Air strikes

VANNI MP Selvam Adaikalanathan says Sri Lankan Airforce attacks in the north-east have intensified since the LTTE assault on the international airport at Katunayake on 24 July. The air raids are severely affecting the civilian population. A large number of people have been killed in Airforce bombing of the north-east regions since the 1990s. When the Airforce killed 15 refugees in the Vanni in September 1999, Amnesty International expressed concern and informed the government that care must be exercised in selecting and vetting targets, choosing the timing and the manner of carrying out attacks. Amnesty demanded to receive details of the rules of engagement and other instructions given to pilots to assess whether these comply with the rules of humanitarian law. Since then many more civilians have died in air strikes. In a bombing raid on 13 August in LTTE-controlled Kilinochchi in northern Vanni, student and Visvamadu resident Tharmakulasingham Jegathees was killed and a woman was seriously wounded. Several houses were damaged.

In August, the Airforce continued to bomb Thoppigala jungles in Batticaloa District targeting LTTE camps. But attacks have been indiscriminate. In a cable message in mid-August to President Chandrika, Batticaloa NGO consortium secretary Kathir Parathithasan said that civilian lives are in danger. Bombing raids on Pendukalchenai in mid-August damaged houses and killed farm animals. On 17 August, Israeli-made Kfir planes bombed paddy (rice) fields at Tharavi in Unnichchai area.

Mr Adaikalanathan says that the air attacks are intended to demonstrate to the Tigers and the international community that the Airforce has not been weakened, rather than in furtherance of any military strategy.

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