THE Sri Lankan Government told a top UN official it could not guarantee the safe surrender of two Tamil Tiger political leaders who were subsequently shot dead this week, reportedly as they approached troops waving a white flag.

The revelation from the hazy last days of the civil war coincides with a push for Sri Lanka to face a UN war crimes investigation over reports it deliberately bombed unarmed civilians caught in the conflict zone between government troops and the last guerillas of the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam.

It also comes amid fears within Sri Lanka's Tamil population that paramilitary organisations linked to the Government could seek reprisals.

UN special envoy to Sri Lanka Vijay Nambiar told The Weekend Australian he had received two approaches in the lead-up to the fatal surrender -- one from a British journalist and the other through a British ministerial demarche to UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon -- asking him to convey the message that two key rebel figures wanted to surrender.

Mr Ban was due to fly into Sri Lanka late last night ahead of a flyover of the conflict zone in the country's north and a tour of internment camps where up to 300,000 Tamil refugees are reportedly housed in dire conditions.

Mr Nambiar, who is Mr Ban's chief of staff, said he passed the message on to Sri Lankan government officials, including Foreign Secretary Palitha Kohona, but received no guarantees the men would be granted safe passage.

"I gave the message I was asked to convey about the willingness of certain people to surrender. Other diplomats suggested I make the plea to the Government, which I did," Mr Nambiar said. "I told them (Sri Lankan government officials) and they said, 'It may be too late, we will see'."

Tamil Tiger political chief Balasingham Nadesan and Peace Secretariat head Seevaratnam Pulideevan are understood to have made numerous calls to aid groups, including the Red Cross, and diplomats last weekend, in the final days of the war, to negotiate a surrender for themselves and their families.

The two men reportedly attempted to cross the conflict zone late on Sunday night or early on Monday morning but were shot as they walked towards the army's 58th division waving a white flag.

Dr Kohona confirmed yesterday that he had received a message from a non-government organisation in Europe last weekend informing him the men wanted to surrender.

But he told The Weekend Australian he had no conversation about the surrender with Mr Nambiar or any diplomat. "I responded to the message from the NGO by saying, 'Tell them to follow the normal procedures (of surrender)'," he said.

Dr Kohona said he did not pass the information on to anyone, adding: "Contacting me at that time about surrender was probably not a useful way of setting about it."

Dr Kohona said he could not be sure the two men were not shot by troops but he believed they had been shot by their own comrades.

The International Committee of the Red Cross has confirmed the pair contacted them asking for their request to be passed to the Sri Lankan army. Diplomats and aid officials say the last contact with the men was on Sunday night.

The LTTE issued a statement of surrender early on Monday, the same day the Government revealed the two men had been shot.

President Mahinda Rajapakse declared victory on Tuesday. He also announced the slaying of LTTE commander Velupillai Prabhakaran.

The Government denies any civilian casualties despite mounting witness accounts from aid workers, doctors and fleeing civilians of the army bombarding LTTE forces and of civilians being caught between the two sides amid shelling and artillery fire.

The UN estimates that at least 7000 civilians have died in the conflict zone this year.

The Government revealed yesterday that 6200 troops had been killed in the same time frame and and that more than 23,000 had died since 1981. The rebels are said to have lost 22,000 since 1982. More than 70,000 civilians have died during the LTTE's armed struggle for a separate Tamil homeland. LTTE chief of international relations Selvarasa Pathmanathan accused the Sri Lankan Government of carrying out a "well-planned massacre" of unarmed officers.

He claimed Mr Nadesan and Mr Pulideevan were unarmed and carrying white flags and were called on by the officers of the 58th Division to come forward for discussions. "When they complied they were both shot and killed," he said.

The two men's bodies have been cremated and Mr Kohona could not say whether an autopsy had been conducted. The military has also cremated the body of Prabhakaran, eliminating any chance of clearing up confusion surrounding his death.

Human Rights Watch spokeswoman Anna Neistat said she was "extremely concerned" to hear about the cremations, which amounted to destruction of evidence. But she said HRW's main concern was over potential purges of suspected Tamil Tiger sympathisers by paramilitary groups.

They are also reportedly being used in the screening procedures in the camps, including to weed out child soldiers, according to The Coalition to Stop the Use of Child Soldiers, which claimed this week that at least 80 had already gone missing from the camps in the main resettlement area of Vavuniya.

But Mr Kohona told The Weekend Australian the Government's priority was to unite the country, "not churn up old wounds".

"Already we have over 4000 former cadres in the IDP camps. We're hoping they will reform and return to their communities, leaving behind the violence to which they were so accustomed," he said.

The UN has called on the Sri Lankan Government to hold discussions with Tamil leaders.

"The process of national reconciliation, we feel, must be all-inclusive so that it can fully address the legitimate aspirations of the Tamils as well as other minorities," Mr Nambiar said. "It is important that victory becomes a victory for all Sri Lankans."

The envoy, who flew over the conflict zone on Thursday, described a scene of mass devastation, with charred vehicles, vast swathes of burnt ground and trees, and tent camps in disarray.

"We were not able to see any civilians. What was truly striking was almost the total absence of human habitation ... it was almost eerie," he said.

Additional reporting:

Alexandra Cameron in Colombo

http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/story...45-2703,00.html

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