Jaffna

Jaffna (Tamil: யாழ்ப்பாணம் Yalpanam, Sinhala: යාපනය Yāpanaya) is the capital city of the Northern Province of Sri Lanka. It is the administrative headquarters of the Jaffna district located on a peninsula of the same name. With a population of 88,138, Jaffna is Sri Lanka's 12th largest city. Jaffna is approximately six miles away from Kandarodai which served as a famous emporium in the Jaffna peninsula from classical antiquity. Jaffna's suburb, Nallur served as the capital of the four centuries-long medieval Jaffna kingdom. Prior to the Sri Lankan civil war, it was Sri Lanka's second most populated city after the commercial capital Colombo. Since the 1980s insurgent uprising, military occupation, extensive damage, expulsion and depopulation has happened. Since the end of civil war in 2009, refugees and internally displaced people are returning to their homes and government and private sector reconstruction has begun.