The leader of the NDP, Canada’s main opposition party released a statement commemorating Black July.

Tom Mulcair said his party renewed its commitment “to defend the human rights of the Tamil people in Sri Lanka and press for accountability.”

See full statement below:

“Today, New Democrats’ thoughts are with the Tamil community in Canada and around the world as we commemorate Black July.

"We remember the hundreds of Tamils who were killed and the thousands who were displaced when their homes and businesses were destroyed in Sri Lanka from the violence that ensued from the pogroms targeting Tamils that began on July 23, 1983. The perpetrators and organizers of the violence have never been held accountable for their actions.

The surveying of 800 acres of land, for acquisition by the army, was stopped after protesters disrupted the process.

The land in Vetrilakeni, Jaffna, was going to be surveyed for the 533 Brigade of the Sri Lankan army, but the owners of the land, carrying their deeds, protested against it, together with elected representatives. 

TNA MP Sritharan, Northern Provincial Council minister Ayngaranesan and councillors Pasupathipillai and Paranjothi were present at the protest, alongside local residents and journalists.

The UNP accused the Sri Lankan government of pandering to the international community in performing an u-turn in regards to the domestic commission investigate missing people, and the recent appointment of international experts to provide advice to it.

The opposition party charged that the government previously maintained that the Sri Lankan Army did not commit war crimes and that now the UPFA government seemed to be concurring with the view of the international community that war crimes should be investigated, reported the Colombo Gazette.

The Sri Lankan navy arrested 38 fishermen from Tamil Nadu on Monday evening, according to the government news portal.

The navy said that the fishermen, on 8 fishing trawlers, were poaching “well within Sri Lankan waters”, when they were arrested in the seas off Delft and Thalaimannar.

The 11-year old girl, who was raped by navy personnel, said that the men kidnapped her during the day, raped her and released her in the afternoons for 11 days, TNA MP Saravanabhavan told media, after visiting the victim’s parents in Karainagar.

The MP said that the victim revealed that another 9 year old girl was also raped by the sailors, Ceylon Today reported.

Seven members of the navy were brought back to court on Monday, after being released on bail last week. The girl could not identify the attackers during the ID parade on Friday, as the police had brought in the wrong men to be identified in court, the MP charged.

Since the then the victim has identified the location of where the rapes took place to the police, the Uthayan reported.

Navy media spokesperson, Commander Kosala Warnakulasuriya however rejected all allegations of navy personnel being involved in the rape and said it was a ploy, brought about by the TNA, to dislodge naval presence in the area.

Photograph Batti News

A body of a male washed up on the bear near Trincomalee fort on Sunday, reports Uthayan and Batti News.

Minister of Construction Wimal Weerawansa has called on the government to ban all religious groups which have been in existence for less than 500 years.

Weerawansa, who is the leader of the National Freedom Front, a key partner in President Rajapaksa’s ruling coalition, said that such a ban on "sects and cults" would "end communal, religious and sectarian violence in the future", reported Ceylon Today.

"Until and unless the government takes steps to ban all those groups spreading extremism in the name of protecting the religion, this problem will not end. There are three or four main religions that people of this country have practised for at least 500 years,” Weerawansa said to Ceylon Today.

Tamil civil servants will be required to learn Sinhala through a government sponsored programme, which has also been introduced in pre-schools in the North-East, according to President Mahinda Rajapaksa's office.

All newly recruited civil servants and former members of the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam, who completed the military’s controversial rehabilitation programme, will have to attend a training programme conducted by the Rehabilitation Commissioner General's Office and National Language Training Centre.