18 February
● SLA soldiers shot dead a final year Art faculty student of Jaffna University close to the SLA 52-4 Brigade Head Quarters and near his house in Iyattalai, Varani, Thenmaradchi. Krishnan Kamalathas 24, was shot dead while he was going towards a private tutory to teach classes (see separate story).
● A SLN sailor was killed and nineteen others injured when the bus transporting a group of sailors from Habarana to Trincomalee met with an accident at Kantalai. The sailors were returning to report to the Trincomalee navy headquarters after vacation when the bus carrying them ran off the road.
● A Muslim civilian was killed and a Tamil man injured when police fired indiscriminately following a grenade attack by armed men at Chenkalady Police Post in Eravur, Batticaloa. Mohammad Cassim, 60, of Kaththankudy, who died, and Samithamby Thanabalasingam, 44, of Batticaloa, who was injured, were both bystanders when the police started firing.
● Armed men shot and seriously injured Kanapathipillai Thiyagarajah alias Ananda, 67, at Central Camp in Amparai. The armed men called him out of his house and searched his house before shooting him.
17 February
● Two SLA soldiers of the 51-2 brigade were killed and 12 troopers wounded in a road side claymore ambush along the A9, 300 meters from the Jaffna District Secretariat and inside a SLA High Security Zone. A child, believed to be around 5, was rushed to hospital with shrapnel wounds, but died at the hospital. SLA soldiers opened fire, cordoned off the area and launched a search operation. Three civilians were wounded. The injured soldiers were identified as Soorasinghe, 32 and Premadasa, 42. The injured civilians were identified as A. Chithra, 24, of Ariyalai, K. Mohan, 46, and E. Jesuthasan, 55.
● One civilian was killed and two injured when the SLA opened fire in Kumankulam, Vavuniya, but Vavuniya Police said they received no information about the incident. Sinnarajah Suresh, 18, was killed, and Kumar Raguvaran, 17, and Logeswaran, 36, were injured.
● Assailants triggered a claymore mine in Pandarikulam, but no injuries to SLA soldiers or Police officers were reported. Residents of Pandarikulam said SLA soldiers fired indiscriminately for 30 minutes after the attack, but no one was injured.
● A male body with gunshot injuries recovered from Uppuveli, Trincomalee, was identified as Sivalingam Senthooran of Aathimoddai village along Trincomalee-Nilaveli road. His body was found blindfolded and with hands tied behind and he had been shot dead by unidentified persons. His wife said three unidentified persons went to her house Friday night and abducted him.
16 February
● SLAF bombers attacked Muhamalai, Kilali and Vadamaradchi East as the SLA launched a heavy artillery barrage using Multi Barrel Rocket Launchers. Four SLAF bombers dropped more than 20 bombs, while the SLA stepped up its artillery barrage on the two separate FDL positions, one from the northern FDL towards Muhamalai, Kilali and Vadamaradchi east and the other from Manalaru SLA camp in Mullaitivu towards LTTE held areas.
● The SLN attacked two fishermen, fishing in deep seas from Vadamaradchy east coast, and arrested both with their boats. Two other fishermen witnessed the incident and fled to safety. The arrested fishermen, Karunakaran Jegathesan, 27, from Vathirayan, and Sivanantharajah Sureshkumar, 30, from Maruthankerni, were internally displaced from Vadamarachchy East region and lived temporarily at Puthu Maththalan in Mullaithivu.
● An attempt by Jaffna Police to send youths who surrendered to police fearing for their lives from SLA and paramilitaries working with SLA, to rehabilitation centres in the South, was stopped by the intervention of the Jaffna District Judge. The Police tried to send the youths to rehabilitation centres in south for further interrogation and "rehabilitation." Their parents took the matter to Jaffna Court, and the judge, with the support of the Sri Lanka Attorney General, ordered the police to keep them in Jaffna. Although people who fear for their lives seek refuge in prisons, prisons themselves are not safe in Sri Lanka. On 23 and 25 July 1983, Sinhala prisoners at Welikada Prison beat 53 Tamil political prisoners to death. On 25 October 2000, 25 Tamil detainees were hacked to death and 16 others were seriously wounded when hundreds of Sinhala villagers assisted by Police attacked the Bindunuwewa detention centre.
● Kandy Police and SLA soldiers arrested 14 civilians, including nine Tamils, three Muslims and a Sinhalese, in a cordon and search operation following a tip off that a bomb had been placed in the Kandy bus stand. The SLA bomb disposal squad rushed to the site, but no bomb was found. Police took the civilians into custody as they failed to prove their identity and the purpose for the stay in the area. Of the three Muslims one is a woman. The Tamil suspects are all natives of Jaffna or Vavuniya, and were taken into custody when they were returning to their temporary residences after attending Maha Sivarathiri poojah at the Hindu Temple in Kandy town. The police arrested them even after they showed their national identity cards to prove their identity.
