Suspect implies Sri Lankan involvement in Parithi murder - le Parisien

Suspect implies Sri Lankan involvement in Parithi murder - le Parisien 

Tamil Guardian 13 November 2012  
   
 Two men, both aged 33, were held in custody on Monday night in connection with the murder of French TCC leader Nadarajah Mathinthiran.

The two suspects, both described as of ‘Sri Lankan’ nationality, were arrested on Sunday morning in Villeneuve-Saint-Georges and La Chapelle.

A source close to the case is reported to have said that searches of the suspects’ homes did not provide evidence for their involvement in the killing.

Both suspects deny their involvement in the murder of Mathinthiran alias Parithi who was shot in the back with three 9mm bullets as he left TCC’s Paris office.

Accord to French newspaper le Parisien, one of the two suspects has made some confessions to the homicide investigators in charge of the issue, who said:

“This man claimed to have been contacted by a relative of the Sri Lankan Ambassador in France who offered him a reward of 50,000 Euros (49000 GBP) and a Sri Lankan passport in exchange for the execution. All these factors are being verified.”

Mathinthiran’s daughter Saarrah also implied the Sri Lankan government’s responsibility in the murder, saying:

“There are chances that it was the Sri Lankan government... [because] the two hooded men knew full well how to shoot.”

Saarrah also said that her father had not recently mentioned any threats, adding “he was very secretive about his community life.”

An altar draped in red and orange has been put up, with Mathinthiran’s picture and candles, in a small square in the twentieth arrondissement near the site of the murder.

Hamas military chief killed in Israeli attack

Hamas military chief killed in Israeli attack

Ahmad Jabari, the head of Hamas's military wing, has been assassinated in an Israeli air strike on Gaza.

 

Last Modified: 14 Nov 2012 15:0

Senior Hamas military commander Ahmed al-Jabari was killed in an Israeli air strike on a car in Gaza City, medics have said.

"The martyr is Ahmed al-Jabari and his bodyguard was injured," Ayman Sahabani, a doctor at Shifa hospital in Gaza City, said.

A Hamas security source also confirmed Jabari's death, speaking on condition of anonymity.

Israel's Shin Bet domestic intelligence agency and the military also confirmed the operation.

"During a joint operation of the General Security Service (Shin Bet) and the IDF (army) today, Ahmed Jabari, the senior commander of the military wing of Hamas in the Gaza Strip, was targeted," a statement from the Shin Bet said.

"In the past hour, the IDF targeted Ahmed Jabari, the head of Hamas's military wing, in the Gaza Strip," the military added in a statement, saying Jabari "was a senior Hamas operative... directly responsible for executing terror attacks."

"The purpose of this operation was to severely impair the command and control chain of the Hamas leadership, as well as its terrorist infrastructure."

Military spokeswoman Avital Leibovich said the strike was the start of an operation targeting armed groups in Gaza following multiple rocket attacks on southern Israel.

"The IDF started an operation against terror organisations in Gaza due to the ongoing attacks against Israeli civilians," she said on her Twitter account.

Head of military wing

Jabari is said to have been the head of the Ezzedine al-Qassam Brigades, the military wing of Hamas. He coordinated much of Hamas' military capability, its military strategy, and the transformation of the military wing.

He also led the final negotiations in Cairo that concluded the prisoner swap between Hamas and Israel in 2011.

The killing of Jabari sparked furious protests in Gaza City, with hundreds of members of Hamas and its armed wing, the Ezzedine al-Qassam Brigades, chanting for revenge inside Shifa hospital.

Outside, armed men fired weapons into the air, and mosques throughout the city called prayers to mourn the commander's death.

Airstrikes

Palestinian security sources and medics confirmed a total of four air strikes across Gaza during the late afternoon, two in Gaza City, one of which killed Jabari, one in northern Gaza, and a fourth in the southern city of Khan Yunis.

Wednesday's attack comes after several days worth of Israeli air strikes on the Gaza Strip, leaving at least seven Palestinians dead and several more wounded.

