" Appeal to Declare May 18th as Global Tamils Mourning Day "

NEW YORK, UNITED STATES OF AMERICA, January 13, 2021 /EINPresswire.com/ --

A Protest Webinar was held on Monday over the destruction of Mullivaaikaal Monument in the University of Jaffna campus by the Sri Lankan Government. Student leaders from the University, political leaders and activists from the North East, Tamil Nadu and from Tamil diaspora participated.

Visuvanathan Rudrakumaran, Prime Minister of the Transnational Government of Tamil Eelam (TGTE), stated in his speech that the destruction of the Mullivaaikaal monument at the University was a clear demonstration of the fact that in the island of Sri Lanka Eelam Tamils not only do not have political space to express their political aspirations fully, but they also have been denied the space to remember the dead. Therefore, such a space has to be created outside the island of Sri Lanka to mourn the death of innocent Tamil civilians.

** He called upon the Tamil Nadu State Government to construct an appropriate Mullivaaikaal monument either in Marina beach or in another prominent place in Chennai.

** He went on to also call the Tamil Nadu State Government to declare May 18th as the Global Tamils’ Mourning Day in view of the genocide that had taken place in Mullivaaikaal. Such acts will serve to contribute to the build and solidify Tamil power in the region.

Visuvanathan also stated in his speech that the destruction of Mullivaaikkaal monument was another manifestation of the ugly face of evil Sinhala racism towards the Tamils. He further said that this was another case of the Sri Lankan state’s refusal to acknowledge and to hide the genocide that had taken place during the final stages of the war between the Sri Lankan state and the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam; denial of genocide is the last stage of genocide. Mr. Rudrakumaran congratulated the University students for their swift mobilizing of protest action even in the midst of occupying armed forces of the State on campus.

Rudrakumaran pointed out that, as was stated in the condemnation message of the Tamil poet Kasi Ananthan, the destruction of the monument took place within 20 short hours ofthe Indian Minister for External Affairs Mr. Jaishankar’s return to India, following his surprise visit to Sri Lanka, raising questions about any correlation between Mr. Jaishankar’s visit and the destruction of the monument. Minister Jaishankar, in his visit to Sri Lanka, stated “it is in Sri Lanka’s own interests to meet the expectation of Tamils”. Rudrakumaran said that the destruction of the Mullivaaikaal monument was Sri Lanka’s reply to Mr. Jaishankar’s message, and by extension, a message to India.

Rudrakumaran went on to cite the 1954 Nehru-Kotelawala Pact in which India accepted the repatriation of Indian population in Ceylon, the Sirima-Shastri Pact of 1964 which casually distributed Tamils of Indian origin between the two states, and the 1974 India-Sri Lanka Maritime Boundary Agreement in which India ceded Kachatheevu island to Sri Lanka. Rudrakumaran said that through these agreements India persistently employed a policy of appeasement to keep Sri Lanka within its zone of influence. However, the recent activities of Sri Lanka necessitate Indian policy makers to re-evaluate their age-old premises and strategy.

Mr. Sutharsan Sivagurunathan, the Minister for Political Affairs of the TGTE, commented that given the fact the Tamil Nadu State Assembly had already passed unanimously a Eelam Tamils Genocide Resolution, it would go on to materialize the TGTE’s appeal within a year.


ABOUT THE TRANSNATIONAL GOVERNMENT OF TAMIL EELAM (TGTE):

The Transnational Government of Tamil Eelam (TGTE) is a democratically elected Government of over a million strong Tamils (from the island of Sri Lanka) living in several countries around the world.

TGTE was formed after the mass killing of Tamils by the Sri Lankan Government in 2009.

TGTE thrice held internationally supervised elections among Tamils around the world to elect 135 Members of Parliament. It has two chambers of Parliament: The House of Representatives and the Senate and also a Cabinet.

TGTE is leading a campaign to realize the political aspirations of Tamils through peaceful, democratic, and diplomatic means and its Constitution mandates that it should realize its political objectives only through peaceful means. It’s based on the principles of nationhood, homeland and self-determination.

TGTE seeks that the international community hold the perpetrators of war crimes, crimes against humanity, and genocide against the Tamil people to account. TGTE calls for a referendum to decide the political future of Tamils.

The Prime Minister of TGTE is Mr. Visuvanathan Rudrakumaran, a New York based lawyer.

Twitter: @TGTE_PMO
Email: pmo@tgte.org
Web: www.tgte-us.org

BACKGROUND

Tamils in the island of Sri Lanka faced repeated mass killings in 1958, 1977, and 1983 and the mass killings in 2009 prompted UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon to appoint a Panel of Experts to report on the scale of the killings.

According to UN internal review report on Sri Lanka, over 70 thousand Tamils were killed in six months in early 2009 and Tamil women were sexually assaulted and raped by the Sri Lankan Security forces.

International Truth and Justice Project (ITJP) in February 2017 handed over details to UN of Sri Lankan Military run "Rape Camps", where Tamil women are being held as “sex slaves”. Also, According to UK Foreign and Commonwealth Office report on April 2013, there are over 90 thousand Tamil war widows in Sri Lanka.

Thousands of Tamils disappeared, including babies and children. UN Working Group on Enforced Disappearances stated in 2020 that the second highest number of enforced disappearance cases in the world is from Sri Lanka.
According to this UN report, the killings and other abuses that took place amount to war crimes and crimes against humanity. Independent experts believe that there are elements of these abuses that constitute an act of genocide.

Members of the Sri Lankan security forces are almost exclusively from the Sinhalese community and the victims are all from the Tamil community. A Buddhist Monk shot and killed a Sri Lankan Prime Minister 1959 for having talks with Tamils.

Tamils overwhelmingly voted in a Parliamentary election in 1977 to establish an independent and sovereign country called Tamil Eelam. This Parliamentary election was conducted by the Sri Lankan Government.

Transnational Government of Tamil Eelam
TGTE
r.thave@tgte.org
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