Justice for Lena ! After all LTTE leader, KP is also free now.

We are in Solidarity with Lena of Malaysia.!

Lena was convicted to 3 years of imprisonment due to screening of the Film "NO FIRE ZONE" which was based on the War Crime Charges against SL.

WFFP/WFF in Cop 21- Convergance on Land and Water Resources! All are welcome at Paris

Some more Media coverage on Food Sovereignty campaign from 1-16 October

Some work carried out by NAFSO on Food Sovereignty campaign Was reported in Tamil news paper.

NAFSO launched island wide children's day campaign against chid abuse

The child abuse reported many parts of the country in the recent past.
In many places there were children abuses and killings were reported.
In Jaffna, school girl Vidya Devi was raped and killed.
In Kotadeniyawa Seya Dewmini was raped and killed.
In Negombo there was another rape case reported during this week.

The National Women Federation which is facilitated by NAFSO was organized an islandwide campaign against child abuse and violence against women.
Galle, Matara, Negombo, Puttlam, Ampara, Jaffna, Mannar, Trincomallee, Polonnaruwa and Batticoloa district organizations were organized the campaign under the theme of "Let us protect our future through protecting our children and Protecting women from violence."

The Negombo Sri Vimukthi Fisher Women Organization shared their work sending through photos which is they had conducted a successful event with march, protest against child abuse and handing over petition to the Negombo divisional secretary.
The Subashiniee Kamalanadan, the Coordinator of Sri Vimukthi Fisher women Organization, said at the meeting,
"We the women come forward to protect our children from any form of abuse as this is a growing tendency in our country. When we come forward as citizens and be on alert as organized group, it is not allow to continue this situation.
It is our intention too to force the authorities to take stern action against the perpetrators of child abuse with out any delay." added Subashinee at the media briefing.

Empowering Citizens in North-Valikamam North in Jaffna

NAFSO is engage in empowering people in the ground, specifically the war affected communities in selected divisional secretariat areas in Northern, Eastern, North Western Provinces.
War affected communities are one of the most vulnerable groups as some of them are still living in displaced camps or some other people's lands even after 51/2 years of war ended.

NAFSO team conducted another education and focus group meeting last 19th January in Valikamam north in Thellipillai, Jaffna. The 26 participants from 5 selected villages met and selected their representatives to the

citizen committee as Valikamam north citizen committee and elected 2 persons for represent the People's Gallery at the Thellipilai Pradesheeya Saba. At the same time, people were able to elect another person for the advisory council of the same Pradesheeya Saba which is a great achievement of the Citizen Committee formation process of NAFSO.

People Say NO to Corrupted Politicians to Maithree Regime

It is really painful to see the corrupted politicians are either leave the country secretly or join the Maithree Government which promised for a change and change for a good governance.

It is we who faced lot of harassment, brutal attacks while engage in the campaign for reform agenda during the elections. Eppawla is one place we were attacked by Mahinda Rajapakse's supporters or the goons. Also Hambantota, where Mahinda Rajapakse's place of political origin we were brutally attacked and 4 of our colleagues were hospitalized due to the attacks.
The mayor of Hambantota municipality[I dont write this fellows name purposely]  was the main accused of the attack who was arrested later and remanded for 3 days during the election.

After the election, the same person has come forward to support Maithreepala Sirisena, the present president. However, people in the area are totally reject his joining the ruling party and campaigned against the acceptance of his support to Maithripala.

EU fish import ban from Lanka goes into effect Wedaarachchi hopeful new govt’s appeal will get the country a breather

 

The issue of EU ban of export fish to EU territories are on effect from the 15th of January 2015. 

Although former fisheries minister, Rajitha Senarathne boasted that the MOF can revert the decision of EU ban of fishing import from Sri Lanka that was not success at all.

Now, the fishing industry mainly the multiday, deep sea fishery is in danger.

No one took serious look in to the issue and now fishers are the victims.

Maheesha Mudugamuwa of the Island news paper has written an interesting article with interviewing newly appointed Fisheries Minister[Non Cabinet Minister] Dilip Wedaarachchi on the issue.

Minister has simply put the blame on previous government and with high hopes about the new President and the Prime Minister could solve the issue.

Herman

 http://www.island.lk/index.php?page_cat=article-details&page=article-details&code_title=117735

January 16, 2015, 7:42 am 

by Maheesha Mudugamuwa

After issuing a red card against Sri Lankan seafood exports in October last year, due to the country’s failure to demonstrate that it sufficiently addressed Illegal, Unreported and Unregulated (IUU) fishing, the European Union (EU) began its ban yesterday (15).

The newly appointed State Minister of Fisheries Dilip Wedaarachchi yesterday told The Island that he was confident the EU would remove the ban for six months as per the request made by Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe and President Maithripala Sirisena.

The EU in 2012 also issued a Yellow Card warning to Sri Lanka following complaints of 11 Sri Lankan vessels intruding into international waters in 2011for fishing and fishermen violating the international maritime boundary laws.

Minister Wedaarachchi who is to assume duties at the Ministry today (16) said that the EU’s decision to ban Sri Lankan fish exports was due to the distrust they had of the former government.

The government had already sent a letter to EU seeking removal of its fishing ban for six months, while promising to comply with required rules and regulations during that time period, he noted.

Minister Wedaarachchi said however that the EU had not yet responded to the request.

Responding to a query, he said that he would have to find what the Ministry’s next step would be to cope with the ban after he assumed duties today.

The European Commission said last year that Sri Lanka had failed to make ‘credible progress’ toward fighting illegal fishing, including creating a scheme to punish high-seas violators.

According to the European Commission, Sri Lanka is one of the biggest exporters to the EU of high value products such as swordfish and tuna. EU imports in 2013 amounted to 7,400 MT of fish worth USD 94 million from the country.