SL judiciary blocks massacre victims remembrance in Batticaloa

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 10 September 2014, 22:54 GMT]
The occupying Sri Lankan Police in Batticaloa on Tuesday blocked the 24th annual remembrance event of the victims of the brutal massacre of Chaththuruk-ko’ndaan massacre carried out by the Sri Lanka Army in 1990. Batticaloa District Magistrate Mr NMM Abdulla issued an injunction order prohibiting the remembrance event at the memorial site accepting the SL police version, legal sources in Batticaloa said.

Five infants, 42 children under ten, 85 women and 28 elders were among the 184 Eezham Tamil villagers who were massacred by the occupying Sri Lanka Army on 09 September in 1990 in the Chaththuruk-ko’ndaan SLA camp in the district. Tamil people have been annually observing remembrance event in the memory of the massacre victims since then.

Although two commissions of inquiry appointed to investigate the massacre identified the SL military soldiers and their commanding officer, there has not been any legal proceeding instituted against those responsible for the massacre.

The commissions of inquiry had documented the gruesome massacre in detail, including the brutal murder of 27-year-old Mohanasundari and her 3-month infant, who were chopped to death with manna knives by the SLA soldiers.

Some of the surviving massacre victims were forced to live on hiding as the SLA was searching for them to silence them permanently.

The SL police had approached the Magistrate Court to block the memorial event arguing that there were efforts to pay tribute to LTTE members who perished in the war under the cover of remembering the victims of Chaththurukko’ndaan massacre.

However, the people marked the remembrance with the participation of Tamil National Alliance (TNA) parliamentarians P. Ariyanethiran, S. Yogeswaran and P. Selvarasa, at a different locality.

Chronology: