COLOMBO, Sept. 7; Reuter: Sri Lanka’s biggest Tamiol rebel group demonstrated on Monday against Indian peace- keeping troops, saying they favored rival guerrilla organizations. Travellers from the northern city of Jaffna said shops there closed and civilians stayed indoors as thousands of Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) fighters protested outside about 10 Indian military camps.
“Have you come to help us or anger us?” the travelers quoted the LTTE men as shouting at the Indians.
The LTTE, in a statement issued in India on Sunday, said Indian soldiers were colluding with rival guerrillas whom they accused of killings, looting and car thefts. More than 7,000 Indian soldiers have been posted to northern and eastern Sri Lanka to enforce a July peace accord which ended four years of fighting between Colombo and the Tamil separatists, in the northern city of Vavuniya, members of the People’s Liberation Organization of Tamil Eelam group killed an LTTE fighter on Monday residents said. The killing raised to eight the number of dead in three days of fighting between rival rebel groups.
The LTTE has killed many members of rival groups in the last two years. It’s rendered its weapons under the peace accord reluctantly, fearing revenge. Sri Lankan officials said the fighting was hampering progress of the peace plan under which northern and eastern areas, regarded by Tamils as their heart- land, are to be given autonomy by the Sinhalese dominated government.
Article extracted from this publication >> September 11, 1987
