At least seven persons, including five Tamil Tiger rebels, were killed today in fresh fighting in Sri Lanka's troubled regions, military sources said.
Five members of the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) were killed in a confrontation with the breakaway faction led by Colonel Karuna at the Sampur area of Trincomalee, the sources said.
There were no immediate reports of casualties on the Karuna faction, but the residents in nearby areas said they heard heavy mortar bomb attacks in the area.
In the northern Vavuniya region, two army soldiers were shot dead by suspected Tiger rebels, the sources said.
The latest fighting came amid reports that a resolution in the European parliament yesterday criticised the LTTE and urged a ban on the group to cut off its international funding within the 25-member European Union.
There was no formal ban on the Tigers, Western diplomats here said adding, however, that a proscription was under consideration.
(http://www.outlookindia.com/pti_news.asp?id=386022)
Friday, May 19, 2006
Thursday, May 18, 2006
Farmers learn to fight from Sri Lanka's Tamil Tigers by Anuruddha Lokuhapuarachchi
Tamil farmer Thuraichami Wardanayagam is happiest tending his aubergine and chilli crops, but war clouds hang over his native Sri Lanka and he has turned to Tamil Tiger rebels for combat training.
He has been running and doing star jumps in this village just outside the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam's (LTTE) northern stronghold, and if all goes well he will learn how to handle a semi-automatic rifle and possibly even explosives.
The Tigers are offering men, women and youngsters training in the island's north and east as a spate of deadly attacks and military clashes between the rebels and the state threaten to rupture a 2002 truce that still technically holds.
"We don't consider this as training. This is vital to our lives," said 55-year-old Thuraichami Wardanayagam, doing physical training in a white and brown sarong and vest under the guidance of two rebels in Tiger-striped camouflage fatigues.
A spate of deadly attacks on Tamil civilians in the northern, army-held enclave of Jaffna which the rebels blame on the military and vice-versa have left many residents feeling too scared to venture out onto the streets.
Grenade attacks and shootings are now near daily occurrences in the town now controlled by Sri Lanka's majority-Sinhalese army and which Tamils regard as the cradle of their civilization.
Nordic truce monitors say they believe some troops are involved in extrajudicial killings of Tamil civilians.
On Wednesday, the latest in a string of mine ambushes by suspected Tigers killed two soldiers in the east, while a civilian was shot dead in Jaffna.
Some Tamils sympathetic to the Tigers' cause for a separate Tamil homeland want to learn to fight back if the time comes.
"So many things happened in and around Jaffna during the last four or five days. That means war has come," Wardanayagam said. "This is to protect us all, including our children, from war."
GEARING UP FOR WAR?
With more than 270 troops and civilians killed since early April -- including a fierce naval battle and aerial bombing raids just last week -- the violence looks just like periods of the two-decade civil war in which over 64,000 people died.
Truce monitors and the Tigers have both started referring to a "low intensity war". The government disagrees, saying the ceasefire holds and says it will limit itself to tactical bursts of retaliation if attacked.
The Tigers began training civilians since last year in parts of Sri Lanka's north and east they control as a precaution against any eventual return to a two-decade civil war that has already killed more than 64,000 people.
At the time, they said the civilians would be trained for their own safety and would not fight alongside them.
"The country is going towards war. That's why we're doing this training," said rebel media coordinator Daya Master. "In our controlled area, people in every village are getting self-defence training."
"If they want weapons training, we will give it to them," he added, saying several thousand people have been trained. "When the opportunity arises, they can join the LTTE if they want."
In Kilinochchi, the Tigers' nerve centre, heavily armed rebel fighters are visible on the streets. Some families have moved away from forward defence lines near government territory, arriving in the town on tractors with their worldly possessions.
The training lasts two hours each day, and comprises self-defence and physical exercise, first aid and finally weapons training for those deemed suitable.
"This training is very helpful for us to defend ourselves against the government's military forces," said one 60-year-old housewife, exercising in a green saree, her hair in a bun. She refused to give her name or be photographed for fear of being identified by the military.
"They always harrass us and our children. That is the reason I came to this training," she said.
(http://www.alertnet.org/thenews/newsdesk/COL7157.htm)
He has been running and doing star jumps in this village just outside the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam's (LTTE) northern stronghold, and if all goes well he will learn how to handle a semi-automatic rifle and possibly even explosives.
The Tigers are offering men, women and youngsters training in the island's north and east as a spate of deadly attacks and military clashes between the rebels and the state threaten to rupture a 2002 truce that still technically holds.
"We don't consider this as training. This is vital to our lives," said 55-year-old Thuraichami Wardanayagam, doing physical training in a white and brown sarong and vest under the guidance of two rebels in Tiger-striped camouflage fatigues.
A spate of deadly attacks on Tamil civilians in the northern, army-held enclave of Jaffna which the rebels blame on the military and vice-versa have left many residents feeling too scared to venture out onto the streets.
Grenade attacks and shootings are now near daily occurrences in the town now controlled by Sri Lanka's majority-Sinhalese army and which Tamils regard as the cradle of their civilization.
Nordic truce monitors say they believe some troops are involved in extrajudicial killings of Tamil civilians.
On Wednesday, the latest in a string of mine ambushes by suspected Tigers killed two soldiers in the east, while a civilian was shot dead in Jaffna.
Some Tamils sympathetic to the Tigers' cause for a separate Tamil homeland want to learn to fight back if the time comes.
"So many things happened in and around Jaffna during the last four or five days. That means war has come," Wardanayagam said. "This is to protect us all, including our children, from war."
GEARING UP FOR WAR?
With more than 270 troops and civilians killed since early April -- including a fierce naval battle and aerial bombing raids just last week -- the violence looks just like periods of the two-decade civil war in which over 64,000 people died.
Truce monitors and the Tigers have both started referring to a "low intensity war". The government disagrees, saying the ceasefire holds and says it will limit itself to tactical bursts of retaliation if attacked.
The Tigers began training civilians since last year in parts of Sri Lanka's north and east they control as a precaution against any eventual return to a two-decade civil war that has already killed more than 64,000 people.
At the time, they said the civilians would be trained for their own safety and would not fight alongside them.
"The country is going towards war. That's why we're doing this training," said rebel media coordinator Daya Master. "In our controlled area, people in every village are getting self-defence training."
"If they want weapons training, we will give it to them," he added, saying several thousand people have been trained. "When the opportunity arises, they can join the LTTE if they want."
In Kilinochchi, the Tigers' nerve centre, heavily armed rebel fighters are visible on the streets. Some families have moved away from forward defence lines near government territory, arriving in the town on tractors with their worldly possessions.
The training lasts two hours each day, and comprises self-defence and physical exercise, first aid and finally weapons training for those deemed suitable.
"This training is very helpful for us to defend ourselves against the government's military forces," said one 60-year-old housewife, exercising in a green saree, her hair in a bun. She refused to give her name or be photographed for fear of being identified by the military.
"They always harrass us and our children. That is the reason I came to this training," she said.
(http://www.alertnet.org/thenews/newsdesk/COL7157.htm)
Wednesday, May 17, 2006
Tamil Tigers use civilians as shield: Sri Lankan official
The Sri Lankan government accused Wednesday the Tamil Tiger rebels of using civilians as a shield in attacks against the security forces.
Prasad Samarasinghe, the defense ministry spokesman, told reporters here Wednesday that the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam(LTTE) rebels carry out attacks against the government troops in heavily populated areas.
"They use them as a shield and even have some civilians in their payroll to attack troops," Samarasinghe said.
Over 150 members of the government troops have been killed by the Tiger rebels in the upsurge of violence since December last year, which has hampered the Norwegian peace facilitators' efforts to bring the two sides to the negotiating table.
Keheliya Rambukwella, minister of Policy Planning and government's defense spokesman, said that in spite of the violence,the government remained committed to the Norwegian-backed peace process.
Rambukwella said the government would be giving a full account of the violence and the numbers of security forces victims to the European Union in order for them to consider their moves to outlaw the Tamil Tigers.
The LTTE made a suicide assassination bid on Army Commander Sarath Fonseka late April, which upset the second round of talks in Geneva to discuss the truce scheduled for April 24-25.
The LTTE makes counter accusations at the government troops for carrying out extra judicial killings of Tamil civilians in the north and east.
The international truce monitors, the Sri Lanka Monitoring Mission (SLMM), has blamed both sides of doing nothing to build confidence to facilitate direct talks.
(http://www.xinhuanet.com/english/world.htm)
A Tiger Under Every Stone by TamilGuardian
The recent escalation of violence that has put the Ceasefire Agreement under severe pressure seems in many ways to reflect the mutually reinforcing relationship between Sinhalese and Tamil nationalisms and their respective protagonists. In such circumstances, an argument is put forward more vociferously that the ‘extremism’ and ‘provocation’ of the LTTE’ feeds and justifies the ‘hardline’ political rhetoric of Sinhala politicians and the violence of the state’s armed forces.
This perspective has, in many ways, informed the myriad of actors who have contributed to the recent peace process, either as direct participants or as advisors offering comment and analysis to the major players.
Advocates of this perspective have argued that the only way to wean the Sinhalese population away from the uncompromising positions of nationalist actors is to transform the LTTE. Transformation of the LTTE has thus been the mantra that has guided many international analysts and policy maker for the last three or four years.
The argument goes thus: if the LTTE’s military capacity is radically curtailed and its political autonomy contained within the boundaries of commitment to a ‘united’ or ‘unitary’ Sri Lanka, the Sinhala hardliners will no longer be able to mount such vehement opposition to any mention of devolution or federalism. Once the LTTE has been de – fanged, more moderate Sinhala politicians will be able to confidently advocate a political solution that grants significant autonomy to the Tamils.
It is also argued that while the LTTE remains a significant military and political ‘threat’, ‘spoilers’ in the south will always outbid moderate Sinhala politicians attempts to find a negotiated settlement by whipping up the Sinhala polity’s anxieties about a separate Tamil state. In the idiom of its exponents, the claim that transformation of the LTTE will undermine Sinhala ‘spoilers’ of the peace process and thereby allow for the ‘reform of the state by liberal actors is now almost axiomatic.
Given the current perilous standoff between the Sri Lankan government and the LTTE, it might be time to examine the basic premises of this argument. According to the ‘transform the LTTE first’ mantra, the political plausibility of Sinhala nationalist positions is directly related to the actions and perceived intentions of the LTTE.
However, a close examination of the dynamics of politics within the Sinhala polity would suggest that southern opposition to any form of political devolution for the Tamils is sustained through sources that are completely independent of the LTTE per se.
The ideal of a unitary Sinhala Buddhist state in which the minorities have a politically recognised but subordinate position, resonates with the interests of a multitude of groups within the Sinhala polity. A compromise with the Tamils is rejected, not because of anxieties or loathing of the LTTE (alone), but because such a compromise would necessarily destroy this utopian vision, the most basic political assumption and aspiration of Sinhala Buddhist common sense.
The vision of a unitary Sinhala Buddhist state in which there is both a massive centralisation of resources and seamless continuity between the language, rituals and beliefs of the Sinhala Buddhist world and the institutions of the state, clearly has its appeal both for political elites and for non elite sections of the polity. For aspirant social groups, a centralised Sinhala Buddhist state not only provides opportunities through public sector employment through which they can achieve upward mobility, it also protects and fosters the integrity of their Sinhala Buddhist world.
It is for this reason that all political concessions to the Tamils, however mild, are immediately interpreted as both a material and moral threat. Any minor political recognition of a Tamil claim to the island or the state can be seen as undermining both the Sinhala Buddhist state and the Sinhala Buddhist religious, cultural and linguistic world that it protects. So for example, attempts during the 1950’s and 1960’s to replace the Sinhala Only’ legislation with official recognition for Tamil were decried as attempts to ‘destroy the Sinhala race’ or ‘make the Sinhalese learn Tamil.’
The continuation of this phenomenon can be seen in the fierce opposition that was mounted against both the PTOMS and the LTTE’s proposals for an Interim Self Governing Authority (ISGA). The ‘transform the LTTE’ school of thought often argues that both these proposals conceded far too much to the LTTE and thereby played straight into the hands of the Sinhala ‘spoilers.’
However, it must be remembered that opposition to both proposals mounted well before the actual details of the proposal were released. The substance of the proposals was therefore irrelevant, what was problematic for the Sinhala Buddhists was the recognition of a Tamil political identity that these proposals entailed. Both the PTOMS and the ISGA contained the assumption that the Tamils have legitimate political interests that have to be recognised and accommodated through institutions outside the control of the Sinhala Buddhist polity. It is this possibility that is deeply problematic for the Sinhala Buddhist psyche. This is not a recent phenomena, either; well before the emergence of the LTTE, attempts by Tamil political leaders to negotiate a compromise with their Sinhala counterparts were destroyed by opposition using the imagery of a Sinhala Buddhist state and world under threat.
While the Sinhala Buddhist state fosters and protects the social aspirations of non – elite Sinhalese, it is also a useful resource for political elites. The excessively centralised state gives political actors vast resources with which to build patron – client networks and consolidate their power. Neither the UNP nor the SLFP, the two main Sinhala parties, have robust party structures and both rely on access to the state’s resources to build and maintain a support base. Political competition therefore revolves on the distribution of the state’s resources. The parties in power can distribute resources through subsidies and patronage while the parties in opposition promise greater resource while mobilising the discontent of sections who have been excluded from government largesse.
Crucially, the political parties have no incentive to aggressively promote a political settlement and even if they had an incentive, they do not have the party organisation through which to spread such a message. Political competition is played out in a public sphere dominated by Sinhala Buddhist common sense.
Alongside their deep antipathy to any form of political recognition for the Tamils, Sinhala Buddhist nationalists are also deeply intolerant to every form of autonomous Tamil political activity. In Sri Lanka this leads this results in all expressions of an autonomous Tamil political identity being dismissed as results of LTTE manipulation and coercion. The same principle is increasingly being extended to the international arena and Tamil Diaspora political activity is carefully watched for ‘pro-LTTE’ tendencies by the Sinhala nationalist press. The baleful distrust and anxiety created by Tamil participation in local government (council) elections in far away England recently led The Island newspaper to print a front page story. IAccording to the paper, ‘pro LTTE’ individuals standing for local council elections are promising a mini Eelam in London with sports facilities, funding for Saturday schools and centres for the elderly, exclusively for Tamils. The argument of the story is clear – all Tamil political activity, however mild and unconnected to the ethnic question, is inherently separatist and dangerous. The fact that local councils in Britain have long provided such community facilities for their Bengali, Punjabi, Gujarati, Chinese, Turkish and Pakistani citizens is somehow missed. ‘Even’ in Britain, today the Tamils are asking for a Saturday school, tomorrow they will want a separate state, the logic goes.
The poisonous racism that pervades mass circulation Island’s reporting of British Tamils is pervasive in wider Sinhala society and is reproduced within a variety of sources, over which the LTTE can have no possible influence. The political vision of a united Sinhala Buddhist Sri Lanka is reinforced and repeated through the media, the education system, public institutions, the rhetoric of politicians and recently the interventions of international actors.
Meanwhile, the biased and one sided international response to events in Sri Lanka simply reinforces the Sinhala Buddhist conviction that all Tamil political demands are indeed a moral threat to the Sri Lankan state and the Sinhala Buddhist world it protects. Each condemnation of the LTTE and its ‘reprehensible terrorist’ nature, every failure of the international community to stand by agreements such as the PTOMS, every instance where incidents of high profile violence against Tamils are followed by indifferent international silence, the Sinhala Buddhist position is once again assured of its (international) legitimacy.
Given that the sources of Sinhala Buddhist nationalist are demonstrably independent of the LTTE, transforming and containing the LTTE is unlikely to produce an attitude of compromise within the Sinhala polity. Indeed, once the Tiger has been de – fanged, there will be even less reason for Sinhala political leaders to concede even a modicum of political devolution. Attempts to transform the Sri Lankan state, which would give the Tamils some form of political recognition, would, as always, instantly arouse opposition as a cloak for dangerous Tamil separatist aspirations.
In order to transform the Sri Lankan state both pro peace advocates and the Sinhala polity have to replace their unhealthy fixation with the LTTE with a serious consideration of the sites and mechanisms through with Sinhala Buddhist nationalism is reproduced. International actors have to consider why they cannot confront Sinhala Buddhist nationalism of the Sri Lankan state with the same open contempt with which they dismiss Tamil aspirations.
As is increasingly argued on the Tamil street, in the absence of any change in either the Sinhala Buddhist or international mindset, the Tamils, whose struggle has never enjoyed or needed external legitimisation, may be better off concentrating on changing facts on the ground.
(http://www.sibernews.com/the-news/featured-articles/a-tiger-under-every-stone-20
0605174331/&cid=0)
Who is behind the escalation of violence in the north and east ?
The rise in violence, particularly killings in Jaffna, after the first round of talks in Geneva, is a disturbing trend that is yet to be investigated by the Police, judicial inquiries and the Sri Lankan Monitoring Mission.
"We can't say who's clearly responsible for the killings, as there are still many questions on who may have been behind it," said Helen Olafsdottir, spokeswoman for the Sri Lanka Monitoring Mission to the New York Times. (May 16, 2006).
The mystery of who is behind the killings in places controlled by the government, the LTTE and other Tamil groups has not been resolved by the conflicting reports and lack of evidence.
The LTTE accuses the Security Forces. This charge is frequently advanced by the LTTE saying that the killings take place within a few meters of the Security Camps or checkpoints. Ulf Hendrickson, the retired Swedish major general who commands the monitoring force, told the New York Times (May 16, 2006) that his Monitoring Mission “had received reports of killings in which the police or soldiers could be implicated, taking pains to note that it was not the job of his mission to investigate individual killings, but to present the information to the proper authorities.”
He added: "I don't know how the security forces are involved. It could be individuals, it could be lower levels, it could be fundamentalist elements in the security forces." He said the police had promised to investigate.
Minister Nimal Sripla de Silva, the Government Chief Negotiator at the Geneva talks, said it "condemns all forms of reprisal attacks against innocent civilians."
Government sources say that it is aware of the attempts by the LTTE to provoke the Sinhala community to retaliate and it is taking all precautions to prevent a backlash against the Tamils which would favor the LTTE.
Political observers agree that there is no official policy of the government to attack Tamil civilians though it is possible that individual police and soldiers may go on the rampage provoked by the LTTE attacks on their camps or checkpoints.
