Army advances on Kilionochchi
Tigers Ill 1.400 at Mullaitivu
Over 200,000 frightened Tamil civilians fled the northern town of Kilinochchi, headquarters of the insurgent Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE), in the face of a major offensive by Sri Lankan forces on 26 July.
After a week of artillery shelling and aerial bombing, troops supported by helicopter gunships pushed south from Elephant Pass to Paranthan, six km north of Kilinochchi, meeting stiff resistance from Tiger fighters. Kilinochchi became the LTTE’s capital-in-exile after they forcibly evacuated over 250,000 civilians south of the lagoon last December when the military captured Jaffna town.
Twice displaced in eight months, thousands have fled into jungle areas south of the town and international relief agencies say the terrain and continuing air strikes make it difficult to survey their whereabouts and safety. Bombing raids have continued on Iranaimadu and Mankulam and the LTTE says seven civilians were killed and six badly injured in an air attack on 24 July at Mallavi, west of Mankulam where the Tigers have regrouped.
There are three major concentrations of refugees say initial estimates: at Mallavi, another at Akkarayankulam where Kilinochchi’s civil administration has relocated and a third at Mankulam on the main route south to government-controlled Vavuniya.
Authorities in Vavuniya are preparing for a massive refugee influx, requisitioning community halls and schools but the Tigers are unlikely to surrender control of their civilian power base, and the Mankulam road remains quiet. Only a few hundred civilians have arrived at Madhu, Sri Lanka’s most sacred Catholic shrine 60 km west of Vavuniya where there is a United Nations refugee camp capable of holding 30,000. The fear of day-time air strikes as the siege of Kilinochchi continues and tight Tiger control has trapped 200,000 people in the open without adequate food, water or shelter.
The Tigers in turn say the government is using food aid as a weapon of war, blocking all relief convoys to the LTTE- controlled Vanni areas north of Vavuniya since the 17th July. Over 120 food lorries are lined up outside the town and the LTTE says 40 drivers were badly beaten by soldiers when they attempted to take a convoy north with official permission.
Unlike many other civil wars, the Sri Lankan government has continued to send food aid across the front line as part of its "hearts and minds" strategy fuelling increasing military frustration. "We are feeding the Tigers then fighting them", thundered Colombo’s top brass as the LTTE routinely plundered or taxed government supplies through its parallel administration in the north.
Having forced the Tigers out of Jaffna the Army may seek to starve them into submission, threatening thousands of civilians trapped between the two forces.
What will further harden military hearts is a devastating attack by Tiger guerrillas in mid July on an isolated Army camp at Mullaitivu, 175 miles north-west of Colombo in the biggest battle of the 13-year civil war.
Over 1,400 Sri Lankan soldiers died in a ten-day battle as thousands of LTTE guerrillas overran the camp, capturing huge stocks of arms and ammunition. One of only 40 soldiers who survived told the London Times how the Tigers attacked in human waves while mortar shells rained down. Many soldiers who were wounded bled to death said Private WG Dammike, aged 19. When an Army relief column broke through in late July the base was flattened and stripped bare. Grim faced officials from the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) said it appeared the Tigers had taken no prisoners.
The Mullaitivu attack has badly jolted Colombo and the Chandrika Kumaratunge government shattering post-Jaffna propaganda that the Tigers were a spent force. Hundreds of anxious parents jammed military headquarters telephone lines seeking news of missing sons while Colombo newspapers fulminated over the government’s inept censorship strategy, claiming that world press attention meant everyone else knew how many died at Mullaitivu except Sri Lankan citizens.
The government has stayed tight- lipped over final casualty figures. As the Kilinochchi advance gathered pace Foreign Minister Lakshman Kadirgamar told the BBC that the LTTE was a separatist organisation which did not want peace and there was no alternative but to make war on them.
One theory currently circulating is the Mullaitivu attack was a pre-emptive strike by the Tigers to prevent a pincer advance on Kilinochchi, from north and east. Its success will further destabilise sea routes to the Jaffna peninsula and threaten food supplies and rehabilitation of the shattered peninsula.
The Army’s thrust on Kilinochchi opens up the dangerous promise of a land route to Vavuniya, 70 km south, symbolically reuniting the country and banishing the Tigers to the jungles. But with 10,000 cadre under arms that is where the LTTE is most dangerous and a land corridor may cost thousands of lives, civilian and military as the stakes rise in this forgotten war.
Over 60 people were killed and 450 injured when two bombs exploded in a packed commuter train in the suburbs of Colombo on 24 July. Authorities blamed the LTTE. Hours after the 13th anniversary of ethnic riots which killed hundreds of Tamils in 1983, President Chandrika appealed for calm in a nationwide TV address. A full report on page four.
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