Sri Lanka's Criminal Investigation Department has arrested the head of the finance division of the Tamil Rehabilitation Organisation, a front organisation for the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam, in Jaffna.He is alleged to have provided millions of rupees to the Tiger rebels for their war efforts. Investigations have claimed that he had provided TRO funds to slain LTTE leader Velupillai Prabhakaran, its political head S Thamil Selvan and several key members.
Sri Lankan forces eliminated surrendering Tiger leaders on the orders of the defence secretary who had instructed that 'all Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam leaders must be killed,' ex-army chief General Sarath Fonseka has claimed, prompting the government to describe it as a 'great betrayal.'
Breaking a 28-year-long hiatus, Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Friday embarked on an important visit to Sri Lanka with the message that India favoured a life of equality, justice, peace and dignity for Tamils in its "new journey" of peace and reconciliation.
Professor P Radhakrishnan, a sociologist from the Madras Institute of Development Studies, draws the difference between the LTTE and the ordinary Tamils of Sri Lanka.
Sri Lankan Army General Sarath Fonseka, who presided over the military offensive on the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam, has been asked by the United States authorities to testify before them against Lankan Defence Secretary Gotabhaya Rajapakse over allegations of widespread human rights abuse during the war.
The fallout of the spat between two headstrong and powerful personalities like Mahinda Rajapakse and Sarath Fonseka does not augur well for this small and beautiful Island nation struggling to leave the ravages of war behind, writes Nitin Gokhale.
Mahinda Rajapaksa's re-election as Sri Lankan president has come as a disappointment for the Tamil diaspora, which is still reeling from Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam rebels' defeat in the country's civil war last year. The influential community of Tamils living overseas now doesn't know about what role it should play in their homeland, the Christian Science Monitor reports.
Nearly 70 percent voters cast their franchise in Sri Lanka's first post-Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam presidential election on Tuesday, expected to be a close finish between incumbent Mahinda Rajapaksa and his main challenger General Sarath Fonseka.
President Mahinda Rajapaksa promised on Friday to seek a political solution to address the ethnic conflict in a post-Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam Sri Lanka, even as a top UN official pressed Colombo to begin process of national reconciliation by accommodating "legitimate" grievances of Tamils.
Sri Lanka's presidential polls on January 26, between incumbent President Mahinda Rajapakse and the combined opposition candidate Sarath Fonseka, may be surprisingly too close to call, even as it has emerged that Rajapakse did the Congress party a favour during the Lok Sabha elections in Tamil Nadu last year by withdrawing the use of heavy weaponry against pro-Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam rebels in the last days of the war.
A pro-Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam parliamentarian has underlined his party's resolve for an 'autonomous rule' for Tamils in Sri Lanka, claiming that Tamil National Alliance's support for opposition presidential candidate Sarath Fonseka was extended only after getting him to agree to those conditions.
In a major boost to the presidential campaign of former top Sri Lankan army general Sarath Fonseka, the dominant Tamil party, Tamil National Alliance on Wednesday announced support to him.
The 74-year-old leader, who describe himself as "a rebel with a cause", earlier served as the country's president from 2005-2015, becoming South Asia's longest-serving leader. He was also prime minister for a brief period in 2018.
Five Tamil protesters forced their way on Monday into the Indian High Commission and smashed bullet proof glasses while thousands agitated against the Sri Lankan military offensive against the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam, prompting the mission to seek "adequate security" to protect its offices.
Prabhakaran's follies which led to the LTTE's downfall are its split with Karuna, the legendary conventional fighter from the Eastern Province and his followers, the increasing reliance on terrorism after the desertion of the conventional fighters led by Karuna and Prabhakaran's working to defeat of former prime minister Ranil Wickremasinghe in the 2006 presidential elections, which were won by Mahinda Rajapaksa.
Tamil journalist Jayaprakash Sittampalam Tissainayagam, who was sentenced to 20 years rigorous imprisonment in Sri Lanka for links with the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam has received two prestigious international awards. Global Media Forum and the US branch of Reporters Without Borders on Monday announced that Tissainayagam has been selected as winner of the Peter Mackler Award for Courageous and Ethical Journalism. The award would be presented in October.
Sections of top Tamil Tiger leadership on Wednesday began to surrender before rapidly advancing Sri Lankan forces, signalling an imminent collapse of the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam after a two-decade long relentless battle.
The Sri Lankan government has formally communicated to India the proof and details of the death of Liberation Tigers of the Tamil Eelam supremo Velupillai Prabhakaran, a move expected to help New Delhi to close the investigations into the Rajiv Gandhi assassination case.
Three Liberation Tigers of the Tamil Eelam supporters who admitted providing over one million dollars in cash to the terror group were allowed to walk free on Wednesday by the Australian Supreme Court on bonds to be of good behaviour. The supreme court was told an Australian-based charity was used as a cover to collect and send money to the Tamil Tigers in Sri Lanka, the Herald Sun reported.
A perfect strategist who undertook operations against the Sri Lankan army methodically, Velupillai Prabhakaran provided Tamil translations on English language books on war strategy to his cadres to take on the government forces.
Karuna Amman, a former lieutenant of slain Liberation Tiges of Tamil Eelam chief Velupillai Prabhakaran and now a federal minister favours tapping of moderates among the Tamil Tigers who are "sincerely interested" in a just and peaceful solution to the ethnic problem in Sri Lanka.
