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Anonymous Wrote:
Forwarded message from S. Kalyanaraman
http://sites.google.com/site/hindunew/srilanka
Shri Lankan rebels say they have put down arms
Shri Lanka's Tamil Tiger rebels on Sunday said they would
put down their weapons after a 37-year battle for an
independent ethnic homeland, with their last remaining
fighters encircled in the jungle.
In what could mark the end of Asia's longest running civil
war -- one that left more than 70,000 dead in pitched
battles, suicide attacks, bomb strikes and assassinations -
- the rebels appeared to finally admit defeat.
But the military refused to let up in their offensive,
saying troops were pushing on to recapture "every inch of
land" held by the rebels.
Selvarasa Pathmanathan, the Tigers' chief of international
relations, said in a statement on the Tamilnet website that
the fighting had reached "its bitter end."
"We remain with one last choice -- to remove the last weak
excuse of the enemy for killing our people," he said.
"We have decided to silence our guns. Our only regrets are
for the lives lost and that we could not hold out for
longer."
Velupillai Prabhakaran , the Tigers' founder and leader,
had been reported to be with his fighters as they made
their last stand, though the defence ministry said it had
no news of his whereabouts -- or whether he was still
alive.
Only two years ago, the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam
(LTTE) controlled nearly a third of the island nation and
operated an effectively autonomous Tamil state with courts,
schools and a civil service.
But the government of President Mahinda Rajapakse launched
a military assault which drove the Tigers out of the east
and then the north, before trapping the remaining
guerrillas on the island's coast.
"They were actually defeated some time ago, but they have
formally accepted defeat only now," military spokesman
Brigadier Udaya Nanayakkara told AFP.
"They fought for an Eelam (separate state) that they could
never win. It was only a waste of lives. They have caused
massive death and destruction over the years. Finally they
themselves have realised that it is all over."
He said the government soldiers were moving in on the 24-
hectare (60-acre) patch of jungle still held by Tigers and
would soon "take back every inch of land they have
occupied."
There was considerable doubt whether the defeat would bring
peace to the island, however, as the Tigers were thought
likely to return to the guerrilla tactics they used to
devastating effect in the past.
The military's push for victory has come at the cost of
thousands of innocent lives, according to the United
Nations, and the government has faced international
condemnation for its conduct of the war in recent months.
Shortly before the LTTE's announcement, Shri Lanka's
officials said all civilians held hostage by the Tigers had
escaped the war zone.
Shri Lankan military leaders say they held back on their
final assault to avoid civilian deaths, though thousands
are still thought to have been killed in months of heavy
fighting.
Rajapakse, who announced in Jordan on Saturday that his
forces had finally defeated the rebels, was greeted by
supporters waving flags and setting off firecrackers as he
returned home earlier on Sunday.
"My government, with the total commitment of our armed
forces, has in an unprecedented humanitarian operation
finally defeated the LTTE militarily," he told a meeting of
international leaders.
The president has faced fierce criticism for civilian
casualties caused by army shelling and for the detention in
state-run camps of more than 100,000 Tamils who fled the
fighting.
Thousands of non-combatants had been held hostage by the
Tigers, though the exact number has been a matter of
dispute between the United Nations and Shri Lankan
officials.
The government previously maintained that less than 20,000
civilians were being held by the rebels as human shields,
while the United Nations said there could have been 50,000
people trapped.
The International Committee of the Red Cross, the only
neutral organisation working in the war zone, described the
situation as "an unimaginable humanitarian catastrophe."
Despite pleas for a ceasefire from the United Nations, the
United States and many other countries, Shri Lanka had been
determined to push on until it had secured a clear victory
against the rebels.
http://www.nst.com.my/Current_News/NST/AfpNews/090517124614.p11fq7c9.txt/afp
Lanka army claims LTTE chief Prabhakaran dead
CNN-IBN
END OF TIGER? Lankan sources say top LTTE leadership may
have committed mass suicide.
New Delhi: Liberation Tiger of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) chief V
Prabhakaran could be dead with Shri Lankan army sources
telling CNN-IBN that his body has been recovered and is
being taken to an army camp in Colombo.
Shri Lankan army sources say they have recovered 150 bodies
of LTTE cadres but the bodies are still being identified.
According to reports all civilians held hostage by the LTTE
have now been freed from the battle zone.
The report comes even as the Lankan government announced it
had captured the final stronghold of the LTTE, and that the
top LTTE leadership may have committed mass suicide.
"I am proud to announce... that my government with the
total commitment of our armed forces, has in an
unprecedented humanitarian operation, finally defeated the
LTTE militarily," said Shri Lankan President Mahinda
Rajapaksa.
