Tigers hand over 29 SLA bodies

[TamilNet, Friday, 04 May 2001, 11:01 GMT]
Twenty-nine bodies of the Sri Lanka Army soldiers killed in the Jaffna battle last week were handed over to the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) by the Liberation Tigers Friday, Mr.Thangan, the Head of the political administration of the LTTE handed over the bodies to the local ICRC representative at a meeting held at Kilinochchi at 9 a.m., according to an official statement from the LTTE head quarters in the northern Vanni.

Altogether 93 identifiable bodies of the Sri Lanka Army soldiers have been handed over to the ICRC. A large number of decomposed, unidentifiable bodies of the soldiers killed in the battle were cremated at the battle ground with military honours, according to the statement.

Meanwhile the International Committee of the Red Cross Friday said it handed over the bodies 29 Sri Lanka army soldiers to the military at Piramanaalankulam, the main entry point to the Vanni west of Vavuniya, around 4.25 p.m.

The soldiers were killed in the military offensive launched by Colombo on 24 April in which the SLA sustained more than 2000 casualties.

The Liberation Tigers handed over the bodies of 64 soldiers to the ICRC since the two division strong offensive by the SLA was routed in Jaffna's southern sector after three days of heavy fighting.

Donor agency sources working in the Vanni said that scores of bodies of soldiers were trapped in bunkers and temporary defences in the one kilometre salient that the Sri Lankan army managed to capture in the first phase of the operation. They said the bodies that were handed over today appear to have been retrieved by LTTE troops clearing the areas from which they routed the Sri Lankan army last week.