Al Jazeera's Nadim Baba, reporting from the attack site, said, “This is a residential area, and people have rushed to the site as soon as they heard the news.”

Al Jazeera’s Rula Amin, reporting from Beirut, Lebanon, said Jabari had been a target for Israel for a long time.

"This is a big loss for Hamas, and a success for Israel, who have been after him for a while." she said.

“We will see an escalation for sure within the immediate future.”

“People in Gaza know him. He was considered very smart, very shrewd, considered to be a hero because he had managed until now to escape numerous assassination attempts by Israel.”

“People will be bracing for more violence, not just against Hamas but against the civilians too.”

Israel defiant

Defence Minister Ehud Barak warned on Tuesday that a flare-up in violence with Gaza was "not over," after Palestinian fighters fired two more rockets and Israel carried out air strikes throughout the previous night.

Barak, meeting Israeli military chiefs, said the current round of confrontations was ongoing, adding that Israel would decide how and when to respond to the rocket fire.

"It is certainly not over and we will decide how and when to act if necessary," he said in remarks communicated by his office.

"We intend to reinforce the deterrence, and strengthen it, so that we are able to operate along the length of the border fence in a way that will ensure the security of all our soldiers who are serving around the Gaza Strip," he said.

"At this time... it is preferable to act [in a timely fashion] rather than just talk."

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu told community leaders in southern Israel that he would decide when to retaliate.

"Anyone who thinks that he can harm the daily lives of southern residents and not pay a heavy price for it is mistaken," a statement from his office quoted him as saying during a meeting in the city of Beersheba.

"I am responsible for choosing the right time for exacting the most heavy price and that's how it will be."

On Monday night, Israeli planes struck three sites in Gaza, which the military identified as a weapons facility and two rocket launch sites.

And the following morning, the army said fighters fired two rockets into Israel, causing no injuries, with local media reporting one of them was a longer-range Grad rocket, which landed near the coastal town of Ashdod.

In Gaza, medics said 20-year-old Mohammed Ziad, a member of Hamas's armed wing, the Ezzedine al-Qassam Brigades, died Tuesday of wounds he sustained on Saturday, after the flare-up began when fighters fired at an Israeli army jeep.

That attack injured four soldiers and prompted a quick escalation in violence, with Israel carrying out air strikes and shelling that killed six other Palestinians and injured more than 30.

Gaza fighters fired 123 rockets into southern Israel, lightly injuring four people.

Despite Barak's comments, and a series of bellicose statements from Israeli politicians on Monday, other officials sounded a more cautious tone on Tuesday.

"I don't think it will be necessary to enter the Gaza Strip," former military intelligence chief Amos Yadlin told Israel's army  radio.

"The army has at its disposal a series of measures that it has not yet used, it can raise the level of its response without resorting to a ground operation."

Source: Al Jazeera

PFLP: Abbas’ statements on the right of return and resistance are unacceptable

''Palestinian people will continue to insist on their right of return and self-determination and a democratic Palestine on all of the land of Palestine''. PFLP

PFLP: Abbas’ statements on the right of return and resistance are unacceptable
Posted: 03 Nov 2012 05:04 AM PDT

The Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine stated its complete rejection of the statements of PA President Mahmoud Abbas in an interview with Israeli television and demanded that the Executive Committee and Central Council of the PLO act immediately to address these statements.

Comrade Dr. Rabah Muhanna, member of the political bureau of the PFLP, said that these statements contradict the PLO’s own positions and the fundamental principles of the Palestinian people, including the right of return, self-determination, the independent state, the right of our people to exercise all forms of resistance against the occupation to achieve our national goals. He noted that Abu Mazen is not entitled to liquidate these constants, nor is anyone else, noting that these remarks apparently seek to propitiate and beg before the US and Israel seeking to be given something. Dr. Muhanna said that the Palestinian people will continue to insist on their right of return and self-determination and a democratic Palestine on all of the land of Palestine.

