srilanka1998
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Sri Lanka's north tense after new grenade attack
[ Reuters ] [ 11:08 GMT, Jan. 12, 2006 ]
Four policemen and a soldier were injured in a grenade attack and a youth was shot on Thursday in Sri Lanka's tense, army-held northern enclave of Jaffna as escalating violence stokes fears of renewed civil war. A 16-year-old boy who works in a nearby shop suffered two gunshot wounds, apparently hit by bullets as they fell to the ground, nurses said. He was the latest civilian casualty in the crossfire of Sri Lanka's protracted conflict. "I was crossing the road when I was hit by a piece of metal," said dazed Dharmalingam Rajakumar, lying in a hospital bed next to one of the injured policemen in a run-down ward as heavily armed officers stood guard. The incident was the latest in a rash of grenade attacks and deadly claymore mine blasts in the Jaffna peninsula, which the rebels see as the cradle of Sri Lanka's ethnic Tamil civilisation and want back.
24 refugees from Sri Lanka land in Tamil Nadu coast
[ UNI ] [ 11:15 GMT, Jan. 12, 2006 ]
Twenty-four Sri Lankan Tamil refugees, nine of them children, landed at Arichamanai coast near Dhanuskodi in Ramanathapuram district of Tamil Nadu early today fearing a confrontation between the LTTE and the Sri Lankan army on the island. Police said the refugees hailed from Selvapuram in Thalaimannar in the Jaffna peninsula. They had engaged a country boat to reach the Arichamani shores. Later they took asylum at the Dhanuskodi police station. One of the refugees told UNI that for the past few days, both the military and LTTE rebels had been patrolling their areas and there were fears that clashes between them would break out any moment.
The Dilemma of the US: The LTTE and the Buddhist Ayatollahs
[ TamilCanadian ] [ 11:50 GMT, Jan. 12, 2006 ]
Now the Ambassador must understand that neither the Tamils nor the LTTE is fighting a nation, a people or a government. They are fighting an ideology based on 'one land, one faith, one language and one rule.' This ideology reduces the other as an unwanted, secondary alien; a mere cannon fodder. The Tamils are therefore fighting for dignity and self-respect, for freedom and justice. They also know that all weapons including nuclear ones supplied by the US can kill them. But in the end they will have Tamils' dead bodies not their dignity and respect. It may be of interest to the US Ambassador to know that the very first political assassination of a prime minister in office in South Asia took place in Sri Lanka. It was not committed by a terrorist or by any designated member of a terrorist group. It was meticulously planned and executed by a Buddhist chief priest of an Episcopal rank in (Thero) 1959.
Appeal to end Sri Lanka violence
[ BBC ] [ 12:40 GMT, Jan. 12, 2006 ]
Amnesty International has urged the Sri Lankan government and Tamil Tiger rebels to end killings and abductions after a sharp rise in violence. More than 100 people have died in the north and the east in the past month, including 40 civilians, the group says. The violence has brought a four-year ceasefire to the brink of collapse. The Tigers are blamed for a spate of attacks on military personnel. The rebels say civilians have been beaten and, in some cases killed, by the army. Amnesty International says it is "appalled" by the killing of a Tamil MP, Joseph Pararajasingham, who was shot dead while attending midnight mass at a church in Batticaloa on Christmas Eve.
Sailors killed in Sri Lanka blast
[ BBC ] [ 12:44 GMT, Jan. 12, 2006 ]
At least nine Sri Lankan sailors have been killed in a blast in the north of the country, the military says. Officials blamed "terrorists" for the Vavuniya district attack, in which another seven sailors were hurt. The sailors were travelling in a bus which struck a claymore mine, a military spokesman said. Fears that Sri Lanka's bloody civil war could resume are high after a series of attacks which have strained a truce between troops and Tamil rebels. The latest attack took place at about 1605 (1005 GMT) in the Mannar area near Vavuniya, Sri Lankan military spokesman Prasad Samarasinghe told the BBC.