The LTTE also accuses the “paramilitaries” meaning Douglas Devnanda’s group or their former commander Col. Karuna who has broken away. Analysts agree that the rivalry between the two main Tamil groups and the other anti-LTTE Tamil parties have contributed to the increasing violence. This week, for instance, the LTTE cadres gate-crashed into a Batticoloa hospital and gunned down two cadres of Karuna’s group recovering from battle injuries.
Karuna’s group has openly declared that it has called off the unilateral ceasefire announced in January as the LTTE has launched its new offensive against them saying that if the Government doesn’t disarm the “paramilitaries” then they will. The killings in the east of prominent LTTE politicians, like Joseph Pararajasingham, MP, are attributed to Karuna’s Group though they have not acknowledged it.
Douglas Devananda has denied any involvement with the killings despite his cadres in Jaffna have been either attacked or killed by the LTTE cadres. The LTTE has accused Devananda of killing of two workers in a newspaper office in Jaffna recently. Devananda’s office has denied such allegations saying that it is not in his interests to kill Tamils.
However, both Karuna’s group and Devananda’s EPDP have accused the LTTE of deliberately increasing the violence in the east and the north to smear them as being agents of the Government. A spokesperson for Devananada said:
“The LTTE is relying on the accusation that the “paramilitaries” are with the government to press their latest excuse to keep out of the talks. They have to prove this and escalating the killings of Tamils in the north and the east is their way of proving that the anti-LTTE groups are involved in killing the Tamils.”
The documented trend reveals that the LTTE has increased its violence since the end of the Geneva talks. The LTTE has been preparing for Eelam IV according to the pronouncement made by Velupillai Prabhakaran in his last annual speech delivered on November 27 – his birthday. He has also admitted that his preparations to launch his war were postponed because of the damage caused by the Tsunami. The standard LTTE tactic has been to target his Tamil rivals and the Sinhalese to provoke a backlash.
The recent explosion of violence in Trincomalee where the Sinhala community went on the rampage against the Tamils is a clear example of LTTE provoking violence to gain political mileage. All community sources agree that the LTTE planted the bomb on the cycle placed near the vegetable market in Trincomalee. The explosion was hear right the round world with the BBC repeating the pro-Tamil media figure of 40,000 fleeing the locality.
According to analysts the LTTE has thrived on creating chaos, backlashes and killings. The current trend conforms to its past performances. The other parties too may resort to violence but not to the same extent as the LTTE which has had no strategy other than increasing and decreasing violence as when it suits its political needs.
(http://news.google.lk/news/url?sa=t&ct=us/3-0&fp=446b61f061c25258&ei=o-trRJC5N4Ku
oQL8kP3UCA&url=http%3A//www.asiantribune.com/index.php%3Fq%3Dnode/138&cid=110
6580253)
Karuna demands payment from Sinhala villagers
The convenor of the All Ceylon Movement for Protecting Farmers' Rights Ven. Dambulle Nanda Thero says farmers in the border villagers have had to give their harvest to the Karuna Group in addition to facing threats from the Wanni Tigers.
The Ven. Thero says the Karuna Group demands 35-40 bushels of rice from farmers and the defence sectors do not take action, although they are informed of the problem.
<>The Karuna Group, a breakaway faction of the LTTE, runs a chain of safe houses in Sinhala and Tamil villages in the Welikanda area, on the border of the North Central and Eastern Provinces. Farmers in the border villages face threats from the rebels and several farmers from Moraweva in the Trincomalee district were gunned down recently while harvesting their paddy fields.(http://news.google.lk/news/url?sa=t&ct=us/6-0&fp=446b61f061c25258&ei=o-trRJC5N4Kuo
QL8kP3UCA&url=http%3A//www.colombopage.com/archive/May14133653SL.html&cid=0)
Low r
Monitors confirm deep penetration, extrajudicial killings charges
International truce monitors this week said they believed reports Sri Lanka Army troops were conducting Deep Penetration raids into Tamil Tiger controlled areas, killing several civilians. Their comments came as the LTTE said its frontlines to the north and south of Vanni were attacked by infiltrating SLA soldiers. Meanwhile, the international monitors also said Sri Lankan security forces are responsible for extrajudicial killings with the troops so unconcerned as to the consequences as to not even provide plausible denials.
(http://www.tamilnet.com/art.html?catid=79&artid=18154)
The Nordic-staffed Sri Lanka Monitoring Mission (SLMM) office in the northern town of Vavuniya told Reuters Monday it has recorded at least seven attacks in LTTE-controlled areas, including several on civilians.
The monitors believe military patrols are working alongside anti-Tiger Tamil armed groups.
"We believe that the Sri Lankan army and Tamil armed groups are operating behind LTTE lines," truce monitor Bernt Gulbrandesen told Reuters. "There are so many incidents it has to be an organized thing."
Monitors also said that paramilitaries of the Karuna Group were being deployed in Vavuniya.
“I firmly believe that Karuna is going around this area,” Mr Jouni Suninen, head of the district office of the SLMM in Vavuniya told Reuters.
“We have eyewitnesses who tell us they have seen Karunas around. I cannot see how they could be operating here without the support of the army.”
Sri Lanka’s military and government reject accusations that there are backing the renegade LTTE commander in a campaign against the LTTE.
Howver, the monitors in Vavuniya told Reuters they are confident they have evidence. They say they believe Karuna’s men are operating from army camps and carrying out attacks behind rebel lines.
“We have eyewitnesses telling us that they are based in army camps,” said Mr Suninen.
Reuters quoted the Tigers as saying the first attack on them in their controlled areas was a claymore fragmentation mine ambush on a LTTE political wing leader in January, during a spike in violence that preceded a first round of peace talks in Switzerland.
Last week truce monitors said probable Tamil Tiger attacks on the military have been followed by disappearances and open killings of Tamil civilians.
“We have very strong indications that at least part of the government troops have been involved in these killings,” Suninen, an Finnish ex-army officer, said.
“The pattern is clear,” he added. In one case, a civilian was killed 60 metres from an army checkpoint. The soldiers told the monitors they heard nothing.
Suninen said at least 40 people have been killed in the last month by suspected Tigers, soldiers or associated groups around Vavuniya, just beyond the southern border of LTTE-controlled Vanni.
For the first time, the monitoring mission’s field staff were authorised to speak on the record about what they had found. They say publicity is the only weapon they have.
The monitors say suspected military killings target civilians believed to be LTTE-linked.
Ponnuthurai Thayanithi, 27, killed last week, had one sister who had died fighting for the Tigers but was not believed to have any direct link. Police initially refused to come and inspect the body, said Heiskanen.
“This is where the girl was killed in the middle of the day,” Heiskanen said. “As you can see, we’re about 60 metres from an army checkpoint. There are always three soldiers there. The girl had two bullets in her head. They didn’t hear or see anything.”
Heiskanen said he asked the soldiers why they had not noticed the killing taking place within sight and earshot. They said that as the shots were fired, there was a particularly strong gust of wind, so they had heard nothing.
“I said ‘how do you know what was the exact time?’“ he said. “It is ridiculous. They don’t even try to make things up.”
People have disappeared at government checkpoints and turned up dead. A white van seen before some of the killings appears to have moved with impunity through checkpoints and in one case was reportedly seen leaving an army camp, the monitors say.(http://www.tamilnet.com/art.html?catid=79&artid=18154)
More death as war looms in Sri Lanka
`WORRYING SITUATION': Prominent LTTE rebels spoke about the tension in Sri Lanka while another rebel group was accused of working with the army
Two anti-personnel mines intended to target Sri Lankan military vehicles exploded prematurely yesterday, killing a village guard and wounding two policemen in the country's restive northeast, the military said.
Two anti-personnel mines intended to target Sri Lankan military vehicles exploded prematurely yesterday, killing a village guard and wounding two policemen in the country's restive northeast, the military said.
Anti-personnel mines, which can be detonated by remote control, are the preferred weapons of the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) rebels, also known as the Tamil Tigers.
The Media Unit of the Defense Ministry said the guard was killed and policemen hurt near the port town of Trincomalee -- about 230km northeast of the capital, Colombo -- when the mines were triggered. A military convoy was to travel along the road hours later.
Meanwhile, a senior Tamil Tiger rebel leader said yesterday that the spiraling violence in Sri Lanka is worrying and that they are prepared for a resumption of the civil war.
"It is a very worrying situation," Seevaratnam Puleedevan, a top Tamil Tiger said.
"A low intensity war is already going on, there are lot of civilians being killed in the military controlled areas in the whole north east," Puleedevan said. "If the war is thrust upon us then we are ready to retaliate," he said.
Another senior Tamil Tiger leader accused the government of waging an undeclared war on ethnic Tamils.
Speaking at a funeral for four insurgents killed last week in a suicide attack on a government navy patrol boat, senior rebel leader K.V. Balakumaran on Monday accused the military of deliberately targeting Tamil civilians.
"Our people are being blatantly victimized in an undeclared war by the Sri Lanka government armed forces and paramilitaries," Balakumaran said according to pro-rebel Web site TamilNet.
The government has denied targeting civilians, saying its actions were defensive and blamed the Tigers for the surging violence.
In another development, former Tamil Tigers now part of a breakaway group appear to be carrying out attacks and extortion in Sri Lanka's north and probably have army backing, despite denials, international truce monitors say.
The government denies any links to the so-called Karuna group, but the Tigers appear to have retaliated for attacks by ambushing the army. The rebels say Karuna killings must stop before they will come to peace talks.