Comrade Khalida Jarrar, also a member of the Political Bureau, joined in the strong condemnation, saying that these statements seek to undermine a sacred and inalienable right and cross a red line, and that the right to return cannot be undermined by any person. It is not a personal opinion of this or that person. Jarrar also denounced his claims that he would not allow the outbreak of a third intifada, noting that no one can restrain the anger of the resistance of the Palestinian people or the inevitability of a new uprising so long as the occupation and its aggressive policies continue to exist.

Jarrar said that the resistance in all of its forms has been and continues to be the path of the Palestinian people in the struggle against the occupation in order to gain their rights, and said that no matter how long it takes our people will achieve freedom, return and self-determination and will return to their hometowns from which they were forced in 1948.

Syrian tanks in Golan Heights buffer zone, says Israel

Latest update: 03/11/2012 
Syrian tanks in Golan Heights buffer zone, says Israel

Israel’s military lodged a complaint with the United Nations on Saturday after three Syrian tanks allegedly entered the demilitarised zone in the Golan Heights which separates the two countries, just a few kilometres from an Israeli military post.

By News Wires (text)

Three Syrian tanks entered the demilitarized zone in the Golan Heights on Saturday, prompting Israel to complain to U.N. peacekeepers, a military spokesman said. The foray would be the first such violation in 40 years and hikes concerns that violence from Syria’s civil war could heat up a long-quiet frontier.

Israel’s relatively low-key response of turning to the U.N. suggested it did not see the Syrian armor as an immediate threat.

But the entry marks the most serious spillover of Syria’s turmoil at the frontier to date. Misfired Syrian shells have exploded inside Israel on several occasions and a tourist site was temporary shut after armed Syrians were spotted nearby recently.

The three tanks entered the DMZ on Saturday and Israel lodged a complaint with the peacekeepers, an Israeli military spokeswoman said, speaking on condition of anonymity in line with military protocol. She did not elaborate on what the tanks were doing.

The Israeli news site Ynet said the tanks and two armored personnel carriers drove a few kilometers (miles) away from Israeli military positions.

Israel captured the Golan Heights from Syria in the 1967 Mideast war. It later annexed the strategic territory overlooking northern Israel in a move that is not recognized internationally. Before 1967, Syria used the highlands to shell Israeli villages and farms.

The DMZ, which is about 7 kilometers (3.5 miles) at its widest and 200 meters (yards) at its narrowest, was created after the 1973 war in which Syria tried to retake the plateau.

Marco Carminjani, an official with the U.N. body supervising the zone, said he could not immediately confirm the entry of the tanks. But if the report is true, he said, it would be a violation of the 1974 disengagement agreement between Syria and Israel. He said it would be the first such move in the zone since the accord.

There was no immediate comment from Syria.

Israel and Syria have been bitter enemies for decades and have fought several wars but the border has been mostly quiet for years.

There is concern in Israel that if the regime of Syrian President Bashar Assad is toppled, the country could fall into the hands of Islamic extremists or descend into sectarian warfare, destabilizing the region.

Israeli officials have also expressed concern that the frontier region could turn into a lawless area like Egypt’s Sinai desert, where Islamic militants have gained strength since the ouster last year of Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak.

சிரியாவிலும் யுத்தக் குற்றமாம்! இழைத்தது REBELS ஆம்!

கோசோவோ தனிநாட்டில் சட்டம் ஒழுங்கை நிலைநாட்டத் தவறிய ஈரோப்பியன் ஜூனியன்!

Auditors: EU wastes billions, Kosovo lawless
Source: B92

LUXEMBOURG -- The EU has spent EUR 700mn to establish the rule of law and reduce
corruption in Kosovo but results are poor, the European Court of Auditors says in a report.

 It says in the report, which was released on Tuesday, that EULEX is not efficient enough despite
the funding.

“Staff delegated to go to Kosovo is often not trained well enough and their participation in the
mission is often too short. The EU takes the part of the responsibility because it should provide
greater support,” reads the report.

During the period 1999-2007, Kosovo received EUR 3.5bn in donor assistance, two thirds of

which came from the European Commission and EU Member States.

