Jésus Victoire

America had requested the Sri Lankan government to take immediate attention in regard to the war crimes charged against Sri Lanka. Failing Sri Lanka will have to face international pressure and other relative actions, was the warning given by American State Department.

The statement consisting a warning was published by American State Department yesterday. If investigation are not processed, Sri Lanka will have to face actions taken by the State Department was mentioned in the warning statement. Meanwhile the Sri Lankan government officials are advancing activities in regard to this matter. The American State Department stated, such actions will originate goodwill between the races. America insisted on this, after the video images telecast over the Channel 4 TV Channel regarding Sri Lankan war crimes.

President Mahinda Rajapaksa denied that he had come under pressure from India to offer the minority Tamils a political solution, saying that any settlement to the matter will have to be approved by Parliament.

"There was no pressure from India on the thirteenth amendment of thirteen plus," Rajapaksa told reporters. Responding to a query on the visit by Indian National Security Advisor Shiv Shankar Menon, Foreign Secretary Nirupama Rao and Defence Secretary Pradeep Kumar, he said the Indians had only discussed with him routine bilateral issues. The Indian officials visited Colombo early this month in the backdrop of a call by Tamil Nadu Chief Minister Jayalalithaa to impose economic sanctions on Sri Lanka. Rajapaksa said Menon had indicated to him the proposal made by his own Cabinet minister Douglas Devananda on the need for Sri Lankan parliament to thrash out the question of a political solution to the island's ethnic question. He said appointing a parliamentary select committee on the ethnic question was not a delaying tactic. "Any solution that comes up will have to be approved in parliament," the president said. "I will back any solution approved by parliament". "While having talks with political parties (with Tamil National Alliance) we can have PSC talks at the same time. If we wait for political party talks to end and then have PSC discussions, this will cause delays," he said. The president said the election for the northern provincial council will be held "next year". He wanted the parties to start preparing for the polls which will be the first ever for the council since separated from the east in the supreme court ordered demerger of 2007. On the present international campaign against Sri Lanka by the UN and other western nations, he said it was to be countered by submitting two separate reports. They will deal with the humanitarian nature of the government s military campaign that ended in May 2009 and the military aspects of it. External Affairs Minister GL Peiris, who was also present, said that not all countries were opposed to Sri Lanka despite the UN special panel report which accused Colombo of war crimes.President Mahinda Rajapaksa on Tuesday denied that he had come under pressure from India to offer the minority Tamils a political solution, saying that any settlement to the matter will have to be approved by Parliament. "There was no pressure from India on the thirteenth amendment of thirteen plus," Rajapaksa told reporters.

A group of Indian delegates who visited to the IDP camps in Sri-Lanka on June 25th 2011 organize a media briefing in Chennai yesterday.

While speaking in the briefing officials said the statement released by the Sri-Lankan government about the completing of resettlement in the North and East was false and officials also said government is failed to complete the resettlement programme as it announced to the international. Officials also went on to say during the three decades of war 40,000 people were injured and there are 90,000 widows in the North and East. They further said at least one person was killed or injured in the every family who are presently living in the war affected areas. Indian officials also added there are two major IDP camps under the control of Sri-Lankan Army.

Thousands gathered at Marina beach in Tamil Nadu capital Chennai on June 26th to observe candle light vigil for Sri Lankan Tamil war victims.
The commemorative event was held on Sunday as June 26th has been declared by the UN as “International day in support of victims of torture”.
The June 26th candle light vigil was not organized by any political party.It was held by the”May 17th Movement”which is a peoples movement.
The”May 17th Movement”was set up by youths in Tamil Nadu.The date May 17 denotes the Mullivaaikkaal debacle of the LTTE on that day in 2009.
Chief organizer of candle light vigil by “May 17th Movement” was Thirumurugan Gandhi. Co-organizers were Rajkumar Palanichamy & Umar Naina.
Although held by a civil society organization several political figures also participated. The broad gathering cut across party lines.
Among prominent attendees were P.Nedumaran, Kaasi Ananandan, Thamarai, Seeman, Viduthalai Rajendran, Chanthaanam, Professor Saraswathy & Thiyaagu.
Nedumaran delivered the introductory address. Thirumurugan ended the event with another speech.Others speeches were disallowed.
Slogans were chanted frequently. Some slogan themes were -Genocide, Tamil Eelam, Betrayal of New Delhi govt,solidarity of Tamil Nadu Tamils etc.
The commemorative vigil was held for 3 hours from 5.45 pm to 8.45 pm. A folk music event based on traditional “Oppaari” (lamentation) was held.
A street drama”Vamsa vatham” (decimation of a generation)was also performed. The drama portrayed deaths of Tamils in Sri Lanka as “Genocide”.

