Illankai Thamil Arasu Kadchi (ITAK) recently commemorated the death of Sahayaseeli Pedhuruppillai, alias Maalathy, the first woman cadre killed fighting for the macabre Eelam cause.

Jaffna District parliamentarian and ITAK leader Sivagnanam Shritharan, MP, attended the event, organised by the ITAK Kilinochchi branch. Tamil Guardian (TG) in an online report, headlined ‘ITAK commemorates 2nd Lt. Maalathy in Kilinochchi,’ posted on 13 October, 2025, recounting how Shritharan spoke about Maalathy’s life and the sacrifice she made for the Tamil liberation struggle.

According to that report, there hadn’t been any other parliamentarian, past or present, except for Shritharan, at the event. Shritharan received the ITAK leadership in January 2024 after beating parliamentarian M.A. Sumanthiran, PC. Shritharan succeeded the ageing Mavai Senathiraja, who passed away in January 2025.

Having first entered Parliament, in 2010, on the ITAK ticket (ITAK led the Tamil National Alliance), Shritharan was reelected at the 2015, 2020 and 2024 parliamentary elections.

What really interested me, in that TG report, was the reference to the Indian Army deployment in Sri Lanka in the late ’80s. TG reported: “Maalathy was killed at the age of 20 during a confrontation with the Indian Peace Keeping Force (IPKF) in Jaffna. She was shot in the legs by the IPKF and swallowed cyanide to avoid being captured.”

Maalathy committed suicide to avoid falling into the hands of the IPKF on 10 October, 1987, close to Navatkuli-Kopay Road, during a fierce confrontation between the Indians and the LTTE.

TG also reported a commemoration event in Jaffna to mark the Pirambadi massacre in Kokuvil, where over 64 Tamils were massacred by the IPKF, 38 years ago. That massacre happened at the onset of IPKF operation, codenamed ‘Pawan,’ to disarm the belligerent LTTE. Obviously, India had no option but to go on the offensive against those New Delhi clandestinely recruited, trained, and armed with Indian taxpayers’ money. TG posted its online report, headlined ‘Pirambadi massacre by Indian troops remembered in Jaffna’ on 12 October, 2025.

Those who had been loudly demanding accountability, on the part of Sri Lanka during the war/conflict, are conveniently silent about the IPKF deployment in northern and eastern Sri Lanka (29 July, 1987, to 24 March, 1990). Would Shritharan care to explain the ITAK’s stand on accountability at least now? There cannot be any justifiable reason for him to remain silent on the contentious issue against the backdrop of him attending a commemoration event for Maalathy.

The Valvettithurai Citizens’ Committee (VCC) has caught both Sri Lanka and India by surprise. The Committee has sought compensation from the Office for Reparations, for the Valvettithurai massacre, perpetrated by the IPKF in early August 1989. VCC has asked for altogether Rs. 4.3 bn (USD 14.6 mn) and The Sunday Times, last week, quoted the Secretary to VCC, N. Aanatharaj, as having said they asked for compensation from India in 1990 but didn’t receive any response. Nearly 70 perished in the VVT incidents.

The Jaffna Hospital massacre, in October 1987, was another incident directly blamed on the IPKF. Over 60 people died at the Jaffna Hospital. But the thriving Western funded global human rights industry has never taken into consideration such incidents when moving resolutions, targeting Sri Lanka. Sri Lanka, too, never mentioned such atrocities at Geneva in order not to antagonise India and thereby has ended up taking the blame for everything that had happened.

The Geneva-based United Nations Human Rights Council (UNHRC) had been always silent on India’s accountability. Successive Sri Lankan governments, too, lacked the courage to set the record straight at the Geneva HRC. The JVP-led National People’s Power government, despite all their previous bravado, especially against India, prior to coming to power, is no exception.

