Even before resettling the Tamils in their traditional areas, the Sri Lankan government is in the process of acquiring lands in the northern and eastern regions of the country to attract foreign investors. Sri Lankan Deputy High Commissioner Vadivelu Krishnamoorthy said that with the eradication of terrorism most areas in the north and east of the country have been opened for tourists and invited Indian investors to build tourism-related infrastructure such as theme parks. Nilaveli in Trincomalle district and Pasikudah, Vakarai and Arugambay in Batticaloa district had been identified as potential areas for investment in tourism. [ Full Report ]

    More than 1,486 Tamil families are unable to peacefully resettle in their homes in Trincomalee, Vavuniya and Batticaloa due to unlawful and widespread occupation of state land by members of the majority community, according to Tamil politicians. “There are more than 500 families of the majority community who have set up houses and are cultivating paddy in areas that were previously occupied by Tamils before the war intensified,” said Packiyaselvam Ariyanethiran, a member of Ilankai Thamil Arasu Kadchi (ITAK). [ Full Report ]

    Seventeen Tamil youths have been either abducted or gone missing in the past two weeks in Moothoor East in Trincomalee district and Thirikkoayil in Batticaloa district, according to complaints made by the youths’ relatives to Trincomalee district Tamil National Alliance (TNA) parliamentarian K. Thurairatnasingam. Sri Lanka Army (SLA) soldiers and paramilitary military men who operate with them come to the houses of the youths in white vans and forcibly take the youths away, the relatives said in the complaint. [ Full Report ]

    Four commandos of a Sri Lankan Special Task Force (STF) unit that launched a search operation into a jungle area in Poththuvil in Ampaa'rai district were killed and one wounded in a counter-attack carried out by the Liberation Tigers of Tamileelam (LTTE) Friday around 11:50 a.m., according to LTTE official Nilavan in Ampaa'rai. The Sri Lankan Police has not released any details of the said clash. [ Full Report ]

    An evangelical pastor in eastern Sri Lankia was receiving treatment in hospital Tuesday, June 24, a day after he was attacked by militant government forces because of his Christian activities, local believers and investigators said. Reverend Fernando from the Methodist Church in Ampara, a remote city 200 kilometers east of the capital Colombo, was apparently attacked in the area while returning home from a church group meeting in the suburb of Uhana. "He is currently receiving treatment for his injuries in hospital," said Britain based rights group Christian Solidarity Worldwide (CSW). The attackers are believed to be members of the Gramarakshaka Niladhari, or 'Home Guards', an auxiliary force established by the government to assist the police and military in security duties. [ Full Report ]

    Sri Lanka's opposition said today it would launch a mass campaign calling on the government to restore democracy in the island nation after tense Eastern Province elections that it says were tainted by vote tampering and intimidation. Sri Lanka's president yesterday hailed his party's election win as a mandate to push ahead with the war against Tamil Tiger rebels in the north. Archbishop Oswald Gomez from the Archdiocese of Colombo says that while the Government is claiming victory, it remains for the courts to decide whether the election was valid… [ Full Report ]

    Two members of the civil protection committee established by the Sri Lanka government and a trader were taken into custody by the Ampaarai Police in connection with the killing of a Christian clergy Rev Neil Samson at Ampaarai town on Sunday night, media sources reported. Two members of the civil protection committee are alleged have committed the crime at the instigation of the third who is a trader, according to media sources quoting Ampaarai police. [ Full Report ]

    The Liberation Tigers have attacked and destroyed a Special Task Force (STC) camp in Bakmityawa in the Ampara District in the early hours of Monday, according to initial reports from the south eastern town. The Tigers launched the attack on the STF camp around 4.30 a.m and took control of the camp within an hour, the sources said. [ Full Report ]

    Monsoon flooding has forced more than 30,000 people in east Sri Lanka from their homes, with many taking refuge in temporary shelters like huts, schools and mosques. Flooding and ensuing mass displacement are common in Sri Lanka, fuelled by monsoon rains. In December, 175,000 people took refuge in welfare centres and temples in the eastern and central parts of the country following flash floods. [ Full Report ]

