The Ceylon News

Sri Lankan troops have recovered the birth certificate, horoscope and albums of LTTE supremo Velupillai Prabhakaran in the last rebel bastion of Pudukudiyirippu, which has been captured by the military.

"The troops of the 53 division unearthed the vital documents including the birth certificate, horoscopes and albums of the LTTE leader Vellupillai Prabhakaran and his family yesterday," the state-run Sunday Observer reported today quoting sources.

"Prabhakaran had buried the lot before he fled from his residence in Pudukudiyiruppu east and the troops of 53 and 58 divisions encircled the rebels in a one square kilometre" area, the reoprt said. Subsequently, the one sq km area was captured by the troops.

According to sources, Prabhakaran and LTTE second-in- command Pottu Amman were inside the area but had fled before the troops entered the territory.

Security forces had earlier this week recovered a damaged bullet-proof limousine belonging to Prabhakaran near a luxury air-conditioned bungalow in Puthukudiyiruppu.

Colombo, April 05: Moving closer to "annihilating" the LTTE, Sri Lankan troops captured their last stronghold of Pudukudiriyirippu and pushed the rebels into a narrow 'no-fire zone' packed with civilians after killing at least 420 Tamil Tigers in heavy fighting in the north.

LTTE supremo Velupillai Prabhakaran, second-in-command Pottu Amman and other senior commanders of the guerrillas are believed to be holed up in the 20 sq-km safety zone, the military said today and accused the rebels of using the tens of thousands civilians as "human shields".

The army has captured the entire Pudukudiriyirippu area that was under the control of the Tamil Tigers, who have lost many of their key leaders in the latest fighting, military spokesman Udaya Nanayakkara said. Bodies of 420 rebels killed in intense clashes with advancing troops in the past three days have been recovered from the war zone, he added.

"Prabhakaran is in the 20 sq-km no-fire zone after army captured the remaining one sq-km LTTE area in Pudukudiyirippu. He will be caught dead or alive. It will be easier to detect him amongst the people because of his heavy size," a top Defence Ministry official told a news agency.

Military sources said a number of senior LTTE leaders, including Theepan, Ruben, Nagesh, Gadaphi (a former bodyguard of Prabakaran), Vidusha (head of 'Malathi' female wing), Durga (head of 'Soothiya' female wing) and Kamalini were killed in fighting since last night.

The main objectives of the rally were:

This is incorrect news which was in TamilNet web (see pic), TamilNet is always publishing incorrect news and Its proof that they are trying to make virtual moral.
a) Use all available influence and resources in Australia to pressure the LTTE Tamil tiger terrorists to release Tamil civilians held as “human shield” to protect themselves from the advancing military forces from the Sri Lankan government.

b) Stop the LTTE terrorists from shooting the Tamil civilians who are desperately seeking means of escaping the LTTE grip.

c) Stop LTTE terrorists robbing food, medical supplies and other essentials sent by the Sri Lankan government to the Tamil civilians held captive in the north.

d) Urge the Australian Government not to allow LTTE tiger terrorists to collect funds in Australian soil.

e) Ban LTTE and their front organizations operating in Australia behind bogus names under criminal code.

f) Lay down arms, renounce violence and put an end to the claim for separate state.

Fierce fighting between Sri Lankan troops and Tamil Tiger rebels defending their last remaining territory in the country's war-ravaged north killed 93 rebels on Saturday, the military said.

The military also said it destroyed three rebel boats and recovered a torched bulletproof vehicle belonging to the leader of the Tamil Tiger guerrillas.

Government forces are in what they say is a final push to defeat the rebels — the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam — and end 25 years of civil war.

A string of major victories by the military in recent months, in which the rebels' administrative capital and main bases were captured, has pushed the guerillas into a small strip of coastal land measuring just 8.4 square miles (21 square kilometers) in the northeast.

Military spokesman Brig. Udaya Nanayakkara said separate battles broke out Saturday as soldiers fought to capture the remaining rebel territory.

Soldiers found the bodies of 93 rebels after the battles, he said, without giving details of casualties suffered by government forces.

A military statement earlier Saturday said five vehicles, including one used by rebel leader Velupillai Prabhakaran, were recovered late Friday. It said the rebels torched them as they withdrew.

Navy spokesman Cmdr. Mahesh Karunaratne said a sea battle took place in the middle of the night when 10 rebel boats were intercepted by the navy.

He said the navy destroyed one boat, disabled a second, and that ground forces destroyed two others when they tried to beach under heavy navy fire. The remaining boats fled. Karunaratne did not know how many Sea Tigers, as the rebel navy wing is called, were killed.

He said some navy boats were damaged. The Sri Lanka military does not give casualty figures.

Accounts of the battles cannot be verified because independent journalists are barred from the war zone.

Karunaratne said the rebel boats took off from and returned to a government declared "no-fire" zone, which makes up almost all the war zone. The military says the rebels have set up bases in the zone, which was designated to protect the tens of thousands of civilians trapped by the fighting.

The United Nations and aid and rights groups have expressed grave concerns about the civilians caught in the fighting.

The military says the rebels are holding them as human shields in a desperate attempt to avoid defeat. But the Tigers say the people do not want to leave and have asked for their protection.