Sexual violence committed against Eezham Tamils by the occupying Sri Lanka Army in Vanni is on the increase in the recent months, reliable civil sources told TamilNet. Personnel in military vehicles and auto rickshaws parked under the trees away from the roadside in Ki'linochchi commit sexual violence to girls forcefully brought from the resettled villages and sometimes even to girls passing by on the road, by grabbing them into the vehicles. The wails of the victims are commonly heard, but people are unable to do anything about it, the civil sources further said. The violence is systematically committed with genocidal mentality and soon by replacing the civil administration of Ki'linochchi entirely by the Sinhalese, all protests will be silenced, the sources added.

In the meantime, a military backed or military participated racket of bringing Tamil girls from the North and East for running brothels in the south has also been reported in several instances, but civil society workers are unable to come out with presentable evidences.

Recently, Fort Police in Colombo took into custody two Tamil girls from Vanni, after a ‘broker’ who had brought them to Colombo with promises of employment had abandoned them. A lawyer, contacted by the police, handed over the girls to their family. Incidents like these often go unreported, civil sources in Colombo said.

In January 2011, Women's Development Centre, Jaffna, and Paalnilai Chamaththuva Amaippu (Gender Equality Group), cautioned residents in the North to be aware of employment offers targeting women are being made without any guarantees of transparency or contracts. The caution came after SL Army commanders in North were engaged in campaigning among the rural populations in the North that they were offering employment to Tamil women in the garments industry in the South.

In the meantime, National Child Protection Authority (NCPA) Chairperson Anoma Dissanayake in Colombo has come with an official acknowledgement of the crime for the first time.

On Sunday, the Sunday Times and Virakesari newspaper in Colombo have come out detailed reports on a sexual racket that exploited Eezham Tamil girls Vanni and East .

The racket was brought to the notice to the NCPA through the police after a 16-year-old Tamil girl from Mullaiththeevu, who ran away from the National Hospital in Colombo, where she was warded for an operation to prevent pregnancy, revealed the details.

“Based on the information provided by the runaway girl, police raided a brothel in Maradana and found eight girls between the ages of 16 and 24 being used as prostitutes,” The Sunday Times reported citing the NCPA president.

A midwife of the Colombo National Hospital had been looking after the girls in the brothel. “She was in charge of giving them contraceptives and looking into their medical needs. She had the assistance of a doctor as well,” Ms. Dissanayake told paper.

Of the nine girls in custody, six are from North and one from East. At least one of them was brought from the barbed-wire internment camp in Vavuniyaa. Two of the victims are underaged girls.

Meanwhile, Virakesari Tamil daily reported that two of the victims were found afflicted by Sexually Transmitted Diseases.

Killing large number of men and exploiting women of a nation is an age-old tactic of carrying out genocide. The genocide in the so-called post-war period is more nuanced and pathetic than the earlier one, civil society workers said.

Greedy establishments of many countries, now rush to Colombo, singing the song ‘the war is over’. Even a country like Vietnam that has seen the worst of such violence is not an exception, the civil society workers further said.

A government-appointed official in Sri Lanka has appealed to families in the north to protect under-age girls from sex traffickers.

Anoma Dissanayake of the National Child Protection Authority warned parents to be wary of strangers who offered to find their daughters jobs. Women from the north of Sri Lanka, which is in desperate need of development, were particularly vulnerable, she said. Earlier this week, nine women, including two under-age girls, were rescued from a brothel in the capital, Colombo. She says two of them were teenagers, while others include divorcees, widows and young mothers. One underage girl is a Tamil national from Mullaitivu and the other a Sinhala girl from Bandarawela, she said. Three suspects were arrested in connection with the abuse. The trafficking was busted when a teenage girl came to health facility to undergo family planning procedure. Mrs Dissanayake also says government is worried that trafficking within the country may rise as a result of surge in tourism.

Sri Lanka Geological and Mines Bureau says that recent studies carried out island wide have shown that ores containing gold are present in the island.
The Chairman of the Bureau Dr. N.K. Wijayananda told media that gold ore could be found in Balangoda, Kirinnabara areas and the areas close to Walawe and Menik Rivers.
The Chairman said that many countries use physical and chemical methodology to process gold ore. However, Sri Lanka Geological and Mines Bureau will never permit chemical processing of gold ore, the Chairman says. The exploration to find gold ore was slow and costlier due to the use of mechanical process, he said.
Gold extraction or recovery from its ores may require a combination of comminution, mineral processing, hydrometallurgical and pyrometallurgical processes to be performed on the ore.