"I firmly believe that Karuna is going around this area," said Jouni Suninen, head of the district office of the Sri Lanka Monitoring Mission (SLMM) in the northern town of Vavuniya.
"We have eyewitnesses who tell us they have seen Karunas around. I cannot see how they could be operating here without the support of the army," Suninen said.
Former eastern Tiger commander Colonel Karuna Amman split from the mainstream Tamil Tigers in 2004, taking control of much of their eastern territories, but was swiftly pushed out by a Tiger offensive.
His group says they have attacked the rebels in the east, but not the north.
A senior Karuna aide and member of his fledgling political party, the TMVP, said there was no truth to the SLMM reports.
Karuna's powerbase is seen as his home area in eastern Sri Lanka, where the group says it has camps. The government says they are in uncontrolled jungle areas, while the Tigers say they are clearly next to army installations.
(http://www.taipeitimes.com/News/world/archives/2006/05/17/2003308600)
Karuna group has army backing: Lanka monitors
Vavuniya (Sri Lanka), May 16: Former Tamil Tigers now part of a breakaway group appear to be carrying out attacks and extortion in Sri Lanka’s north and probably have army backing, despite denials, international truce monitors say.The government denies any links to the so-called Karuna group, but the Tigers appear to have retaliated for attacks by ambushing the army. The rebels say Karuna killings must stop before they will come to peace talks.
“I firmly believe that Karuna is going around this area,” said Mr Jouni Suninen, head of the district office of the Sri Lanka Monitoring Mission in the northern town of Vavuniya.
“We have eyewitnesses who tell us they have seen Karunas around. I cannot see how they could be operating here without the support of the army.”
The monitors will not give details of individual cases for fear the victims could be tracked down and killed.
Former eastern Tiger commander Col Karuna Amman split from the mainstream Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam rebels in 2004, taking control of much of their eastern territories, but was swiftly pushed out by a Tiger offensive.
His group says they have attacked the rebels in the east, but not the north.
A senior Karuna aide and member of his fledgling political party, the TMVP, said there was no truth to the SLMM reports.
“We don’t have any military activities in that area,” he said, denying the group had any support from the military.
Karuna’s powerbase is seen as his home area in eastern Sri Lanka, where the group says it has camps. The government says they are in uncontrolled jungle areas, while the Tigers say they are clearly next to army installations.
The Vavuniya monitors, who track violations of a 2002 cease-fire despite recent violence, say they are confident they have evidence. They say they believe Karuna’s men are operating from army camps and carrying out attacks behind rebel lines.
“We have eyewitnesses telling us that they are based in army camps,” said Mr Suninen.
The government’s reluctance to stop Karuna attacks is seen as a key reason the Tigers pulled indefinitely out of peace talks last month. Violence has since risen sharply and the SLMM says Sri Lanka is now in a low intensity war with the LTTE.
The monitors say both Karuna and the mainstream Tigers are using threats to extract money from local business leaders — but that Karuna members demand more money and have a greater tendency to kill if they do not get it.
Grenades are thrown at the houses of those who refuse to pay, they say, and then the businessmen are kidnapped and sometimes killed. Officials say 10 businessmen have been killed in the last three months in Vavuniya.
The local district judge says he has used court orders to block what he believes are Karuna bank accounts in the eastern towns of Ampara and Trincomalee used in extortion cases.
Local police say they know extortion is taking place, but that they believe Karuna only operates in the east.
“There are a lot of Tamil groups asking for money,” said senior superintendent, Mr J Abeysririgunawardena. “The businessmen in the community, they know the groups. But they are not coming to us.”
(http://www.navhindtimes.com/stories.php?part=news&Story_ID=051745)
“I firmly believe that Karuna is going around this area,” said Mr Jouni Suninen, head of the district office of the Sri Lanka Monitoring Mission in the northern town of Vavuniya.
“We have eyewitnesses who tell us they have seen Karunas around. I cannot see how they could be operating here without the support of the army.”
The monitors will not give details of individual cases for fear the victims could be tracked down and killed.
Former eastern Tiger commander Col Karuna Amman split from the mainstream Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam rebels in 2004, taking control of much of their eastern territories, but was swiftly pushed out by a Tiger offensive.
His group says they have attacked the rebels in the east, but not the north.
A senior Karuna aide and member of his fledgling political party, the TMVP, said there was no truth to the SLMM reports.
“We don’t have any military activities in that area,” he said, denying the group had any support from the military.
Karuna’s powerbase is seen as his home area in eastern Sri Lanka, where the group says it has camps. The government says they are in uncontrolled jungle areas, while the Tigers say they are clearly next to army installations.
The Vavuniya monitors, who track violations of a 2002 cease-fire despite recent violence, say they are confident they have evidence. They say they believe Karuna’s men are operating from army camps and carrying out attacks behind rebel lines.
“We have eyewitnesses telling us that they are based in army camps,” said Mr Suninen.
The government’s reluctance to stop Karuna attacks is seen as a key reason the Tigers pulled indefinitely out of peace talks last month. Violence has since risen sharply and the SLMM says Sri Lanka is now in a low intensity war with the LTTE.
The monitors say both Karuna and the mainstream Tigers are using threats to extract money from local business leaders — but that Karuna members demand more money and have a greater tendency to kill if they do not get it.
Grenades are thrown at the houses of those who refuse to pay, they say, and then the businessmen are kidnapped and sometimes killed. Officials say 10 businessmen have been killed in the last three months in Vavuniya.
The local district judge says he has used court orders to block what he believes are Karuna bank accounts in the eastern towns of Ampara and Trincomalee used in extortion cases.
Local police say they know extortion is taking place, but that they believe Karuna only operates in the east.
“There are a lot of Tamil groups asking for money,” said senior superintendent, Mr J Abeysririgunawardena. “The businessmen in the community, they know the groups. But they are not coming to us.”
(http://www.navhindtimes.com/stories.php?part=news&Story_ID=051745)
Tigers, civilians see more attacks in north Sri Lanka
MANKULAM, Sri Lanka - Glancing nervously into the jungle as they secure the main road north, Tamil Tiger fighters say they believe they are already at war and that government troops are operating behind their lines.
International truce monitors say a string of attacks in Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) territory -- yet more ceasefire violations as violence on both sides becomes what the monitors term a “low intensity war” -- suggest that the rebels could be right. The army denies the charge.
Most analysts say it was the rebels who began the cycle of violence with a series of attacks on troops, but the Tigers blame the government.
“The government has started an unofficial war with the LTTE and we want to face them,” said Tiger fighter Shankar, one of a group of rebels guarding the A9 highway north through the rebel de facto state. “Our commander has advised us that if the government attacks LTTE cadres, we should retaliate immediately.”
Asked if he wanted peace or war, standing next to the rough corrugated iron camp he shares with around 10 other fighters, he said in Tamil: “We like war”.
The Tigers have fought for two decades for a separate Tamil homeland, evolving from a small group of young men to one of the world’s most feared guerrilla armies, 10,000-20,000 strong with powerful naval and Black Tiger suicide bomber wings.
United Nations agency UNICEF says some are abducted as children against the wishes of their parents, but most fighters say they are volunteers. They say they will bite into cyanide capsules dangling around their necks rather than surrender.
Since a 2002 ceasefire, Sri Lanka’s two-decade civil war has been halted. But since early April more than 270 people have died as naval battles, ambushes, murders and air strikes have led to many concluding that the island is once again at war.
Shankar says he believes Sri Lankan troops from wartime Deep Penetration Units are again operating behind rebel territory, launching hit-and-run attacks on fighters and civilians living in the one-seventh of the island under Tiger control.
Behind rebel lines
The Nordic-staffed Sri Lanka Monitoring Mission (SLMM) office in the northern town of Vavuniya says it has recorded at least seven attacks in rebel areas, including several on civilians. They believe military patrols are working alongside anti-Tiger Tamil armed groups.
“We believe that the Sri Lankan army and Tamil armed groups are operating behind LTTE lines,” said truce monitor Bernt Gulbrandesen. “There are so many incidents it has to be an organised thing.”
The Tigers say the first attack on them in rebel territory was a claymore fragmentation mine ambush on a rebel political wing leader in January, during a spike in violence that preceded a first round of peace talks in Switzerland.
That followed a string of claymore attacks on the military that were widely blamed on the rebels.
As the number of incidents soars, many civilians say they fear army attacks. But more than that, they fear aerial bombing.
The first official government strikes on the Tigers came in April after a suicide attack on an army headquarters in Colombo. The government hit the rebel heartland near their northern headquarters of Kilinochchi last week for the first time.
The Tigers say no one was hurt, but their persistent refusal to grant truce monitors access has raised suspicions that their fledgling air force headquarters might have been hit.
In Kilinochchi town itself, where many buildings were flattened by bombs and shells during the war, life is getting back to normal. But few civilians share fighter Shankar’s enthusiasm for more conflict.
“I think war has come,” said 67-year-old Subramaniyam Palaniamma, selling baskets in the marketplace. “We believe the bombs will come back. All of us are living in fear.”
(http://www.khaleejtimes.com/DisplayArticleNew.asp?xfile=data/subcontinent/2006/May/subcontinent_May529.xml§ion=subcontinent)
International truce monitors say a string of attacks in Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) territory -- yet more ceasefire violations as violence on both sides becomes what the monitors term a “low intensity war” -- suggest that the rebels could be right. The army denies the charge.
