Two top members of the Tamil Tigers may have been shot by their own side or executed by Sri Lankan troops while trying to surrender, conflicting accounts of the last days of the rebels said.
Hours before the Sri Lankan defense ministry announced the entire rebel leadership had been killed and the decades-old war won, Tamil Tiger political chief B. Nadesan and Peace Secretariat head S. Pulideevan were trying to give themselves up.
On Sunday night, the pair called the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) and the nation’s former peace broker, Norway, asking for the message to be passed to the Sri Lankan army, diplomats and aid officials said.
The Red Cross confirmed the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) officials had made contact in the closing hours of the war, after offering to “silence their guns.”
“We were approached by the LTTE and Norway as part of our role as a neutral intermediary,” ICRC spokeswoman Sarasi Wijeratne said, adding that the message was passed to the Sri Lankan government.
“I don’t know what happened. We lost contact with the LTTE in the final stages,” Wijeratne said.
A diplomat familiar with the communications said the last message from Pulideevan was that “they were going to cross over with a white flag, with their families.”
The source asked not to be identified because of the sensitivity of the issue.
“The next thing we heard was on Monday morning, when the Sri Lankans said they were dead. But what transpired after the satellite phone calls, I don’t know,” the diplomat said.
“They may have been shot by their own side for trying to surrender. They may have got out too late, as troops were moving in. They may have been executed by the army. In Sri Lanka, neither side takes any prisoners,” the source said.
The Tamil Tigers were known for wearing cyanide capsules around their necks to avoid being captured alive and seldom took prisoners during their quarter-century fight for an independent state.
Government troops were equally ruthless towards an enemy that had perfected the use of the suicide bomber.
A second diplomatic source said Nadesan and Pulideevan — who always cast themselves as LTTE politicians rather than fighters — did appear to want to live.
“They were non-stop on the phone, trying to get out,” the diplomat said.
He refused to speculate on the circumstances of their deaths, but commented that “Sri Lanka is just one big violation of the Geneva Conventions.”
A senior Sri Lankan official said the two were killed by their own side.
“I was contacted by a third party [ICRC] saying that the two of them want to surrender,” Sri Lankan Secretary of Foreign Affairs Palitha Kohona said.
“I told them to follow the widely accepted procedure — take a white flag and walk slowly towards the army lines in an unthreatening manner. What I learnt subsequently is that the two of them were shot from behind as they tried to come out,” Kohona said. “They had been killed by the LTTE.”
The LTTE has accused the government of carrying out a “well-planned massacre” of unarmed officers with the aim of eliminating the Tigers’ political structure.
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