A protest was held in Britain last week condemning the arrest of five Tamils, including religious leader Velan Swamigal, during protests against the illegal construction of a Buddhist vihara at Thaiyiddy in the Tamil homeland.

The Tamil National People's Front (TNPF) remembered assassinated human rights lawyer and former leader of the All Ceylon Tamil Congress (ACTC), Kumar Ponnambalam yesterday. 

The thirteenth annual ‘Kings of Gaana’ took place at Troxy on 14th December, organised by King’s College London’s. British Tamil comedian Kutti Hari and broadcaster Nisha Nisanthan hosted the world’s largest inter-university Gaana competition.

United States President Donald Trump has said the US has carried out a “large scale strike” against Venezuela and “captured” the country’s leader, President Nicolas Maduro.

In a post on Truth Social, Trump claimed Maduro and his wife had been “captured and flown out of the country” following the operation, which the US leader said was conducted “in conjunction with US law enforcement”.

Landowners and students protest installation of Buddha statue at illegally constructed Buddhist temple in Thaiyiddy.

On this day 20 years ago, five Tamil students were summarily executed by Sri Lanka's Special Task Force, whilst they spent an afternoon on the beach in Trincomalee.

To date, no one has been held accountable for the murder.

A Tamil father who has spent the last 17 years looking for his forcibly disappeared son has passed away this week. 

Vaiyapuri Chandran from Chinnathampanai, Vavuniya died at the age of 69 from an illness. 

Chandran has been protesting alongside other Tamil families in Vavuniya to know the fate of his son Jayakanthan who was forcibly disappeared in 2008.

2025 has been an interesting year for Tamil cinema. There have been no film releases for Vijay, whose next film ‘Jana Nayagan’ is awaiting release in early 2026. The much anticipated collaboration between director Lokesh Kanagaraj and Rajinikanth was a middling disappointment. Dhanush released two films as director, neither of which show much improvement in his trajectory as a writer. Mani Ratnam and Kamal Haasan’s reunion following their 1987 classic ‘Nayakan’ was unanimously panned by critics and audiences alike. In the midst of all this negativity, there were a few releases which act as a silver lining to an otherwise lacklustre year of film.

Sri Lanka's Criminal Investigation Department (CID) arrested Eelam People's Democratic Party (EPDP) leader Douglas Devananda  yesterday, over the alleged transfer of a firearm to an underworld drug kingpin.