Between 2007 and 2011, EU assistance to rule of law through the IPA and EULEX totaled
approximately EUR 0.7bn, reads the report.

EULEX’s mandate will last until 2014 and there is a total of 2,250 people working for the
mission. Its annual budget is about EUR 111mn. The European Court of Auditors has assessed
the mission’s success as “modest”.

According to the report, one of the main problems in the functioning of EULEX is a lack of
coordination between the EU and the U.S., unqualified EU staff and poor work of Kosovo’s
anti-corruption institutions.

“Kosovo’s authorities accord insufficient priority to the rule of law and the EU support should
be more effective,” said Gijs de Vries, the ECA member responsible for the report.

Kosovo unilaterally declared independence from Serbia in February 2008 but this step was not
followed by universal recognition of Kosovo. Five EU member states, Cyprus, Greece,
Romania, Slovakia and Spain, have not recognized Kosovo’s independence which has led the EU
to adopt what is termed a “status neutral” position, the European Court of Auditors stressed.

Many parts of Kosovo are still lawless since EULEX has failed to tackle the crime, especially in
the north.

“Kosovo’s judiciary still is not isolated enough from the political influence and police are still
not capable of tackling serious financial crime,” reads the report.

De Vries said that the EU needed to “formulate stricter priorities” for Kosovo.

“This is an important report and we will take into account everything that is written in it,” said
EU Enlargement Commissioner Stefan Fule’s Spokesman Peter Stano.

The European Court of Auditors’ report comes after criticism of German Defense Minister
Thomas de Maiziere who said that “EULEX needs a new beginning”.

“EULEX is on the wrong track. We need a new beginning, new people, new structure, new name
and a new mandate. We have to resolve this at the highest level in the EU,” he said in October.

சிரியாவில் அமெரிக்கப் பொம்மலாட்டம்!

“We’ve made it clear that the SNC can no longer be viewed as the visible leader of the opposition. They can be part of a larger opposition, but that opposition must include people from inside Syria and others who have a legitimate voice that needs to be heard. So our efforts are very focused on that.”
 

“We have recommended names and organizations that we believe should be included in any leadership structure,” 

Secretary of State Hillary Clinton

U.S. Seeks a New Opposition in Syria
TIME By Jay Newton-Small Nov. 01, 20124

Secretary of State Hillary Clinton on Wednesday announced the U.S. would be shifting allegiances in Syria after nearly two years of trying to empower the Paris-based Syrian National Council made up of mostly Syrians in exile.

“This cannot be an opposition represented by people who have many good attributes but have in many instances not been inside Syria for 20, 30 or 40 years,” Clinton told reporters on a trip to Croatia. “There has to be a representation of those who are on the front lines fighting and dying today to obtain their freedom. And there needs to be an opposition leadership structure that is dedicated to representing and protecting all Syrians.”

Clinton said the U.S. would be looking to cobble together a new opposition with members drawn from two groups working within Syria to bring down the regime of President Bashar Assad, as well as expatriate leaders. She said the SNC will still represent up to a third of the new council, which will have about 35 to 50 members and will include in addition to the SNC, Malah’s Syrian Patriotic Group, Kiyali’s National Bloc, and possibly the new “People’s Committee” from both inside and out of Syria. That council will be formed in Doha, Qatar, early next week.  “We have recommended names and organizations that we believe should be included in any leadership structure,” she said. “We’ve made it clear that the SNC can no longer be viewed as the visible leader of the opposition. They can be part of a larger opposition, but that opposition must include people from inside Syria and others who have a legitimate voice that needs to be heard. So our efforts are very focused on that.”
The move is a major shift in U.S. policy in Syria, which up until this week had focused on unifying the SNC and other external opposition groups. Even in that, the U.S. struggled to force the SNC to agree to work with the remnants of Assad’s regime after his potential departure, and to address differing priorities amongst Syria’s ethnic sects: Alawites, Christians, Sunnis, Druze, Kurds and Shias. A meeting in Cairo over the summer included fistfights and thrown furniture.