Most analysts say it was the rebels who began the cycle of violence with a series of attacks on troops, but the Tigers blame the government.
“The government has started an unofficial war with the LTTE and we want to face them,” said Tiger fighter Shankar, one of a group of rebels guarding the A9 highway north through the rebel de facto state. “Our commander has advised us that if the government attacks LTTE cadres, we should retaliate immediately.”
Asked if he wanted peace or war, standing next to the rough corrugated iron camp he shares with around 10 other fighters, he said in Tamil: “We like war”.
The Tigers have fought for two decades for a separate Tamil homeland, evolving from a small group of young men to one of the world’s most feared guerrilla armies, 10,000-20,000 strong with powerful naval and Black Tiger suicide bomber wings.
United Nations agency UNICEF says some are abducted as children against the wishes of their parents, but most fighters say they are volunteers. They say they will bite into cyanide capsules dangling around their necks rather than surrender.
Since a 2002 ceasefire, Sri Lanka’s two-decade civil war has been halted. But since early April more than 270 people have died as naval battles, ambushes, murders and air strikes have led to many concluding that the island is once again at war.
Shankar says he believes Sri Lankan troops from wartime Deep Penetration Units are again operating behind rebel territory, launching hit-and-run attacks on fighters and civilians living in the one-seventh of the island under Tiger control.
Behind rebel lines
The Nordic-staffed Sri Lanka Monitoring Mission (SLMM) office in the northern town of Vavuniya says it has recorded at least seven attacks in rebel areas, including several on civilians. They believe military patrols are working alongside anti-Tiger Tamil armed groups.
“We believe that the Sri Lankan army and Tamil armed groups are operating behind LTTE lines,” said truce monitor Bernt Gulbrandesen. “There are so many incidents it has to be an organised thing.”
The Tigers say the first attack on them in rebel territory was a claymore fragmentation mine ambush on a rebel political wing leader in January, during a spike in violence that preceded a first round of peace talks in Switzerland.
That followed a string of claymore attacks on the military that were widely blamed on the rebels.
As the number of incidents soars, many civilians say they fear army attacks. But more than that, they fear aerial bombing.
The first official government strikes on the Tigers came in April after a suicide attack on an army headquarters in Colombo. The government hit the rebel heartland near their northern headquarters of Kilinochchi last week for the first time.
The Tigers say no one was hurt, but their persistent refusal to grant truce monitors access has raised suspicions that their fledgling air force headquarters might have been hit.
In Kilinochchi town itself, where many buildings were flattened by bombs and shells during the war, life is getting back to normal. But few civilians share fighter Shankar’s enthusiasm for more conflict.
“I think war has come,” said 67-year-old Subramaniyam Palaniamma, selling baskets in the marketplace. “We believe the bombs will come back. All of us are living in fear.”
(http://www.khaleejtimes.com/DisplayArticleNew.asp?xfile=data/subcontinent/2006/May/subcontinent_May529.xml§ion=subcontinent)
One LTTE cadre killed, 2 LTTE, 4 SLA troopers wounded
A Liberation Tigers woman cadre, Yalisai, was killed when Sri Lanka Army (SLA) soldiers who moved beyond the no-man zone at Palamodai, north of Vavuniya, attacked an LTTE Forward Defence Line (FDL) around 2:30 p.m. Tuesday. Later, two LTTE cadres were wounded in Jaffna district when SLA soldiers attacked the FDL of the Tigers at Kandalkadu, located near Eluthumadduval between Nagarkovil and Muhamalai in Jaffna district, around 5:45 p.m., according to LTTE sources in Kilinochchi. Direct clash between the SLA troops and the Tigers erupted after the incident. Four SLA soldiers were wounded, according to SLA sources in Jaffna.
The Liberation Tigers have lodged a complaint on the incident with the Sri Lanka Monitoring Mission (SLMM), LTTE sources in Kilinochchi said.
The wounded SLA soldiers were rushed to Palaly military hospital.
(http://www.tamilnet.com/art.html?catid=13&artid=18160)
The Liberation Tigers have lodged a complaint on the incident with the Sri Lanka Monitoring Mission (SLMM), LTTE sources in Kilinochchi said.
The wounded SLA soldiers were rushed to Palaly military hospital.
(http://www.tamilnet.com/art.html?catid=13&artid=18160)
Claymore blast kills STF elite trooper in Thirukovil
A Special Task Force (STF) elite trooper was killed when a claymore mine exploded around 8.30 a.m., Wednesday. The blast targettet STF foot patrol along the Main Street in Thirukovil, Kalmunai Police sources said.
(http://www.tamilnet.com/art.html?catid=13&artid=18168)
The STF personnel, Mr.Dharmaretna was seriously injured in the blast and succumbed to injuries while he was being taken to the Amparai general hospital, the sources said.
Sri Lankan Government troops immediately cordoned off the area and conducted a search operation, police sources said.
It is not known if any arrests were made.(http://www.tamilnet.com/art.html?catid=13&artid=18168)
On a bloody front, S.Lanka troops want to hit back by Peter Apps
ALPHA COMPANY STRONG POINT, Sri Lanka, May 14 (Reuters) - Standing by the bloody dust where he says two of his men were shot dead by Tamil Tiger rebels, Sri Lankan Army Lieutenant-Colonel Kumar Wijenayake knows what he wants to do.
He wants to send out his soldiers from their positions some 200 metres (yards) from Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) territory to flush out rebel fighters he believes crept across no-man's land to kill his men.
Nordic truce monitors say Sri Lanka and the Tigers have already resumed a low intensity war, but the government says it is limiting itself to tactical retaliation and under the terms of a 2002 truce that still holds on paper at least, Wijenayake must hold back.
"I am a military man, not a politician," he says, wearing a sweat and dust-stained khaki t-shirt and with a pistol stuck in the belt of his combat trousers. "I think we should take more aggressive action. The enemy is attacking us, we should attack back."
Diplomats say a lack of compromises on both sides led to the island's peace process stalling. More than 270 people have been killed since early April and talks have been postponed indefinitely. The recent violence looks a lot like periods of the island's two-decade civil war.
On Saturday, violence came to Wijenayake's battalion for the first time with a hit-and-run attack around the front line they hold just north of the town of Vavuniya.
The position is near an ethnic Tamil village abandoned during the war. The majority Sinhalese soldiers do not remember its name. They only know it as the strong point held by Alpha Company, 10th Battalion, Sri Lankan Light Infantry (SLLI).
The troops say three or four rebel fighters crept up on the position in the late morning, picking their way through old wartime minefields. They lay in the brush, watching one of the most exposed sections of the front.
Eventually, two SLLI soldiers on patrol came into view. The suspected rebels fired bursts with AK47 assault rifles. The troops fired back, but the attackers escaped.
YEARNING TO RETALIATE
A bullet through the head killed one soldier instantly. His colleague died later from wounds to the chest and head. Reuters saw the bodies in the hospital morgue, still in tattered fatigues with blood drying on the tiled floor beneath the slabs.
The Tigers deny being behind most recent attacks on the military, but few believe them. The rebels say it is the government that has pushed the country to the fringes of war.
Firing across the front line has become increasingly common, as have increasingly serious naval clashes and government air strikes on rebel territory. Each side blames the other, and both say the ceasefire still holds.
For Lieutenant-Colonel Wijenayake, it is not that clear.
"Morale is OK," he told Reuters, strain clearly visible on the faces of his men as they nervously scanned the jungle. "But because of the ceasefire agreement, we cannot dominate the area. We cannot act in an offensive manner as we were trained."
The monitors say there is no doubt the rebels are hitting the military, but they also believe members of the armed forces are retaliating by killing Tamil civilians. The military denies the charge.
Kanagaratnam Pushparani's niece was shot dead within 60 metres of an army position on another area of the front line near Vavuniya. The girl's sister was a Tiger fighter, and truce monitors say signs of army involvement in the killing are too strong to ignore.
"I strongly believe the army was involved in this killing," she told Reuters in Tamil. "This girl was innocent. She did nothing. The immediate family has gone to the LTTE area. They were so afraid."
(http://www.alertnet.org/thenews/newsdesk/COL282514.htm)
He wants to send out his soldiers from their positions some 200 metres (yards) from Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) territory to flush out rebel fighters he believes crept across no-man's land to kill his men.
Nordic truce monitors say Sri Lanka and the Tigers have already resumed a low intensity war, but the government says it is limiting itself to tactical retaliation and under the terms of a 2002 truce that still holds on paper at least, Wijenayake must hold back.
"I am a military man, not a politician," he says, wearing a sweat and dust-stained khaki t-shirt and with a pistol stuck in the belt of his combat trousers. "I think we should take more aggressive action. The enemy is attacking us, we should attack back."
Diplomats say a lack of compromises on both sides led to the island's peace process stalling. More than 270 people have been killed since early April and talks have been postponed indefinitely. The recent violence looks a lot like periods of the island's two-decade civil war.
On Saturday, violence came to Wijenayake's battalion for the first time with a hit-and-run attack around the front line they hold just north of the town of Vavuniya.
The position is near an ethnic Tamil village abandoned during the war. The majority Sinhalese soldiers do not remember its name. They only know it as the strong point held by Alpha Company, 10th Battalion, Sri Lankan Light Infantry (SLLI).
The troops say three or four rebel fighters crept up on the position in the late morning, picking their way through old wartime minefields. They lay in the brush, watching one of the most exposed sections of the front.