Nine SLN sailors killed, 10 wounded in Claymore blast in Chettikulam
[TamilNet, January 12, 2006 10:48 GMT]
Nine Sri Lanka Navy sailors were killed and ten wounded when their bus hit a Claymore mine in Chettikulam Thursday evening around 4:20 p.m., Sri Lankan naval sources said. The attack took place on Madawachi - Mannar Road. A Sinhala home guard was reported killed and a Muslim youth was wounded in SLN gunfire following the attack. Sri Lanka Army soldiers who cordoned off and searched the area have attacked civilian residents in Veerapuram village located close to the site of explosion. Tension prevails in the area, civilian sources said.
The bus with SLN sailors left the Vavuniya-Punava Naval Base around 3:30 carrying sailors to Mannar, sources said.
The Claymore explosion was reported, between Chettikulam and Adappankulam, at Siluvai (Cross) junction where Nelukkulam and Chettykulam Roads crosscut with Madawachi-Mannar main road. A police checkpost is located at the junction.
Chettikulam is located 24 km southwest of Vavuniya town.
Additional troops were sent to the area to conduct a cordon and search operation.
A Sinhala home guard, H. Jeyasinghe, 50, was killed and a Muslim youth, Mohammed Naffar, was wounded in the gunfire by SLN personnel following the Claymore attack.
Names of the nine SLN sailors killed in the blast:
K. K. Chandrapala
A. S. Dhanapala
M. Fernando
S. M. Subasinghe
S. K-Prasath Nilantha
H. Gunetilleke
G. G. Athukorale
W. G. A. Wijeyasooriya
M. M. P. Ajantha
The bodies of the sailors killed in Chettikulam were taken to Madawachiya Hospital mortuary, medical sources said.
C. T. S. Srimeman, K. Fernando, A.T.M. Fernando, H.N.A. Fernando, A. D. Chandrasri and M.K.K. Ranathunge were six of the ten sailors wounded in the Claymore blast.
Injured sailors were immediatly admitted to the Chettikulam hospital and later transferred to Anuradhapura hospital.
Suspected rebel ambush kills 8 Sri Lankan sailors
Thu Jan 12, 2006 6:53 AM ET
COLOMBO (Reuters) - Suspected Tamil Tiger rebels killed 8 sailors in a fragmentation mine ambush on a main supply route in the island's north on Thursday, the Navy said, amid growing fears of a return to civil war.
The strike in army-held territory in the north-central district of Vavuniya comes after a series of similar mine attacks killed 39 military personnel in December.
"A Navy bus exploded due to a claymore mine attack," a Navy spokesman said. "It is eight dead and eight wounded," he added, revising down an earlier death toll of nine.
Claymores are blocks of plastic explosive at the end of a trip-wire or control line that send ball bearings and metal flying out toward their target, to devastating effect.
The Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) were not immediately available for comment, but have routinely denied involvement in a series of attacks that have strained a 2002 ceasefire to breaking point.
The Tigers have threatened to resume their armed struggle unless the government gives them a separate Tamil homeland and wide political powers in the north and east, where they already run a de facto state, and say they are ready to use suicide bombers as in the past if war resumes.
Diplomats and defense experts say both sides are engaged in an undeclared war that has hammered the stock market and started to erode the island's lynchpin tourism industry.
On Saturday, suspected Tiger suicide bombers rammed a naval fast attack boat off the island's east coast, killing 13 sailors.
ATTACKS A DAILY ROUTINE
Smaller attacks are carried out almost daily. Four policemen and a soldier were injured in a grenade attack and a youth was shot in the tense, army-held northern enclave of Jaffna on Thursday.
Heavily armed troops blamed the attack on the Tigers and conducted spot checks on streets still scarred by years of past shelling. Shops closed and residents stayed indoors.
Diplomats fear continued escalation could spiral back into an all-out war that would choke the $20 billion economy.
The Tigers helped scuttle the chances of the more conciliatory candidate at November's presidential election, which analysts say shows the Tigers are not ready to talk peace and have used the truce to regroup and rearm.
