backing of the military, said Saturday. more

First East Timor convictions

An East Timor court sentenced 10 pro-Jakarta militia men to jail earlier this month for crimes against humanity in 1999, the first convictions for the violence that marred the territory's break from Indonesia, reported Reuters. The case concerned five incidents, among them 12 murders that included the killings of two nuns and three priests. more

European Union publishes first list of terrorist organisations

The European Union on Fri-day expanded its list of terrorist organizations to include Irish, Basque, Greek and Middle Eastern extremist groups, a move that requires all EU countries to freeze the groups' assets and seek to arrest members, the International Herald Tribune reported. more