Sri Lanka police constable commits suicide in Jaffna

[TamilNet, Sunday, 28 December 2003, 19:57 GMT]
Mr.S.M.Premaretna, a constable of the Sri Lanka Police Saturday night committed suicide by shooting himself while staying in barracks located at Nedunthivu in Jaffna district. His body was handed at the Jaffna teaching hospital Sunday morning, police said.

Twenty-eight year-old deceased was a native of Kurunagala district in the northwestern province and a father of two children, police said.

Fellow police personnel staying in the Nedunthivu police barracks heard gunshots from the deceased's room Saturday night. When they rushed to the room they saw the deceased lying on the floor with bleeding gunshot injuries. The deceased succumbed to injuries despite immediate medical attention provided by the Sri Lanka Navy, which has its detachment near the police station, police said.

The Sri Lanka Police opened a police station in Nedunthivu to provide security to the cadres of the para military Eelam Peoples Democratic Party (EPDP), after the signing of the Memorandum of Understanding by the government and the LTTE, civil sources said.