LTTE leader participates in Heroes commemoration event

[TamilNet, Sunday, 26 November 2006, 08:22 GMT]
Leader of Liberation Tigers, Velupillai Pirapaharan, took part in a commemoration event held in Vanni Saturday when the three-day long 'Tamil National Heroes Day' remembrance events were inaugurated. From 27 November 1982, when the first LTTE fighter Lt.Sanker was killed, until 20 November 2006, a total of 18,742 fighters have died, all of whom have been declared War Heroes by the LTTE. 818 LTTE fighters, 568 men and 250 women fighters of the LTTE, have been killed in a largely defensive war faced by the Tigers in 2006. The list also includes members of Eelam Revolutionary Organization of Students (EROS) and selected members of other organisations.

The LTTE has released photos of Mr. Pirapaharan attending a Heroes Day event at a location in Vanni where he paid homage to Lt. Sankar and the senior commanders who have been killed during the 24 years since 1982.

The Tiger movement, formed in 1972 as Tamil New Tigers, and renamed as LTTE in 1976, has fought four wars, each after a failed negotiation process.



The Heroes Day event is being commemorated in regionally across the Northeast. Streets are decorated with red and yellow flags, ceremonial archs are erected across key roads, and Heroes cemeteries are renovated, residents said.



Small huts were erected along roadsides where garlanded portraits of the cadres who died in the wars are kept to pay homage.

The Heroes Day events were inaugurated in Kilinochchi at LTTE Political Head Quarters where brother of late Lt. Col. Thuyavan lit the common flame. S. P. Thamilchelvan, the Political Head of LTTE, hoisted the Tamil Eelam national flag at 8:00 a.m. Saturday.

Arasanna, the director of the Thuyavan College of Political Science delivered the memorial speech.

LTTE cadres, parents, and relatives of cadres who were killed in the Tamil struggle lit flames of sacrifice for the portraits and offered flowers.




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