TG reportage is evidence that those who wanted to haul Sri Lanka up before a hybrid court, consisting of local and foreign judges, selectively make reference to alleged atrocities perpetrated by the IPKF. In the absence of cohesive planning on the part of Sri Lanka, the ITAK, LTTE rump and the Tamil Diaspora have been able to advance their strategy meant to isolate the war-winning country. They are careful not to condemn the Indian Army when the Sri Lankan military is targeted at Geneva. The UNHRC seems comfortable with that obvious, but utterly shameful strategy.

True face of the LTTE

The same lot are generally silent about the atrocities committed by the LTTE. Perhaps, they must be reminded of the true face of the LTTE. The LTTE massacred hundreds of Tamils, belonging to rival Tamil groups trained by India, killed quite a number of Tamil civilians, executed members of its own organisation, including its number two Gopalswamy Mahendrarajah, aka Mahattaya, killed Tamil parliamentarians, and blew up Indian Congress Party leader and former Indian Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi. Do not forget that the LTTE assassinated Gandhi over a year after India ended its disastrous military mission in Sri Lanka. India could never explain how it lost nearly 1,500 officers and men and nearly 3,000 wounded, some maimed for life, during less than three years of ‘peace keeping’ here!

The LTTE could have easily reached a consensus with President J.R. Jayewardene’s government on the basis of the July 1987 Indo-Lanka Peace Accord and secured the Lion’s share of the first North-East Provincial Council. But, the LTTE had been too greedy and sought to eradicate all other Tamil groups and the Tamil United Liberation Front (TULF), predecessor of the TNA.

The LTTE believed in one-party rule and the group also sought to force Muslims and Sinhalese out of the northern and eastern regions. The eviction of Muslims from the Northern Province, in October 90, several months after India ended its military mission here, and the LTTE resuming its cold blooded hostilities with terror attacks, revealed the mindset of the group. The LTTE obviously felt confident that it could overwhelm the Sri Lankan military, after India withdrew its Army.

At one point, the LTTE even toyed with the idea of contesting elections – both parliamentary and Provincial Councils – during Ranasinghe Premadasa’s presidenc, but changed its strategy. On Premadasa’s explicit directive, the then Election Commissioner Chandrananda de Silva recognised the People’s Front of Liberation Tigers (PFLT) as a recognised political party, regardless of the group retaining arms, as the government and the LTTE examined how mutual trust could be established.

The LTTE never sought to hide its intentions to do away with other political parties. The group brazenly used direct negotiations with Premadasa (May 1989 to June 1990) to infiltrate Colombo. An LTTE hit squad that arrived in Colombo, courtesy Sri Lanka Air Force (SLAF), assassinated foremost Tamil politician Appapillai Amirthalingam, along with ex-Jaffna MP Vettivelu Yogeswaran. Ex-Nallur MP Murugesu Sivasithamparam was shot and wounded during the same hit job, but he luckily survived.

The Indian Army was still deployed in the northern and eastern provinces while Premadasa foolishly provided funds and arms to the LTTE, thinking that he was getting on their good books and to get rid of the Indians. On the orders of Premadasa, the Sri Lankan military even facilitated the LTTE operations, aimed at liquidating rival Tamil groups. The LTTE killed hundreds of hastily trained men of rival groups, by Delhi, in a stupid bid to form, what was called, the Tamil National Army (TNA), prior to its departure from here, as demanded by Premadasa. The result was Velupillai Prabhakaran unleashed his forces to wipe them out. The LTTE killed indiscriminately.

Even after the LTTE resumed hostilities, in June 1990, against his own government, Premadasa had been so dumb, he released funds to the Tigers, through the Treasury. By the time R. Paskaralingam, who served as Premadasa’s trusted Treasury Chief, had released as much as Rs 125 mn and the true value of the arms, ammunition and equipment provided during this period of madness is not known. As to how trustworthy is Paskaralingam can be gauged from yet unresolved revelations made by Pandora papers.