● Vavuniya Police said armed men gunned down a former PLOTE cadre, Kumaraswamy, in Thirunavatkulam in Vavuniya.
15 February
● Three LTTE cadres and a Home Guard were killed, and two other Home Guards wounded in a fire fight at a remote boarder village in Amparai. The policemen and Home Guards manning Komattalawa sentry point foiled an LTTE attack, killing three attackers. The Police recovered the three bodies and two T-56 assaulted rifles' Amparai police said, but the LTTE has not commented on the incident.
● Moratuwa Police took into custody 19 Tamils, all of them from areas of NorthEast, in a midnight to dawn cordon and search operation in the Soysapura Flat area in Moratuwa, Colombo. The police said the suspects, aged between 19 and 40, were taken into custody as they failed to produce legal documents to prove their identity and the reasons for the stay in the locality.
● The Colombo Chief Magistrate ordered the release of 18 Tamil civilians arrested on February 9 in a cordon and search operation in Borella and Mirihana, Colombo, after police said there was no evidence to implicate the suspects in any offence. The Sri Lanka government troops and police took the civilians into custody on suspicion and they were detained under the Prevention of Terrorism Act and interrogated.
● A decapitated body washed ashore at Nadukkudah in Mannar. Fishermen in Pesalai witnessed more than four dead bodies, packed inside polypropylene fertilizer bags, floating in the sea. More than 10 persons had been reported missing in Pesalai area in the previous 20 days, according to the Mannar SLHRC. Fishermen from Vankalai, Thalvupadu and Southbar reported bodies floating at sea to the Sri Lankan Police, but were told that they had to report to the SLN as the police would only handle bodies once they reach the shore.
● A journalist working as Vadamaradchi correspondent for two Tamil dailies, Thinakural and Valampuri, went missing after ending his private tuition class. Subramaniam Ramachandran, 37, a father of two, who also runs the private education institute at Arasady, Karaveddy, Vadamaradchi, went missing after he closed his institute and was on his way home on his bicycle. Ramachandran, described as an "energetic correspondent," by the editorial staff of Yarl Thinakural, worked for the two dailies for 5 years since the signing of the Cease Fire Agreement in 2002. He is a native of Thunnalai in Karaveddy, Vadmaradchi.
14 February
● Ten SLA soldiers were injured when more than forty shells fired by the LTTE hit their camp in Meesalai, Jaffna. SLA command did not release details of the attack and casualties. Shells were also directed towards several other key camps in Kodikamam and Meesalai. An elderly pedestrian, C. Kulasekaram, 64, from Allarai North, Kodikamam, was seriously injured and several civilians sustained minor injuries when a shell fell near the main road in Kodikamam during a crowded market.
● Armed men shot dead Somapala Wijepalan in Anpuvallipuram, Trincomalee. No other details about the victim or the motivation for the killing were released.
● The SLA conducted a cordon and search operation in Vankalai, Mannar, following an attack on the sentry point the previous night. The sentry was attacked with small arms by a group of three who travelled in a boat by sea. The SLA said the attackers had fled from the shore, leaving the boat, when they retaliated. Soldiers had recovered two T56 rifles, two hand grenades and five magazines with live bullets from the boat they captured.
● The SLN in Delft, an islet of Jaffna, issued a directive banning fishing and using boats on the Delft Sea between 6:00 p.m. and 6:00 a.m. Ninety percent of the population of Delft depend on fishing for their livelihood, and are seriously affected by the ban. Delft, under the control of SLN and SLN-backed paramilitaries, has until now escaped SLN restrictions on fishing.
● Armed men in a white van, alleged to be members of Karuna Group, abducted five youths from the Central camp in Amparai over two days. The parents of T. Srithas, 17, Thambipillai Sritharan, 18, Tharumarajah Thayaparan, 20, all from Sangapura area, lodged complaints with Central camp police. Parents of the other two abducted youths are hesitating about making complaints as they fear retaliation.
● A special police team from the Criminal Investigation Department arrested three Tamil teachers in Ragala, Nuwara Eliya and took them to Colombo for interrogation. Police said the three were arrested on information from one of the three Sinhala journalists, arrested earlier in Colombo, on charges of having received arms training from the LTTE. Vaithilingam Mahendran of Alkaranoya Barathi Vidyalayam, Suthanthirakesari Sugasenan of Konaipitty Tamil Vidyalayam and Rajaretnam Jeyaseelan of Mahauwa Tamil Vidyalayam, are all said to be members of the New Democratic Party (NDP). The national organizer of the NDP appealed to Sri Lanka's President Mahinda Rajapakse to release the teachers, saying they were innocent. Meanwhile, the police arrested two Sinhalese civilians in Ratnapura in Uva Province also for having connections with three Sinhala journalists.
