Sri Lankan President Mahinda Rajapaksa is not planning to attend the Commonwealth Games in Glasgow this summer, according to a report on the insidethegames website.

The website says a “potentially harmful diplomatic challenge” for the games will likely be avoided if Rajapaksa stays away, after letters expressing concern about the Sri Lankan president’s visit were sent to Foreign Secretary by the shadow foreign secretary Douglas Alexander and the Transnational Government of Tamil Eelam.

India’s Union Ministry this week extended the ban on the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam has been extended for another five years. 

“The Government of India, under the provisions of the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act, 1967, has proscribed the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) as an ‘Unlawful Association’. The declaration of LTTE as an ‘Unlawful Association’ has been extended for a further period of five years with effect from May 14, 2014,” said a notification made public on Thursday.

The proscription of the LTTE was last extended in 2012.

The notification in 2012 said that the LTTE continued to be working towards “the Eelam cause” and that the government has information that “the activities of the LTTE remnant cadres, dropouts, sympathisers, supporters who have been traced out recently in the State of Tamil Nadu suggest that the cadres sent to Tamil Nadu would ultimately be utilised by the LTTE for unlawful activities”, The Hindu reported.

The Jaffna University Science Teachers’ Association has condemned the closure of the university over the period covering the anniversary of the end of the armed conflict, in a statement released on Wednesday.
The statement said that death threats were issued against several student leaders and professors, who were accused of “guiding students to support terrorism”.

“Why should Tamils speaking of the war be such an explosive issue five years after it ended, a war in which neither side owned a monopoly on terrorism? The answer has to do with the ideological polarization that remains because there is even less hope now of a political settlement to the national question that has been with us from Independence. Let us not forget that the Government is to observe the same anniversary in grand style in Matara, as the sole author of victory over the LTTE, and with all the pomp and circumstance that goes on around it,” the statement said.

Sri Lanka’s President Mahinda Rajapaksa did not yield to international pressure to end the military campaign in 2009, said Media Minister Keheliya Rambukwella, according to PTI.

Photo: defence.lk

A subsidiary of the Tata group announced on Monday that it is investing $400mn to develop a township project in Sri Lanka’s capital Colombo, reported NDTV.

Tata Housing is developing the project together with the Sri Lankan Urban Development Authority, which falls under the purview of Gothabaya Rajapaksa, the Secretary for the Ministry of Defence and Urban Development.

Gothabhaya Rajapaksa "graced the ground breaking ceremony" of the launch of the development earlier today, along with Sri Lankan ministers, MPs and representatives of Tata Housing, reported the defence ministry's website.

"We are extremely glad in partnering with Tata Housing to pilot the first redevelopment project under the PPP model which provide a better quality of life for the current tenants of slave island. We are sure that the experience of Tata Housing and their thrust on quality would result in this project to be a landmark in Colombo," Sri Lanka Urban Development Authority Chairman Nimal Parera said.

The British government is concerned at the recent proscription of Tamil diaspora groups by Sri Lanka, the Foreign and Commonwealth Minister Hugo Swire said in parliament on Monday.

Swire said that the British High Commissioner in Colombo has made clear to the government that “proscription should not be used to prevent or stifle the right to freedom of speech, particularly at a time when Sri Lanka’s human rights record is under international scrutiny.”

The minister also said that the High Commission has raised concerns regarding the Prevention of Terrorism Act and the continued detention of Mrs Jeyakumari Balendran and other rights activists with the Sri Lankan government.

A notice was put up in Vavuniya last month, announcing the acquisition of 20 acres for “public use”, reported The Social Architects.

The arrest of 10 Tamil refugees from Sri Lanka has sparked outrage from human rights groups and Tamil activists in India, reported The New Indian Express.

The refugees, including 5 children, were arrested under the Foreigners Act and sent to Puzhal Prison in Chennai on May 5. India stopped admitting Tamil refugees after 2011 as it deemed that peace had returned to Sri Lanka.

P Nedumaran, head of the World Tamil Confederation, told the paper that the former Prime Minister Indira Gandhi and former Chief Minister M G Ramachandran had accepted Tamils as refugees and made all arrangements for them. Nedumaran alleged that the Indian government is taking action against Tamil refugees due to pressure from Sri Lankan President Mahinda Rajapakse.

Photographs have emerged of Sri Lankan military banners calling for unmarried Tamil women to join the army.

The banners, thought to have been photographed earlier this year, ask for Tamil women, aged between 18 and 24, with a height of at 5 ft 3 inches and offer a monthly salary of Rs 30,000.

The women would be joining nine brigades in the Mullaitivu district.