Eventually, two SLLI soldiers on patrol came into view. The suspected rebels fired bursts with AK47 assault rifles. The troops fired back, but the attackers escaped.
YEARNING TO RETALIATE
A bullet through the head killed one soldier instantly. His colleague died later from wounds to the chest and head. Reuters saw the bodies in the hospital morgue, still in tattered fatigues with blood drying on the tiled floor beneath the slabs.
The Tigers deny being behind most recent attacks on the military, but few believe them. The rebels say it is the government that has pushed the country to the fringes of war.
Firing across the front line has become increasingly common, as have increasingly serious naval clashes and government air strikes on rebel territory. Each side blames the other, and both say the ceasefire still holds.
For Lieutenant-Colonel Wijenayake, it is not that clear.
"Morale is OK," he told Reuters, strain clearly visible on the faces of his men as they nervously scanned the jungle. "But because of the ceasefire agreement, we cannot dominate the area. We cannot act in an offensive manner as we were trained."
The monitors say there is no doubt the rebels are hitting the military, but they also believe members of the armed forces are retaliating by killing Tamil civilians. The military denies the charge.
Kanagaratnam Pushparani's niece was shot dead within 60 metres of an army position on another area of the front line near Vavuniya. The girl's sister was a Tiger fighter, and truce monitors say signs of army involvement in the killing are too strong to ignore.
"I strongly believe the army was involved in this killing," she told Reuters in Tamil. "This girl was innocent. She did nothing. The immediate family has gone to the LTTE area. They were so afraid."
(http://www.alertnet.org/thenews/newsdesk/COL282514.htm)
Wednesday, May 10, 2006
LTTE Tax Collectors at Chunnakam Market Nabbed
adres belonging to the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam, who functioned as Tax Collectors at the Chunnakam Market, one of the biggest vegetable markets in the Jaffna peninsula, was arrested by the Sri Lanka Army and Police.
The security forces assisted by policeman arrested 6 men, suspected to be the members of the LTTE from the Chunnakam market in Jaffna on Tuesday (09) while they were collecting extortions from vendors inside the market, Sri Lanka Army website revealed.
A search conducted afterwards by the Security Forces was able to detect a receipt book and a collection of Rs 15,000 in cash.
The Security Forces handed them over to the Manipay Police station for further investigations.
(http://www.asiantribune.com/index.php?q=node/31)
Is Cyber trekking of the LTTE at optimum? by Thanuka
According to a scholar on terrorism, most of the planning and coordination of 9/11 attack was conducted through internet and the FBI Director Ronald Dick was quoted as saying “The hijackers had used internet and used it well”.
It was way back in 1997 the LTTE hacked into Sheffield University computer system to send their propaganda for fund raising. This was done so covertly with the legitimate user IDs and passwords of some academics of the university.
One year later, the LTTE swamped a specific number of Sri Lankan missions abroad with nearly 1000 e-mails a day over a period of two-weeks.
LTTE in fact admitted the offence stating in the Email that " Internet Black Tigers are doing this to disrupt communications."
Wikipedia defines Cyber-terrorism as use of computers and information technology, particularly the Internet, to cause harm or severe disruption to others with the aim of advancing attacker's own political or religious goals. This implies that individuals or groups can use the anonymity afforded by cyberspace to threaten citizens, specific groups, communities and entire countries.
This definition does not seem to cover the subject area adequately. A better definition is offered by the Federal Bureau of Investigation. They specify that “cyber terrorism is the premeditated, politically motivated attack against information, computer systems, computer programs, and data which result in violence against non combatant targets by sub national groups or clandestine agents.”
Literature also suggests that ‘terrorists may be classified as cyber terrorists whether they solely rely on cyber terrorism to further their cause, or whether they use cyber terrorism in addition to other more conventional forms of terrorism’. That completes both definitions as Cyber terrorism has become a real threat because of a) its own sophistication and dynamics, b) dependence of financial institutions, production facilities, and government functions on computer technology and c) the vulnerability of economies that are increasingly dependent on electronic transactions.
Some argue that the term cyber terrorism simply does not exist because the worst that can happen on the computer is information warfare and hacking which could be classified as a crime and not terrorism. The terrorism label is said to be inappropriately heavy due to its improbability of creating fear of real physical harm or death among people using electronic means.
The need arose to define cyber terrorism with hate websites and hate emails, intrusion into sensitive computer networks gaining momentum. In order to deal with this global phenomenon of the abuse of computers and the Internet, an international convention, backed by national legislations, was needed.
In a case where in 1996, a computer hacker allegedly associated with the White Supremacist movement successfully disabled a US based Internet Service Provider and temporarily damaged part of its record keeping system. This was not identified as cyber terrorism as the intention of the attacker was not to further any political, social, religious, ideological goal.
In 1998, Institute for Global Communications (IGC) was bombarded with thousands of bogus e-mail messages sent by protestors against IGC’s hosting of the web-site for the Euskal Herria Journal supporting Basque independence. IGC had to give in and pull the site. This was considered an act of terrorism as the normal activities of the ISP in cyber space had been disrupted by using a pre planned methodology and the intention of the attackers was to further a political objective.
‘Cyber Terrorism and Information Warfare’ authored by Michael Vatis sheds light to cyber terrorism from Governments’ perspective. One is to use the system for disseminating propaganda. LTTE is one organisation that uses the information and cyber technology for dissemination of propaganda. Vatis says the Internet is used for fund raising. Once again the LTTE is leading in that. Internet transactions are found to be much easier for some members of Diaspora to contribute.
Intelligence gathering is another use in cyber technology. To what extent the LTTE is using cyber technology for intelligence gathering, such as hacking individual electronic mail and entering classified data bases etc, is not ascertained, not because it is not important, it is because there are no avenues to tap such information. Hacking has become technically possible and all that the hacker has to do is to download onto computers automated hacking scripts. And one needs is to put in a target, click on a button, and launch the automated script against your intended target or list of targets.
Vatis says ‘terrorists can communicate with their co-conspirators around the world’. Indeed so and the cost would be minimal. Communication is effective. The communication is well secured ‘outside the eyes and ears of government, law enforcement, or security agencies’. LTTE is one group that has exploited this global facility to its utmost.
But how big is the LTTE cyber threat?. This is not assessed. What is known is that LTTE has used cyber attacks on Sri Lankan government sites and also to hack into web sites to alter and send political propaganda. Some people refer to that as the first known instance of cyber-terrorism. But the facts are still far from knowledge as to how much they are using the cyber space for their own development.
The study ‘ E-fying terrorism’ carried out by Ranga Kalansooriya in 2004 was aimed at identifying the electronic face of terrorist and politically violent groups and to evaluate the campaign strategies that they have adopted through their e-outlets.
Kalansooriya described in his study how rebels who were fighting in the jungles or deserts, brought battle into the cyber world. He elaborated that ‘technology has always been a tool of advantage for terrorism since its inception, and the internet – Information Technology (IT) in particular – added new dimension to their strategies, tactics and operations’.
He identified that organizations such as Zapatista of Mexico and LTTE of Sri Lanka as local rebel groups with international reach and they have a significant presence on Internet with the aims of propaganda and fund raising. LTTE in particular, expanded its campaign into the World Wide Web during the very inception of the IT boom. LTTE naturally caters to international audiences including the ethnic Diaspora community.
Kalansooriya’s study brings out the point that contents of rebel websites will never admit that they are engaged in ‘terrorism’ or violence against unarmed civilians. Instead the propaganda will justify as it is the only available option to ‘liberate their peoples from the oppression. ‘ E-fying terrorism’ study when completed in 2004, had predicted that LTTE will be in full force on the web with dozes of websites, supported by other sympathetic and individual web pages catering to the Diaspora and their home countries.
The Sri Lankan Government eventually realised the extent of cyber threat of the LTTE, but any possible counter strategy and methodologies had fallen way short of requirement. LTTE activities have always been driven by commitment while the Government has no such aptitude.
Prof Jeganathan of the University of Chicago, referring to the Tamil Diaspora and Eelam websites stated that these websites "preserve the form of the nation as territory for the LTTE and those who want to believe in its mission". He said that the Pro LTTE Tamil viewers whether they are in the US or in Australia, the Eelam is real, not as a place but as an image although they have no intention of returning to Sri Lanka.
That is the key appoint and the strength that LTTE will carry for the next few decades with or without Prabhakaran. Pro LTTE Tamils argued that propaganda cannot be considered cyber terrorism as politically, each group has a right to express its appeals whoever they are targeting their propaganda at. Such propaganda will invariably have a provision for fund raising.
The anti LTTE factions are trying hard to express the way LTTE is using cyber space and recently accused Pottu Amman for launching sites including www.nitharsanam.com to put out threats, intimidations, hate e-mails, spam, and viruses. They also complain that LTTE operatives exert pressure on the web hosting companies in Europe and North America with the threat that court action will be taken if anti-LTTE stories are not removed.
It is reported that LTTE’s websites nitharsanam, neruppu etc are registered with go-daddy. This company has responded to the complaints stating that they are not expected to judge the alleged illegal activities. This could be true as there is only a thin line between propaganda and disinformation which the legislators can hardly fathom out.
LTTE is using the cyber system for networking among their fronts and cover organisations. The efficiency and cost saving on cyber networking has been immense. Procurement by the KP department has been heavily dependent upon cyber communication that always operate beyond detection.