13 February
● Gunmen shot and killed Ariyaratna Silva, a Dehiwela-Mount Lavinia Municipal Council member of the main opposition UNP, inside his office in Dehiwela, a suburb of Colombo.
● Two youths from Sirupiddy, Valigamam east, Jaffna, fearing threat to their lives from the government armed forces and allied paramilitaries, sought safety at the SLHRC and were placed under the protective custody in Jaffna prison. The parents said that armed persons were searching for their sons at nights following an incident where the bodies of two men abducted from their homes in Sirupiddy were found dumped in Nilaavarai. The parents were scared that their sons' lives were also in danger, and sought safety with the help of the SLHRC.
● Armed men on a motorcycle chased a youth and shot him dead as he was returning from Kodikamam town to Kachchai along the road behind Kodikamam police station in Thenmaradchi, Jaffna. Kasipillai Vasanthakumar, 17, had more than six gunshot wounds on his dead body.
● Gunmen shot dead a man driving his tractor along Navatkuli-Kerativu road, one hundred metres from the Navatkuli SLA camp in Thenmaradchi, Jaffna. Rasathurai Thavanesan, 26, a father of one, from Thachanthopu in Kaithady, had been stopped by his assailants, who spoke to him before opening fire.
● Six troopers were injured in a mortar attack by the LTTE on the Vavunativu STF camp. The STF retaliated but information on LTTE casualties was not released.
● Two family men, one aged 34, from Kalvayal in Chavakacheri in Thenmaradchi, and the other aged 32, from Kokuvil area in Jaffna, fearing threat to their lives from Sri Lanka armed forces and allied paramilitaries sought safety at the SLHRC and were placed under protective custody in Jaffna prison.
● Sri Lanka Police recovered a decomposed male body from a well in Vaharai. The body was bound inside a sack. The SLA has not permitted former residents to resettle in Vaharai after LTTE cadres withdrew from the region and the SLA took control last month. Only the armed forces and allied paramilitaries are currently in the area.
● Karuna group armed paramilitaries in military fatigues waylaid a Colombo bound civilian bus from Kathankudy, Batticaloa, and robbed Rs. 1,500,000 rupees, several national identity cards, 15 hand phones and jewellery from the passengers. The armed robbery took place between Mavadi SLA camp and Murakodanchenai SLA camp, near which there is an office of the Karuna group. The bus had begun its journey from Kathankudy to Colombo with 45 passengers and was waylaid near Sithandy Murugan temple junction in Eravur. Police said that small vans had been robbed at the same place, but this robbery was the biggest.
12 February
● Six Sri SLAF Kfir bombers dropped 18 bombs in LTTE controlled Visvamadu, Mullaithivu, Vanni, near civilian settlements.
● Sri Lanka government security forces conducted a cordon and search operation covering fishing hamlets in Kallaruwa, Pudavaikattu, Pulmoddai and other coastal areas of Kuchchaveli, Trincomalee town.
● Sri Lanka military reports from Colombo claimed that they had destroyed one of the two LTTE boats sailing towards Pulmoddai from Mullaitivu, and taken the other boat into custody. The LTTE did not comment on the claim.
● Two gunmen pretending to be customers entered a meat stall in Chavakacheri Modern public market and shot rapidly with pistols, killing an employee on the spot and seriously injuring another, who later succumbed to his wounds. The victims were identified as Rajendram Tharsan, 22 of Madduvil, Chavakacheri and Sellathamby Selvarupan, 27 of Allary.
● The bodies of two unidentified men were recovered by police at two different locations in Colombo. One body was found at Kettarama bridge area and the other at Galkissa seashore.
● A Jaffna employee of the international humanitarian de-mining organization, Halo Trust, was reported "missing" since Friday. Nagarasa Narenthiran, 27, of Temple road, Nallur went to work as usual to the head office of Halo Trust at Nallur Cross road, Friday morning, his wife told the SLHRC in Jaffna, but never returned home. Eleven Halo Trust workers have been either reported "missing" or killed during the past 6 months.
● Kanapathippillai Kirushnapavan, 35, a family man, who went to see his abandoned house situated near a SLA camp in Thondamanaru in Vadamarachchy, has not returned home. His wife told the SLHRC officials that his motorbike, the house key and some clothes were seen at the entrance to the house.
