chronology of LTTE terror - art 56

From the Daily News Archives:

When the euphoria of victory dies down, and together with it the media hype ceases, when the guns do not rattle and boom anymore and the sky, the land and the sea become calm and serene, when tranquillity reigns through it is natural to live in the present moment and forget the past. But one cannot live in the present without a past. Nor can one envision the future discarding the experience of the preceding events.

Hence the Daily News is serialising the Chronicle of LTTE Terror taken from our own archives which would remind our readers how it all began. An awareness of the chronology of terror would help us prevent the recurrence of such terror and frustrate any attempts by misguided elements to repeat history to suit their evil designs. It was not simple terror.

Nor was terror sporadic. It was all pre-planned, pre-determined, well-calculated terror. The victims were innocent people. Though it is too many innumerate we would like to recall the major episodes in the Chronology of Terror.

LTTE kills President Premadasa

Wijitha Nakkawita

May Day 1993 was to mark the second assassination of a Head of Government of Sri Lanka since independence was regained in 1948. The first Head of Government to be assassinated was Premier S.W.R.D.Bandaranaike in 1959 and twenty four years later President Ranasinghe Premadasa was killed allegedly by a suicide bomber who had been among his personal aides living at the Keselwatte residence of Premadasa.

The whole affair was shrouded in mystery as it was a well known fact that President Premadasa had befriended the LTTE terrorist group helping them directly as well indirectly through many years.

The alleged suicide bomber known as Babu was a young man who had become a friend of the valet and personal aide of Premadasa, Mohideen. On this day when the UNP May Day rally was to be held at Galle Face Green the main procession started from the slum district Keselwatte and it was moving towards the Armour Street with the President and his retinue also joining the procession.

When the group of UNP supporters and Premadasa’s inner circle including Mohideen, Babu and his body guard approached the Armour Street junction it was seen on the video tapes that Babu was pushing a bicycle and coming toward the group that was around Premadasa.

Though Babu was coming closer to Premadasa, Mohideen held the bicycle by its handle and stopped Babu preventing him coming closer to Premadasa. Just then Premadasa who was looking at the moving procession carrying a white handkerchief in his hand waved the handkerchief and attempted to get into the bullet proof jeep that was parked alongside the moving procession.

In that same instant a huge explosion deafening the ears of the people in the vicinity was heard and Premadasa and several people including Mohideen, Babu and his bodyguards were killed in the bomb blast. It was immediately not known why Premadasa waved the handkerchief or why Mohideen prevented Babu moving closer to Premadasa but the police and intelligence officers said Babu was a suicide bomber who was responsible for the Assassination.

The alleged assassin Babu according to the theory of the investigators had been sent to live in the household of Premadasa and had gained confidence of Mohideen.

When Babu was seen with the inner circle of Premadasa everyone accepted him as one of the group and as to why he came pushing a pedal cycle on May Day procession was also a mysterious occurrence and the mystery deepened as the powers that be washed the scene of crime just a few hours after the explosion for some unknown reason.

Once again the LTTE terrorists amply demonstrated that they would always betray and destroy people who had helped them. Reminiscent of the LTTE first killing their godfather Appapillai Amirthalingam the TULF Leader and other members of parliament of the same party once the LTTE became the strongest terrorist group.

Next they killed Indian Premier Rajiv Gandhi who too had helped the terrorists in diverse ways. Premadasa was also known to have been instrumental in sending back the Indian Peace Keeping Force when the LTTE was nearly finished with only a few hundred cadres remaining after the IPKF went all out to attack the terrorist group. It was also a known fact that Premadasa gave the LTTE arms, ammunition, cement, cash and vehicles on the pretext of making the LTTE strong to be able to fight the IPKF.

The LTTE proved clearly that it did not respect friends even among its own ranks as the years went on with only the killer instinct in it remaining unchanged.

Thursday January 20, 1994

Passenger jumped off minutes before:

Bus bomb kills 10 at Rambewa

At least 10 passengers were killed and 40 injured, some of them critically, when a bomb exploded in a private bus around 9.30 a.m. yesterday, near a police checkpoint at Rambewa, a few miles north-east of Anuradhapura, on the Pulmoddai-Anuradhapura road.

Police said they heard a deafening explosion as they rushed out of the bus after noticing smoke in the vehicle. One woman described how she was thrown out of the bus by the explosion and the next thing she knew was that she was in hospital, reported Renuka Damayanthi (30) a sports officer working at the Divisional Secretary’s office at Rambewa.

