Foreign bid to pull Sri Lanka from war amid killings

May 17, 2006 (AFP) – The United States is leading international efforts to halt Sri Lanka’s slide back to war, diplomats and officials said Wednesday as four more people died in fresh violence.

A US State Department official left here Tuesday, urging the government and Tamil Tiger rebels to resume talks suspended in April 2003 and stop violence that has claimed over 200 lives since early April.

But a day after the visit three policemen were killed in two landmine attacks while a civilian was shot dead in the northeast, the military said.

"The trend lines are discouraging in terms of the increasing provocations by the LTTE (Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam), the fact that killings are increasing," Principal Deputy Assistant Secretary for South and Central Asian Affairs Donald Camp said at the end of his two-day visit.

"All of these suggest Sri Lanka is not on the way back to a lasting ceasefire," he said.

Sri Lanka, meanwhile, came on for criticism from Amnesty International for a spate of killings.

"Regardless of who is responsible for the attacks, the Sri Lankan government has obligations under international law to take steps to prevent such killings," the London-based rights watchdog said.

Camp’s talks came before a crucial meeting May 30 in Tokyo of Sri Lanka’s key international financial backers.

The US, Japan, the European Union and Norway co-chaired a meeting in June 2003 to raise 4.5 billion dollars in international aid pledges in support of the island’s peace efforts.

But much of the aid was tied to progress in the Norwegian-backed and internationally supported peace initiative which hit snags by mid-2003.

"We would like to do everything we can, as an outside party, to encourage a return to the peace process," Camp said Tuesday. "I’m here to look at what we might do to encourage that progress back to the peace process."

He said Washington had also "encouraged" the 25-member European Union to ban the Tigers and cut off their international funding.

The US banned the LTTE in 1997, five years after India outlawed the LTTE after accusing it of involvement in the assassination of former Indian premier Rajiv Gandhi.

"We have encouraged the EU to list the LTTE" as a terrorist group, Camp said. "We think the LTTE is very deserving of that label. We think it will help cut off financial supplies and weapons procurement and the like."
Diplomatic sources said the EU was debating the ban but some members feared it could prompt the Tigers to pull out of the peace process completely.

"There’s an internal debate on how such a ban will impact overall peace efforts," a Western diplomatic source said. "What the EU wants to make sure is no move impacts negatively on the peace process."

The EU slapped travel restrictions on the Tigers in September after blaming them for the August assassination of Sri Lanka’s Foreign Minister Lakshman Kadirgamar.

The EU at the time warned the Tigers could face a complete ban, which would affect fund-raising among the many Tamils living in Europe, unless they renounce violence.

Despite the 2002 truce, violence between the government and the rebels has surged in the past month.
Camp said the government must also address complaints of violence in parts of the northeast which it holds.
He said there were a "disturbing number of killings in recent months."

Tamil Tigers have accused government forces of siding with a breakaway rebel faction to lead attacks against Tiger supporters, a charge denied by Colombo. -LBO By Amal Jayasinghe

On the Kappang Highway to Nowhere

Oslo-based Mrs Zoo-Paa pleads Norwegian saloon mission for hubby

Catapult Thangavelu of Hurling Green, Scarborough, Ontario

Canada Wanni, that is Scarborough in Toronto, is buzzing with excitement that a Thamil Kodukku Padai from Guilder/Eglinton has chartered a World War I Dakota aircraft capable of landing on A9 Kappang Highway to provide personal security for Wanni’s most endangered species, Political Commissar Zoo-Paa Sonoftamil. This is a response to an SOS to Zoo-Paa’s Canadian sibling who has approached the devious, designing Delta Division of the World Tiger Mafia (WTM) for armed-guard support and raise funds for such a mission; possibly through kondaddams whatever the consequential thindaddams be, now that the Legion of Terrorists of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) has been globally proscribed.

      
Since the Kappang Highway has no overhead wires, electric or telegraph between Mankulam and Kilinochchi, there should be no problem for this reconditioned aircraft from an Arizona dump yard, to land on the Kappang Highway. It will carry 16 Kodukku Padai veerar, a press team of four chief editors of Tamil trashloids and six volunteer housemaids. One of them came to Canada recently from Wanni via the Colombo underworld and Vancouver to direct underground counterfeit currency and credit card operations. In the Colombo underworld she headed the Kidnap for Ransom Division of the LTTE under cover of a daily dosai supplier to Colombo restaurants. On one suicide mission in Colombo, she was a standby for lookout and escape routes duties.

The Wanni SOS was in consequence to fears that Zoo-Paa has been marked for capture by a crack team from the Eastern Province. Indications are that it has entered the Wanni jungles a few nights ago. On a previous mission under the guise of woodcutters this team was supposed to have networked a support team from disgruntled Tiger cadres looking for chances to escape from the claws of the Wanni bandits.

Three evenings ago when Zoo-Paa hurried into the bush to meet an urgent demand of nature, he felt there was a strange movement. His immediate reaction that made him sweat profusely was that Jeevan and Rajan Hoole had come to strangle him. Since he felt there were three, he wondered whether England’s resident Tamil terrorist Anton Balasingam was with them too. Perhaps there were five and not three, the others being Wanni’s doyen of doom Karuna and Jaffna’s proper parliamentarian Devananda. Such was the shock even nature shut the flow of his bush call and he ran panting as if struck by something horribly weird; even the zip on his Norwegian jeans malfunctioned.

It was then he called his sibling in Canada. He fears for his life and suspects some of his Wanni colleagues are conspiring against him. Perhaps it is due to pathological paranoia of the subterranean chief of Groundhog Hole that has infected Zoo-Paa, Spotamman, Youngsun and Tigergod, seasoned slayers who slaughter for nothing. When fear strikes such people, they spare nobody. Even a chirp of a tiny bird looking for a worm would make them go for the gun. The Tiger survival instinct is shoot first and then ask questions; the bully’s bullet, a coward’s pre-emptive burst of fire.

Zoo-Paa Sonoftamil’s current nightmare are the Hoole brothers and Balasingam who has earned for himself a niche in the British society perhaps as an agent or informer of sorts. Zoo-Paa is having regular nightmares about them because some chap had told him that Christians have angels who not only protect their earthly wards but also create hell for those who cause them pain and anguish; Hoole brothers are Protestants and Balasingam is Catholic and that makes a powerful combination of ethereal nightmare for Zoo-Paa. This is why Zoo-Paa Sonoftamil has stopped grinning; he sees strange beings and even hears a steady drone that has a chilling effect on him. It goes something like; "You are a fool Zoo-Paa to draw tool with Dr Hoole"

At first he appealed to his Norwegian buddy Eric. But his repeated calls on the mobile phone gifted to him by Eric on the first of three visits to Oslo among other things including as pistol, were not returned. Eric probably is courting political disaster for supporting a terror group that enlists hundreds of children against all laws, legal, moral and spiritual. Also Tamil-only Zoo-Paa could not have communicated properly without Balasingam.

It was then he remembered the millions threat-collected from Canada for Wanni’s eternal "Final War", millions raised by sheer intimidation by the Thamil Kodukku Padai veerars and their agents from Tamil families. Kodukku Padai was formed after Paul Martin got caught in the FACT trap along with one of his ministerial colleagues a few years ago. FACT in fact is now non-FACT and something else equally creepy and serpentine has taken its place and hisses a great deal these days but only when the RCMP are not around.

Chief editors of two trashloids have turned down their invitation on hearing that the LTTE charges one dollar a day for the period an individual has been out of the country. "No alms" they said, "but please keep the dogs away." They will, however, publish pictures in their respective newspapers taken with the holed-up Killer Kapitan which Oslo’s Dirty guy Sethu of Nitharsanam will doctor accordingly and provide for them at $2,000 per picture. Two thousand dollars are much, much cheaper than the one dollar a day Wanni tax on Tamil visitors from overseas.