India is keen to open a consulate in Jaffna, once a stronghold of the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam, Foreign Secretary Nirupama Rao said on Monday, even as she pressed for political reconciliation among all communities in Sri Lanka so as to usher in peace and harmony."Of course, we have to work out the modalities. Because we feel our office there will help us to be in touch with the local people, help us do assistance programmes, help issue visas," she said.
The Centre may be open to talks with Maoists provided they abjure violence, but some senior police personnel in Naxal-hit regions feel it is a ruse to regroup and re-arm themselves.
The US asked the Sri Lankan government to "take advantage" of the opportunity and accept an offer of a UN team that is probing alleged human rights abuses in the final months of the war with the Liberation Tigers of the Tamil Eelam. The UN on Tuesday announced that Secretary-General Ban Ki-Moon had set up a three-member panel to look into alleged human rights violations during the final stages of the war against the LTTE in Sri Lanka.
The Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam, vanquished by the Sri Lankan Army in May after a three decade bloody civil war, procured most of their arms from the former Soviet Republic of Ukraine as well as China, a former rebel commander has said.
Sri Lankan troops on Friday captured the strategic town of Ampalavanpokkanai in south of Mullaittivu, after a fierce battle with the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam, in which two senior LTTE commanders were killed. Advancing rapidly, the Lankan forces have now virtually encircled Puthukudirippu, the last town held by the Tigers, where LTTE supremo Velupillai Prabhakaran is reportedly leading the rebels.
A delegation of MPs from Tamil Nadu will be leaving for Sri Lanka tomorrow to get first hand account of the conditions prevailing in the camps housing Lankan Tamil refugees displaced by the war between the island army and the Liberation Tigers of the Tamil Eelam.
At the Human Rights Councils special session on Sri Lanka last week, High Commissioner for Human Rights Navi Pillay said that investigating abuses allegedly committed against civilians by both the Government and LTTE will help the country transition into a new future. "There are strong reasons to believe that both sides have grossly disregarded the fundamental principle of the inviolability of civilians," Pillay had stated.
The Sri Lankan government has ruled out unregulated access to the Internally Displaced Persons' camps in the island nation, arguing that such a step may threaten 'peace and tranquility' in these camps.Thousands of Tamil civilians, who had fled their homes after the fighting between the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam and the Sri Lankan army escalated after a decades-long civil war, are still living in these camps.
The dreaded Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam may have been wiped off from Sri Lanka, but its lessons to Naxals are showing in the form of attacks carried out by improvised explosive devices with precision in the hinterlands of Chhattisgarh. The Left-wing extremists used the technique to blow-up a civilian bus on Monday in which at least 50 people were feared killed, officials said. The Maoists staged the attack by digging a tunnel on either side of the road.
Sri Lankan Air Force pounded identified LTTE hideout located in the jungles south of Puthukudiyirippu, Mullaittivu, believed to be frequented by top Tamil Tiger leadership, including supremo Velupillai Prabhakaran. According to Wing Commander Janaka Nanayakkara, Air Force spokesperson, the air raids targeted the hideout believed to be frequented by Prabhakaran.
Sources said Prabhakaran could never have been captured alive because of care he took to have a cyanide capsule on his body 25 years ago. The slain LTTE supremo believed that it was better to commit suicide than to be captured alive and that is why the Sri Lankan army could only recover his body after smashing the LTTE completely.
The Home Ministry on Tuesday has issued a Look out Circular (LOC) against a USA-based Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam sympathiser Dr. Ellyn Shander, who was to have addressed a meeting in New Delhi on Thursday, at the India Islamic Culture Centre .Shander has a valid Indian visa, still the LOC was issued.
Home Minister P Chidambaram ruled out military operations as an option to tackle the Maoist menace and said it is a matter of "ethical consideration" not to do so.
'Children and their families need to return to their homes and put the pieces of their old lives back together again after the trauma of conflict,' says UNICEF official Sarah Crowe.
'Sri Lankan army chief General Fonseka told me that 10 minutes before they were killed, ambassadors were calling up Defence Secretary Gotabaya Rajapakse to save Prabhakaran and top LTTE leaders. Fonseka said any fool would have known that a ceasefire appeal was to save Prabhakaran and not the people, because there were no people there,' reveals Nitin Gokhale, author of the new book, Sri Lanka: From War to Peace.
Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani on Sunday said that Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) was the mastermind behind the attack on the visiting Sri Lankan cricket team in Lahore on March 3.
The United Nations Security Council on Thursday asked the Tamil Tigers to immediately surrender, renounce terrorism and join the political process through dialogue to put an end to the decades old ethnic conflict in Sri Lanka. "We demand that the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam immediately lay down arms, renounce terrorism, allow a UN assisted evacuation of the remaining civilians in the conflict area, and join the political process through dialogue," UNSC stated.
The Tamil Nadu police on Wednesday refuted media reports about possible intrusion of Liberation Tigers of the Tamil Eelam cadres in the state following the discovery of some boats with bullet marks along the Rameswaram coast recently.
Congress star campaigner Priyanka Gandhi on Tuesday said India as a nation cannot forgive Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam chief V Prabhakaran for the assassination of Rajiv Gandhi though personally she and her family harbours no "hatred or anger" against killers of her father.
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