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1 of 26 12/16/2008 11:46 AM
The Pirabhakaran Phenomenon Part 46 http://www.sangam.org/PIRABAKARAN/Part46.htm
2 of 26 12/16/2008 11:46 AM
The Pirabhakaran Phenomenon Part 46 http://www.sangam.org/PIRABAKARAN/Part46.htm
3 of 26 12/16/2008 11:46 AM
The Pirabhakaran Phenomenon Part 46 http://www.sangam.org/PIRABAKARAN/Part46.htm
4 of 26 12/16/2008 11:46 AM
The Pirabhakaran Phenomenon Part 46 http://www.sangam.org/PIRABAKARAN/Part46.htm
They state that ‘All told, we traveled some fifty thousand miles in
twelve months to write War Zones. We conducted well over two
hundred and fifty interviews and transcribed more than a hundred
and fifty hours of tape recordings.’
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The Pirabhakaran Phenomenon Part 46 http://www.sangam.org/PIRABAKARAN/Part46.htm
and hidden from the public. So, one can excuse their naiveté on
the un-Buddhist practices of Sri Lankan armed personnel in the
land.
Lena: You see, here we were colonized by the British, and one
thing they gave us was a trust in others. So when independence
came, we trusted in the political parties. We trusted them! We
wanted a political settlement. But they didn’t keep their promises.
Lena: They have gone back on the promises they made to the
Tamil community. They’ve gone back! Because they feel they must
enslave us forever! I got involved because it’s my duty, for my
community and my people. It’s my duty. We elder people saw the
way, and the younger people came. They are liberating us. They
have been a great service to us! We don’t call them terrorists;
they’re freedom fighters. They’re fighting for a cause. I’m an old
man, but I want a new country! Look at this moment. You see the
children on their way to school. They are not safe. There is
shooting at random. In the school, they are not safe. On the way
they are not safe. In the market they are not safe. In the churches
they are not safe! They are martyring our children!
You must have so much sympathy for us. That is the thing that we
want you to know. Go back to your country and tell them how
much we suffer; how much we suffer, how much of the victims are
our children, how much of our future generation are going to be
affected by this situation here. Please, for God’s sake!
(Overwhelmed with emotion, the old man stops talking as he tries
to stifle the tears that have appeared in his eyes.)’
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The Pirabhakaran Phenomenon Part 46 http://www.sangam.org/PIRABAKARAN/Part46.htm
Kumarappa: Our soldiers, every day when they get up, they do
some exercises first of all. Then they have to get out and guard.
Then, every day, they have to do some duty, politically,
economically – you know, some intellect training. Everything, you
know.
Jon Lee Anderson: What are the rules about being a Tiger?
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The Pirabhakaran Phenomenon Part 46 http://www.sangam.org/PIRABAKARAN/Part46.htm
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The Pirabhakaran Phenomenon Part 46 http://www.sangam.org/PIRABAKARAN/Part46.htm
SA: Will the Tigers accept anything less than a separate state?
JLA: What if he doesn’t take the cyanide. Say, he gets caught and
is afraid?
Kumarappa: Yeah, it’s a good death. Our soldiers did that. It’s a
very brave death…I’m not afraid to die, you know?
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JLA: When the STF goes berserk after an attack by you and kills
civilians, does that make you feel partly responsible?
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The Pirabhakaran Phenomenon Part 46 http://www.sangam.org/PIRABAKARAN/Part46.htm
Kumarappa: We knew about her two months ago, but day before
yesterday, we captured her. Now there is an inquiry.
Kumarappa: Yeah.
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JLA: It’s not because the STF leaned on her, are holding her
husband or brother or something like that?
JLA: But it also happens, doesn’t it, that the STF captures Tamil
civilians, holds them, and then maybe goes to the relatives and
says, ‘If you want your son back you must bring us information’.
Doesn’t that happen?
JLA: If you knew it was going to happen, why did you do it?
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Kumarappa: She knows very well the final decision. She knows
we’re going to kill her.
Kumarappa: No.
‘It can be assumed that Athuma was executed within a few days of
the interview. Attempts to intercede on her behalf with Tiger
supporters in Batticaloa were futile. Eleven days later, the STF
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JLA: Come on. The women are falling on the ground and crying.
Silva: How do you know what the truth is? That can be arranged,
can’t it? The women come here also.
Silva: (laughs) I’ve been here in instances when they came here
and said, ‘So-and-so-died.’ But we have no reason to deny it, you
know, if we have shot this boy in action, killed him in action. I
won’t hide anything from you.
JLA: We were told that the three killed yesterday, one was a boy
who was urinating in his garden –
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JLA: - and the other two were crossing the lagoon on a boat.
Silva: (laughs) What can I say? I have perfect proof, but I cannot
show it to you. Perfect proof, that would be accepted in any court
of law anywhere in the world, that they were terrorists. I’m
assuring you of that. Only, I can’t show it to you.
