Karuna group armed with captured LTTE weapons

Australia’s Special Broadcasting Service (SBS) yesterday interviewed Pradeep, the Political leader of TVMP (Karuna’s group), projecting Col Karuna’s group as the new political entity that is emerging as formidable force in the Sri Lankan crisis.

Pradeep said that they have a military wing, a political wing, a financial wing and an intelligence wing. Aaron Lewis, the reporter who interviewed Pradeep in Batticoloa, said that the Karuna Group is fighting with the LTTE weapons they took with them when they broke away from the LTTE in 2004. Some of the weapons were captured from the LTTE cadres.

The camera focused on TMVP pasted as posters or painted on the walls of Batticoloa. Aaron Lewis also showed footage of TVMP soldiers carrying rocket propelled grenade launches, AK 47 and other weapons. He said that the TVMP claims to have a force of 1500 soldiers.

Pradeep told SBS that they broke away because the Vanni group used them as cannon fodder and did not give them the places due to them. Their cadres were never promoted to higher ranks, he said.

Aaron Lewis said that when Karuna defected the LTTE was ruthless. He showed the massacre of the Karuna cadres in a safe house in Colombo. Those who survived regrouped.

He concluded by reporting that if the Sri Lankan government in "unable or unwilling” to disarm Karuna’s Group then "war is inevitable."

The Defence Secretary, Gotabaya Rajapakse, said that no one has proved that the Government is backing the Karun Group. In any case, it is not easy to disarm the Karun Group. It means waging another war, he said. He added that the LTTE id dragging on unnecessarily the peace process because they are not genuine about peace.

Ms. Helen Olafsdottir, the spokesperson for the European Peace Monitors, said that they don’t have proof of “but we know that they are there”. She said that the situation is so fragile that it does not need a big attack to start a war. Events are escalating into a war situation and a little incident can spark off a big war, she said.

(http://www.asiantribune.com/show_news.php?id=17691)