Prabhakaran could have easily had his Eelam without waging war. Don’t forget at India’s behest, Sri Lanka merged the Eastern Province with the Northern Province, in September 1988, in terms of the Indo-Lanka Accord. That interim arrangement was to be placed before the people living in the Eastern Province by/before 31 December, 1988, for approval/rejection. But that referendum was never held. The LTTE had an extremely favourable ground situation and could have easily consolidated political power if not for unleashing violence in the wake of a group of its cadres, including Kumarappan and Pulendran, detained at Palalay, taking their own lives in protest.

The Supreme Court declared the North-East merger illegal in October 2006. The province was formally demerged into the Northern and Eastern provinces on 1 January, 2007. The SC gave its historic order on 16 October, 2006, the LTTE mounted devastating suicide attack on the Navy at Digampathana. The blast claimed the lives of 107 Navy personnel and wounded over 150 more. Retired Admiral Ravi Wijegunaratne is on record as having said that attack influenced their campaign against the Sea Tigers. In a series of operations, facilitated by intelligence provided by the Army and the US, the then Navy Chief VA Wasantha Karannagoda’s Navy hunted down floating LTTE arsenals.

The unprecedented success, achieved by the Navy, with stepped up operation, entirely disrupted the Tiger sea supply routes to Northern Sri Lanka. By the time the war ended, in May, 2009, the LTTE had almost run out of ammunition stocks. In the following year, Shritharan’s ITAK, then led by the late R. Sampanthan, betrayed the LTTE by backing retired General Sarath Fonseka at the presidential election. That should be examined against Sampanthan’s declaration, way back in 2001, that the LTTE/Velupillai Prabhakaran is the sole representative of the Tamil speaking people. The Trincomalee district lawmaker obviously and conveniently forgot what the group did to Amirthalingam.

Did the UN fail the Tamil community? Tamil Guardian

Editor Thusiyan Nandakumar dealt with the latest UN resolution in a well-articulated piece, posted on The Diplomat. The 14 October, 2025, datelined article (The UN’s Sri Lanka Failure: Why yet another resolution on accountability is being rejected by victims) bluntly alleged that the UNHRC failed to hold Sri Lanka’s war criminals to account.

The UK-based Nandakumar quoted those whom he identified as observers as having asserted that the latest resolution, adopted without a vote, is the weakest since the introduction of accountability measures in 2012. (https://thediplomat.com/2025/10/the-uns-sri-lanka-failure/)

It would be pertinent to ask whether accountability measures could be implemented without examining the origins of terrorism here. Of course the UN failed Sri Lanka by turning a blind eye to the high profile Indian destabilisation project that caused massive death and destruction. That project was meant to pave the way for the creation of a single administrative unit, comprising the Northern and Eastern Provinces. Had the UN intervened here thousands of lives could have been saved. The UN did nothing. The global body simply watched as India destabilised Sri Lanka, forcing the latter to accept the Indian Army on a peacekeeping role. Not only the Mullivaikkal battle but Nanthikadal could have been avoided if the LTTE accepted peace under Indian terms. Instead, the LTTE was overconfident and believed it had the wherewithal to deceive India, Sri Lanka and achieve Eelam in an all-out war.

Interested parties tend to forget that the Sri Lankan military fought the LTTE, consisted of almost 100 percent Tamils. Often, they portrayed the conflict as war between the military and Tamil civilians. They bring up atrocities perpetrated by the IPKF in isolation to highlight selected cases such as Maalathy taking her life after being shot in both legs and the Pirambadi massacre in Kokuvil, both incidents in October 1987.

There had been instances of excesses by the Sri Lankan military and the IPKF, no doubt, when fighting a ruthless enemy, like the LTTE. There is no point in denying that. But, the LTTE, after having killed as many as 35,000 Sri Lankan armed forces and police and 1,500 Indians cannot continue to portray themselves as the victims. Those who fled Sri Lanka and secured highly sought after citizenship in the affluent West, while their same Western backers shouldn’t be allowed to exploit the situation to the separatists’ advantage. The LTTE fought well and adopted tactics such as suicide attacks on selected individuals and military targets and there cannot be any dispute over their commitment to the Eelam cause. But, foreigners of Sri Lankan origin have become a nuisance with organisations such as Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch (HRW) harassing post-war Sri Lanka.