Although Kodukku Padai veerar received some military training when a film with some fighting sequences were made in Toronto to glorify the LTTE as saviours and also to collect funds for the "Final war", on arrival they will receive some more training. In charge of their training will be two child soldiers, 14-year old Col. Mariana and 13-year old Lt. Vathana, both orphans who grew up in one of the Wanni orphanages. Both have committed themselves to be suicide bombers and are waiting for orders. Mariana and Vathana have a score of 41 and 32 respectively, that is the number of "traitors" they have killed to date

Recently these young ladies were seen around Tinnevely but once news came that Dr Jeevan Hoole has left Sri Lanka, they returned to Wanni. Now they will take care of the Kodukku Padai veerars. The veerars’ duties would be something like the Oh Canada commitment, standing guard over thee or something to that effect. They would hang around Zoo-Paa to ensure neither Jeevan nor Rajan Hoole or even Anton Balasingam do not strangle him. Unfortunately, anything more would be beyond them and should that happen, World War 1 Dakota parked on the Kappang Highway at Kilinochchi junction should rescue them.

A wit who heard of the Kodukku Padai aptly defined them as the Puli-makkal Padai of Toronto (Tiger-people Force of Toronto), the overseas paramilitary division of the LTTE!

Stop Press: Norway-based Zoo-Paa missus, thanks to Norwegian gifted communication equipment in Wanni, calls her beloved husband three times daily determined to persuade him to vamoose from Wanni and take up a highly remunerative and totally non-risky profession either in Oslo or Stavenger. With over 25,000 Sri Lankan Tamils in Norway, she has suggested a specialist hairdressing enterprise, with door-to-door appointments traditional to Sri Lanka but unique to Scandinavia. His Canadian sibling is supportive with this option and is considering a similar enterprise in Canada using an air-conditioned mobile saloon equipped with bar and massage facilities. Dirty Sethu has promised to provide the necessary publicity for this tonsorial art. 

        
[Note: Kodukku is a cloth tied tightly around the lower waist and tucked through the loin, "Bermuda shorts" of the Jaffna farmer.]

Sri Lanka: Amnesty International condemns killings of civilians

Amnesty International is alarmed by the increasing number of civilians killed as a low-intensity armed conflict appears to be escalating, despite a 2002 ceasefire agreement between the government of Sri Lanka and the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE). More than 200 people have been killed over the past month alone, the majority of them civilians, and more than 20,000 others have been displaced from their homes. Amnesty International fears that a collapse of the ceasefire agreement and return to full-scale armed conflict would have further devastating consequences for civilians.

In separate incidents over the past weekend, 13-14 May, at least 18 civilians were reportedly killed in the north and east of Sri Lanka. Thirteen Tamil civilians were reportedly killed in a spate of incidents on Kayts Island, a small islet off the northwestern coast of the Jaffna Peninsula that is strictly controlled by the Sri Lanka Navy, which has a major base there. On 13 May, at about 8.30 p.m., unidentified gunmen reportedly entered the home of Sellathurai Amalathas in Allaipiddy and opened fire. Eight people were killed on the spot, including a four-month-old baby and four-year-old boy, and one other person died later in hospital. In another incident, at around 10:30 p.m. the same night, unidentified gunmen reportedly entered the home of 72-year-old Murugesu Shanmugalingam in Puliyankoodal, also on Kayts Island, and shot him and two other members of his family dead. Ten shops in Puliyankoodal were reportedly burnt down. In Vangalady, gunmen reportedly entered the home of Ratnam Senthuran, a tea shop owner, and shot him dead. Other members of his family also were shot and injured, but managed to escape.

The government has condemned the Kayts Island killings and announced that a police investigation is underway. Amnesty International welcomes these initial steps but notes that there is a disturbing pattern of incomplete or ineffective investigations by the government, with the result that perpetrators of such violence generally operate with impunity. In accordance with the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, which Sri Lanka has ratified, the government must carry out independent, impartial and effective investigations into all killings; the results of these investigations should be made public, and those found responsible for the attacks must be brought to justice. Without effective investigations and prosecutions, the cycle of retaliatory violence that so endangers the lives of civilians is likely to escalate.