The change reflects the growing chasm between those inside Syria waging the civil war and those outside, who will eventually finance its rebuilding.  “It’s a good move because it favors the internal opposition – they are the ones actively taking down Assad,” says Andrew Tabler, a Syria expert at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy. “We’ve been talking to Tansiqiyat  — LCCs — inside, and now we are working directly with local and revolutionary councils. SNC plays a role but not lead.”

But one problem, Tabler says, is that the U.S. is still not engaging with armed groups. “This is important because the revolution turned armed a long time ago,” Tabler says. “We need influence and leverage with them to help make our plans stick.” The U.S. has been leery to provide arms to the opposition given what happened in Libya. After the fall of Muammar Gaddafi, many of those arms and Gaddafi’s caches ended up in the hands of terrorist groups. There is also concern that given Assad’s bloody massacres of Sunnis – Syria is 70% Sunni while Assad is Alawite, a group representing only 11% of Syrians – arms given to Sunni groups would be used in revenge ethnic killings. They also so far have refused to support the Saudi and French backed network of Revolutionary Councils.

The new entity, pushed by U.S. Ambassador-in-exile Robert Ford, also doesn’t go far enough to include a broader range of political groups on the ground. “Whatever the outcome of the meeting, its still going to be a largely exiled opposition force — even with supposed inside representation — and there will inevitably be a disconnect between this organization and the organic protest movement,” says Elizabeth O’Bagy, an analyst at the Institute for the Study of War. “ I can already think of a number of very important and influential leaders, both rebel and political, who have been left out. Thus, there is already an element of the US “picking” the leaders, rather than letting the Syrians do it themselves.” A top down approach to managing a revolution, however well intentioned, is rarely successful.

Indeed, many feel that Clinton’s reorganization is too little too late. “The opposition Secretary Clinton is trying to unify has become largely irrelevant, even infusing it with elements from inside may not be sufficient,” says Ammar Abdulhamid, a Syrian exile who is active in the opposition in Washington. “Syria’s current fragmentation necessitates working with local groups, that is, the rebels and whatever political forces are coalescing around them.”

In announcing it the way she did, Clinton also alienated one of the few friends the U.S. has amongst the Syrian opposition, the SNC, which announced it would hold its own meeting just prior to the Doha gathering as a snub to the U.S. “The SNC will fight for its survival, many opportunists will fight for inclusion, seeing a window in Clinton’s announcement,” Abdulhamid says. “It’s going to be a free for all and a freakshow in Doha. The U.S. should have worked on this quietly.”

And all of this could be for naught. With the U.S. elections less than a week away, whatever group expected to be announced in Doha next Wednesday could be short-lived should Republican Mitt Romney win the presidency. Romney has said he would do more to empower and potentially arm groups fighting on the ground in Syria, focusing more attention on those groups than the non-armed political ones gathering in Doha. Finally, none of these moves are likely to stem the violence in Syria, which has already claimed 36,000 lives since March 2011.
 

கார்த்திகை 2012

விரிவாதிக்க விச வாயு இந்திய அரசே, விடுதலைப் புலிகள் மீதான தடையை நீக்கு!

Final hearing on LTTE ban in India on November 3
October 31, 2012

A final hearing on the LTTE ban in India will be taken up on November 3 in Madurai, the New
India Express reported.

The three-day long tribunal hearing with regard to the ban on the LTTE ended on Monday, with
tribunal head Justice V K Jain stating that a final hearing would he held at New Delhi on
November 3.

MDMK legal wing secretary G Devadoss had told journalists that their party’s general secretary
Vaiko would participate in the final hearing.

Earlier the Justice heard out three police personnel – Sub-Inspector Selvarani, Inspector R
Venkateswaran and Srinivasan with regard to cases pertaining to the banned outfit.

From Selvarani, the Justice asked for the details pertaining to a case filed against Naam Tamilar
Iyakkam leader Seeman, for his alleged comments with regard to the killing of Sri Lankan
students.