Norwegian peace envoy Erik Solheim is due in Sri Lanka from January 23 to 26 to try to break a deadlock over where to hold talks between the government and the Tigers. Officials played down hopes of an imminent breakthrough.
The rebels want talks in Europe, preferably Oslo. The government has said it is willing to have talks in Asia, and possibly South Africa. But there is still no sign of a face-saving compromise for both sides.
"We hope that this visit will break the ice and settle the deadlock of the venue," Nimal Siripala de Silva, parliament's leader of the house, told reporters after a cabinet briefing.
"The government's commitment to a negotiated settlement is not perturbed by the LTTE attacks. The government will not start the war. We will not be provoked by the LTTE," he added.
Ordinary Sri Lankans are feeling the pinch.
"Today business is very, very bad, because people don't come to town like in the past. People are afraid," said Victor Anandanayagan, 42, tending his empty Jaffna grocery store.
"Incidents are very frequent and sudden," he added. "We were doing about 20,000 rupees ($196) business a day. Now we're not even doing 3,000 rupees a day."
($1 = 102 rupees)
(Additional reporting by Peter Apps in COLOMBO and Joe Ariyaratnam in JAFFNA)
Canada: Minorities, too, abandoning Liberals
[ The Toronto Star ] [ 21:11 GMT, Jan. 12, 2006 ]
Mark Persaud of Toronto placed the letter on his Multicultural News website, and added: "The traditional love affair between the Liberal party and many in the ethno-cultural communities has turned sour." Angelo Persichilli of the Italian daily Corriere Canadese told Reuters news agency: "The ethnic vote should not be taken for granted by the Liberals." Arab Canadians, a significant percentage of whom are Christians, are dismayed by the sorry Liberal record on civil liberties post-9/11, according to Mohamed Boudjenane of the Canadian Arab Federation. Raja Khouri, former president of the federation, said Arabs are upset with what they see as the Liberal pro-Israeli policy tilt.
[ Reuters ] [ 11:08 GMT, Jan. 12, 2006 ]
Four policemen and a soldier were injured in a grenade attack and a youth was shot on Thursday in Sri Lanka's tense, army-held northern enclave of Jaffna as escalating violence stokes fears of renewed civil war. A 16-year-old boy who works in a nearby shop suffered two gunshot wounds, apparently hit by bullets as they fell to the ground, nurses said. He was the latest civilian casualty in the crossfire of Sri Lanka's protracted conflict. "I was crossing the road when I was hit by a piece of metal," said dazed Dharmalingam Rajakumar, lying in a hospital bed next to one of the injured policemen in a run-down ward as heavily armed officers stood guard. The incident was the latest in a rash of grenade attacks and deadly claymore mine blasts in the Jaffna peninsula, which the rebels see as the cradle of Sri Lanka's ethnic Tamil civilisation and want back.
24 refugees from Sri Lanka land in Tamil Nadu coast
[ UNI ] [ 11:15 GMT, Jan. 12, 2006 ]
Twenty-four Sri Lankan Tamil refugees, nine of them children, landed at Arichamanai coast near Dhanuskodi in Ramanathapuram district of Tamil Nadu early today fearing a confrontation between the LTTE and the Sri Lankan army on the island. Police said the refugees hailed from Selvapuram in Thalaimannar in the Jaffna peninsula. They had engaged a country boat to reach the Arichamani shores. Later they took asylum at the Dhanuskodi police station. One of the refugees told UNI that for the past few days, both the military and LTTE rebels had been patrolling their areas and there were fears that clashes between them would break out any moment.