An injured passenger, M. G. Somaratne (48) of Bogaswewa, said he had been in the bus which had started from Padaviya at 6.10 a.m. There were no standing passengers, but near the Rambewa checkpoint the bus was packed to capacity.

When the bomb exploded, some of the passengers had already rushed out because of the thick smoke inside the bus.

The injured passengers were administered to the Anuradhapura hospital. Bus conductor M. Nimal died on the spot. The driver escaped. Police said no arrests have yet been made. They said they could not attribute responsibility yet, but suspect the LTTE.

Police said that at Kebbetigollawa some passengers had seen a fair, tall man, carrying an audio cassette, boarding the bus when it stopped for passengers to have tea at a boutique. But he was missing after the incident.

An injured passenger, M. G. Somaratne (48) of Bogaswewa, said he had been in the bus which had started from Padaviya at 6.10 a.m. There were no standing passengers, but near the Rambewa checkpoint the bus was packed to capacity.

When the bomb exploded, some of the passengers had already rushed out because of the thick smoke inside the bus.

Terrorists sack villages after mass attack on camps:

[Forces lash back]

Welioya death toll rising - 54 now

The death toll in Sunday’s terrorist attack on the army camps has risen to 54 - 27 soldiers, 17 civilians and 10 terrorists. Eighteen soldiers are also reported missing and 29 are wounded.

Military sources claimed that the death toll among the Tigers could be even higher, but added “We have to wait for confirmation through the LTTE radio intelligence”.

The attack on Janakapura army camp came barely 24 hours after LTTE gunmen had killed 10 policemen in the northern region of the Wilpattu jungle.

Official sources said the Welioya attack (on the army camp) had been carried out by over 200 Tigers who later went on a rampage, attacking nearby villages and killing 17 civilians.

The terrorists had also attacked two other army camps, at Kokkutuduwai and Kovil Point in Welioya, to prevent security reinforcements being rushed to Janakapura.

Official reports said security ground troops counter-attacked with artillery fire and air support, inflicting probably heavy casualties among the Tigers and destroying three of their vehicles.

Reports said that around 85 soldiers of the Janakapura army camp were out on ambush duty when the terrorists raided the camp, which they had set on fire after removing some military equipment, which included two tractors, a medium range mortar and a machine gun.

Official sources said newspapers had reported that three army camps were attacked by the terrorists. “These were in fact cadjan structures, housing the Forward Defence Lines which invariably shifted as troops advanced into new territory”.

Among the soldiers killed were an army lieutenant and a cook attached to the Janakapura camp.

Meanwhile Lankapuvath reported the death toll as 41 soldiers and civilians and 10 terrorists, and said the LTTE had announced in a radio transmission that they had recovered 17 bodies, accounting for 17 of the 18 missing servicemen.

“The LTTE radio also said three persons had been captured. According to military sources they are believed to be civilians who were reported missing”, the report said.

The report said the LTTE also confirmed that 10 of their cadres, including some “lieutenants”, had been killed in the fierce counter-attack launched by the security forces. But military sources believe LTTE casualties were much higher.

The terrorists had captured a large quantity of weapons and equipment. These included 44 semi-automatic T-56 rifles, one machine gun, four rocket propelled grenades, three mortars, two tractors, one motor cycle and a bulldozer with which the terrorists reduced the Janakapura camp to rubble, after setting it on fire, military sources said.

Friday October 16, 1992

Sleeping civilians, security guards killed in dawn swoop:

Killing orgy by Tigers in P’naruwa villages

The Joint Operations Command (JOC) yesterday reported that 141 civilians, eight soldiers and eleven policemen were killed and 83 civilians wounded when a band of over 150 LTTE terrorists struck four farming villages on the Polonnaruwa-Batticaloa border. Our Polonnaruwa group correspondent who visited the scene said over 100 houses were burnt.

He said over 100 houses were burnt.l

Our correspondent, Mahindasiri Premalal said he counted 115 dead bodies outside the Palliyagodella mosque and another 22 at the Medirigiriya hospital. The civilians were all Muslims. They were hacked and burnt. He also counted the bodies of eight soldiers, 11 policemen and one home guard at the hospital morgue.