A Sinhala media has quoted a news item that the International Amnesty Council had planned to file a case against Sri Lanka. Report states, the International Amnesty Council had got annoyed due to the activities processed by Major General Savendra Silva to conquer the attempts of Channel 4 media, it has decided to file charges against Sri Lanka. By stating war crimes had occurred in Sri Lanka, it had decided to file charges. The International Amnesty council during its meeting held on last 23rd in Canada had publicly made this statement. With the coordination from the senior experts from Britain and Switzerland charges will be filed against Sri Lanka. JDS namely a media movement will coordinate to the campaign activities of Channel 4 media was the allegation made.

The International Crisis Group (ICG) today slammed the Indian government for failing to work towards fundamental changes in Sri Lanka’s post-war policies.

The Geneva based international organization said that India has long been the country with the greatest influence over Sri Lanka but its policies to encourage the government there towards a sustainable peace are not working. ICG says India’s interventions have made Sri Lankans of all communities suspicious, limiting India’s room for manoeuvre. It says many Sinhalese see India as favouring Tamils and as wanting to weaken or divide the country, despite its crucial role in destroying the Tamil Tigers. For many Tamils, on the other hand, India is seen as having repeatedly broken its pledges to defend their rights and protect their lives, especially during the final phase of the war in 2009, ICG added. The organization says, to support a sustainable and equitable post-war settlement in Sri Lanka and limit the chances of another authoritarian and military-dominated government on its borders, India needs to work more closely with the United States, the European Union and Japan, encouraging them to send the message that Sri Lanka’s current direction is not acceptable. It should press for the demilitarisation of the north, a return to civil administration there and in the east and the end of emergency rule throughout the country, ICG add

Even before taking measures to impose economic sanctions on the Mahinda Rajapaksa government, the Centre ought to annul all existing economic agreements with Sri Lanka, said Marumalarchi Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam leader Vaiko here on Wednesday.
He was speaking at the marriage function of MDMK district secretary N. Ramalingam's son. Chief Minister Jayalalithaa had taken the welcome step of moving a resolution in the Assembly calling for economic sanctions on the Sri Lankan government. She should also press the Centre to cancel all economic agreements with that government, Mr. Vaiko said.
He expressed dismay at continuing abduction, detention, torture and killing, at times, of Tamil Nadu fishermen and destruction of their fishing vessels by the Sri Lankan Navy. He held the Manmohan Singh government responsible for the sufferings faced by Tamil Nadu fishermen. Even now, 23 fishermen were in Sri Lankan custody. Mere writing of letters by the Chief Minister, as done by her predecessor will not suffice, he said.

The Centre for Human Rights of Sri Lanka issuing a statement says it is seriously concerned about blocking Groundviews, Vikalpa and the Transparency International websites, which act as alternative voices, by Sri Lanka Telecom.

In a statement signed by its executive director Rajith Keerthi Tennakoon, the Centre for Human Rights said that at a time there is serious censorship and self-censorship in the main stream media, websites have become an alternative space for public discussion about sensitive issues. The organization points out that the blocked websites are spaces, where serious, sometimes controversial, discussions are carried out by intellectuals and those who are politically sensitive, both pro and antigovernment. Lanka Freedom, Campaign for Free and Fair Elections (CAFFE) website, Lanka Guardian run by Asian Human Rights Commission, Lanka E news, Lanka News Web and TamilNet are among other websites blocked in Sri Lanka says the Center for Human Rights. By sporadically blocking these websites the authorities are attempting to stop the flow of new ideas to the society, the statement said.

