Several armed Sri Lankan soldiers halted and questioned organisers of a travelling memorial dedicated to Lt Col Thileepan in Mannar earlier today.

The memorial, organised by the Tamil National People’s Front was halted by the military in Mannar, by the Madhu Road junction.

Amidst growing concerns over the worsening human rights situation in Sri Lanka, Britain’s new head of state, King Charles III, met with Sri Lankan President Ranil Wickremesinghe, where the two were pictured in conversation.

The meeting follows growing criticism of the Britain’s new hereditary monarch who has held 95 meetings with 8 repressive monarchies in the Middle East since the ‘Arab Spring’ protests of 2011 and for his role in promoting 14.5-billion worth of UK arms exports to these regimes.

Responding to the news of seven Eelam Tamils being captured and tortured by Russian forces, Sri Lanka’s Foreign Ministry slammed the asylum asserting that they are illegal migrants and refuse to return to Sri Lanka.

^{Photograph: Public Kharkiv}

Several Eelam Tamils were captured by Russian forces in Ukraine and tortured for months, before finally being released earlier this month.

A travelling memorial dedicated to Lt Col Thileepan, a political leader of the LTTE who undertook a hunger strike until death in 1987, travelled through Mullivaikkal this week.

More signatures calling for the repeal of the draconian Prevention of Terrorism Act (PTA) were collected in Anuradhapura and Puttalam today after a mass campaign was launched last week.  

During the 51st session of the UN Human Rights Council, Tamil National Alliance (TNA) spokesperson and MP MA Sumanthiran spoke with Tamil Guardian on a range of topics, including the latest UN resolution, the economy of the Tamil homeland, the need for an ICC referral and current geopolitical tensions between India and China.

Speaking to Tamil Guardian at the 51st session of the United Nations Human Rights Council (UNHRC), representatives of the Tamil families of the disappeared reiterated their lack of confidence in domestic mechanisms such as the Office of the Missing Persons (OMP) and how the Sri Lankan state has been trying to quash their continuous roadside protests. 

Vanessa Nanthakumaran, a 56-year-old British Tamil, was the first person to pay her respect to the late British monarch, Queen Elizabeth II, and has been interviewed by a range of British media outlets.

“It was an emotional experience," she told The Guardian. "I was fighting back tears as I approached the coffin and I managed to dignify myself,” added Nanthakumaran, from Harrow in London.

Responding to the planned visit of Sri Lankan President Ranil Wickremesinghe to the UK to attend the funeral of Queen Elizabeth II, British Tamils have expressed their concerns.

In Britain and in the Tamil homeland, Tamils commemorate the passage of Britain’s longest-ruling monarch, Queen Elizabeth II, who passed away on 8 September.