britishtamil.com

Internally displaced families in Moon’raampiddi and Ve’l'laangku’lam villages, located in the northern part of Mannaar district, were fleeing their villages and settlements Friday after artillery and mortar barrage from the Sri Lanka Army (SLA) that has approached Iluppaikkadavai, residents said. Meanwhile, IDPs from the administrative areas of Maanthai West division of Mannaar district and Thu?nukkaay division in Mullaiththeevu district are undergoing severe hardships without proper accommodation and relief supplies in Karaichchi division of Ki’linochchi district.

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A journalist attached to the Daily Mirror newspaper, Yohan Perera, was manhandled by ‘political goons,’ while he was on coverage of the demolition of unauthorized structures in Slave Island, Colombo, by the urban development Authority Friday, media sources in Colombo said. The demolition comes as Sri Lankan authorities were preparing to host the SAARC summit in Colombo.

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A demonstration led by Sinhala nationalist JVP’s Trincomalee district parliamentatrian Jayantha Wijesekare demanded Friday the Sri Lankan government to relax the restriction on fishing imposed in Trincomalee or to compensate Rs. 20,000 per fishing family. The JVP, which is opposed to Rajapaksa government’s move to hand over lands in Moothoor to India’s infrastructure investment of Coal-Fired Power Plant, said it would launch a massive protest campaign against the government if the UPFA government failed to satisfy the demands immediately.

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In a rebuke of Britain?s efforts to deport Tamil asylum seekers, the European Court of Human Rights allowed Thursday the appeal by one refugee, finding that he was at risk of torture by the Sri Lankan authorities if returned there. Immigration lawyers said the European Court?s ruling was ?very significant? as the forcible removal of hundreds of Tamils had been held up pending this judgment. The Court?s decision came as the British government praised the Sri Lankan government?s efforts on human rights.

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The South African judge Ms. Navanethem Pillay, who has served on the International Criminal Court since 2003, is expected to be proposed by U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon as the candidate for UN’s next Human Rights Chief, succeeding Louise Arbour, Reuters reported Friday. As a judge at the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda, where she served for eight years, Judge Pillay led the landmark decisions defining rape as an institutionalized weapon of war and a crime of genocide.

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