Dissenting Tamil lawmakers in Sri Lanka form new coalition

A group of dissenting Sri Lankan Tamil lawmakers has formed a new coalition to challenge the TNA which has come under severe criticism for going soft on the government's delay in delivering justice to the minority community, a parliamentarian said today.
Tamil parliamentarian Sivashakthi Anandan said the Tamil Liberation Alliance (TLA) has been formed to challenge the Tamil National Alliance (TNA) which is the main political front for the Tamil minorities in Sri Lanka.
The new alliance hopes to contest the forthcoming local council elections as their first endeavour.
Anandan, who represents Eelam People's Revolutionary Liberation Front, said that his party along with the Tamil United Liberation Front (TULF) of veteran Tamil leader V Ananda Sangaree have joined together to form the TLA.

"We cannot agree with the current TNA policies, there will be more Tamil parties joining the TLA soon," he said.
The moderate TNA and its leader R Sampanthan, the main opposition leader, have come under strong criticism from the Tamil nationalists for going soft on the government's delay in delivering justice to Tamils.

The TNA's moderation has meant they no longer espouse the cause for a separate Tamil homeland.
They have expressed willingness to work for a solution within an undivided Sri Lanka.
The Tamil nationalists allege that President Maithripala Sirisena, who was backed by them against Mahinda Rajapaksa's pro-Sinhala majority regime, has not delivered justice to the Tamils.

The government has said that its resolve to deliver justice to the victims of the country's three-decade long civil war remains firm and it is working towards making the reconciliation process with Tamils a success.
The UN Human Rights Council has criticised Sri Lanka's "slow" progress in addressing its wartime past and reiterated its earlier call for hybrid court of international and local judges to investigate allegations of rights violations.
The Tamil minority insists on a probe with foreign judges, saying that the Sri Lankan judicial system could not be relied upon to deliver justice to Tamil victims of the conflict.

According to the UN figures, up to 40,000 civilians were killed by the security forces during Rajapaksa's regime that brought an end to nearly three-decades long civil war in Sri Lanka with the defeat of the LTTE in 2009.