LTTE leader pays homage to Thileepan, Sankar

[TamilNet, Friday, 26 September 2008, 12:22 GMT]
Velupillai Pirapaharan, the leader of the Liberation Tigers of Tamileelam (LTTE) on Friday paid homage to Lt. Col. Thileepan, a political leader of the LTTE, who fasted unto death in 1987 and Col. Sankar, a senior commander and the founder of the Tamileelam Air Force (TAF) also known as Air Tigers. Col. Sankar was assassinated by the Sri Lanka Army on September 26 in 2001 when the LTTE was engaged in peace process with the Norwegian facilitators.



Col. Sankar, a close associate of the LTTE leader, together with the then LTTE Political Head S.P. Thamilchelvan took part in the meeting between Mr. Pirapaharan and Mr. Erik Solheim in October 2000. Sankar was slain when LTTE was actively engaged in the peace process and Mr. Thamilchelvan was assassinated in a targeted Sri Lanka Air Force bombardment three months before Colombo withdrew from the Norwegian brokered CFA.

Lt.Col.Thileepan (Rasaiah Parthipan), fasted unto death in a twelve days' campaign putting forward five demands to the Indian government to meet the aspirations of the Tamil people, soon after the signing of the Indo-Sri Lankan agreement in 1987 when the Indian army was in occupation of Jaffna and most parts of the northeast.

Lt. Col. Thileepan began his fasting, without food and water, on 15 September 1987 in front of the Nalloor Kandasamy temple and he passed away on September 26, 1987.