The Hindu : LTTE accuses navy of killing fishermen

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Sunday, May 05, 2002

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International

LTTE accuses navy of killing fishermen

By Nirupama Subramanian

COLOMBO MAY 4. The LTTE has accused the Sri Lankan Navy of firing on fishing vessels and killing several fishermen in an incident off the Batticaloa coast earlier this week.Two of those who survived the attack testified before the Sri Lanka Monitoring Mission on Friday. TamilNet, the pro-LTTE website, gave names of two of the fishermen believed to have been killed in the attack, but said details of the rest of the casualties were not known. It said there were 36 fishermen in all in 12 boats.The Defence Ministry's version of the May 1 incident was that the boats belonged to the Tigers and were transporting munitions to Vakkarai, an LTTE-controlled area in Batticaloa. The Navy said it had seen a third boat on the Vakkarai coast. The ceasefire monitors who visited the scene the next day were shown boxes of ammunition found by the Navy as evidence that the boats were transporting lethal cargo. It was also pointed out that the boats could not have exploded had they not been carrying incendiary materials. However, the two survivors said they were regular fishers in those waters and that on that particular day, the Navy had started firing on their boats.Of the 36 fishermen, the website reported 16 were Sinhalese, 18 were Muslims and two were Tamils.

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