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Public demonstrations against military excesses paralyse Tamil Homeland

Public demonstrations and a complete hartal called by Civilian Based Organisations in the NorthEast paralysed all activities including government offices, banks, schools and other public institutions. CBO’s called this hartal in response to the SL military excesses in Santhively Batticaloa.

A Tamil civilian was shot dead and scores injured when the SL Military and Police reacted aggressively against public demonstrations held to protest the installation of a military check- point in the densely populated hamlet Santhively. Parliamentarians representing Batticaloa district were among the demonstrators and the Sri Lanka Monitoring Mission (SLMM) too was present when military/police firing on the civilian demonstration took place.

Civilians in all parts of the Jaffna peninsula, Kilinochchi, Mullaittivu, Vavuniya, Trincomalee and Batticaloa/Amparai responded overwhelmingly to this call for hartal and normal activities were completely paralysed all over the Tamil Homeland. Focal points of the demonstrations were mostly military check- points that hinder normal civilian life.

Cease-Fire Agreement (CFA) between the Government of Sri Lanka and the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) in 2002 that ended the two-decade old bloody civil war contains an obligatory clause that stipulates removal of military positions from densely populated areas within limited time-frames, maximum being 160 days. In spite of these provisions the SL military adamantly continues to occupy civilian habitats including large chunks of farm- lands, de-housing hundreds of thousands of peasant families, mostly farmers and fishermen from villages that are classified as High Security Zones (HSZ).

Tamil CBO’s have intensified their protests against the arbitrary classification as HSZ and continued military occupation of areas that provide livelihood for the peasantry. Human Rights activists have been lobbying international opinion against the denial of access to the peasantry to their natural habitats from the time the CFA came into force in 2002. Many peasant families displaced from the HSZ who eked out an existence in the sea coasts of Mullaittivu and Vadamaradchy East, tragically met with death when tsunami struck on 26 December 2004.

11 May 2005

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