The Dilemma of the US: The LTTE and the Buddhist Ayatollahs
[ TamilCanadian ] [ 11:50 GMT, Jan. 12, 2006 ]
Now the Ambassador must understand that neither the Tamils nor the LTTE is fighting a nation, a people or a government. They are fighting an ideology based on 'one land, one faith, one language and one rule.' This ideology reduces the other as an unwanted, secondary alien; a mere cannon fodder. The Tamils are therefore fighting for dignity and self-respect, for freedom and justice. They also know that all weapons including nuclear ones supplied by the US can kill them. But in the end they will have Tamils' dead bodies not their dignity and respect. It may be of interest to the US Ambassador to know that the very first political assassination of a prime minister in office in South Asia took place in Sri Lanka. It was not committed by a terrorist or by any designated member of a terrorist group. It was meticulously planned and executed by a Buddhist chief priest of an Episcopal rank in (Thero) 1959.
Appeal to end Sri Lanka violence
[ BBC ] [ 12:40 GMT, Jan. 12, 2006 ]
Amnesty International has urged the Sri Lankan government and Tamil Tiger rebels to end killings and abductions after a sharp rise in violence. More than 100 people have died in the north and the east in the past month, including 40 civilians, the group says. The violence has brought a four-year ceasefire to the brink of collapse. The Tigers are blamed for a spate of attacks on military personnel. The rebels say civilians have been beaten and, in some cases killed, by the army. Amnesty International says it is "appalled" by the killing of a Tamil MP, Joseph Pararajasingham, who was shot dead while attending midnight mass at a church in Batticaloa on Christmas Eve.
Sailors killed in Sri Lanka blast
[ BBC ] [ 12:44 GMT, Jan. 12, 2006 ]
At least nine Sri Lankan sailors have been killed in a blast in the north of the country, the military says. Officials blamed "terrorists" for the Vavuniya district attack, in which another seven sailors were hurt. The sailors were travelling in a bus which struck a claymore mine, a military spokesman said. Fears that Sri Lanka's bloody civil war could resume are high after a series of attacks which have strained a truce between troops and Tamil rebels. The latest attack took place at about 1605 (1005 GMT) in the Mannar area near Vavuniya, Sri Lankan military spokesman Prasad Samarasinghe told the BBC.
Nine SLN sailors killed, 10 wounded in Claymore blast in Chettikulam
[TamilNet, January 12, 2006 10:48 GMT]
Nine Sri Lanka Navy sailors were killed and ten wounded when their bus hit a Claymore mine in Chettikulam Thursday evening around 4:20 p.m., Sri Lankan naval sources said. The attack took place on Madawachi - Mannar Road. A Sinhala home guard was reported killed and a Muslim youth was wounded in SLN gunfire following the attack. Sri Lanka Army soldiers who cordoned off and searched the area have attacked civilian residents in Veerapuram village located close to the site of explosion. Tension prevails in the area, civilian sources said.
The bus with SLN sailors left the Vavuniya-Punava Naval Base around 3:30 carrying sailors to Mannar, sources said.
The Claymore explosion was reported, between Chettikulam and Adappankulam, at Siluvai (Cross) junction where Nelukkulam and Chettykulam Roads crosscut with Madawachi-Mannar main road. A police checkpost is located at the junction.
Chettikulam is located 24 km southwest of Vavuniya town.
Additional troops were sent to the area to conduct a cordon and search operation.
A Sinhala home guard, H. Jeyasinghe, 50, was killed and a Muslim youth, Mohammed Naffar, was wounded in the gunfire by SLN personnel following the Claymore attack.
Names of the nine SLN sailors killed in the blast:
K. K. Chandrapala
A. S. Dhanapala
M. Fernando
S. M. Subasinghe
S. K-Prasath Nilantha
H. Gunetilleke
G. G. Athukorale
W. G. A. Wijeyasooriya
M. M. P. Ajantha
The bodies of the sailors killed in Chettikulam were taken to Madawachiya Hospital mortuary, medical sources said.
C. T. S. Srimeman, K. Fernando, A.T.M. Fernando, H.N.A. Fernando, A. D. Chandrasri and M.K.K. Ranathunge were six of the ten sailors wounded in the Claymore blast.
Injured sailors were immediatly admitted to the Chettikulam hospital and later transferred to Anuradhapura hospital.
Suspected rebel ambush kills 8 Sri Lankan sailors
Thu Jan 12, 2006 6:53 AM ET
COLOMBO (Reuters) - Suspected Tamil Tiger rebels killed 8 sailors in a fragmentation mine ambush on a main supply route in the island's north on Thursday, the Navy said, amid growing fears of a return to civil war.
The strike in army-held territory in the north-central district of Vavuniya comes after a series of similar mine attacks killed 39 military personnel in December.
"A Navy bus exploded due to a claymore mine attack," a Navy spokesman said. "It is eight dead and eight wounded," he added, revising down an earlier death toll of nine.
Claymores are blocks of plastic explosive at the end of a trip-wire or control line that send ball bearings and metal flying out toward their target, to devastating effect.
The Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) were not immediately available for comment, but have routinely denied involvement in a series of attacks that have strained a 2002 ceasefire to breaking point.
The Tigers have threatened to resume their armed struggle unless the government gives them a separate Tamil homeland and wide political powers in the north and east, where they already run a de facto state, and say they are ready to use suicide bombers as in the past if war resumes.
Diplomats and defense experts say both sides are engaged in an undeclared war that has hammered the stock market and started to erode the island's lynchpin tourism industry.
On Saturday, suspected Tiger suicide bombers rammed a naval fast attack boat off the island's east coast, killing 13 sailors.
ATTACKS A DAILY ROUTINE
Smaller attacks are carried out almost daily. Four policemen and a soldier were injured in a grenade attack and a youth was shot in the tense, army-held northern enclave of Jaffna on Thursday.
Heavily armed troops blamed the attack on the Tigers and conducted spot checks on streets still scarred by years of past shelling. Shops closed and residents stayed indoors.
Diplomats fear continued escalation could spiral back into an all-out war that would choke the $20 billion economy.
The Tigers helped scuttle the chances of the more conciliatory candidate at November's presidential election, which analysts say shows the Tigers are not ready to talk peace and have used the truce to regroup and rearm.
Norwegian peace envoy Erik Solheim is due in Sri Lanka from January 23 to 26 to try to break a deadlock over where to hold talks between the government and the Tigers. Officials played down hopes of an imminent breakthrough.
The rebels want talks in Europe, preferably Oslo. The government has said it is willing to have talks in Asia, and possibly South Africa. But there is still no sign of a face-saving compromise for both sides.
"We hope that this visit will break the ice and settle the deadlock of the venue," Nimal Siripala de Silva, parliament's leader of the house, told reporters after a cabinet briefing.
"The government's commitment to a negotiated settlement is not perturbed by the LTTE attacks. The government will not start the war. We will not be provoked by the LTTE," he added.
Ordinary Sri Lankans are feeling the pinch.
"Today business is very, very bad, because people don't come to town like in the past. People are afraid," said Victor Anandanayagan, 42, tending his empty Jaffna grocery store.
"Incidents are very frequent and sudden," he added. "We were doing about 20,000 rupees ($196) business a day. Now we're not even doing 3,000 rupees a day."
($1 = 102 rupees)
(Additional reporting by Peter Apps in COLOMBO and Joe Ariyaratnam in JAFFNA)
Canada: Minorities, too, abandoning Liberals
[ The Toronto Star ] [ 21:11 GMT, Jan. 12, 2006 ]
Mark Persaud of Toronto placed the letter on his Multicultural News website, and added: "The traditional love affair between the Liberal party and many in the ethno-cultural communities has turned sour." Angelo Persichilli of the Italian daily Corriere Canadese told Reuters news agency: "The ethnic vote should not be taken for granted by the Liberals." Arab Canadians, a significant percentage of whom are Christians, are dismayed by the sorry Liberal record on civil liberties post-9/11, according to Mohamed Boudjenane of the Canadian Arab Federation. Raja Khouri, former president of the federation, said Arabs are upset with what they see as the Liberal pro-Israeli policy tilt.