Now everyone says they are innocent, but we know they are
terrorists. We have it from very top authority. The authority I
cannot quote to you, because I would be divulging my source of
information. I can’t do that, because I couldn’t go and get
information again from these sources. (laughs) We have people
who tell us these things. That is because we have perfect rapport
with the large majority of the people here.
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Silva: Look, the terrorists’ very existence is against the law. Their
presence here is obviously for the purpose of dividing Sri Lanka,
which is against the constitution, which is treason, punishable by
death in Sri Lanka.
JLA: How can that be? Literally everyone you’ve picked up has
either been tortured himself or seen someone else undergo it.
There are very specific details on how the torture is carried out.
There is the ‘helicopter training’, the beating, the chili powder –
JLA: Really?
JLA: But surely your forces must feel frustrated here, among a
people whose language they don’t speak, fighting an invisible
enemy –
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JLA: Do you, personally, have any problems with the way the war
is being waged?
SA: Is it true you have a place here in the camp where you burn the
bodies of those killed by your troops?
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SA: But the families are allowed to come and perform last rites?
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The Pirabhakaran Phenomenon Part 46 http://www.sangam.org/PIRABAKARAN/Part46.htm
If they do like this (nods head), the police take us. This way they
caught me. And I was wearing a T-shirt and trousers. So they took
my T-shirt and tied my eyes and they put the handcuff like this and
they put me inside the van and I was lying down. So they took me
to police commando’s camp.
So five days, my eyes were tied. Sixth day, they took me and they
said, ‘Will you tell anything?’ I said I don’t know anything. So
they said, ‘We are going to give you helicopter training’.
Helicopter training means to tie your hands like that (behind
back), and they used to hang you like that…So I was ha-ha-
hanging- like…for nearly five hours. I was in the, uh…while – and
they were ha-ha-hammering also. They were hammering with the
poles and the strong pipe with cement inside.
When I was in the camp, about fifty boys were dying. Sometimes
they hammered, struck on head. Sometimes they used to bury and
sometimes they used to burn. After killing them, they would say
(to the families), ‘We didn’t have him.’ Once we saw two bodies
in the hall, and another one, he escaped and ran, so this one they
shot. And they came in and showed me: ‘If anybody escapes, we
will do like this.’
I know Sinhalese also. I can talk Sinhalese. I used to talk with the
police commandos. They used to come and talk with me, but they
say, ‘We can’t help this. It’s a hard time for you, but we can’t help
you.’ They kept me two months, and my mother went to the MP
for (the town of) Galle in order to pursue my thing. After that, they
moved me to Colombo hospital. They gave me physical therapy. In
hospital, I was in for fifty days. After forty days, little by little I
got my feeling in hands back. Then I came home. For two months
after I didn’t speak anything. I was shocked. I thought I’m going to
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I just don’t think the Sinhalese have it in them. The Tamils are a
more…vigorous people – I guess that’s the right word. You know,
the Sinhalese have this whole Buddhism and karma thing… They
fight a gentleman’s war. They’ve carried over all the worst
characteristics from the old British Army. They’ll go out, fire a
few bullets, and be home in time for tea. They have a…lack of
enthusiasm.
We were out on a patrol and drew fire from some coconut (trees)
near this village. They wouldn’t return fire: ‘Too close to the
village, might hit some civilians!’ I mean, they practically won’t let
you shoot unless you actually see the bloke standing there with the
gun in his hand. All the boys over from South Africa and
Rhodesia, this was a joke to them. They got totally fucked off with
it; most of ‘em packed up and left. Went to Nicaragua.
I just think these boys don’t know how to fight. And don’t want to
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fight. They just want to hold back and wait for a settlement. I tell
you, it’s bloody frustrating. Can’t tell you how many times I’ve
gone to the colonel and cussed out the whole lot of ‘em.’
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down’.
A waiting list exists to join the suicide squads. On the wall of
a deserted hospital a recruiting poster depicts three Black
Tigers, two boys and one girl, about 15. In 1995 they blew up
a Sri Lankan naval vessel, and themselves, in Trincomalee
harbor. The photographs show them just before the mission,
with the explosives strapped to their backs, looking scared
and fiercely angelic.
On the following morning we track down the elusive
Sivagnanam Karikalan, the Tigers’ political officer, at a camp
west of Batticaloa. I ask him why the Tigers will not consider
the president’s proposal to form autonomous districts. ‘We
have entered into this war to achieve a separate state’, he
says, ‘Nothing much will happen through negotiations with
the Sri Lankan government’. But Karikalan denies that Tigers
are responsible for the massacre of Sinhalese villagers: ‘If we
wanted to kill innocent people, it would be easy for us; we
could do it all the time. But we are not terrorists. We are a
liberating force.’ And the recruitment of children?
‘When a young person makes a decision to become a Black
Tiger – to destroy himself – he goes through several training
courses. It is his final act, his only act, and here is where the
dedication of our young people is built. There is no liberation
without sacrifice.’
I am the father of teenagers, and that evening I can do no
more than sit on the hotel roof and absorb the healing beauty
of the sunset over Batticaloa lagoon….” [pp.125-126]
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