The Lankan army claims to have intercepted LTTE messages of
mass suicide of rebel leaders.
http://ibnlive.in.com/news/lanka-army-claims-ltte-chief-prabhakaran-dead/92805- 2.html
LTTE leaders boxed in less than one square kilometer
stretch
5/17/2009 5:05:17 PM
Shri Lankan soldiers have boxed the remaining LTTE cadres
into a 400m x 600m land stretch in the Vellaimullaivaikkal
area reveal the latest battlefield reports. According to
the sources, troops have already rescued all the civilians
held at hostage by the terrorists and taken them to safer
areas. Among the rescued were seven service personnel
including four sailors and three soldiers held as prisoners
of war by the terrorists.
Military spokesperson Udaya Nanayakkara said that over
50,000 civilians have been rescued from the LTTE hold
during last 72 hours. Out of the above figure over 36,000
hostages have been rescued during last 24 hours, he added.
Meanwhile, LTTE launched an unsuccessful attack at the Army
defence line on the eastern bank of the Nanthikadal lagoon
early this morning (May 17). The terrorists using boats
crossed the lagoon around 1.30 AM and attacked the Army
first line of defence. Troops crushed the LTTE assault
after hours of fierce fighting causing heavy damages to the
terrorists.
A senior defence official called the attack a desperate bid
by the terrorists to save their leaders.
"Their aim was to establish a foothold on the eastern bank
of the lagoon. If they were successful they would try to
transfer their most senior leaders there and try their luck
in the jungles", he said.
He further revealed that LTTE has lost their last remaining
fighting cadre in this abortive attack. "The attack was
completely crushed by the well prepared soldiers. It is
just a basic military tactic to show an escape route for
the surrounded enemy as bait and crush them when they take
it", he added.
Troops have so far have collected about 70 bodies of LTTE
cadres following the attack. According to available
information, two senior LTTE leaders identified as
Muttappan and Pradeep were also killed during the
confrontation.
Meanwhile, troops of 53, 58 and 59 Divisions engaged in
daylong clashes with the terrorists yesterday (May 16).
Troops of 5 Gemunu Watch (5 GW) and 6 Gajaba Regiment (6
GR) operating under 53 Division carried out mop up
operations along the A-35 in the Karayamullaivaikkal area
causing heavy damages to the terrorists. Troops during the
subsequent search operations found one body of LTTE cadre,
18 T-56 rifles, 11 radio communication sets, one light
machine gun (LMG) and one outboard motor.
Separately, infantrymen of 9 GW and 8 GR operating under 58
Divisions battled the remaining terror strongholds in the
Vellamullivaikkal area. Troops during the searches found a
large amount weapons including three damaged 152mm heavy
artillery guns. Among the other items found were, 128 T-56
weapons, 17 12.7 mm anti air machine guns, one RCL gun, two
paddle guns, four 40mm grenade launchers, two multi purpose
machine guns (MPMG), three radio communications sets, four
micro pistols, 285 hand grenades, two barrels of 60mm
mortar guns, two barrels of 120mm mortar guns, a large
stock of live ammunition, oxygen tanks and Diving kits.
Intercepted LTTE radio communications revealed that 31
terrorists were killed and 15 wounded during the clashes.
Infantrymen of 12 Shri Lanka Light Infantry (12 SLLI) and
11 GW operating under the 59 Division had confrontations
with the terrorists in the Sarawaruthoddam area in
Mullaittivu during daytime yesterday. Troops collected 3
bodies of LTTE cadres along with 18 T-56, three 40mm
grenade launchers, one MPMG, five radio communication sets,
one RPG launcher, and one 12.7mm machine gun during search
operations. Also, troops found several heavy vehicles
abandoned by the terrorists.
The battle continues.
http://www.defence.lk/PrintPage.asp?fname=20090517_04
Tamils need to be heard - John Pilger
[TamilNet, Sunday, 17 May 2009, 12:24 GMT]
"In order to conduct a slaughter, you ensure the
pornography is unseen, illicit at best. You ban foreigners
and their cameras from Tamil towns such as Mulliavaikal,
which was bombarded recently by the Shri Lankan army, and
you lie that the 75 people killed in the hospital were
blown up quite wilfully by a Tamil suicide bomber. You then
give reporters a ride into the jungle, providing what in
the news business is called a dateline, which suggests an
eyewitness account, and you encourage the gullible to
disseminate only your version and its lies," says award
winning documentary maker and popular journalist John
Pilger in a recent report in the New Statesman on Shri
Lanka war. "History teaches us that when no one listens,
tragedy ensues. Shri Lanka's Tamils face terrible
suffering. They urgently need to be heard," adds the
author.
Full text of the article in the News Statesman follows:
Distant voices, desperate lives
John Pilger, award winning journalist
In the early 1960s, it was the Irish of Derry who would
phone late at night, speaking in a single breath, spilling
out stories of discrimination and injustice. Who listened
to their truth, until the violence began? Bengalis from
what was then East Pakistan did much the same. Their urgent
whispers described terrible state crimes that the news
ignored, and they implored us reporters to "let the world
know". Palestinians speaking above the din of crowded rooms
in Bethlehem and Beirut asked no more. For me, the most
tenacious distant voices have been the Tamils of Shri
Lanka, to whom we ought to have listened a very long time
ago.
