Nearly 135,000 civilians, 15,000 Tigers perished

A political grouping pushing for devolution of power to the provinces yesterday estimated the number of LTTE cadres killed during eelam war IV at 15,000. Dr. Wickremabahu Karunaratne, of the Nava Samasamaja Party (NSSP), claimed that they were among 150,000 persons that perished in the war (July 2006 to May 2009).

Karunaratne was responding to a query by The Island, at a media briefing called by former Deputy Mayor of the CMC, Azath Sally at No 122, Barnes Place, Colombo 7. Sally was acting on behalf of recently formed Muslim-Tamil National Alliance. 

Karunaratne lambasted President Mahinda Rajapaksa’s government for subjecting Tamil speaking people to military oppression, particularly in the Jaffna peninsula.The alliance was represented by TNA MP Suresh Premachandran and Mano Ganeshan of the Democratic People’s Front (DPF).

Asked whether the alliance had inquired from the LTTE rump about battlefield losses

suffered by the group, Karunaratne said that they would go by pronouncements made by the government as regards losses suffered by the LTTE.

TNA MP Premachandran reiterated his longstanding call for an independent international investigation into accountability issues as the party didn’t have faith in President Rajapaksa’s government. The Jaffna District MP said that the long suffering Tamil speaking people wouldn’t have confidence in the government or the "murderous" army. He said that an external inquiry would be nothing but a prerequisite for post- national reconciliation.

Premachandran, who was standing in for TNA colleague M. A. Sumanthiran, didn’t respond to The Island query as regards the period which should be subjected to the proposed international inquiry and the accountability on the part of the TNA, due to it having declared the LTTE as the sole representative of the Tamil speaking people in the run-up to eelam war IV. Instead, Premachandran alleged that hundreds of those who had surrendered to the army at the conclusion of the Vanni battle in May 2009 were missing. The government and the army were both silent on the dead and the missing in spite of their loved ones making representations to the government as well as the Lessons Learnt and Reconciliation Commission (LLRC).

When pointed out that over 11,000 of some 12,000 held in detention had at the end of the conflict were released following rehabilitation, Suresh Premachandran, Wickremabahu Karunaratne and Mano Ganeshan insisted that thousands were still unaccounted for.

Commenting on people transferred from the Vanni east battlefields to Pulmoddai by ship during the tail end of the offensive, Ganeshan said that the ICRC had played a role in the transfer of those wounded from Puthumathalan to a makeshift medical facility manned by Indian personnel. He said that the Sri Lankan military, too, had been present at the makeshift medical facility. The DPF leader said that many of the vast majority of war weary people, who had surrendered to the army in the Vanni, were missing.

The alliance vowed to pursue its campaign until those responsible for war crimes were punished regardless of their standing.

At the conclusion of the media briefing, The Island asked Premachandran whether he was aware of the number of men and women that died while fighting for the LTTE during eelam war IV, he replied in the negative.

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