    250,000 civil defense personnel have been recruited for the security of the Eastern Province in addition to the three armed forces, police and home guards, said Media Minister Lakshman Yapa at the cabinet press briefing today (20). The Government provides salaries, firearms and ammunition to these personnel who work attached to temples and village offices etc. As Lanka-e-News learns, almost all the Buddhist temples of the Eastern Province have been used for military purposes. Such temples have been provided a pick up vehicle and a walkie-talkie and 40 armed personnel of Civil Defense Force are attached to the temple. [ Full Report ]

    A cultural triangle project is to be launched to restore all Buddhist shrines in the districts of Ampaa'rai and Trincomalee by the Sri Lanka's Cultural Ministry. According to the proposed project Digavapi in Amparai district, and Thiriyaai Girihandu Seya Vihare in Trincomalee district are to be restored under the first phase, ministry sources said. Several Buddhist shrines identified by the Jathika Hela Urumaya (JHU), a political ally of the government led by President Mahinda Rajapakse, would be later restored, media reports said quoting ministry sources. The project has been formulated as a part of the Rise of East development programme launched by the Sri Lanka government, sources said. [ Full Report ]

    The people feel angered by the recent celebrations of the capture and liberation of the East. The freedoms so obtained escape them. They charge that the benefits of such liberation have not come to them. They question the validity of the celebrations when they have long lost the battle for survival. There is nothing on ground to even suggest that the government has even begun a proper re-settlement programme. Aside from merely dumping the people whereever it suits them politically, there is little to prove the government’s ambitious programme on paper. [ Full Report ]

    It is still early after the liberation of the totality of the east, so the best may be still to come in the form of the government's eastern rising program. But on the ground, the reality is different. Instead of security and democracy ther is a continuing high level of insecurity, little democracy and no evidence at all of economic development. Belying the government claims on political platforms and in the government controlled media that normalcy and reconstruction are, and will soon be, the features of the liberated east... [ Full Report ]

    Sri Lanka's national carrier is suspending its domestic air service due to deteriorating security and a drop in foreign visitors. SriLankan Airlines will operate the final domestic flight on Tuesday to the eastern town of Ampara, leaving the island with no regular internal service. Last month, Sri Lanka announced the closure of its only international airport where the check-in counters and the runway now shut for six hours from 10:00 pm local time. More than 5,000 people have been killed in the past 18 months in escalating violence between government troops and Tamil Tiger rebels. The Tigers have been fighting for more than 30 years for a separate state for minority Tamils. [ Full Report ]

    Fifteen civilians were killed and more than 20 wounded when a bomb exploded inside or at the side of a bus at the Sri Lankan military checkpost at Kon'daivedduvaan, 4 km west of Amparai town Monday around 12:30 p.m. Police officials in Amparai said. 14 dead bodies have been brought to Amparai hospital, medical sources said. Further details were not available at the moment. [ Full Report ]

    Two years after a devastating tsunami hit Southeast Asia, the Canadian Red Cross says it has spent only $103 million, or 27.8 per cent, of the $370 million it raised for the catastrophe. The agency's slow spending has stoked criticism from other aid agencies who say the Red Cross lacks experience in reconstruction and lacked willingness to partner with local agencies better placed to use money effectively. On Dec. 26, 2004, at about 8 a.m. local time, an 18-metre wall of water triggered by an underground earthquake ravaged Southeast Asia. Indonesia and Sri Lanka were the worst hit. Entire villages were wiped out. One of the hardest hit areas was the Indonesian provincial capital Banda Aceh. [ Full Report ]

    On Monday 18 December, 23 people, from Thirukovul in Amparai, who expressed willingness, were transported to an LTTE training base in Amparai for training. Amparai Special Military Commander, Col Ram, discovered that the many of the youths in the batch were underage. He immediately ordered the release of the entire batch. All 23 people were immediately released and all are now back in their home.Col Ram has initiated investigations into the LTTE officers involved in the recruitment. [ Full Report ]

