The Japanese government has granted US $860,500 in aid to the demining organisation - HALO Trust, to work towards demining in the North.

The agreement was signed between the Japanese Ambassador Nobuhito Hobo and the HALO Trust Programme Manager on the island, Bartholomew Digby on Friday.

A Sri Lankan government minister said on Saturday that it hoped India will vote for it in the UN Human Rights Council in March.

Sri Lankan Minister for Public Administration W.D.J. Seneviratne told reporters here that there had been "a remarkable improvement in the human rights situation" in his country.

In a submission to a conference organised by Berghof and GTF last month, Tamil civil society actors from the North-East advocated for a "referendum wherein the Tamil people could freely express their aspirations for a political solution", after an outline of a proposal for a political solution is drafted from a bottom-up process, echoing work done by the Scottish Constitutional Convention which eventually led to the establishment of the Scottish Parliament.

Writing in the Times of India, Frances Harrison told of how recent flooding in Mullivaikal has exposed skulls and human remains from the final killing fields, where civilains were slaughtered in 2009, according to reports.

Activists from Naam Thamizhar Iyakkam in India have protested against Sri lankan President Mahinda Rajapaksa's visit to Tirupathi, picketing an express train leaving from Puducherry.

Tamil Member of Parliament Sritharan has rebuffed claims made by Australian politicians last week that Sri Lanka was safe for Tamils and the reasons for the rise in asylum seekers were “economic and lifestyle”.

Speaking on Melbourne radio 3CR, Sritharan said,

“I am very hurt by Julie Bishop’s false claims. Spreading lies with no conscience about a race that is being wiped out saddened us. We feel we have been deceived,”

Having met with the Australian delegation as they toured the island, Sritharan went on to say,

“I felt Julie Bishop and her colleagues were taking sides with the Sri Lankan Government. They did not care about Tamil grievances. The actions of people like Julie Bishop hurts us.”

“Many people who have been deported back from Sri Lanka are spending time in jails. They asked for names but I could not provide them at the time. When I asked them whether they could guarantee the lives of these young men, Julie Bishop shook her head and said we can’t guarantee anyone’s life. So we could not talk about issues certain individuals faced. It hurts us to know that they haven’t understood the sufferings of our people,”

“When they visited Tamil areas, they did not speak to any of the Tamil civilians. The people were too scared because the army and intelligence people surrounded them.”

“Thousands of Tamil youth are rotting in jails. Sri Lankan Army is everywhere. We have Sri Lankan intelligence roaming around everywhere. Even two days ago on Sri Lanka’s independence day (which Tamils mourn) Tamils were forced to hoist the Lion flag on their houses. When a flag accidentally fell down from a house, they beat up the house owner.”

“Tamils can’t live peacefully here. This why Tamils flee to places like Australia.”

Earlier, Australian opposition immigration spokesman Scott Morrison denied ongoing human rights abuses on the island stating,

“We didn’t hear of on-going Tamil abuse by the Sinhalese, that’s the point... The most important thing is to beef up the capacity of Sri Lanka to ensure they (the boats) don't get within a few hundred nautical miles of Australia".

Sri Lanka’s foreign secretary has dismissed a warning by a Canadian minister that there might be a revival of “radicalisation by the diaspora”.

The Canadian Minister of Citizenship, Immigration and Multiculturalism Jason Kenney made the comments in Ontario last week, adding that he found the political situation was deteriorating and he had shared his views with Prime Minister Stephen Harper.

In an open letter to the Commonwealth Heads of Government, Brad Adams, Human Rights Watch's Asia director, urged that the choice of Sri Lanka as the venue for the upcoming Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting (CHOGM) be changed given the state's failure to achieve meaningful progress five benchmarks outlined in an open letter late last year. 

The circulation manager of Jaffna newspaper ‘Thinakkural’ was hospitalised after being assaulted by a gang of motorcyclists early on Wednesday morning.

46-year-old Sivagurunathan Sivakumar was followed by six individuals, all with their faces covered by helmets, on three motorbikes as he was doing his daily distribution rounds in Jaffna.

Sivakumar recalls being overtaken and stopped by one motorbike, punched in the face by one individual and beaten with metal poles and clubs by the others.

Sivakumar’s motorcycle and the bundles of newspapers which he had been transporting were then set alight by the attackers.

The Tamil National People’s Front (TNPF) condemned the ‘barbaric’ and ‘malicious’ assault.

In a statement released in Tamil on Thursday, the TNPF said:

 “Last month, a distribution worker for Uthayan was attacked in this same style... These attacks have been carried out by forces with no respect for democracy - anti-democratic forces incapable of engaging in discussions and instead trust in cultures of violence and murder."