The war was waged for over a quarter of a century, with an estimated 70,000 killed by 2007. [1] [2] [3] Immediately following the end of war, on 20 May 2009, the UN estimated a total of 80,000–100,000 deaths. [4] [5] However, in 2011, referring to the final phase of the war in 2009, the Report of the Secretary-General's Panel of Experts on Accountability in Sri Lanka stated, "A number of credible sources have estimated that there could have been as many as 40,000 civilian deaths." [6] The large majority of these civilian deaths in the final phase of the war were said to have been caused by indiscriminate shelling of a formerly designated 'No Fire Zone' by the Sri Lankan Armed Forces. [7] [8]
The "Tamil Centre for Human Rights" recorded that from 1983 to 2004, 54,053 Tamil civilians were killed during the war and another 25,266 were made to disappeared but never found again. [9] According to ITJP (International Truth and Justice Project, which was established 2013 to promote justice and accountability in Sri Lanka and headed by Yasmin Sooka), 169,796 civilians disappeared between January to May 2009 in the Mullaitivu and Kilinochchi districts. [10] Another organization called NESOHR published that from the beginning of the war to the 2002 ceasefire, 4000 to 5000 Tamil civilians were killed in large scale massacres, with a total civilian death of around 40,000. [11] Multiple media sources also quoted an estimated 70,000 killed by 2007. [1] [2] [3]
Civilian casualties that occurred on 2009 is of major controversy, as there were no organizations to record the events during the final months of the war. The Sri Lankan government claimed that 9,000 people were killed in the final months of the war, but it did not differentiate between LTTE cadres and civilians. [12] The UN, based on credible witness evidence from aid agencies and civilians evacuated from the Safe Zone by sea, estimated that 6,500 civilians were killed and another 14,000 injured between mid-January 2009, when the Safe Zone was first declared, and mid-April 2009. [13] [14] There are no official casualty figures after this period but estimates of the death toll for the final four months of the civil war (mid-January to mid-May) range from 15,000 to 75,000, most of the deaths being a result of government shelling. [15] [16] [17] A US State Department report has suggested that the actual casualty figures were probably much higher than the UN's estimates and that significant numbers of casualties weren't recorded. [18] A former UN official has claimed that up to 40,000 civilians may have been killed in the final stages of the civil war. [19] Several human rights groups have even claimed that the death toll in the last months of the war could be 70,000.
The Sri Lankan government has denied all claims of causing mass casualties against Tamils, arguing that it was "taking care not to harm civilians". Instead, it has blamed the LTTE for the high casualty numbers, stating that they used the civilians as human shields. [20] According to the UN Panel Report, LTTE used civilians as hostages and the LTTE's refusal to allow civilians leave the area added significantly to the total death toll in the conflict. The UN Panel Report further states that LTTE instituted a policy of shooting civilians who attempted to escape the conflict zone, significantly adding to the death toll in the final stages of the war. [7] Both the Sri Lankan government and the LTTE have been accused by the U.N for war crimes during the last phase of the war.
