The Army also fired shells on Kondayankerni on the same day, during a temple festival, killing S Anjalidevi and seriously wounding eight year-old S Chandrakumar. Police fired and killed nine year-old Mohanaratnam Kohilarani and injured her sister Anurani, 10, at Karuvakerni on 21 August. Thirteen civilians and three policemen were wounded by a Tiger motorcycle bomb three days earlier in the heart of Batticaloa town.
Local people allege that a number of murders remain uninvestigated. R Rasaratnam and his wife Nageswary were shot dead in their house on 7 August. Police say these murders may have been committed by LTTE’s Pistol Group. Three days later, masked men dragged fisherman Innasie Francis from his home at Karuveppankerni and shot him dead on the road. According to local sources, the victim’s nephew is a LTTE member and the military-aligned Razik Group is suspected to be involved. On 11 August, carpenter Liyoni William, 65, was shot dead in Valaichenai.
The Army hunted for Tigers on 14 August at Arayampathy, two miles south of Batticaloa town, and ordered all residents to assemble at the local school for interrogation. On the same day, the Terrorist Investigation Department (TID) arrested five people, including Dr K Subramaniam, near Paddiruppu bridge in Kaluvanchikudi, after a talayatti or masked informer pointed them out.
Fear pervades Trincomalee District also, because of continuing killings. On 4 August, T Soundararasa, 21, was shot dead at Pallikudyiruppu. The bodies of Sampur residents T Sivakumar, S Gunarasa and S Manickarasa were found in Anaikalkulam on 19 August. Relatives say they had been brutally tortured before being killed. A shell fired on a house in Sampur on the same day killed V Nallammah and wounded six others.
Three people from the UNHCR-supervised Allesthottam refugee camp, who went fishing to Salappaiyaru in northern Trincomalee were shot and injured. These refugees had earlier fled to India, and had been living in Allesthottam since their return to the island.
Ship services to Jaffna were disrupted after the Princess Kash incident near Mullaitivu on 14 August. Trincomalee regional secretary V Velum Mayilum says the ship Lanka Muditha left for Jaffna on 2 September with 1,047 people including 607 refugees. On the same day, 953 refugees from Vavuniya and another 288 from Mannar arrived in Trincomalee to travel to Jaffna.