Letter says half the capital=92s refugees are spies
The battle for Colombo
A letter supposedly from Jaffna civilians to the Army claims that at least=
50%
of the people who came to Colombo from Jaffna after 1993 are LTTE spies
says The Island newspaper. Police have always maintained that hundreds of
suicide Black Tigers are hidden among the 150,000 Tamil refugees in
Colombo.
In early October, Deputy Inspector General Dissanayake issued a warning over
the radio that 25 Black Tiger women had arrived seeking high profile targets=
to
destabilise the capital and surrounding areas. Security forces were put on=
high
alert and the Defence Ministry asked the public to inform police about
suspected persons. The LTTE threat has intensified search operations and
detention.
Police say a Tiger with plans to assassinate a top government minister was
arrested in Borella on 4 October. Three days later, 13 LTTE suspects were
detained. Security forces launched a massive cordon-and-search operation on=
8
October after intelligence reports that Tigers had breached a high-security=
area
in the city centre.
Concern over the plight of detainees remains. Responding to questions raised
by Jaffna MP IM Iliyas about the whereabouts of S Krishnakumar and S
Kamalanathan arrested in Colombo in August 1995, the police Crime
Prevention Unit says that they have been murdered. Over 100 LTTE suspects
including those arrested in Jaffna and held in Colombo and Kalutara prisons
began a fast on 20 October. Following Attorney General=92s assurance that
charges will be filed within the next six weeks, the prisoners ended thair=
fast on
26 October. There are over 1,100 Tamil prisoners in Colombo and Kalutara,
some of whom are held for over four years without trial.
Ill-treatment in custody is a persistent complaint and human rights agencies=
say
many are detained without any evidence of LTTE links. In late October, the
Supreme Court ordered the release of Ilayathamby Menan who had suffered
severe torture after his arrest in June 1994. The release followed the
withdrawal of the charges against him by the Attorney General.
In a fundamental rights application to the Supreme Court, 72 year-old
Ambalam Mylvaganam says he was arrested at his Paranthan home in
September and assaulted with chains in an Army camp. Hill Country resident
Krishnapillai Venkadasalam, 59, arrested in Matale in June and detained in=
the
Magazine prison alleges that policemen pulled out his hair, broke his=
fingers
and burned him with cigarettes.
Arrests continue in the Hill Country. Tamil youths Kandasamy Suresh and
Kanagaratnam Sureshkumar were detained by police in Kandy on 4 October.
University student Sellathurai Vasanthan and his cousin V Nanthini were
arrested when they went to the Kandy police station to register their names=
as
residents.
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