Recruitment fear
ACCORDING to reports, parents in Batticaloa District are worried over the intense recruitment drive of the LTTE. Some are reluctant to allow children to school and others are making arrangements to send them abroad. Posters calling on Tamil youths to join the Tigers appeared in Batticaloa town in early September. The LTTE have also begun a campaign to recruit ‘one person from each household’. Following complaints, a citizens delegation led by Catholic Bishop Kingsley Swampillai met LTTE’s deputy leader Karikalan on 25 September in LTTE-controlled Paduvankarai area. Mr Karikalan told the delegation that the LTTE had only requested one person from each household for military service and there was no forcible recruitment. He said that the LTTE will not be able to maintain the discipline and the mental strength needed for a liberation organisation with cadre recruited by force. Mr Karikalan claimed that some parents had handed over their children to Parent Committees formed in villages. But he admitted that some families had fled to other areas in Batticaloa.In an appeal to the LTTE, Amnesty International says whether the recruitment is forced or not, children have no role to play in war and children must be returned to their families. Many families were coerced with threats into letting their children to be recruited and other families who refused were forced to leave their homes. Amnesty further says children as young as 14 have been recruited. In May 1998, the LTTE pledged to the UN that they would not use children under the age of 18 in combat and would not recruit any one under 17. Amnesty also accused Tamil group PLOTE of recruiting children as young as 12. PLOTE operates under the direct command and control of the Sri Lankan security forces.
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