The LTTE has accused the Sri Lanka Navy of responsibility for the attacks on Kayts Island, a charge which the Navy has denied. However, Amnesty International has received credible reports that Sri Lanka Navy personnel and armed cadres affiliated with the Eelam People’s Democratic Party, a Tamil political party that is opposed to the LTTE, were present at the scene of the killings. The government in turn has suggested that the LTTE orchestrated the attack in order "to divert international opinion".

Regardless of who is responsible for the attacks, the Sri Lankan government has obligations under international law to take steps to prevent such killings, to ensure that those who commit them are brought to justice, and that the families of those killed are able to obtain redress.

Amnesty International calls on all parties to the conflict-including the government of Sri Lanka, the LTTE, and other armed groups-to take all possible measures to avoid harm to civilians and respect international humanitarian law, which prohibits murder or violence to those taking no active part in hostilities.

Public Statement

AI Index: ASA 37/014/2006 (Public)
News Service No: 125
16 May 2006

Amnesty International

Under fire, Tigers plan protest in London

Tigers, under heavy fire over last week’s bid to sink passenger ferry Pearl Cruise II, carrying over 700 unarmed Sri Lankan troops, will stage a major protest in London on Sunday (21) as part of their strategy to divert international attention.

The UN, EU and the US severely criticised the LTTE attack launched on the seven-vessel convoy. The Stockholm-led five-nation Nordic truce monitoring mission censured the LTTE, accusing it of placing the lives of two senior naval monitors – the Trincomalee – based head of the naval monitors and the Jaffna-based deputy. Coming against the backdrop of the assassination bid on Army Chief Lt. Gen. Sarath Fonseka, the sea-battle prompted the EU to issue its toughest statement since the Oslo-arranged Ceasefire Agreement came into operation in February four years ago.

The four-hour protest meeting will take place at Trafalgar Square. Well informed sources said that the focus would be on the immediate need to disarm rival Tamil groups, particularly the Karuna-led erstwhile LTTE cadres waging a bloody campaign against the Vanni group. The vast majority of the participants are likely to be naturalised British citizens.

President Mahinda Rajapakse’s government has brought this to the notice of British authorities. The Home Office, Metropolitan Police and Foreign and Commonwealth Office have also been informed of the scheduled event.

"This is part of their efforts to distract the international community," an official said expressing belief that the British would block the gathering organised in the guise of a legitimate protest. The British proscribed the Tigers several years ago. The May 21 protest is likely to be similar to a Brussels rally held in the aftermath of the EU placing travel restrictions on the LTTE after the assassination of Foreign Minister Lakshman Kadirgamar last August.

Organisers are planning to bring participants from various parts of the 25-member EU to participate in the protest. The Island learns that Tigers are in touch with international wire services to secure adequate coverage.

According to a leaflet distributed in London, four UK-based Tamils including S. Balasundaram, a retired SLAS officer, who had served as the Vavuniya AGA before securing employment at Eelam House in London, the home of the British Tamil Association headed by A.C. Shanthan, are organizing the campaign.

Officials said that organisers would use the Trafalgar protest to raise funds. Among the organisers are S. Srikandarajah, a guest speak at the launch of the London-based former British High Commission (Colombo) employee Anton Balasingham’s book "War and Peace" on September 17th last year and M. Seevaratnam, a trustee if the Sivayogam Trust under investigation by the British Charity Commissioner. A frequent traveller to Kilinochchi and Madras, Seevaratnam is believed to be a key man tasked with fund raising operations in the UK. The other organiser has been identified as P. Mylvaganam who recently moved to UK from Norway. He is believed to have played a major role in setting up the so called Eelam Bank in Kilinochchi which receives millions in various currencies illegally colleted by LTTE gangs. -Island by Shamindra Ferdinando