An analysis of the violent attacks involving the Liberation
Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) of Sri Lanka clearly brings out a
pattern, be it in eliminating Tamil political leaders, militant opponents,
Sri Lankan leaders or security personnel. It is seen that whenever a strong
challenger from any of the above categories appears on the scene, he or she
is targeted by the Tigers.
At a time when they were just one among the several Tamil
militant groups fighting the Sri Lankan government, their ambition to be
recognized as the sole representative of the Sri Lankan Tamils led them to
begin a ruthless fratricidal war against the leaders and members of the
EPRLF, the TELO and the PLOTE in the mid eighties. The justification for
this was that these rival groups were 'quislings' of the Indian agencies
and /or petty criminals who would sell the ideal of Tamil Eelam for their
petty gains and could therefore not be trusted. Rival militant Tamil leaders
killed by the LTTE include Sri Sabarattinam, Padmanabha and Uma Maheswaran.
The Tigers have made several attempts to target Douglas Devananda, leader
of the EPDP and a minister in the present government. Similarly Tamil
political leader Appapillai Amirthalingam, one time mentor of LTTE supremo
Prabhakaran, was also brutally murdered in Colombo by LTTE cadres for opposing the
LTTE. Lakhsman Kadirgamar, the high profile foreign Minister of Sri Lanka,
had done great damage to the LTTE's cause through sauve and relentless
diplomacy against the Tigers. For the Tigers, he was a Tamil 'traitor' and
was duly targeted.
Nothing would stop the Tiger leader from eliminating these
rivals, for he feared that a rival power center would be an obstacle in his
scheme to get Eelam. Prabhakaran is on record stating that he was told by
his advisers not to fight with India when the IPKF was sent
there, but he decided to go ahead and fight for he was unwilling to
compromise the aim to get Eelam. To him, the question was not whether the
opponent was more powerful, the question was whether they had the will to
stand and fight for their 'cause'.
In this quest, the LTTE targeted strong political and
security leaders who came on the scene in Sri Lanka and who took a tough
stand on this issue. The first in this line of political leaders was Ranjan Wijeratne, Sri Lanka's Defense Minister,
who was killed in an explosion in March 1991, about two months before the
LTTE assassinated Rajiv Gandhi. Wijeratne had vowed to finish the Tigers.
Lalith Athulath Mudali was yet another Sri Lankan leader who
was targeted by the LTTE. He had also taken a hard line in the conflict
against the Tigers. Similarly Presidential candidate, Gamini Dissanayake
was also assassinated by suspected Tiger killers. President Premadasa was
assassinated by the Tigers even though he had at one time entered into a
dialogue with the LTTE. For the LTTE, the dialogue with Premadas was only a
tactic in their strategy to get rid of the IPKF and they succeeded in this.
The IPKF left on 24 March 1990, and the LTTE's Eelam War II commenced on 10
June.
Chandrika Kumaratunga also tried negotiating with the Tigers
when she first assumed power. For the Tigers, it seems, dialogue with Colombo is only a
step in their scheme to get Eelam. Fruitless dialogues can always later be
displayed as proof of their desire for a peaceful resolution of the ethnic
problem. When Kumaratunga finally decided to go to war, the Tigers almost
succeeded in assassinating her through a suicide attack.
Among senior Sri Lankan security leaders Gen Denzil
Kobbekaduwa was the most respected. Renowned for his operations against the
Tigers and breaking the Tigers' siege of the Elephant pass in 1991, he was
assassinated through an IED. Major General Vijaya Wimalaratne and Rear
Admiral Mohan Jayamaha were also killed along with General Kobbekadwa in
the mine explosion.
Admiral Clancy Fernando was another high profile target that
the Tigers assassinated through a suicide attack. General Fonseka, also
known for his tough and no-nonsense approach was targeted by the LTTE and
was fortunate to survive a suicide attack by the Tigers this year.
All suicide missions of the Tigers were launched by Pottu
Omman's Black Tigers, and were intended to bring them strategic gains.
Cases involving the Black Tigers could not be prosecuted for want of
legally admissible evidence. The Tigers were therefore able to present
themselves before the West, with support from their sympathizers, as
freedom fighters having nothing to do with terrorism. It was only after the
assassination of Rajiv Gandhi and the path breaking investigations of the
Special Investigation Team of the Central Bureau of Investigations, that
the Tigers could be prosecuted in a court of law and brought to book
through due process of law. India
proscribed the organization in May 1992, and today quite a number of
countries have followed suit. Such action has not however deterred the
Tigers from doing what they are known to do best - murder and mayhem, and
continue to target strong rivals through suicide operations.
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