Hypertension may be much more common than expected among young adults, researchers found.
In the NIH-funded National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent Health (Add Health), the prevalence of hypertension in 24- to 32-year-olds was 19% in 2008, according to Quynh Nguyen, MSPH, a doctoral student at the University of North Carolina’s Gillings School of Global Public Health in Chapel Hill, and colleagues.
That compares with a rate of 4% among young adults participating in the National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey (NHANES) for a similar time period, the researchers reported online in Epidemiology.
Self-reported rates of hypertension, however, were similar in the two studies: 11% in Add Health and 9% in NHANES.Add Health principal investigator Kathleen Mullan Harris, PhD, also of the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, said on a conference call with reporters that there was no clear explanation for the discrepancy between the two studies.
“We tend to think of young adults as rather healthy, but a prevalence of 19% with high blood pressure is alarming, especially since more than half did not know that they had high blood pressure,” Harris said. Although the issue warrants further study, she added, “we think that the prevalence probably lies somewhere in between these two estimates.”
Add Health was started in 1994-1995 by enrolling more than 20,000 U.S. adolescents in middle school and high school. The students have been followed up periodically since then, most recently with Wave IV in 2008, when researchers began collecting in-home blood pressure measurements.
For comparison, the researchers used participants of similar age from NHANES 2007-2008. The cross-survey comparison included 14,252 Add Health participants and 733 NHANES participants.
Both the rate of blood pressure of 140/90 mm Hg or greater (19% versus 4%) and mean blood pressure (125/79 mm Hg versus 114/67 mm Hg) were higher in Add Health than in NHANES, which remained consistent in all sociodemographic subgroups.
Survey weights and propensity for differential selection into Add Health did not account for the different rates of hypertension observed in the two studies. After adjustment for numerous participant characteristics, examination time, use of antihypertensives, and consumption of food, caffeine, and cigarettes before blood pressure measurement, there was still a significantly increased likelihood of hypertension in Add Health (OR 6.6, 95% CI 4.0 to 11.0).
The researchers then examined other potential methodologic concerns, including digit preference, validity, reliability, measurement context, and interview content.

Also known as the Chinese gooseberry, kiwifruit is a very delicious fruit that is known for its appearance and flavor. Kiwis are about egg size and have a brown fuzzy-like surface. When cut open a bright lime green flesh is revealed. Within the bright lime green flesh are black seeds which can be eaten. The skin is somewhat tough, but the flesh is soft. There are both green and yellow kiwifruit.


The Gold Kiwifruit has a yellow flesh which is characterized by its sweet flavor and less acidic base which is found in the traditional green kiwifruit. The golden variety is also shaped with a pointed end and is a bit less hairy than the green variety of the kiwifruit. It should be noted that although most people removed the skin from the kiwi before consumption it is edible.
The kiwifruit is native to southern China. Other varieties of the kiwifruit are available in Japan and India. The kiwifruit is the national fruit of the People’s Republic of China. The kiwifruit would eventually be cultivated in New Zealand when Mary Isabel Fraser, a principal of girl’s school, was visiting a school in China and obtained the kiwi seeds and bought them to New Zealand.
The seeds were planted by the nurseryman Alexander Allison in 1906 and the first fruit appeared in 1910. Currently, there are a number of countries which cultivate kiwifruit which include Italy, New Zealand, France, Chile, Japan, Greece and the United States. Kiwifruit is still grown in China, but the country is not considered to be a major producer of the fruit today.
The process of cultivating kiwifruit is interesting. This fruit is produced in warm climates. In order for fruit to be produced pollination is necessary. It can be difficult to pollinate kiwifruit because the flowers of this fruit are not very preferred by bees. Thus, to increase pollination two methods are used. There is the method of saturation pollination where a large number of beehives are placed in the kiwi orchards forcing them to collect pollen from these plants.
Also, there is the method of blowing pollen over the female flowers to begin germination. Because many kiwifruit can be produced on one vine it is necessary to grow this fruit on a supportive structure. Many times the structure is also accented with a watering system to ensure proper irrigation.
Kiwifruit is a small fruit which packs a load of healthy nutrients. Kiwifruit are very delicious, and there are a number of vitamins and minerals available in this fruit. It is very high in vitamin C and it also contains potassium, vitamin A and vitamin E. The skin of the kiwifruit contains antioxidants so even though people usually discard this part of the kiwifruit they shouldn’t because it offers lots of health benefits.
Kiwifruit is also high in fiber making it a natural laxative. It is possible that there are a number of cardiovascular benefits to eating kiwifruit as it is a natural blood thinner which means it can naturally prevent blood clots and lowers the fat content in the blood to prevent blockages. Because kiwifruit contains lutein it can also be consumed to promote eye health.