The correspondent said over 100 wounded civilians were admitted to the Hingurakgoda, Medirigirya and Polonnaruwa hospitals. The Health Ministry in Colombo which rushed doctors and medicine to these hospitals gave the number of

injures as 120.

The JOC said the terrorists swooped on the four villages at 4.45 a.m. and withdraw at daybreak as the army and the Air Force mounted a counter-attack. The terrorists left five of their dead behind.

“Two helicopters and two fixed-wing aircraft pursued the terrorists,” military spokesman Col. Sarath Munasinghe said. Terrorist dead and wounded are still being checked.

The attack was on the villages of Agbopura, Ahamedpura, Palliyagodella and Pamburana, a cluster of villages with a radius of two and a half kilometres. Agbopura is a mixed village of Muslims and Sinhalese. The villages are situated about 35 km from Polonnaruwa on the western bank of the Mahaweli.

Col. Munasinghe said the villages were guarded by a police platoon which had military training and a section of national guards. The five policemen killed included a sub-inspector.

The Army had been moved from Meegaswewa and Polonnaruwa, Col. Munasinghe said. The counter-attack was still on around noon yesterday.

Ministers A. R. Munsoor, Gamini Atukorale, Dharmadasa Banda, State Ministers A. H. M. Azwer and H. G. P. Nelson and MPs Chandrasiri Suriyarachchi, H. M. T. B. Herath and S. A. Abdul Majeed visited the stricken villages with senior army and police officials.

The JOC spokesman said yesterday’s civilian massacre was the biggest in recent months.

“The LTTE is known to adopt such tactics. When they find it difficult to attack the troops they go for undefended civilians,” Col. Munasinghe said.

“Why are they attacking Muslims?”, he was asked.

“They attack both Muslims and Sinhalese,” Col. Munasinghe said.

Minister A. R. Munsoor, State Minsiters A. H. M. Azwer and H. G. P. Nelson and MPs Chandrasiri Suriyarachchi, H. M. T. B. Herath and S. A. Abdul Majeed visited the stricken villages with senior army and police officials.

Security has been alerted in the Eastern Province to prevent retaliatory attacks on Tamils.

Brigadier Commander Asoka Silva, DIG (NCP) Gamini Randeniya, Polonnaruwa and SSP C. B. Attanayake with ASP Upendra went to the scene shortly after news of the attack.

Emergency relief to the victims was promptly organised by Polonnaruwa GA U. G. Jayasinghe.

Tuesday October 25, 1994

Suicide bomber puts a bloody end to Opposition Leader’s presidential campaign:

Gamini killed at midnight rally

Sarath Malalasekera

Mr. Gamini Dissanayake, Opposition Leader and United National Party candidate for the November 9 presidential election, the party’s General Secretary Dr. Gamini Wijesekera, and two former cabinet ministers were among 53 killed in a suicide bomb attack at an election rally in Colombo North, a few minutes after midnight yesterday.

Messrs Weerasinghe, Mallimarachchi and G. M. Premachandra were the former members of the UNP cabinet who died. Mr. Ossie Abeygoonesekara, MP was critically injured and at the time of going to press was still not out a danger.

Mr. Christie Perera, a member of the western Provincial Council and Colombo North UNP campaign organiser was also killed in the blast. His daughter Mrs. Sriyani Gunasekera died with him.

The attack came at the close of Mr. Dissanayake’s presidential campaign meeting at Thotalanga, Grandpass yesterday. It had the stamp of professional planning. “We are, however, keeping an open mind about the culprits until completion in investigations,” police added. The blast ripped the campaign stage where Mr. Dissanayake had just ended his speech with a quip: “I should have said good night, but it is morning now, so “good morning to you all”, and he turned to take his seat.

The explosion which left no crater was described by police as massive, far more so than a grenade attack, and was obviously carried out by a suicide bomber.

A dismembered head found in a roof drainpipe several feet away and high above ground level is believed to be that of the attacker.

“The body seemed to have been completely destroyed,” people said. Fragments of a few limbs are being held, together with the head for further investigation. The LTTE is suspected of similar suicide attacks, including the blast which killed President R. Premadasa in May 1993. Prime Minister Chandrika Kumaratunge, at an emergency cabinet meeting yesterday, suspended round 2 of the peace talks with the LTTE, scheduled for yesterday. A State of Emergency and an indefinite curfew was declared.

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Saturday - Tigers execute 25 deserters

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