Nonetheless the LTTE will continue to believe in bullets than bytes. For LTTE the cyber communication has been complementary to their primary activities. It is unlikely therefore that LTTE will resort to high scale acts that can be theoretically identifid as cyber-terrorism as they have attempted in the past.
(http://www.dailymirror.lk/2006/05/11/opinion/01.asp)
Sampur, Ralkudi LTTE camp attacked, 30 killed
An attack on LTTE's Ralkudi camp in Sampur by members of the renegade Karuna faction has left 30 LTTE cadres killed, unconfirmed reports said.
On the night of April 25th, in the aftermath of the suicide attack on the Army Commander, security forces carried out an attack on the Sampur camp.
Trincomalee residents said they heard the sounds of gunfire and explosions last night.
Military spokesman Brigadier Prasad Samarasinghe said he cannot comment on the incident as the area in question is outside government held territory.
Meanwhile forces have recovered a claymore mine weighing 8 kilograms from Nelliadi, Jaffna. Two suspicious looking men had defied security force orders to stop and fled and the mine had been found when the security forces searched the area.
In another incident in Mannar, a claymore mine was exploded targeting troops returning after duty, but no one was injured as the mine was detonated prematurely.
(http://www.lankaenews.com/English/news.php?id=2322)
On the night of April 25th, in the aftermath of the suicide attack on the Army Commander, security forces carried out an attack on the Sampur camp.
Trincomalee residents said they heard the sounds of gunfire and explosions last night.
Military spokesman Brigadier Prasad Samarasinghe said he cannot comment on the incident as the area in question is outside government held territory.
Meanwhile forces have recovered a claymore mine weighing 8 kilograms from Nelliadi, Jaffna. Two suspicious looking men had defied security force orders to stop and fled and the mine had been found when the security forces searched the area.
In another incident in Mannar, a claymore mine was exploded targeting troops returning after duty, but no one was injured as the mine was detonated prematurely.
(http://www.lankaenews.com/English/news.php?id=2322)
What would happen if LTTE went to a coalition with Karuna? by Lanka Left
Our studies on paramilitary Karuna Group in the Eastern Province has made us to come to a conclusion that the paramilitaries are trying to establish a small territory of their control in Welikanda area utilizing the advantageous conditions from the Sri Lanka military forces.
Very reliable sources from Eastern Province reveal that the paramilitary Karuma
Group has a camp in government controlled Bowatta village in Welikanda.
Around 60 persons are staying in this safe house. Most of the armed persons who are with Karuna Group are underage boys. There are a few former LTTE cadres who defected from the mainstream group around a year ago but the majority of the cadres are new recruits. The group is provided with enough money and other resources such as motor vehicles. They obtain supplies from Welikanda town and the residents, the security forces and the Police in the area know their presence.
There are a few Sinhala youths also with the paramilitary. They participate in the operations conducted by the Karuna Group and are said well paid. The paramilitaries have been nosy about in the civil life of the village and they have proscribed moonshine selling, drinking and quarrelling, say the villagers. At the moment they seem not engaged in political activities but maintain as a paid competent paramilitary group.
Karuna Group operates in Wadumunai, Karapola, Muthugala and Thiruchenai Tamil
villages in the areas controlled by the Liberation Tigers. Our sources reveal that Karuna Group is gaining support from the Tamil villagers of these areas who are in fear of them. It is reported that the LTTE is losing their grip in these areas as a result of it.
LTTE recently attacked several paramilitary camps in Welikanda area. Sri Lanka
government claimed that the area where the camps were situated was in the LTTE
territory. LTTE said the vice versa. Karuna Group spokesman first said that the
camps were located in the border of Batticalao; about 2 kilometers from the LTTE controlled Kaddumurippu, but later said that the area is not governed by both of the parties.
Karuna Group's move to establish an independent territory of control is well
supported by the short sighted Sinhala chauvinist hardliners. Monk Party National Heritage (JHU) recently demanded the Karuna Group's territories be demarcated and it should be engaged in the peace process.
Our observations on Karuna Group make us to take the matter more seriously. Karuna who was the Second-in-Command of the LTTE has not completely lost his ground in Eastern Province yet. LTTE's sudden allegations against him over corruption did not materialise well. The battle hardened rebel will not give away his ambitions easily.
He will seek a position for himself in Tamil politics in future. Although he lost badly in the first round of his sudden defect he continued to fight. That is why he could stay in the game. He is utilizing all the favourable opportunities to establish himself. Karuna Group has opened a political office in a high security area and once they publicly participated in a meeting of anti-LTTE political groups held at a government office in Colombo representing Karuna's political party.
But the support of the Sinhala camp has both good and bad effects for Karuna. Groups like EPDP, EPRLF and PLOTE were trapped in the support of the government military and were reduced to mere paramilitaries. But Karuna seems to try to avoid such pitfalls. That is why he is trying to work on his own agenda creating his own territories. He is trying to maintain some independence. He has been so cunning to utilize ultra Sinhala chauvinist JHU to raise the issue of demarcating territories for Karuna Group and taking him involved in the peace process. It seems an early expression of his plans. Yet he has to go further to achieve this position.
But it is extremely difficult to be an independent Tamil armed movement because all the anti LTTE forces supporting Karuna Group do not want him to be so. They need just a formidable paramilitary and none other than that. EPDP and PLOTE also tried this but could not succeed and finally reduced to paramilitary outfits. Government security forces let them go only to the length they want. Karuna, if understands this situation will try to evade the traps and sneak out through the contradictions his support camp.
Karuna was a hardcore Tamil nationalist and his earlier acts against Sinhalese and Muslims depicted a kind of Tamil racism. He could have not been changed much in that sense after his defection. On the other hand if he needs to be a de facto leader in the Tamil society, a position he held earlier, he has to base among Tamils. Ties with Sinhala chauvinist camp alienates him from the base he targets.
At the moment Karuna Group does not levy taxes and maintains good relations with the people in Welikanda area where they have chosen to base. This strategic strip of land between Trincomalee and Batticaloa is crucial for the LTTE and therefore Army has allowed them to position there. Security forces think that they can control the paramilitaries who are struck in the edge of their territory. Karuna who understands the plans of the security forces is trying to move further in to the Tiger territory as they can be more independent there.
Karuna Group will gain immensely in a war situation. Their military experience will put themselves far ahead of the government forces in the eastern terrains. The government security forces will have to depend heavily on them and will have to pay for that. LTTE will directly target Karuna Group in a full scale war context and therefore Karuna will also have to depend on the government military machine. However the possibility of protraction of war is high. Such a situation will be disadvantageous for both the Sri Lanka government and the LTTE, but not to the Karuna group.
Sinhala camp is playing with fire. They will win the gambling if they will be able to maintain the Karuna Group reduced to a mere paramilitary. But if Karuna could succeed in investing politically in the complex contradictions among the Sinhala camp he will be able to develop as a formidable independent armed group. In such a context he will even be able to bargain with the LTTE. What would happen if LTTE offered him a formal or informal amnesty or went to a coalition with him? There are experiences from the history of Tamil struggle that when such amnesties are offered by the LTTE directly or indirectly Tamil leaders have warmly welcomed them. You can find enough of anti LTTE Tamils, but it is difficult to make them Sinhala chauvinist to accept the Sinhala unitary state.
Narrow minds who are running the politics of Sri Lanka are putting this beautiful country into trouble from trouble. Those who gain from this kind of narrow politics are the rogues who are in European suits, national suits, red shirts and even in yellow robes.
(http://www.lankaenews.com/English/news.php?id=2321)
Very reliable sources from Eastern Province reveal that the paramilitary Karuma
Group has a camp in government controlled Bowatta village in Welikanda.
Around 60 persons are staying in this safe house. Most of the armed persons who are with Karuna Group are underage boys. There are a few former LTTE cadres who defected from the mainstream group around a year ago but the majority of the cadres are new recruits. The group is provided with enough money and other resources such as motor vehicles. They obtain supplies from Welikanda town and the residents, the security forces and the Police in the area know their presence.
There are a few Sinhala youths also with the paramilitary. They participate in the operations conducted by the Karuna Group and are said well paid. The paramilitaries have been nosy about in the civil life of the village and they have proscribed moonshine selling, drinking and quarrelling, say the villagers. At the moment they seem not engaged in political activities but maintain as a paid competent paramilitary group.
Karuna Group operates in Wadumunai, Karapola, Muthugala and Thiruchenai Tamil
villages in the areas controlled by the Liberation Tigers. Our sources reveal that Karuna Group is gaining support from the Tamil villagers of these areas who are in fear of them. It is reported that the LTTE is losing their grip in these areas as a result of it.
LTTE recently attacked several paramilitary camps in Welikanda area. Sri Lanka
government claimed that the area where the camps were situated was in the LTTE
territory. LTTE said the vice versa. Karuna Group spokesman first said that the
camps were located in the border of Batticalao; about 2 kilometers from the LTTE controlled Kaddumurippu, but later said that the area is not governed by both of the parties.
Karuna Group's move to establish an independent territory of control is well
supported by the short sighted Sinhala chauvinist hardliners. Monk Party National Heritage (JHU) recently demanded the Karuna Group's territories be demarcated and it should be engaged in the peace process.
Our observations on Karuna Group make us to take the matter more seriously. Karuna who was the Second-in-Command of the LTTE has not completely lost his ground in Eastern Province yet. LTTE's sudden allegations against him over corruption did not materialise well. The battle hardened rebel will not give away his ambitions easily.