The United States Monday reiterated its call for an investigation on the allegations of war crimes made against Sri Lanka in the report prepared by the United Nations Panel of Experts and in a documentary aired by a British television station.
In response to a media query at Monday's press briefing the U.S. State Department spokesperson Victoria Nuland said the U.S. is deeply concerned about credible allegations of violations of international humanitarian law and human rights in Sri Lanka.
"As we've stated, we support a full accounting of and accountability for those who engage in acts that violated international human rights in Sri Lanka," the spokesperson said.
"Assistant Secretary Blake and other senior officials have regularly raised these concerns," she added.
Ms. Nuland said the U.S. Personnel have seen the Channel 4 documentary and it includes "some very disturbing images".
The Sri Lankan government has said that its own Lessons Learnt and Reconciliation Commission appointed by President Mahinda Rajapaksa would investigate the alleged crimes shown by Channel 4 in its documentary called " Sri Lanka's Killing Fields" and appropriate action would be taken if found true.
However, the government rejected the video as a complete fabrication by the Channel 4 in collusion with the pro-LTTE Tamil diaspora in Britain.

“The war on terror served as a justification for the invasion of Iraq and Afghanistan, two countries which ten years latter are still shattered and fractured, with a rather bleak future. It seems that it has, under the eyes of the International community, also been used as a cover up for a conflict that was nothing more than a racist war,” says Anissa Haddadi writing on Sri Lanka in International Business Times, Friday, asking the question, “Is the US war on terror responsible for Sri Lanka Killing Fields?”


"We strongly condemn terrorism in all its forms and manifestations, committed by whomever, wherever and for whatever purposes, as it constitutes one of one of the most serious threat to international peace and security", this UN resolution was adopted in 2005 and set international background in which the Sri Lankan civil war was fought, the International Business Times article said.

“The horror that slowly unfolded in Sri Lanka only became possible because of the silence that surrounded it. In the last phase of the civil war, which was the most violent and brutal, there was almost no reporting in the mainstream international press of what was really taking place there,” the article further said.

Meanwhile, the spokesperson of Campaign Against Arms Trade (Caat) in UK, Kaye Stearman said "David Cameron and the UK government are calling on the Sri Lankan government to investigate the atrocities but we also need a proper investigation of the UK government's own complicity in selling arms to Sri Lanka, despite knowing how they were likely to be used,” Morning Star reported on Thursday.

Citing UK’s arms sales to Colombo amounting to 18 million pound sterling during the Vanni war and such sales continuing to this day, the Caat spokesperson said, "UK arms sales confer support and legitimacy on the Sri Lankan government, just as they do to Middle East governments who use UK arms against their own people."

At the height of the war, the British Ambassador to the UN said the LTTE was long blighting the Sri Lanka government.

To what extent this policy is changed now, ask Eezham Tamils in UK, citing the UK Defence Secretary calling on Rajapaksa in London when he was not wanted at Oxford, and the UK High Commission in Colombo choosing the eve of the broadcast of the Channel 4 programme to legitimise the Sri Lanka Army, by announcing the ‘reintegration’ of the ex-LTTE combatants through the genocidal Army.

The US embassy in Colombo not only legitimised the Sri Lanka Army, but also approved the paradigm set by it, by participating the genocidal military’s international conference on disseminating the paradigm, last month.

It is little known by most Sri Lankans that there are refugees and people seeking asylum in Sri Lanka, said UNHCR’s Representative Michael Zwack said.
Issuing a statement to mark the World Refugee Day on June 20, the UNHCR’s Representative said, although numbers are very small in comparison to most countries, Sri Lanka currently hosts 236 registered refugees and 141 asylum seekers.
We appreciate the good cooperation received by UNHCR from government, he said.
According to UNHCR, Sri Lanka is one country refugees are slowly starting to return to after the conflict has ended. Since 201, some 2,900 refugees, mainly from Tamil Nadu in India, have returned with the help of UNHCR, and they continue to arrive at steady numbers. In addition, over 200 refugees returned on their own accord. According to UNHCR’s latest Global Trends statistics for 2010 just released, that there are 141, 063 Sri Lankan refugees and 8, 563 Sri Lankan asylum seekers in different countries around the world – the majority in India.
Currently more than 43 million people are displaced by violence around the world. Europe is no longer home to them. The vast majority – about 80 percent – are hosted and cared for in developing countries, the statement said
Today’s chronicle conflicts are a cause for special concern: What we see is that as new conflicts flared old ones are left unresolved. This leads to new displacement on the one hand and millions of people being prevented from returning home on the other. Fewer than 200,000 refugees went home in 2010, the lowest number in 20 years, the UNHCR statement said.
It is necessary for the international community to step forward and act. Whether it to be keep borders open to those seeking safety from violence or persecution, or to provide solutions to long-term refugees. We need to invest in peace, people need to bpeople to go home, or to be given a chance to start new lives, it further said.