It is only now, as they take to the streets of western
cities, and the persecution of their compatriots reaches a
crescendo, that we listen, though not intently enough to
understand and act. The Shri Lankan government has learned
an old lesson from, I suspect, a modern master: Israel. In
order to conduct a slaughter, you ensure the pornography is
unseen, illicit at best. You ban foreigners and their
cameras from Tamil towns such as Mulliavaikal, which was
bombarded recently by the Shri Lankan army, and you lie
that the 75 people killed in the hospital were blown up
quite wilfully by a Tamil suicide bomber. You then give
reporters a ride into the jungle, providing what in the
news business is called a dateline, which suggests an
eyewitness account, and you encourage the gullible to
disseminate only your version and its lies. Gaza is the
model.
From the same masterclass you learn to manipulate the
definition of terrorism as a universal menace, thus
ingratiating yourself with the "international community"
(Washington) as a noble sovereign state blighted by an
"insurgency" of mindless fanaticism. The truth and lessons
of the past are irrelevant. And, having succeeded in
persuading the United States and Britain to proscribe your
insurgents as terrorists, you affirm you are on the right
side of history, regardless of the fact that your
government has one of the world's worst human rights
records and practises terrorism by another name. Such is
Shri Lanka.
This is not to suggest that those who resist attempts to
obliterate them culturally if not actually are innocent in
their methods. The Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE)
have spilled their share of blood and perpetrated their own
atrocities. But they are the product, not the cause, of an
injustice and a war that long pre-date them. Neither is
Shri Lanka's civil strife as unfathomable as it is often
presented: an ancient religious-ethnic rivalry between the
Hindu Tamils and the Buddhist Sinhalese government.
Shri Lanka, as British-ruled Ceylon, was subjected to
classic divide-and-rule. The British brought Tamils from
India as virtual slave labour while building an educated
Tamil middle class to run the colony. At independence in
1948, the new political elite, in its rush for power,
cultivated ethnic support in a society whose imperative
should have been the eradication of poverty. Language
became the spark. The election of a government pledging to
replace English, the lingua franca, with Sinhalese was a
declaration of war on the Tamils. Under the new law, Tamils
almost disappeared from the civil service by 1970; and as
"nationalism" seduced both left and right, discrimination
and anti-Tamil riots followed.
The formation of a Tamil resistance, notably the LTTE, the
Tamil Tigers, included a demand for a state in the north of
the country. The response of the government was judicial
killing, torture, disappearances and, more recently, the
reported use of cluster bombs and chemical weapons. The
Tigers responded with their own crimes, including suicide
bombing and kidnapping.
In 2002, a ceasefire was agreed, and it held until last
year, when the government decided to finish off the Tigers.
Tamil civilians were urged to flee to military-run "welfare
camps", which have become the symbol of an entire people
under vicious detention, and worse, with nowhere to escape
the army's fury.
This is Gaza again, although the historical parallel is the
British treatment of Boer women and children more than a
century ago, who "died like flies", as a witness wrote.
Foreign aid workers have been banned from Shri Lanka's
camps, except the International Committee of the Red Cross,
which has described a catastrophe in the making. The United
Nations says that 60 Tamils a day are being killed in the
shelling of a government-declared "no-fire zone".
In 2003, the Tigers proposed a devolved Interim Self-
Governing Authority that included possibilities for
negotiation. Today, the government gives the impression it
will use its imminent "victory" to "permanently solve" the
"Tamil minority problem", as many of its more rabid
supporters threaten. The army commander says all of Shri
Lanka "belongs" to the Sinhalese majority. The word
"genocide" is used by Tamil expatriates, perhaps loosely;
but the fear is true.
India could play a critical part. The south Indian state of
Tamil Nadu has a Tamil-speaking population with centuries-
long ties to the Tamils of Shri Lanka. In the current
Indian election campaign, anger over the siege of Tamils in
Shri Lanka has brought hundreds of thousands to rallies.
Having initially helped to arm the Tigers, Indian
governments sent "peacekeeping" troops to disarm them.
Delhi now appears to be allowing the Sinhalese supremacists
in Colombo to "stabilise" its troubled neighbour. In a
responsible regional role, India could stop the killing and
begin to broker a solution.
The great moral citadels in London and Washington offer
merely silent approval of the violence and tragedy. No
appeals are heard in the United Nations from them. David
Miliband has called for a "ceasefire", as he tends to do in
places where British "interests" are served, such as the 14
impoverished countries racked by armed conflict where the
British government licenses arms shipments. In 2005,
British arms exports to Shri Lanka rose by 60 per cent.
The distant voices from there should be heard, urgently.
http://www.tamilnet.com/art.html?catid=13&artid=29393#
End of forwarded message from S. Kalyanaraman
Jai Maharaj
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