The U.N. says an estimated 150,000 to 190,000 people are trapped, resulting in dozens of deaths each day. But the government says more than 23,000 civilians escaped last month and 30,000 to 40,000 still remain.

The Tamil Tiger rebels have fought since 1983 to create an independent homeland for ethnic minority Tamils, who have faced decades of marginalization by successive governments controlled by ethnic Sinhalese. More than 70,000 people have been killed in the violence.

A major sea-borne attack by the Tamil Tiger rebels has been foiled after the navy confronted a cluster of Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) boats, killing 18 rebels onboard off the northeastern coast of Mullaitivu, defence sources said here Saturday.

According to the sources, the pre-dawn sea battle broke out when the navy's Special Boat Squadron (SBS) engaged a flotilla of 10 LTTE boats, which included three explosives-packed suicide boats, heading towards Alampil and Nayaru areas.

"During the sea battle two LTTE boats were destroyed and one more was damaged. The navy conducting the search operation in the area have already recovered at least 11 bodies of the LTTE cadres killed in the pre-dawn clash," a defence official attached to the Media Centre for National Security told IANS Saturday.

He added that two naval sailors were wounded and three naval boats sustained minor damages in the battle that broke out around 1.30 a.m. and lasted for several hours.

The official said that in a separate incident a couple of hours later in the same area, army troops manning the forward defence along the northeastern coastal belt have sunk two other LTTE boats.

"The troops have recovered seven bodies after this incident. Intercepted LTTE communications have revealed that the enemy has suffered heavy casualties," the defence official said.

There was no immediate reaction from the LTTE that has been fighting to carve out a separate state in the island's northeastern provinces over the past quarter century.

Sri Lanka, confident of completely defeating the LTTE militarily, claimed last week that its troops have cornered LTTE into a mere 21-sq km stretch of land, of which 20 sq km are no-fire-zone declared for thousands of civilians trapped in the area.

According to official statistics, the number of civilians fleeing the rebel-held areas defying LTTE orders was on the rise and over 62,000 internally displaced people (IDPs) have already entered the government-held areas since the beginning of 2009.

These IDPs are temporarily housed in welfare centres and villages in the northern Vavuniya, Mannar and Jaffna districts.

Beleaguered LTTE chief Velupillai Prabhakaran and his top commander Pottu Amman were hiding in an area in the last rebel bastion of Pudukudiyirippu but hastily retreated from there just before it was surrounded by Sri Lankan forces, a top military officer said.

"They have hastily retreated from the area once they got the news that troops were going to surround that area," the state run Daily News quoted General Officer Commanding the 58 Division Brigadier Shavendra Silva as saying.

The Army believes the two top rebel leaders would be within the vicinity of the surrounding troops even as the security forces recovered a damaged bullet proof limousine belonging to Prabhakaran as they pushed deeper into the region to capture the remaining rebel pockets.

According to Brigadier Silva, the LTTE is now being directly led by Pottu Amman in confrontation with the advancing Sri Lankan forces.

Earlier reports said Prabhakaran and his son Charles Anthony are believed to be hiding in deep bunkers in the rebel-held Pudukudiyyirippu area and come out occasionally to tell the civilians not to leave their homes.

Anthony subsequently got injured in the attacks by the security forces and is now under treatment, the Army claimed.

LTTE commander-turned-politician V Muralidaran alias Karuna Amman believes Prabhakaran cannot escape to any other country as the concerned authorities would not permit him.

Karuna, who split from the LTTE in 2004 following differences with Prabhakaran and formed the Tamil Makkal Vidhuthalai Pullikal, today said he felt LTTE chief will be arrested if he escapes to India.

Eelam People's Democratic Front leader Douglas Devananda, who has escaped several assassination attempts by the LTTE, said Prabhakaran has been almost cornered.

"Prabhakaran has already tried shifting from one bunker to another or from one hiding place to the next in Wanni. But he cannot escape from the country," Devananda said.

Meanwhile, Prabhakaran and Charles, who is believed to be the head of the Air Tigers, were spotted in the No Fire Zone in Pudukudiyyirippu in non-military attire recently and the duo come out occasionally to mix with civilians.

The LTTE leader has been seen with his son Charles Anthony Seelan in public, the Defence Ministry said quoting sources.

The Army sources, quoting Tamil civilians who have escaped the area, said both of them have from time to time have come out from the bunkers and explained to the non-cadres of the LTTE the importance of rising up against the government forces.

The LTTE chief and his son are always surrounded by heavily armed special bodyguards, the Army said.

It said Prabhakaran will try not to leave the Sri Lankan shores right now as he would rather prefer to create a humanitarian crisis into his favour by harming the civilians and imposing a ceasefire that would benefit him.

The defence ministry quoted terrorism expert Rohan Gunaratne as saying that Prabhakaran can perhaps manage to escape from Sri Lanka.

But he will become extremely vulnerable if he leaves Sri Lanka because he is in the Interpol's red notice and he is wanted by most governments in the world, Gunaratne said.

"Prabhakaran is a proclaimed offender in the Rajiv Gandhi assassination case. So, certainly he will not survive for more than a year. If he leaves Sri Lanka, he will be killed," the expert said.