The New India Express news report said that inspector Venkateswaran detailed the case in which
the Q-branch police arrested five persons, including two Lankan refugees, with 47 walkie talkies,
a Tata Sumo and `4.5 lakh in cash. Another case pertained to the arrest of Jesuraj, a member of
the Tamilar Revolutionary Front, who was alleged to have close links with the LTTE.

Berlusconi Is Found Guilty of Tax Fraud

The case at the heart of Friday’s ruling centered on a scheme in which Mr. Berlusconi and several other defendants used a series of offshore companies to buy the rights to broadcast American movies on Mr. Berlusconi’s private television networks and falsely declared the amount of the payments to avoid taxes. Prosecutors said the defendants then inflated the price for the television rights of some 3,000 films as they relicensed them internally to Mr. Berlusconi’s networks, pocketing the difference, which amounted to around 250 million euros, about $320 million. Mr. Berlusconi, who has major holdings in real estate, insurance, advertising and publishing, has been involved in dozens of legal cases over the years. In 1997 and 1998, when Mr. Berlusconi was the opposition leader, he was convicted by lower courts on charges of tax fraud and corruption.

October 26, 2012
Berlusconi Is Found Guilty of Tax Fraud

By RACHEL DONADIO NYT
 

ROME — A court in Milan convicted former Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi of tax fraud on Friday and sentenced him to four years in prison. Mr. Berlusconi is also currently on trial over charges that he paid for sex with an underage prostitute. He has denied the accusation.

The ruling was Mr. Berlusconi’s fourth lower-court conviction, and the first since he stepped down as prime minister in November, after years in which his personal legal battles often eclipsed the work of his government. His four-year sentence was reduced to one year under a law aimed at reducing prison overcrowding.

Besides being a blow to Mr. Berlusconi personally, the ruling comes at a time when his center-right party is unraveling and Italy is in the throes of the most dramatic political transition since the early 1990s, when he first came to power. It was just two days ago that he announced that he would not lead his party in Italy’s next elections.

“It’s without a doubt a political sentence, the way so many other trials invented against me have been political,” Mr. Berlusconi said after Friday’s ruling, calling in to a news program on a channel he owns.

A lawyer for Mr. Berlusconi said the former prime minister would appeal the ruling, which must go through two more rounds of appeal before becoming definitive. It is unlikely that he will ever serve jail time. Even if a definitive ruling were reached before the statute of limitations in the case runs out next year, Mr. Berlusconi would enjoy immunity as long as he remained in the Parliament.

However, the judges also barred the former prime minister from holding public office for five years, a penalty that would be applied only if his conviction were upheld by the highest court. They also took the unusual step of reading the reasoning behind the verdict, which normally takes 60 to 90 days after a ruling. That could speed up the appeals.

On Wednesday, Mr. Berlusconi, 76, said he would not lead his People of Liberty party in Italy’s national elections next spring to replace the unelected technocratic government of Prime Minister Mario Monti, who has been guiding Italy through a perilous economic crisis. But he said that he would stay involved in politics.

The case at the heart of Friday’s ruling centered on a scheme in which Mr. Berlusconi and several other defendants used a series of offshore companies to buy the rights to broadcast American movies on Mr. Berlusconi’s private television networks and falsely declared the amount of the payments to avoid taxes. Prosecutors said the defendants then inflated the price for the television rights of some 3,000 films as they relicensed them internally to Mr. Berlusconi’s networks, pocketing the difference, which amounted to around 250 million euros, about $320 million. Mr. Berlusconi, who has major holdings in real estate, insurance, advertising and publishing, has been involved in dozens of legal cases over the years. In 1997 and 1998, when Mr. Berlusconi was the opposition leader, he was convicted by lower courts on charges of tax fraud and corruption.

All three previous lower-court convictions were either overturned on appeal or thrown out for lack of evidence — or the statute of limitations ran out before a definitive highest court ruling was reached.

Gaia Pianigiani contributed reporting.