Another killing fields in Asia
New video shows Sri Lankan war crimes
COLOMBO: New video evidence has emerged linking Sri
Lanka's military to the execution of prisoners during the final hours of the country's decades-long civil war last year, international human rights groups said Thursday.
Human Rights Watch and Amnesty International said the grisly content of a five-minute video clip aired by Britain's Channel 4 television last month warrants a United Nations investigation.
The video was an extension of a short clip aired by the station last year showing blindfolded, naked men being shot dead at close range. The latest video shows the naked body of a young woman with a blood-spattered face identified by Tamil media as "Isaippriya," a news reader with the Tamil Tiger rebel television station.
A dozen other men and women, some with hands tied behind their backs, also lay dead beside her.
New York-based Human Rights Watch said an acquaintance identified the body as Isaippriya. It said the video links the Sri Lankan army's 53rd division, which conducted the final battle with the boxed-in rebels on a small beach strip, with summary executions.
"This horrific new evidence demonstrates graphically that the Sri Lankan army engaged in summary executions of prisoners during the final days of fighting in May 2009," said Brad Adams, Asia director at Human Rights Watch.
U.N. human rights investigator Philip Alston has said, however, the videos aired last year was authentic.
Sam Zarifi, Amnesty International's Asia-Pacific program director, said the Sri Lankan government's stance that the videos are fake has become increasingly difficult to defend.
"The video footage seen in full is extremely disturbing and includes what appears to be a number of naked male and female bodies, many of them blindfolded and bound, depicting what seems to be cold-blooded execution of prisoners. If true, this would constitute a war crime," said Zarifi.
Adams also challenged the government's claims. "Each time new evidence emerges of a wartime atrocity, the government's knee-jerk reaction is to claim that it's all part of some bizarre plot against it," he said. "How many more photos and videos need to emerge before the government recognizes that it can't hide the truth forever?"
Amid calls for a war crimes probe, U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon appointed a three-member panel to advise him how to ensure accountability.
More than 7,000 civilians were killed in the last five months of the conflict, according to the U.N. An estimated 80,000 people died in the 25-year war.
*sigh* I said try harder... not dumber!
lol you are not worth. talk about the OP if you have anything left in your brain moron
Everytime you post a response you expose you retardedness but nevertheless....... try harder!
Seanc from the many responses here you must have learned whats LTTE. now on ,dont poke ur nose and blabber on subjects which you dont have any clue. Realise and stop acting as a allknower fool.
Killing Rajeev Gandhi hastened LTTE's downfall...every war has collateral damage in terms of civilians. In retrospect, the only question that can be asked is if such damage was intentional or unavoidable?
One of my closest friend is a Muslim from Jaffna. Her parents' home and properties were seized by the LTTE and they were banished from their own land while her father's mom and sister were killed by them in a bomb attack. Anyone who claims this war was against Jaffna Tamils and/or Tamils and not the LTTE are ignorant and misinformed to say the least. I also know of many people who lost loved ones, eyes and limbs in the many bomb attacks executed by the LTTE all around the country over the years.the LTTE murdered not just Sinhalese and Buddhists but also Tamils,Muslims, Christians,etc that too of all ages!I still remember the fear we would feel gripping us each time we'd hear an explosion going off.Having lived in central Colombo the areas around my home were vulnerable to numerous attacks.Like this once when the mall just across the road was targeted by the LTTE..I just remember sitting in my room praying hard that if we are to die then pleases let us go with less pain! Thankfully the bomb was successfully diffused, Alhamdullilah!Then the two terrifying air raids carried out in the dead of the night by the LTTE..Audubillah!Only one who experienced such terror will understand how we felt. These are just a few examples.Through out the war the LTTE had caused much pain,destruction, and mayhem in the lives of thousands. this war was against terrorists..and ALhamdullilah today they are no more!
what do u expect?? but what next? we see Bush outside the bars.
Then read the report card of LTTE
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/LTTE
Hope this is noe complicated for narrow mind to digest.
Arien, Pathetic response.... try harder
Well is all that going to change history and the reality just because you find a few hand picked Tamils in distant places.