While the majority of civilian deaths were that of the Tamil minority, the war also took many Sinhalese and Muslim lives. The LTTE were estimated to be responsible for 3,700 to 4,100 civilian deaths in over 200 separate attacks. [21] However, this figure only accounts for those killed in open attacks. Rajan Hoole, a human rights activist claims that various dissident sources allege that the number of Tamil dissenters and prisoners from rival armed groups clandestinely killed by the LTTE in detention or otherwise ranges from 8,000 - 20,000, [22] although he later stated that western agencies dismissed his figures as exaggeration. [23] In response to the killings of Sinhalese and Muslims, LTTE leader Prabhakaran denied allegations of killing civilians, claiming to condemn such acts of violence; and claimed that LTTE had instead attacked armed home guards who were "death-squads let loose on Tamil civilians" and Sinhalese settlers who were "brought to the Tamil areas to forcibly occupy the land." Amnesty International has noted that in several massacres of Sinhalese and Muslims, the victims had not been home guards or armed settlers. [24] Human Rights Watch has noted that LTTE had engaged in "ethnic cleansing" of Sinhalese and Muslim villagers. [25]
Around 27,000 LTTE cadres, 28,708 Sri Lankan military personnel, [26] 1000+ Sri Lankan police, 1,165 Indian soldiers were said to have died in the conflict. Another 5,000 Sri Lankan military members went missing in action. [27] In 2008, the LTTE revealed that "22,390 fighters who have lost their lives in the armed struggle since 27 November 1982". [28] Minister of Defence Gotabhaya Rajapaksa said on an interview with state television that 23,790 Sri Lankan military personnel were killed since 1981 (it was not specified if police or other non armed forces personnel were included in this particular figure). The Uppsala Conflict Data Program, a university-based data collection program considered to be "one of the most accurate and well-used data-sources on global armed conflicts" [29] provides free data to the public and has divided Sri Lanka's conflicts into groups based on the actors involved. It collectively reported that between 1990 and 2009 between 59,193 and 75,601 [30] people were killed in Sri Lanka during various three types of organized armed conflict: "State-based" conflicts, those that involved the Government of Sri Lanka against rebel groups(LTTE and the JVP), "Non-state" conflicts, those conflicts that did not involve the government of Sri Lanka (e.g. LTTE vs. LTTE-Karuna Faction, and LTTE vs. PLOTE), as well as "One-sided" violence, that involved deliberate attacks against civilians perpetrated by the Government of Sri Lanka. [31]
Minister of Defence Gotabhaya Rajapaksa said on an interview with state television that 23,790 Sri Lankan military personnel were killed since 1981 (it was not specified if police or other non armed forces personnel were included in this particular figure).
From the August 2006 recapture of the Mavil Aru reservoir until the formal declaration of the cessation of hostilities (on 18 May), 6261 Sri Lankan soldiers were killed and 29,551 were wounded. [32]
The Sri Lankan military estimates that up to 22,000 Tamil Tiger rebels were killed in the last three years of the conflict. [33]
The final five months of the civil war saw the heaviest civilian casualties. The UN, based on credible witness evidence from aid agencies and civilians evacuated from the Safe Zone by sea, estimated that 6,500 civilians were killed and another 14,000 injured between mid-January 2009, when the Safe Zone was first declared, and mid-April 2009. [13] [14] There are no official casualty figures after this period but estimates of the death toll for the final four months of the civil war (mid-January to mid-May) range from 15,000 to 20,000. [15] [16] A US State Department report has suggested that the actual casualty figures were probably much higher than the UN's estimates and that significant numbers of casualties weren't recorded. [18] A former UN official has claimed that up to 40,000 civilians may have been killed in the final stages of the civil war. [19]
The Tamil Center for Human Rights claims 12,104 Tamil women had been raped between 1983 and 2004 throughout the war. [34]
War or Phase | Date | Deaths | Total dead | Wounded | Total wounded | Sources/ notes | ||||||||||||||||
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
combat | other | total | combat | other | total | |||||||||||||||||
C | SF | TT | C | SF | TT | C | SF | TT | C | SF | TT | C | SF | TT | C | SF | TT | |||||
Eelam War I | 1983 | 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | 11 | 12 | 13 | 14 | 15 | 16 | 17 | 18 | |||
1984 | ||||||||||||||||||||||
1985 | ||||||||||||||||||||||
1986 | ||||||||||||||||||||||
Eelam War I/Indian intervention | 1987 | |||||||||||||||||||||
1988 | ||||||||||||||||||||||
1989 | ||||||||||||||||||||||
Indian intervention /Eelam War II | 1990 | |||||||||||||||||||||
1991 | ||||||||||||||||||||||
1992 | ||||||||||||||||||||||
1993 | ||||||||||||||||||||||
1994 | ||||||||||||||||||||||
Eelam War II/Eelam War III | 1995 | |||||||||||||||||||||
1996 | ||||||||||||||||||||||
1997 | ||||||||||||||||||||||
1998 | ||||||||||||||||||||||
1999 | ||||||||||||||||||||||
2000 | 162 | 784 | 2,845 | [35] | ||||||||||||||||||
2001 | 89 | 412 | 1,321 | [35] | ||||||||||||||||||
2002 Ceasefire | 2002 | 14 | 1 | 0 | [35] | |||||||||||||||||
2003 | 31 | 2 | 26 | [35] | ||||||||||||||||||
2004 | 33 | 7 | 69 | [35] | ||||||||||||||||||
2005 | 153 | 90 | 87 | [35] | ||||||||||||||||||
2002 Ceasefire/Eelam War IV | 2006 | 981 | 826 | 2,319 | [35] | |||||||||||||||||
2007 | 525 | 499 | 3,345 | [35] | ||||||||||||||||||
2008 | 404 | 1,314 | 9,426 | [35] | ||||||||||||||||||
2009 | 11,108 | 1,312 | 2,941 | [35] | ||||||||||||||||||
Total | ≈26 years | 13,500 | 5,247 | 22,379 | 23,790 | 27,639 | [35] |
Year | Civilians | Security Force | LTTE | Total |
---|---|---|---|---|
1983 | 400 - 6,571 | 13 | 53 - 100 | ~3,113[ citation needed ] |
1984 | 872 -1,075 | |||
1985 | 777 - 1,023 | |||
1986 | 889 - 1,067 | |||
1987 | 3,714 - 5,017 | |||
Total | 6,652 - 14,753 | |||
Notes: higher estimates including disappeared peoples as presumed dead | ||||
Source: [34] |
Year | Civilians | Security Force | IPKF | LTTE | Total |
---|---|---|---|---|---|
1987 | 3,714 - 5,017 | ||||
1988 | 2,929 - 4,182 | ||||
1989 | 1,475 - 3,003 | ||||
1990 | 5,798 - 15,179 | ||||
Total | 13,916 - 27,381 | 26 | 1,000+ | 1,300 | |
Notes: higher estimates including disappeared peoples as presumed dead | |||||
Source: [34] |
Year | Civilians | Security Force | LTTE | Total |
---|---|---|---|---|
1990 | 5,798 - 15,179 | |||
1991 | 4,360 - 6,207 | |||
1992 | 3,769 - 5,549 | |||
1993 | 2,983 - 3,659 | |||
1994 | 2,470 - 3,006 | |||
1995 | 3,481 - 4,415 | |||
Total | 22,861 - 38,015 | |||
Notes: higher estimates including disappeared peoples as presumed dead | ||||
Source: [34] |
Year | Civilians | Security Force | LTTE | Total |
---|---|---|---|---|
1995 | 3,481 - 4,415 | |||
1996 | 4,074 - 5,752 | |||
1997 | 4,056 - 5,519 | |||
1998 | 2,161 - 3,499 | |||
1999 | 1,661 - 1,838 | |||
2000* | 162 - 1,707 | 784 | 2,845 | 3,791 |
2001 | 89 - 93 | 412 | 1,321 | 1,822 |
Total | 15,684 - 22,823 | 1,196 | 4,166 | 5,613 |
Notes:*Data from 1 March 2000 higher estimates including disappeared peoples as presumed dead | ||||
Source: [34] [36] |
Year | Civilians | Security Force | LTTE | Total |
---|---|---|---|---|
2002 | 14 - 32 | 1 | 0 | 15 |
2003 | 31 -50 | 2 | 26 | 59 |
2004 | 33 - 91 | 7 | 69 | 109 |
2005 | 153 | 90 | 87 | 330 |
Total | 231 - 326 | 100 | 182 | 513 |
Notes:Includes only Casualties between 2002 and 2005 most of which is the Cease Fire. higher estimates including disappeared peoples as presumed dead | ||||
Source: [34] [36] |
Year | Civilians | Security Force | LTTE | Total |
---|---|---|---|---|
2006 | 981 | 826 | 2,319 | 4,126 |
2007 | 525 | 499 | 3,345 | 4,369 |
2008 | 404 | 1,314 | 9,426 | 11,144 |
2009* | 9,257 - 140,000 [37] [38] | 1,312 | 2,515 | 13,084 - 143,827 |
Total | 11,167 - 141,910 | 3,954 | 17,425 | 32,723 - 163,466 |
Notes:*Data till April 20, 2009 | ||||
Source: [36] [39] [19] [34] [40] |
Year | Civilians | Security Force | LTTE | Total |
---|---|---|---|---|
Eelam War I | ||||
1983 | 400 - 6,571 | 13 | 53 - 100 | ~3,113[ citation needed ] |
1984 | 872 -1,075 | |||
1985 | 777 - 1,023 | |||
1986 | 889 - 1,067 | |||
1987 | 3,714 - 5,017 | |||
Indian intervention | ||||
1988 | 2,929 - 4,182 | |||
1989 | 1,475 - 3,003 | |||
Eelam War II | ||||
1990 | 5,798 - 15,179 | |||
1991 | 4,360 - 6,207 | |||
1992 | 3,769 - 5,549 | |||
1993 | 2,983 - 3,659 | |||
1994 | 2,470 - 3,006 | |||
Eelam War III | ||||
1995 | 3,481 - 4,415 | |||
1996 | 4,074 - 5,752 | |||
1997 | 4,056 - 5,519 | |||
1998 | 2,161 - 3,499 | |||
1999 | 1,661 - 1,838 | |||
2000 | 162 - 1,707 | 784 | 2,845 | 3,791 |
2001 | 89 - 93 | 412 | 1,321 | 1,822 |
Cease Fire Period | ||||
2002 | 14 - 32 | 1 | 0 | 15 |
2003 | 31 -50 | 2 | 26 | 59 |
2004 | 33 - 91 | 7 | 69 | 109 |
2005 | 153 | 90 | 87 | 330 |
Eelam War IV | ||||
2006 | 981 | 826 | 2,319 | 4,126 |
2007 | 525 | 499 | 3,345 | 4,369 |
2008 | 404 | 1,314 | 9,426 | 11,144 |
2009* | 9,257 - 40,000 ________________________ (? 71,173 ? - accounting for 75,000 [40] figure) | 1,312 ________________________ (? 32,485 - 63,228 ? - accounting for 75,000 [40] figure) | 2,515 ________________________ (Tamil Tigers didn't have (They had 30,000 fighters) enough fighters to account for the 75,000 figure.) | 13,084 - 75,000 [40] |
Total | 55,608 - 125,614 ________________________ (156,787 accounting for 75,000 [40] figure in 2009) | 5,247 - 67,163 (accounting for 75,000 [40] figure in 2009) | 21,953 | 38,849 - 152,814 ________________________ (183,987 - 214,730 accounting for 75,000 [40] figure in 2009) |
Notes:*Data till May 11, 2009, **Data from March 1, 2000, higher estimates including disappeared peoples as presumed dead | ||||
Source: [36] [39] [19] [40] |
The above table is incomplete. Revisions and sourced additions are welcome.
The Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam was a Tamil militant organization, that was based in the northern and eastern Sri Lanka. The LTTE fought to create an independent Tamil state called Tamil Eelam in the northeast of the island in response to violent persecution and discriminatory policies against Sri Lankan Tamils by the Sinhalese-dominated Sri Lankan Government.
The Sri Lankan civil war was a civil war fought in Sri Lanka from 1983 to 2009. Beginning on 23 July 1983, it was an intermittent insurgency against the government by the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam led by Velupillai Prabhakaran. The LTTE fought to create an independent Tamil state called Tamil Eelam in the north-east of the island, due to the continuous discrimination and violent persecution against Sri Lankan Tamils by the Sinhalese-dominated Sri Lanka government.
Sri Lankan Tamil militant groups rose to prominence in the 1970s to fight the state of Sri Lanka in order to create an independent Tamil Eelam in the north of Sri Lanka. They rose in response to the perception among minority Sri Lankan Tamils that the state was preferring the majority Sinhalese for educational opportunities and government jobs. By the end of 1987, the militants had fought not only the Sri Lankan security forces but also the Indian Peace Keeping Force. They also fought among each other briefly, with the main Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) rebel group dominating the others. The militants represented inter-generational tensions, as well as the caste and ideological differences. Except for the LTTE, many of the remaining organizations have morphed into minor political parties within the Tamil National Alliance, or as standalone political parties. Some Tamil militant groups also functioned as paramilitaries within the Sri Lankan military against separatist militants.
The Sri Lankan state has been accused of state terrorism against the Tamil minority as well as the Sinhalese majority, during the two Marxist–Leninist insurrections. The Sri Lankan government and the Sri Lankan Armed Forces have been charged with massacres, indiscriminate shelling and bombing, extrajudicial killings, rape, torture, disappearance, arbitrary detention, forced displacement and economic blockade. According to Amnesty International, state terror was institutionalized into Sri Lanka's laws, government and society.
The Kent and Dollar Farm massacres were the first massacres of Sinhalese civilians carried out by the LTTE during the Sri Lankan Civil War. The massacres took place on 30 November 1984, in two tiny farming villages in the Mullaitivu district in north-eastern Sri Lanka. The Sri Lankan government labeled this as an attack on civilians by the LTTE.
Eelam War I is the name given to the initial phase of the armed conflict between the government of Sri Lanka and the LTTE.
Eelam War II is the name given to the second phase of armed conflict between Sri Lankan military and the separatist Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam. The war started after the failure of peace talks between the Premadasa government and the LTTE. This phase of the war was initiated by the LTTE who massacred almost 600 Sinhalese and Muslim police personnel after they were ordered by the Premadasa government to surrender to the LTTE. The truce was broken on June 10, 1990, when the LTTE in October expelled all the 28,000 Muslims residing in Jaffna.
Eelam War IV is the name given to the fourth and final phase of armed conflict between the Sri Lankan military and the separatist Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE). Renewed hostilities began on the 26 July 2006, when Sri Lanka Air Force fighter jets bombed several LTTE camps around Mavil Aru anicut. The government's casus belli was that the LTTE had cut off the water supply to surrounding paddy fields in the area. Shutting down the sluice gates of the Mavil Aru on July 21 depriving the water to over 15,000 people - Sinhalese and Muslim settlers under Sri Lankan state-sponsored colonisation schemes in Trincomalee district. They were denied of water for drinking and also cultivating over 30,000 acres of paddy and other crops. The fighting resumed after a four-year ceasefire between the Government of Sri Lanka (GoSL) and LTTE. Continued fighting led to several territorial gains for the Sri Lankan Army, including the capture of Sampur, Vakarai and other parts of the east. The war took on an added dimension when the LTTE Air Tigers bombed Katunayake airbase on March 26, 2007, the first rebel air attack without external assistance in history.
The 2008–2009 SLA Northern offensive was an armed conflict in the northern Province of Sri Lanka between the military of Sri Lanka and the separatist Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE). The battle began with a Sri Lanka Army (SLA) offensive attempting to break through the LTTE defence lines in the north of the island, aiming to conclude the country's 25-year-old civil war by military victory.
The following lists notable events that took place during 2009 in Sri Lanka.
The history of Sri Lanka from 1948 to the present is marked by the independence of the country through to Dominion and becoming a Republic.
War crimes during the final stages of the Sri Lankan civil war are war crimes and crimes against humanity which the Sri Lanka Armed Forces and the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam have been accused of committing during the final months of the Sri Lankan civil war in 2009. The war crimes include attacks on civilians and civilian buildings by both sides; executions of combatants and prisoners by both sides; enforced disappearances by the Sri Lankan military and paramilitary groups backed by them; sexual violence by the Sri Lankan military; the systematic denial of food, medicine, and clean water by the government to civilians trapped in the war zone; child recruitment, hostage taking, use of military equipment in the proximity of civilians and use of forced labor by the Tamil Tigers.
The Lessons Learnt and Reconciliation Commission was a commission of inquiry appointed by Sri Lankan President Mahinda Rajapaksa in May 2010 after the 26-year-long civil war in Sri Lanka to function as a Truth and reconciliation commission. The commission was mandated to investigate the facts and circumstances which led to the failure of the ceasefire agreement made operational on 27 February 2002, the lessons that should be learnt from those events and the institutional, administrative and legislative measures which need to be taken in order to prevent any recurrence of such concerns in the future, and to promote further national unity and reconciliation among all communities. After an 18-month inquiry, the commission submitted its report to the President on 15 November 2011. The report was made public on 16 December 2011, after being tabled in the parliament.
The Report of the Secretary-General's Panel of Experts on Accountability in Sri Lanka was a 2011 report produced by a panel of experts appointed by United Nations Secretary-General (UNSG) Ban Ki-moon to advise him on the issue of accountability with regard to any alleged violations of international human rights and humanitarian law during the final stages of the Sri Lankan Civil War. The report is referred to by some as the Darusman Report, after the name of the chairman of the panel.
Lies Agreed Upon is a documentary produced by Sri Lanka Ministry of Defence in response to a documentary aired by Channel 4, named Sri Lanka's Killing Fields, about the final weeks of the Sri Lankan Civil War. The documentary gives the Sri Lanka Ministry of Defence response to war crimes accusations and rebuts points made by the producers of the Channel 4 documentary, who presented it as "a forensic investigation into the final weeks of the quarter-century-long civil war between the government of Sri Lanka and the secessionist rebels, the Tamil Tigers." Lies Agreed Upon was first aired at an official function held at Hilton Colombo on 1 August 2011, one and half months after the broadcasting of "Sri Lanka's Killing Fields". Ministry of Defence released another report named Humanitarian Operation – Factual Analysis : July 2006 – May 2009 on the same day.
The Tamil genocide refers to the various systematic acts of physical violence and cultural destruction committed against the Tamil population in Sri Lanka during the Sinhala–Tamil ethnic conflict beginning in 1956, particularly during the Sri Lankan Civil War, as acts of genocide. Various commenters have accused the Sri Lankan state of responsibility for and complicity in a genocide of Tamils, and point to state-sponsored settler colonialism, state-backed pogroms, and mass killings, enforced disappearances and sexual violence by the security forces as examples of genocidal acts.
Terrorism in Sri Lanka has been a highly destructive phenomenon during the 20th and 21st centuries, especially so during the periods of the Sri Lankan Civil War (1983–2009) and the first (1971) and second JVP insurrections (1987–1989). A common definition of terrorism is the systematic or threatened use of violence to intimidate a population or government for political, religious, or ideological goals. Sri Lanka is a country that has experienced some of the worst known acts of modern terrorism, such as suicide bombings, massacres of civilians and assassination of political and social leaders. Terrorism has posed a significant threat to the society, economy and development of the country. The Prevention of Terrorism Act of 1978 is the legislation that provides the powers to law enforcement officers to deal with issues related to terrorism in Sri Lanka. It was first enacted as a temporary law in 1979 under the presidency of J. R. Jayewardene, and later made permanent in 1982.
The Mullivaikkal massacre was the mass killing of tens of thousands of Sri Lankan Tamils in 2009 during the closing stages of the Sri Lankan Civil War, which ended in May 2009 in a tiny strip of land in Mullivaikkal, Mullaitivu.
The 1987 Eastern Province massacres were a series of massacres of the Sinhalese population in the Eastern Province of Sri Lanka by Tamil mobs and Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) during the Sri Lankan Civil War. Though they began spontaneously, they became more organized, with the LTTE leading the violence. Over 200 Sinhalese were killed by mob and militant violence, and over 20,000 fled the Eastern Province. The violence has been described as having had the appearance of a pogrom, with the objective of removing Sinhalese from the Eastern Province.
The COG had prepared a casualty sheet which showed that a large majority of the civilian casualties recorded by the UN had reportedly been caused by Government fire
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