The Road to Coup d'état

End of War

May 18, 2009

Jaffna University Student Union (JUSU) said that it is suspending all educational activities for a week from Tuesday as the students are undergoing severe mental stress and grief on account of the carnage of innocent Tamil civilians in Vanni, in a statement to the media Tuesday.

The Road to Coup d'état

Period: May 18, 2009 to Dec 13, 2011

Holding grounds is fundamental to everything

Jul 12, 2009

Professing defeatism or surrendering the basic grounds are not the ways to begin or to sustain the struggle with the masses, even in ways anew, perhaps through democratic means. Talking on the need to continue the struggle is not to rule out the need to negotiate. But negotiation is not collaboration. Negotiators need a firm platform supported by the hearts of the masses on behalf of whom they negotiate. Negotiation cannot take place when the platform is surrendered.

Tamil national aspirations, TNA and transnational governance

Sep 16, 2009

The Tamil National Alliance (TNA) or any other political party claiming that they represent Tamils have no right to proclaim that they have moved away from the 1977 mandate for independence and sovereignty of the Eezham Tamil nation, to satisfy India, Mahinda Rajapaksa or any other power. They may negotiate but without dropping the fundamentals, until any acceptable formula is freshly mandated by all Tamils including those who are now in the diaspora.

Tamil National Peoples Front launched in Jaffna

Mar 1, 2010

TNPF will attempt to sideline the elements that lead the TNA on 'wrong paths', but the alliance, mainly between the former TNA parliamentarians and civil society leaders, doesn't seek to 'to disintegrate the unity of the TNA', it was told in the press meet.

Confederation of nations, manifesto option of TNPF

Mar 25, 2010

The election manifesto of the Tamil National Peoples' Front (TNPF) comes out with an option for confederation of Tamil and Sinhala nations in the island, said former MP Selvarajah Kajendren to Tamil media on Wednesday. While stressing on Tamil homeland, nationalism, self-determination and nation of identifiable sovereignty as political aspirations, the other distinguishing features of the election manifesto of the TNPF were demand to repeal the 6th Amendment to the Sri Lankan Constitution, inclusion of the diaspora in the political processes of Eezham Tamils and an outlook to involve the international community in providing security and support to the political struggle of Tamils.

Nirupama faces civil society outburst in North

Aug 31, 2010

India provided arms and logistical support to Colombo in the Vanni war. It didn’t take any effort to stop the war. Even after one year of the war, India didn’t act on rehabilitating the incarcerated people, accused members of the confederation of citizens’ forums in Jaffna while meeting the visiting Indian Foreign Secretary Nirupama Menon Rao on Tuesday. Resettlement is a hoodwink in Vanni, said retired Senior Professor S.K. Sitrampalam of the University of Jaffna, expressing the strong sentiments of Eezham Tamils. Army has occupied the Tamil lands and people have strong doubts whether India would be of any help in Tamils getting a political solution, the civil society representatives told the visiting Indian diplomat.

Sitrampalam proves self-determination not a diaspora fantasy

Sep 24, 2011

Prof Sitrampalam in his article appeared on 11 and 18 of this month in Thinakkural, Colombo, was highly critical of the political unpreparedness of the TNA leadership in taking up the issue of the right to self-determination of Eezham Tamils with New Delhi. He was citing a recent meeting of Tamil political parties convened by a Congress politician, Dr. Natchiappan in New Delhi, and accused that the TNA in its eagerness to save its ‘holdings’ in India, dubiously wronged long-standing Tamil aspirations. Sitrampalam appreciated the steady role played by All Ceylon Tamil Congress (ACTC) in New Delhi. ACTC did what the TNA should have done, he said.

No bartering of war-crimes accountability for political concessions: TNPF

Oct 23, 2011

While pointing out that the TNA is carrying a tremendous burden on its shoulders to articulate clearly the aspirations of Tamils, TNPF cautioned that TNA, under no circumstance, should barter away Sri Lanka's accountability for war crimes for ‘political concessions.’....Tamil National Peoples Front is a post-war political formation founded by a section of former TNA parliamentarians and many civil society groups, who differed with the TNA over its hesitation to spell out the sovereignty of the nation of Ezham Tamils after the genocidal war.

Delink War Crimes accountability from political process, NorthEast civil leaders urge Clinton

Oct 26, 2011

In a memorandum sent to U.S. Secretary of State Hilary Clinton and copied to the Tamil National Alliance, a group of NorthEast Civil society leaders said that "the question of accountability [for war-crimes] should not be bartered for the sake of arriving at political solution [yet to be defined]," and added that the civil leaders believe that "justice cannot and should not be bartered for anything else," informed sources who obtained a leaked version of the confidential letter said Tuesday. The civil society group is comprised of politically active and highly respected professional members of the NorthEast Tamils.

TNA leadership faces admonition from civil society of Eezham Tamils

Dec 13, 2011

Prominent members of the Tamil civil society of all walks of life presented a memorandum to the Tamil National Alliance leadership on Tuesday, strongly condemning deception and deviatory polity of the leadership while times demand well-defined solutions to a long struggle. The civil society members urged firmness of leadership in political stand in convincing India and the US of the indispensability of addressing fundamentals of the aspirations of Eezham Tamils, i.e., nation and the right to self-determination. Tamils are not a ‘minority’ requesting concessions, but a nation demanding self-rule, the memorandum said. The impressive list of signatories included prominent religious leaders, academics, educationalists, professionals, trade unionists and community leaders. For the first time the TNA leadership faces such an open challenge of the first magnitude from the civil society.