It happened in Mullivaikal, a village squeezed onto a narrow spit of sand between the Nandikadal lagoon and the Indian Ocean on the island’s northeastern coast, a place declared a civilian “safe zone” by the government. Having lost a son and her husband – both members of the Tigers – to the fighting and with another son in detention, Mathi is searching desperately for her remaining son who went missing in the final stages of the conflict. Arulananthan is convinced Ayengaran is still alive but the search and the uncertainty has exhausted him, and his family. He’s alerted the ICRC and the Human Rights Commission, visited known detention centres, army camps and police stations, noting diligently the details of every meeting in a small Red Cross notebook.
But his eldest son, Ayengaran, who was taken by the Tigers in 2002, is missing and Arulananthan’s search for him has yielded little but a growing record of his fruitless search. He’s been displaced numerous times in the course of the Sri Lankan conflict and now lives with his wife, daughter and two sons in a rented house in Jaffna. Few of those interviewed for this story wanted to reveal their identities and would meet only at a “safe” house. Military approval is required for large gatherings, and soldiers will often enquire about smaller meetings. There are numerous bases along the A9 road north to Jaffna and smaller camps spread among civilian villages across the Vanni. With a continuous military presence in the former conflict zone, few are prepared to risk association with former LTTE members, and LTTE families don’t advertise their past.
Mano occasionally works in a shop but relies mainly on his family for support. Although some former LTTE members have found good jobs in government-run reconstruction projects, many find it hard to get regular work. The rehabilitation programme includes psychological counselling as well as skills training. Mano spent nearly a year in a government-run rehabilitation camp and has been living with his family in the northern town of Vavuniya since his release in April 2010. “A sense of impunity and that the worst can happen is still prevalent,” said Jehan Perera, Executive Director of the National Peace Council in the Sri Lankan capital, Colombo. More than two-thirds have now been released, but amid a pervasive military presence many struggle to resume a normal life. Some gave themselves up, but no detainees have access to lawyers and few are charged, their families left to find out for themselves the location of their loved ones. More than 11,000 people were detained by the Sri Lankan authorities at the end of the war on suspicion of being members of the Tamil Tigers, who fought a 26-year battle for an independent Tamil homeland. “Then I heard voices and, 200m away, saw soldiers advancing. I was just lying there in the sun,” he said as he recalled the final days of the fighting between the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) and the Sri Lankan military. “There wasn’t anybody there, not a drop of water. Alone, he languished on the sand for six days, surrounded by the bodies of his friends and the ruins of war. But an elderly woman nearby rushed to give him water and he survived.
Seriously injured in a shell attack, his Tamil Tiger comrades dead, Mano (pseudonym) tried to end his own life by biting on the cyanide pill that, like all hardened fighters, he wore around his neck. Sri Lankan soldiers celebrate the anniversary of the end of the civil war – but many suspected Tamil fighters still remain in custody The civil war is over in Sri Lanka, but many men suspected of being Tamil Tiger fighters continue to be detained.
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