The Sri Lankan Army has announced the launch of a brand that will create resorts across the country, as they opened yet another holiday resort on the island.

Speaking to reporters, Army chief Jagath Jayasuriya proudly announced the launch of the “Laya” brand hotels, stating,

"Our vision is to make the 'Laya' brand one of the most sought-after resort hotels in Sri Lanka".

The Army chief went on to comment that the security forces had taken up this task because of necessity, explaining,

"We're not going to challenge the private sector but trying to help meet the room requirement for the anticipated tourist arrivals and maintain the best standards."

He went on to anticipate a bigger role for hotel resort industry on the island, and possibly the armed forces, telling reporters,

"This depends on the rapid build up of room capacity…The government has set a target room capacity of 30,000 by 2015".

Earlier this year the Sri Lankan Army opened their second holiday resort in the Jaffna peninsula alone. See below:

Army opens yet another holiday resort in Jaffna (11 Jan 2012)

The Leader of the French branch of TCC (Tamil Co-ordination Committee) has been killed in a shooting in Paris’s 20th arrondissement on Thursday evening.

A prominent figure in the French Tamil community, Nadarajah Mathinthiran alias Parithi was shot dead as he left TCC's Paris office, allegedly by two hooded individuals on motorbike who fired three shots at their victim.

The Australian government has sent a group of 30 asylum seekers to Colombo, the second such group in as many days, in a specially chartered flight Christmas Island earlier today.

Immigration Minister Chris Bowen told media that the group were "involuntarily"' returned, bringing eh total number of asylum seekers deported to Sri Lanka 186, since new immigration policies were put into place in August of this year.

Finance Minister Mahinda Rajapakse, who also happens to be President and Defence Minister, has presented the 2013 budget to parliament today.

Three years after the end of the armed conflict, Rajapakse has allocated a record US$ 2.2 billion to the defence ministry.

This increase is partly financed by a rise in taxation on luxury goods and other imports, like milk powder.

Mavai Senathirajah, TNA (central, speaking)

Delegates at the World Tamil Conference - including Tamil activists and politicians from the North-East and the diaspora, as well as politicians and civil society activists from Tamil Nadu - gathered at the British Houses of Parliament for a second day to discuss and endorse the resolution proposed.

The resolution put before the delegates, which received widespread backing on the first day, including by several British parliamentarians, called for an international, independent investigation into the allegations war crimes, crimes against humanity and crimes of genocide by the Sri Lankan state against the Tamil nation.

The United Nations Human Rights Council’s (UNHRC) 2^nd Universal Periodic Review (UPR) of Sri Lanka formally concluded on Monday the 5^th of November 2012, with the outcome once again confirming the urgent need for drastic action to force Sri Lanka to abide by its human rights obligations.

Sri Lanka has rejected outright 100 out of 210 recommendations made at the UPR. These included those made by a number of countries calling for the implementation of recommendations from Sri Lanka’s very own flawed LLRC report, as well as those made by the more credible UN Panel of Experts’ report.

Although TYO-UK welcomes some of the effective recommendations made by countries, including the calls for accountability for war crimes and for ratification of the Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court, many of the recommendations lacked the required strength to effect tangible change on the island.

Nearly all of the recommendations fail to take into account the ethnic nature of the conflict that continues to blight the Tamil people to this very day. What remains unchanged is that it is Tamils who suffer the consequences of the “time and space” that was requested by Sri Lanka, and granted by the international community.

The Sri Lankan Army has intimidated a fishing society to allow itself access to fish in Iranaimadukulam, reports Uthayan.

Troops in Mullaitivu are reported to have approached the Freshwater Fisheries Co-Operative Society on Tuesday afternoon to demand access to fish in the waters, claiming it was necessary for camp food stocks.

The Society said in a statement about the demands:

Ruling collation parties, the Jathika Hela Urumaya (JHU) and the National Freedom Front (NFF), have rallied together in their call against the 13th amendment, making a joint statement calling for its abolition.

At a joint press conference held in Colombo, NFF leader and government Minister Wimal Weerawamsa reportedly said,

TNPF leader Gajendrakumar Ponnambalam addresses World Tamil Conference

Gathering at the 2012 World Tamil Conference, Tamil activists and politicians from the North-East and the diaspora, together with British parliamentarians and Tamil Nadu politicians and civil society activists, made a united call for an international, independent investigation into the allegations war crimes, crimes against humanity and crimes of genocide by the Sri Lankan state against the Tamil nation.

The event, organised by the All Party Parliamentary Group for Tamils (APPGT) and British Tamils Forum (BTF), was held on Wednesday, inside the British Houses of Parliament in Westminster, London.

Follow us on Twitter @TamilGuardian to see our live coverage of today's event.

 

In a proposed resolution delegates from Tamil political parties and organisations worldwide urged:

1) Take immediate steps to provide for space for free flow of information that would bring to light as to the ground realities prevailing in the North and East of the Island of Sri Lanka.

2) To stop decimation of the Tamil Nation by the Sri Lankan State.

3) To stop Sinhalisation of the Tamil traditional Homeland.

4) To demilitarise the Tamil People’s Homeland for the people to exercise their democratic rights free from fear of persecution.

See here for full text of proposed resolution.

Addressing the event, the leader of the Tamil National People's Front (TNPF), Gajendrakumar Ponnambalam, asserted that the genocide of Tamils was nothing short of "a systematic dismantelling of the existence of the Tamils as a nation in the island of Sri Lanka", and though the international community may hestitate in recognising it to be so, the Tamil nation must never hesitate in articulating it.

Speaking at a press conference on Friday, at the 12th meeting of the Foreign Ministers of the Indian Ocean Rim Association for Regional Cooperation, India's new External Affairs Minister Salman Khurshid said that India "had no indication whatsoever that there is an issue of dilution or a reversal of the 13th Amendment."

Khurshid said: