by Victor Rajakulendran; published May 27, 2004 Intensive efforts are being made in Sri Lanka by the International Community (IC) to restart the stalled Norwegian facilitated peace process between the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) and the Sri Lankan government. Through this peace process, the IC is trying to prevent the island of Sri Lanka… Read more »
Monthly Archives: May 2004
Red Herring
by V. Gunaratnam; published May 26, 2004 It is too early to be speculating on where the peace process is heading, but we cannot forever be engaged in political invective, and not go further afield to look at other plausible causes which have forced Sri Lanka to come down from its high-horse in search of a… Read more »
Are They Trying to Take Us for a Ride?
by Rajkumar Sivapatham; published May 26, 2004 The USA and India have recently made statements on the Tamil issue which need some careful examination. The USA’s Ms. Rocca made a statement asking the LTTE to lay down their arms. There have been different reports on exactly what she has said. However, at the outset, she wanted… Read more »
American Gulag
Not so many Sri Lankans are entering the American immigration detention system as a few years ago, but those who are still there need visits and assistance when they are released. -Ed. American Gulag: Inside U.S. Immigration Prisons You can also order on-line from the publisher — and read chapter 7, “The Art of Jailing”… Read more »
Malacca Straits
by P.S. Suryanarayana;The Hindu, Chennai, April 6, 2004 Marines and Malacca Straits P.S. SURYANARAYANA in Singapore The U.S. proposal to intervene in the Strait of Malacca in order to prevent any traffic of cargo relating to weapons of mass destruction raises the hackles of some littoral states. STRATEGIC game plans are the basic stuff of the… Read more »
UN Crop Mission to Sri Lanka
Does anyone have information on the areas missed in this report? Ed. Special ReportFAO/WFP Crop and Food Supply Assistance Mission to Sri Lanka May 10, 2004 5.3 North-eastern Province Eight districts, Jaffna, Kilinochchi, Mannar, Mullaitivu, Vavuniya, Trincomalee and Batticaloa and Ampara form the North-eastern Province. Following the signing of a ceasefire in February, 2002, many farmers… Read more »
The Sycophant
by R.K. Narayan; published May 24, 2004 Front Note by Sachi Sri Kantha: Anantha Vikatan, the popular weekly published from Chennai, has been a household name among Tamils for decades. In one plane, it can be tagged as the equivalent of New Yorker for Tamils. In its English translation, Anantha Vikatan reads as ‘Happy Humorist’. One cartoon which appeared in… Read more »
Beware of RAW, not Sonia
by Wakeley Paul; published May 21, 2004 While the Sinhala press may have exulted over the prospect that Sonia may have sought to reek some misguided personal revenge against Prabakaran; and while we may breath a sigh of relief that she now will not; the underlying reality remains, that the lurking danger in our midst has… Read more »
Sinhala Political Enmity Will Thwart Peace
Tamil Guardian editorial; London, May 19, 2004 Amid the hectic diplomatic activity of the past two weeks and the broad hints from officials on both sides last week, the prospect of direct negotiations between the Liberation Tigers and the Sri Lankan government seemed brighter than ever before. The comparative quiet this week is hence somewhat… Read more »
Will the Poor be With Us Always?
by Neeraj Kaushal; Economic Times, India, April 27, 2004 The World Bank’s estimates released last week show that the number of people living in extreme poverty has declined by 350 million in the last two decades. In 1981, 1.45 billion people were in extreme poverty. By 2001, the number had declined to 1.1 billion. Tempting though… Read more »
Pirapaharan 2, Chapter 3: The Final Solution
by T. Sabaratnam; published May 20, 2004 (Volume 2) 3. The Final Solution I was upset when I saw flames leap up in the direction of Borella. I was deeply troubled when more tongues of flame rose threateningly in that vicinity. Was the information Piyadasa had given me coming true? Telephone calls further disturbed me. Tamils… Read more »
Sri Lanka Scene: Sex Scandal, Blackmail & Kidnap
by T. Sabaratnam; published May 19, 2004 Weekly Review Sex Scandal, Blackmail and Kidnap New Trends Tuesday’s election of the Deputy Speaker and Deputy Chairman of Committees appeared a tame affair, an anti-climax. There was no shouting. There was no seizing of the ballot box. They were elected unopposed. Prime Minister Mahinda Rajapakse proposed Geethanjana Gunawardene… Read more »
Sonia’s Slap to the Roof-top Barkers
by Sachi Sri Kantha; published May 19, 2004 Sonia Gandhi’s Slap to the Roof-top Barkers As one could expect from India and Sri Lanka, quite a few hacks jumped the gun on what Sonia Gandhi would do, after the Congress Party led by her gained an electoral advantage in forming a new government. They began to… Read more »
Forced Migration
Confronting the Realities of Forced Migration By Stephen Castles, Refugee Studies Centre, University of Oxford Migration Information Source: May 1, 2004 http://www.migrationinformation.org/USfocus/display.cfm?id=222 2024 – Confronting the Realities of Forced Migra.. | migrationpolicy.org Europeans, North Americans, or Australians who rely on the tabloid press might well believe that their countries were under siege by asylum seekers… Read more »
CSIS: Election Shake-up
by Teresita Schaffer and Sean Farrell, South Asia Monitor, Center for Strategic and International Studies, Washington, DC, May 2, 2004 https://csis-website-prod.s3.amazonaws.com/s3fs-public/legacy_files/files/media/csis/pubs/sam70.pdf Sri Lanka: Election Shakes Up Political Landscape Sri Lanka’s parliamentary election, held April 2, is likely to usher in a new phase of polarization and introspection in the country’s deeply divided politics. The new… Read more »
28th Anniversary of Vaddukoddai Resolution
THE RESOLUTIONUnanimously adopted at the First National Convention of the TAMIL UNITED LIBERATION FRONT held at Vaddukoddai on May 14, 1976 Chairman S.J.V. Chelvanayakam Q.C., M.P. (K.K.S) Whereas, throughout the centuries from the dawn of history, the Sinhalese and Tamil nations have divided between themselves the possession of Ceylon, the Sinhalese inhabiting the interior of… Read more »
Miffed with the LTTE’s Military Muscle
by Sachi Sri Kantha; published May 16, 2004 Miffed with the LTTE’s Military Muscle; a provocative point of view Has anyone wondered why the Washington Poo Bahs who dictate American diplomacy are miffed with the LTTE’s military muscle? Time and again, Eelam Tamils are served with statements from the American political decision-makers that the LTTE should… Read more »
Are the People Sending a Message?
by Rajkumar Sivapatham ; published May 16, 2004 The recent elections in two South Asian countries send some messages to the world loud and clear. The important one is that “Don’t take the ordinary people for granted.” Recent Indian election results were shocking to the BJP, despite its records in the government. They were unbelievably surprising to… Read more »
ISGA: Chance for a United Sri Lanka
by Taraki; Daily Mirror, Colombo, May 13, 2004 ISGA: The chance to persuade Tamils to remain in United Lanka Everyone would agree today that a bit of homework is necessary for taking forward the peace talks stage by stage. The study of the negotiating behaviour of the party or person with whom one is going to deal… Read more »
Tamil Children’s Endowment Fund
TCEF – Brightening our children’s future A nation’s most precious resource is its children. The armed conflict in Sri Lanka, along with a decade-old, state-enforced economic embargo has literally and figuratively devastated this resource. Presently, there is a climate of positive change and with the development of the Tamil homeland and peace looming in the… Read more »