"Killing and hurting other people just because they follow a different religion, language, habits and a way of life is never going to bring you peace and security."
Really, That's why deputy Sri Lankan High Commissioner to Qatar is a prominent Tamil from Jaffna.
That's why Ltte terrorists killed their own Tamils.eg. Foreign Minister of Sri Lanka, Luxman Kadiragamar.
Talk about something you are aware of.not some garbage collected from the internet.
You can pretend that everythig is okay until one day you find yourself caught in the same lies and deceptions and this thugs do the same to you as they have done to the others. Take a stand while you can.
Killing and hurting other people just because they follow a different religion, language, habits and a way of life is never going to bring you peace and security. Other despotic countries like your own may prop you up in the short term but when the going gets out of hand they will run away to leave you to the wolves
List of attacks attributed to the LTTE
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
The following is a list of attacks attributed to the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE), commonly known as the Tamil Tigers.[1][2][3] Th LTTE is a separatist militant group that has been fighting for a separate Tamil state in the north and east of Sri Lanka since 1976, and it has carried out numerous attacks against civilian, military, political, and religious targets. It has been banned as a terrorist organization by 30 countries, including the United States, Canada, India and the 27 member nations of the European Union.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_attacks_attributed_to_the_LTTE
Good old joe - what do you know about the General? You are just following the comments published by the western Terrorist Lovers.
Bottom line is Sri Lanka wiped out the terror from the face of Sri Lanka
Exactly FU
Killing field? What a load of BS!
I think these parasite organizations like UN and HRW must be forced to shut shop immediately. They do nothing to help countries in need but start blowing their trumpet the moment everything is over.
Sri Lank achieved what rest of the world can never dream!
The scale of their problem and the will of their government to solve it is worth a lot of respect and no amount of criticism about 'how they did it'can change that.
well said lucky luciano. Morons with halfbaked knowledge on the scenario just blabber..SeanC cant help your ignorance.. massacres have happend allover in defferent forms, why only this issue which was inevitable?? LTTE have shot and slaughterd 1000s. read the history and shed some light yourself.
you are the biggest bigot I have seen on this forum
Lucky, you react the same as those who did when these videos came to light.
An average person does not need a video to prove how killings would have taken place particularly in a war of this scale.
Can you term difference in other words terrorists performing terror and soldiers doing the same?
In their dreams they might have wiped out the terrorist organization and have now jailed the very general who did the dirty job for its leaders. Now this same leaders ane trying to distance themselves from this general to safeguard themselves against war crimes.
You can fool the world and your people too for some time but the truth has to come out some day and the sooner the better for everybody so innocent people are not killed and butchered in the name of wiping out terrorists.
'Any country facing terrorism should follow Lankan model'
In an exclusive interview, with 'The Asian Age' Sri Lankan Defence Secretary Gotabaya Rajapaksa says that Sri Lanka's military victory over the LTTE offers lessons for the international community.
Following are excerpts of the interview on 15th September, 2010.
Q. Recently you visited India for defence talks. There was defence cooperation for years before and during the conflict, so what are both sides talking today?
A. India could not do certain things, meet certain needs of the Sri Lankan armed forces, like supply of weapons, because of the sensitivities during the conflict period. Now that issue is no longer there, so we can think of going beyond that. The whole idea is to improve the defence relationship, to strengthen regional security, to improve maritime security in the Indian Ocean.
Q. There are concerns in India about China looking to beef up its presence in Sri Lanka, particularly its role in the Hambantota port project.
A. It is purely a business arrangement, nothing beyond that. I don't think there is any issue in that sense. Wherever possible, when India has faced any security concerns, we have always bent backwards to accommodate them. With India, we are not looking at government-to-government relations alone; we are interested in people-to-people ties and trade. I know that Indian investors are interested in infrastructure projects in Sri Lanka. We are studying India's successful PPP (public-private partnership) model.
Q. There has been criticism of the delay in the rehabilitation of the displaced Tamils.
A. I don't think any other place in the world has so quickly resettled these people in their original habitats in such a short period. In one year we have resettled a majority of the three lakh IDPs. Very few are remaining, and that is because of the delay in clearing landmines. We cannot solve problems overnight but the government has aggressively invested more money in the North and East than the other provinces.