None of those shedding crocodile tears now for war victims did not bother to issue even a simple statement requesting the LTTE not to depend on Tamil civilian human shields to advance their macabre cause. They remained tight-lipped when the retreating LTTE forced Tamil civilians, living in Vanni west, to accompany them. The LTTE’s action resulted in approximately 300,000 people being trapped in the Mullivaikkal area. That was Velupillai Prabhakaran’s intention to have a human shield to protect his surviving band.

The ITAK stayed silent throughout that period (last phase of the war January to May 2009) while the LTTE took cover behind the civilians. If the ITAK made any interventions on behalf of the people and particularly to save children from forced conscription, leader Shritharan should be able to prove their efforts. The Jaffna district politician can do so in Parliament.

In fact, the UN had been aware of the civilians seeking to flee LTTE held areas at the onset of military operations in the Vanni west. The 57 Division – one of the principal offensive divisions conducting operations on the Vanni west, beginning March 2007, prompted those living in the area to seek refuge in the government held area. Fearing large scale departure of civilians, the LTTE took action to halt secret flight of people. When the LTTE realised some UN workers, too, had been involved in secretly moving people across the lines, Velupillai Prabhakaran ordered action. Except for The Island no other media – both print and electronic – reported the detention of UN workers by the increasingly desperate LTTE.

The UN secretly negotiated for the release of two UN workers held by the Tigers in the Vanni. The Colombo-based UN bigwigs kept the incident under wraps believing that the LTTE would eventually free them.

The UN Headquarters claimed that its Colombo office hadn’t alerted New York about the abduction. An influential section of the Colombo-based diplomatic community strived to resolve the dispute without bringing it to the notice of the government though the incident should have been immediately brought to the notice of the government.

The UN is believed to have brought the incident to the notice of the government several weeks after the unexpected development and the LTTE’s refusal to release the UN workers.

So-called human rights champions (they are also called human rights defenders) remained deaf and dumb during the entire period. Those who accuse the government of death and destruction, at the drop of a hat, turned a convenient Nelsonian eye. The detention of two employees of the world body is a case in point. Until the very end, the LTTE tried to retain the civilian shield at any cost by shooting anyone who tried to flee. Instead of demanding the LTTE to give up civilian shields forthwith, the UN sought to evacuate Velupillai Prabhakaran, his family and a selected group of LTTE families, from the Vanni east. The US had been involved in that project and no less than wartime Navy Commander, the then VA Karannagoda, in his memoirs, published in both Sinhala and English, mentioned the US involvement in the effort.

President Mahinda Rajapaksa had the guts to thwart that plan as well as a US backed joint British-French bid meant to force a ceasefire in April 2009 to save the LTTE. If Western powers really wanted to save Velupillai Prabhakaran and his loved ones, they could have arranged for them to leave Puthumathalan, under ICRC protection. That is the truth. The ICRC evacuated thousands of wounded civilians and their relatives from Vanni east to Pulmoddai where an Indian medical team accepted them. Transfer of Prabhakaran and family, too, from Vanni east to Pulmoddai could have been arranged. The writer was among a small group of journalists taken by the Navy to Mullaitivu seas in late April 2009 (three weeks before Prabhakaran’s death) to observe the ICRC operation.

Let me conclude this article by reproducing a note written by the then Norwegian Ambassador in Colombo to Basil Rajapaksa. The following is the text of the missive dated 16 February, 2009: “I refer to our telephone conversation today. The proposal to the LTTE on how to release the civilian population now trapped in the LTTE controlled area has been transmitted to the LTTE through several channels. So far there has been regrettably no response from the LTTE and it does not seem to be likely that the LTTE will agree to this in the near future.”

The ugly truth is civilians/civilian shields have been an integral part of the overall LTTE defence.

By Shamindra Ferdinando ✍️