    Asian Development Bank is lending an additional US$60 million to support a project that is helping increase access of the poor in three provinces in Sri Lanka to safe water and sanitation. The loan will help the Secondary Towns and Rural Community-Based Water Supply and Sanitation Project, approved in 2003 with a $60.3 million loan, achieve its objective of bringing clean water to nearly a million people and better sanitation to more than 170,000 people.The project is providing water in four urban areas - Batticaloa and Muttur in the North-East province, Polonnaruwa in the North Central province, and Hambantota in the Southern Province. [ Full Report ]

    A new scene is now being staged by the police with regard to the September 17 slaughter of 10 Muslims civilians in Pottuvil, with attempts to project as if clashes between poachers of jungle trees and Muslim villagers was the cause of the murders. The Pottuvil police had summoned media personnel from Colombo to Pottuvil to witness and record the transportation of several cart-loads of logs to the Pottuvil Magistrate Court in connection with a case they had filed in the Court against illicit felling of jungle trees, with an attempt to give them an impression that there was animosity brewing for a long time between the villagers and the poachers. [ Full Report ]

    Protests continued for the third day yesterday in the Pottuvil area of eastern Sri Lanka over the murder of 10 young Muslim workers. While the government attempted to blame the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE), locals have accused members of the elite police commando unit, the Special Task Force (STF), of being responsible.Eleven workers went to repair an irrigation sluice gate at Rattal Kulam in Pottuvil on Sunday but did not return. The bodies of 10 of them were found the following day near the sluice gate. [ Full Report ]

    Tamil National Alliance parliamentarian K. Pathmanathan, Wednesday condemned the massacre of 10 Muslim youths alleged to have been carried out by the counter-insurgency Special Task Force (STF) stationed close to the site of massacre at Rattal Kulam. "When the people of the country are affected, those holding responsible positions, instead of exploiting the situation for their own political benefits, should step out to expose the truth irrespective of the ethnicity or religion of those affected", said the TNA parliamentarian in his statement to the press released on behalf of the TNA. [ Full Report ]

    Three people were shot dead by unidentified gunmen in northeast Sri Lanka, police said, and a curfew was put in place in a nearby town following an earlier massacre of 10 Muslim men. The three men were shot dead in two separate incidents in the Trincomalee district on Wednesday evening, police said, adding that they suspected Tamil Tiger rebels were involved.There was no immediate word from the Tigers, but police in the eastern town of Pottuvil imposed a curfew following tension two days after the massacre of the 10 men."There was a clash between a mob and police commandos," a local police officer in the area said by telephone on Wednesday. [ Full Report ]

    Fourteen Muslim protestors were wounded when Sri Lankan counter-insurgency Special Task Force (STF) troopers opened fire on Muslim protestors who turned violent as the STF personnel started attacking the Muslim shop owners to open the shops, disregarding the shut-down protest. 4 protestors, with serious injuries, were rushed to Kalmunai hospital. 10 protestors were admitted at Pottuvil hospital. STF has clamped down a curfew in Pottuvil and suburbs till further notice. Sinhalese civilians were seen fleeing Pottuvil area in boats towards Paanama in the south. [ Full Report ]

    The United Nations high commissioner for human rights called Monday for international monitors for Sri Lanka, where the bodies of 11 Muslim men were found hacked to death in the country’s east.“There is an urgent need for the international community to monitor the unfolding human rights situation, as these are not merely cease-fire violations, but grave breaches of international human rights and humanitarian law,” the commissioner, Louise Arbour, said at the opening session of the Human Rights Council in Geneva. [ Full Report ]

    Environmental ideology demands opposition to DDT despite the millions of malaria deaths its use could prevent. The environmental crusade against DDT began with Rachel Carson's antipesticide diatribe "Silent Spring," published in 1962 at the height of the worldwide antimalaria campaign. The widespread spraying of DDT had caused a spectacular drop in malaria incidence--Sri Lanka, for example, reported 2.8 million malaria victims in 1948, but by 1963 it had only 17. [ Full Report ]