Q. Sri Lanka has also been criticized for not minimizing the civilian casualties of the war.
A. India knows what is LTTE but most of the outside world does not. It was a most ruthless terrorist organisation. Some think the attack on the USS Cole was the first attack by a terrorist group but by that time the LTTE had done many attacks on ships. It had done more suicide attacks in one year in Sri Lanka than all the suicide attacks in Afghanistan and Iraq put together. The LTTE's weaponry was equivalent to that of the armed forces - heavy artillery guns, mortars, machine guns, missiles, Naval suicide boats and, ultimately, even small aircraft. That was the magnitude of its military strength. So it was not a small insurrection or a civil disturbance. By defeating the LTTE, we have stopped the killings of innocent civilians.
Q. How are you dealing with the former LTTE combatants?
A. We have rehabilitated about 500 child soldiers. We started a skill development programme for the 11,000 former combatants who surrendered; some of whom have completed this programme and joined the society. This is the truth but the other side does not know the true story.
Q. What can the world learn from Sri Lanka's experience with terrorism?
A. What we have done is to defeat the terrorists. I should say any country which faces terrorism should follow the Sri Lankan model. I think in fighting terrorism as well as humanitarian assistance in a conflict like this, there are lots of lessons for others to learn rather than criticise. But there were concerns about humanitarian assistance during the conflict. Our military operations and humanitarian assistance ran parallely. One can say the actions were not effective, maybe there were weaknesses, but it was a success. Of course, there were issues but in a situation there would be issues. We had no-fire-zones and restrictions on use of heavy weapons which are not normally done anywhere in the world in this type of situation, but we did that.
Q. Looking back at the last days of the conflict, would you have done anything differently? There were reports that some LTTE leaders wanted to surrender but they were shot, there was also talk of ceasefire.
A. Prabhakaran did not want to surrender. Even the night before they were defeated, they tried to launch a counter attack and escape. There would have been no problem if they had surrendered, but we came to that last minute after a hard battle and a lot of sacrifices, so we were not ready for ceasefire.
Q. And did they inform the UN?
A. Nobody informed us about any surrender. We took the time to defeat the LTTE because of the civilians. If we had no such concerns, we could have bombarded the place, used all our artillery and walked through within a day but we took over two months. So the international community must consider the risks that we took.
Q. Looking ahead, do you have a political solution of the ethnic problem, a devolution package?
A. Political jargons alone will not bring about a solution. We have created an environment for everybody to live peacefully, as Sri Lankans, as one nation. All other issues are for politicians. The ground reality is we must give people the opportunity to live peacefully, with jobs and education. That is what they want and the government will ensure that is there in Sri Lanka.
Q. What will be your message to the Lankan-Tamils living in India and abroad?
A. Some of them left long ago; others, more recently. The second and third generations have concerns about their children's education. I know it is difficult to give all that up and come. But if they come, they are most welcome. I think they must bring their know-how, knowledge, and invest their wealth here because development is the main requirement.
Courtesy: The Asian Age
Where were HRW, AI and you when LTTE terrorists killing innocent civilians by Thousands, killing whole villages, Bombing innocent civilians, killing Rajiv Ghandhi, suicide bombing, Killing Monks,
FYI this video is a fake and it was proven a fake more than year ago when it was 1st aired by Channel 4.
FYI the Sri Lankans hane wiped out the No. 1 terrorist organization in the world from the soil of their motherland.
When will you two grow up fighting over nothing all the time.
Arien, it is apparent that you need a shrink if all that you could come up with is to question HRW's and AI's presence and role in Sri Lanka, despite them bringing to light the gore.
Your posts are just BS!
War ia dirty business .. ANYWHERE - Anyone who thinks otherwise is living in cloud cuckoo land..
Who has leaded the video???
Another wikileak sort of news..:)
seanC get help.
Arien, get lost!
HRW and AI are done with Iraq and Afghan?, when did they reach Srilanka