Toll reaches 50 in Prabha-Karuna stand off

Even as groups declare eight dead, unofficial sources put the death toll at over fifty in the rebel fight, reports PK Balachanddran.

The much expected fratricidal fighting between the LTTE Supremo Velupillai Prabhakaran and the rebel Eastern Commander, Col. Karuna, broke out on Friday along the Verugal river in north Batticaloa.

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Both the groups said that eight cadres had died on each side. But unofficial sources put the death toll at over fifty.

A military source told Hindustan Times that a heavily armed 350-strong force loyal to Prabhakaran infiltrated into Batticalao district in the early hours of Friday and took on the forward defense lines of the rebel Commander Karuna.

The land and sea-borne attack had apparently taken Karuna's troops by surprise and they withdrew from their entrenched positions along the Verugal river which separates the two districts of Trincomalee and Batticaloa.

Both the factions had positioned themselves along the river and were facing each other eye ball to eye ball for about a month now.

The pro-Prabhakaran "Tamilnet" website said that commando units backed by infantry and supported by mortars and artillery, routed Karuna's forces along the river. Sri Lankan army sources said that the intruding forces had penetrated 200 to 300 metres into the Batticaloa side of the river.

According to Tamilnet, about 300 young cadres surrendered without a fight. It further said that the Karuna group also handed over several heavy mortars in their possession to the invading forces led by the Trincomalee Commander Col. Sornam.

Tamilnet further said that a sea borne assault secured the Kathiraveli sea base, 12 kms north of Vaharai, without much of a fight.

Other sources in Batticaloa said that heavy shelling by the invaders had claimed the lives of Pillaiyan, who was in charge of Col. Karuna's Transport Corps, and Ravindran, an ambulance van driver. These deaths occurred on the Valaichenai-Vaharai road north of Batticaloa town.

A van full of civilians was blasted by a landmine on the same road between the villages of Panichenai and Paalchenai. Two persons were injured.

It is also reported a group of invaders led by Bhaskaran attacked one of Karuna's camps deep inside Batticalao and secured the surrender of all the troops holed up there.

Sources in Batticalao said that the Karuna group feared infiltration from Amparai in the south also.

Both the Prabhakaran and Karuna groups have asked the kid fighters on the other side to surrender in return for an amnesty. Most of the fighters are apparently very young boys and girls recruited in the last two years of peace, despite a universal outcry against recruitment of children for armed combat.

According to the pro-Prabhakaran "Tamilnet", the invading formations have already started making arrangements to send the 300 captured kid soldiers back to their parents.

On its party, the Karuna group has condemned Prabhakaran for starting a
"fratricidal" war and said that he has deliberately sent cadres from the East to kill Eastern cadres.

In an appeal made through loudspeakers in Paduvankarai, the Karuna group said that if the Eastern boys now with Prabhakaran surrendered, they would be returned to their parents.

According to army sources in Colombo, the fighting, which began at midnight, ceased after four or five hours and resumed at 1 pm.

The Sri Lankan Armed forces are keeping aloof partly because the fighting is taking place outside their territory in LTTE-held areas, and partly because it is not a violation of the ceasefire agreement of February 22, 2002, which was between the LTTE and the Sri Lankan armed forces and not between the factions of the LTTE.

Furthermore, to be on the safe side, many of Prabhakaran's men had infiltrated in bullock carts in groups of four and five. These small groups had begun ambushing Karuna's men. The heavy guns were moved in after establishing a bridgehead on the Verugal river.

Background to Prabha-Karuna stand off

On March 3, a split between Prabhakaran and Karuna came out into the open, with Karuna raising the banner of revolt and Prabhakaran expelling him from the LTTE and branding him a "traitor" to the Tamil cause.

Karuna had broken away on the issue of "discrimination" against the cadres and the people of the Eastern district of Batticalao and Amparai. Karuna hails from Batticaloa and had been the Eastern Commander of the LTTE for more than a decade.

The two sides had massed forces on the Verugal river border as Prabhakaran appointed senior Col. Sornam as Trincomalee's commander apparently with an intention to invade Batticalao district and crush the rebellion.

However, neither side seemed keen on launching an operation before the
conclusion of the parliamentary elections on April 2. Both sides wanted to show that "their" candidates had the peoples' support and could win.

Terror tactics

But both used terror tactics to intimidate the voters and public officials. Karuna kept Prabhakaran's man, Joseph Pararajasingham, under house arrest and prevented him from campaining. Prabhakaran went a step further and killed Karuna's man, Rajan Sathiamoorthy. His men shot at and wounded Batticaloa's Government Agent (top-most district civil servant and election officer) Mouna Guruswamy, and a university don, Prof.Tiruchelvam.

There were other murders too, as Karuna asked people from the Northern district of Jaffna to leave Batticalao district. Estimates of the number of people who fled varied from 9,000 to 20,000.

Elections

Meanwhile, in the April 2 elections, Karuna's candidates numbering four in Batticalao district and one in Amparai, won. Prabhakaran's candidate, Joseph Pararajasingham was defeated.

The pro-LTTE Tamil party, Ilankai Tamil Arasu Katchi (ITAK), sent 20 MPs to the Sri Lankan parliament, in all. The ITAK MPs, who met in Colombo earlier this week, unanimously endorsed the united and long standing political demands of the Tamils vis-a-vis the Sri Lankan state. The Prabhakaran-Karuna rift was sidestepped. They also agreed to appoint to the National List in parliament, the two persons put up by the Prabhakaran group, namely, Joseph Pararajasingham and M.K.Kanekandran better alias M.K. Eelaventhan.

Some observers view this as a setback for Karuna. But other say that given the threat to the security of his MPs, Karuna himself had asked them to fill in line with the majority view.