TNS Corner
Conference on 'Current Situation of Tamils in Sri Lanka' in TN

Jun 29, 2009, 16:46

Seetha Vijayan - TNS

Chennai - IT Professionals in Tamil Nadu (TN) of 'savetamils' google group organized a conference on 'current situation of Tamils in Sri Lanka,' Sunday, June 28th at Loyola College. 500 people attended the conference.

The conference mainly organized as part of the effort by them to hold the Sri Lankan authorities accountable for war crimes, crimes against humanity and the ethnic cleansing of more than 20,000 Tamil civilians who were slaughtered and 30,000 disabled which includes tens of thousands of children in the last days of the Sri Lankan military onslaught, so justice can be served, truth and reconciliation can take place between the majority Singhalese and historically discriminated Tamils in Sri Lanka to achieve long lasting peace.

Many rights groups, including Human Rights Watch (HRW) and Amnesty International (AI) continue to voice their concerns and accuse Sri Lanka of violating international humanitarian laws for illegally and deliberately detaining Tamil civilians without freedom of movement behind barbed wire under military administration in the camps which are referred as Tamils’ torture camps.

UK based Sky News recently reported dead bodies of the Tamils lying outside the Tents. On average, ten to fifteen people are dying daily of preventable diseases and untreated wounds as the mortuaries in hospitals are unable to cope with the rising number of deaths.

At the conference experts spoke on justice for 300,000 internally displaced people in internment camps, alleged war crimes, history and future of the prolonged struggle and political solution for Eelam struggle.

Arul George of PUCL, Chennai spoke on IDPs and war crimes. Viduthalai Rajendran delivered a speech supporting the Transnational Government of Tamil Eelam. A question and answer session was held at the end of the conference. The conference included a short film screening and a photo exhibition.