He will seek a position for himself in Tamil politics in future. Although he lost badly in the first round of his sudden defect he continued to fight. That is why he could stay in the game. He is utilizing all the favourable opportunities to establish himself. Karuna Group has opened a political office in a high security area and once they publicly participated in a meeting of anti-LTTE political groups held at a government office in Colombo representing Karuna's political party.
But the support of the Sinhala camp has both good and bad effects for Karuna. Groups like EPDP, EPRLF and PLOTE were trapped in the support of the government military and were reduced to mere paramilitaries. But Karuna seems to try to avoid such pitfalls. That is why he is trying to work on his own agenda creating his own territories. He is trying to maintain some independence. He has been so cunning to utilize ultra Sinhala chauvinist JHU to raise the issue of demarcating territories for Karuna Group and taking him involved in the peace process. It seems an early expression of his plans. Yet he has to go further to achieve this position.
But it is extremely difficult to be an independent Tamil armed movement because all the anti LTTE forces supporting Karuna Group do not want him to be so. They need just a formidable paramilitary and none other than that. EPDP and PLOTE also tried this but could not succeed and finally reduced to paramilitary outfits. Government security forces let them go only to the length they want. Karuna, if understands this situation will try to evade the traps and sneak out through the contradictions his support camp.
Karuna was a hardcore Tamil nationalist and his earlier acts against Sinhalese and Muslims depicted a kind of Tamil racism. He could have not been changed much in that sense after his defection. On the other hand if he needs to be a de facto leader in the Tamil society, a position he held earlier, he has to base among Tamils. Ties with Sinhala chauvinist camp alienates him from the base he targets.
At the moment Karuna Group does not levy taxes and maintains good relations with the people in Welikanda area where they have chosen to base. This strategic strip of land between Trincomalee and Batticaloa is crucial for the LTTE and therefore Army has allowed them to position there. Security forces think that they can control the paramilitaries who are struck in the edge of their territory. Karuna who understands the plans of the security forces is trying to move further in to the Tiger territory as they can be more independent there.
Karuna Group will gain immensely in a war situation. Their military experience will put themselves far ahead of the government forces in the eastern terrains. The government security forces will have to depend heavily on them and will have to pay for that. LTTE will directly target Karuna Group in a full scale war context and therefore Karuna will also have to depend on the government military machine. However the possibility of protraction of war is high. Such a situation will be disadvantageous for both the Sri Lanka government and the LTTE, but not to the Karuna group.
Sinhala camp is playing with fire. They will win the gambling if they will be able to maintain the Karuna Group reduced to a mere paramilitary. But if Karuna could succeed in investing politically in the complex contradictions among the Sinhala camp he will be able to develop as a formidable independent armed group. In such a context he will even be able to bargain with the LTTE. What would happen if LTTE offered him a formal or informal amnesty or went to a coalition with him? There are experiences from the history of Tamil struggle that when such amnesties are offered by the LTTE directly or indirectly Tamil leaders have warmly welcomed them. You can find enough of anti LTTE Tamils, but it is difficult to make them Sinhala chauvinist to accept the Sinhala unitary state.
Narrow minds who are running the politics of Sri Lanka are putting this beautiful country into trouble from trouble. Those who gain from this kind of narrow politics are the rogues who are in European suits, national suits, red shirts and even in yellow robes.
(http://www.lankaenews.com/English/news.php?id=2321)
Karuna challenges LTTE, Sri Lanka government and international community
"Nobody envisaged us splitting from the LTTE, so the CFA does not cover us." May 08, Colombo: Sources from the Welikanda area, 250 km east of Colombo, say the Karuna Group is maintaining a chain of camps in the Sinhala and Tamil border villages. There are suspicions that the breakaway faction of the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) is trying to establish an area of their own control in the region. The LTTE recently attacked three paramilitary camps in the Welikanda area and assassinated several cadres. The Sri Lanka government claimed that the area where the camps were situated was in LTTE territory, rejecting LTTE claims that the area is in the territory controlled by the Sri Lanka government. A Karuna Group spokesperson first said that the camps were located on the border of Batticaloa, about 2 km from LTTE-controlled Kaddumurippu, but later said the area was not governed by either party. Meanwhile Karuna spokesperson Thooyavan, speaking to the Daily Mirror by telephone from an undisclosed location, also dismissed allegations that the group was operating with the assistance of the government security forces, claiming that 17 of its cadres are in Anuradhapura prison for carrying arms in government-controlled areas. “We were not given arms by the government. If the government gave us arms, then they can disarm us. The government has disarmed the groups it provided arms to. We are not a part of those groups. Our group is a splinter organisation of the LTTE. Nobody envisaged us splitting from the LTTE, so the CFA does not cover us. We will disarm only when our leader Karuna Amman tells us to do so. The government, Norway, the SLMM or the LTTE cannot disarm us,” Thooyavan said. The splinter group led by the former leader of the LTTE Eastern Command, Karuna Amman, does not favor being called the ‘Karuna Faction’ and wants to appear as a political party named Thamil Eela Makkal Viduthalai Pulikal (TMVP). (http://www.colombopage.com/archive/May8125756SL.html)
Sunday, May 07, 2006
Mannar villagers seek safety from SLA deep penetration unit
Fear of armed members of Deep Penetration Unit (DPU) of the Sri Lanka Army (SLA) are forcing residents of Silavthurai, Arippu and Mullikulam in the Mannar district to leave their houses by dusk and return after dawn, civil society sources in Mannar said. Residents are alarmed at the grenade attack on a house at Savariarpuram in Silavthurai on Tuesday night by a group of armed persons believed to be belonging to the DPU, sources in Mannar said.
(http://www.tamilnet.com/art.html?catid=13&artid=18043)
Mannar residents say that they have witnessed movement of strangers armed with weapons and fear that members of the DPU are on the prowl during nights in their villages in the Liberation Tigers held area in the Mannar district, civil sources said.
Mullikulam residents are spending their night at St.Mary's Church, Silavthurai residents in St.Francis Xavier Church and Arippu families in a common ground in the middle of the village, sources said.
Villagers have complained to Mannar Bishop and the Sri Lanka Monitoring Mission (SLMM) in Mannar, sources said.(http://www.tamilnet.com/art.html?catid=13&artid=18043)
Friday, May 05, 2006
LTTE leaders come under bomb attacks By Nirupama Subramanian
COLOMBO, AUG. 15. A series of claymore mine explosions in LTTE- controlled areas targeting senior LTTE leaders has given rise to speculation that either a ``deep-penetration'' unit of the Sri Lanka Army is at work or that feuds within the rebel group are behind the incidents.
The state-run Daily News reported today that a claymore blast had seriously wounded a former bodyguard of the LTTE leader, Mr. Velupillai Prabhakaran.
Quoting intelligence sources, the newspaper identified the cadre as Jeyam, and said he was the ``chief bodyguard'' of Mr. Prabhakaran from 1990 to 1994. The incident took place in Periyamadhu in the LTTE-controlled Vanni ``a few days ago,'' the report said.
This is the sixth such incident in LTTE-controlled territory. The LTTE political wing leader, Mr. S. Tamilchelvam, escaped a similar attack at Kokkavil in May this year while travelling through the Vanni to meet the Norwegian facilitator, Mr. Erik Solheim, but one of the cadres escorting him was killed.
In another claymore attack, this time in Mannar district, the LTTE sea wing deputy leader, Gangai Amaran, was killed along with his wife and child and the driver of the Pajero in which they were travelling.
Within a week of this incident, Balraj, a senior fighting cadre, was targeted at Nedunkerni. Again, it was a claymore blast. He escaped but six cadres in an escort vehicle were killed.
Nizam, a senior cadre in charge of the political wing in Batticaloa and Ampara, was also killed two months ago in Vavunatheevu, which is under LTTE control, in a claymore attack.
Claymore mines are fixed at a height, usually on trees, and triggered by remote control.
The Government is putting out that the attacks are evidence of growing rifts within the LTTE, and that rival groups within it are carrying out mafia-style killings against each other.
One theory which gained ground immediately after the attack on Mr. Tamilchelvam was that it was the work of those in the LTTE against peace talks. The political wing leader is said to be a staunch supporter of talks with the Government.
The LTTE, on its part, is taking the attacks seriously, and perhaps even panicking that a hit-group targeting its leaders is now among its ranks. It said the attack on Mr. Tamilchelvam was the work of a ``deep-penetration unit'' of the army.It believes this unit is working with LTTE renegades who know the area well. According to Tamil sources, leaflets have been distributed to civilians living in LTTE-controlled areas to be vigilant and not to entertain or even speak to strangers. ``Would you betray your own?'' one leaflet asks.
Soon after the Nizam incident, the LTTE ``police'' in Batticaloa declared that they had information that 30 claymore mines had been smuggled into its territory, and carried out several ``arrests.'' According to reports, five of the ``arrested'' were executed summarily in public.
Four of the six routes in Batticaloa to LTTE- controlled areas have been closed down by the LTTE so that it is better able to monitor the daily traffic of traders and others in and out of these areas.
According to unconfirmed reports, the LTTE carried out ``arrests'' in the Vanni too after the killing of Gangai Amaran and the attack on Balraj and two weeks ago.
(http://www.hinduonnet.com/2001/08/16/stories/03160005.htm)
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