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.
Major General Vanigamuni Indrajith Vijeyakumar Mendis Wimalaratne, RWP, RSP, VSV, USP was a senior Sri Lanka Army officer. One of the most distinguished field commanders in Sri Lanka, Wimalaratne raised the Gajaba Regiment, he commanded the 1st Brigade during the Vadamarachchi Operation, he commanded the Amphibious Task Force Commander during Operation Balavegaya and was the Commander Security Forces – Jaffna at the time of his death in a land mine explosion at Point Arali in the Kayts Island while making preparations to re-capture Jaffna.
The Indo-Sri Lanka Peace Accord was an accord signed in Colombo on 29 July 1987, between Indian Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi and Sri Lankan President J. R. Jayewardene. The accord was expected to resolve the Sri Lankan Civil War by enabling the thirteenth Amendment to the Constitution of Sri Lanka and the Provincial Councils Act of 1987. Under the terms of the agreement, Colombo agreed to a devolution of power to the provinces, the Sri Lankan troops were to be withdrawn to their barracks in the north and the Tamil rebels were to surrender their arms.
Indian Peace Keeping Force (IPKF) was the Indian military contingent performing a peacekeeping operation in Sri Lanka between 1987 and 1990. It was formed under the mandate of the 1987 Indo-Sri Lankan Accord that aimed to end the Sri Lankan Civil War between Sri Lankan Tamil militant groups such as the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) and the Sri Lankan military.
The 1987–1989 JVP insurrection, also known as the 1988–1989 revolt or the JVP troubles, was an armed revolt in Sri Lanka, led by the Marxist–Leninist Janatha Vimukthi Peramuna, against the Government of Sri Lanka. The insurrection, like the previous one in 1971, was unsuccessful. The main phase of the insurrection was a low-intensity conflict that lasted from April 1987 to December 1989. The insurgents led by the JVP resorted to subversion, assassinations, raids, and attacks on military and civilian targets while the Sri Lankan government reacted through counter-insurgency operations to suppress the revolt.
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 Jaffna University Helidrop was the first of the operations launched by the Indian Peace Keeping Forces (IPKF) aimed at disarming the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) by force and capturing the city of Jaffna, Sri Lanka, in the opening stages of Operation Pawan during the Indian intervention in the Sri Lankan Civil War. Mounted on the midnight of 12 October 1987, the operation was planned as a fast heliborne assault involving Mi-8's of the No.109 Helicopter Unit, the 10th Para Commandos and a contingent of the 13th Sikh Light Infantry. The aim of the operation was to capture the LTTE leadership at Jaffna University building which served as the Tactical Headquarters of the LTTE, which was expected to shorten Operation Pawan, the battle for Jaffna. However, the operation ended disastrously, failing to capture its objectives due to intelligence and planning failures. The heli-dropped force suffered significant casualties, with nearly the entire Sikh LI detachment of twenty-nine troops, along with six Para commandos, killed in action.
Suppayya Paramu Thamilselvan, commonly known as S. P. Tamilselvan,, was the leader of the political wing of the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam, an organisation fighting for a separate state for the ethnic Tamil minority in the north and east of Sri Lanka from majority Sinhalese government. He was a prominent negotiator and one of the closest associates of LTTE leader Velupillai Prabhakaran.
Operation Pawan was the code name assigned to the operation by the Indian Peace Keeping Force (IPKF) to take control of Jaffna from the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE), better known as the Tamil Tigers, in late 1987 to enforce the disarmament of the LTTE as a part of the Indo-Sri Lanka Accord. In brutal fighting lasting about three weeks, the IPKF took control of the Jaffna Peninsula from the LTTE, something that the Sri Lankan Army had tried but failed to do. Supported by Indian Army tanks, helicopter gunships and heavy artillery, the IPKF routed the LTTE at the cost of 214 soldiers and officers.
The Eastern Theatre of Eelam War IV started in the Eastern province of Sri Lanka on July 21, 2006, when the LTTE cut off the water supply to rice fields in eastern Trincomalee district. The government claimed total control of the Eastern province after capturing Thoppigala on July 11, 2007, after nearly a year of fighting. Major battles took place at Sampoor, Vakarai, Kanchikudicharu, Kokkadichloai and Thoppigala. Military and civilian deaths were relatively low on both sides. Government forces captured much military hardware from the LTTE during the conflict. The civilians managed to flee the combat zones, and this reduced civilian casualties, while swelling the number of internally displaced people (IDP). The world health organization (WHO) estimated ~200,300 IDPs, and claims that significant progress occurred in resettling them. The LTTE vowed to attack Sri Lanka's military and economic targets across the country to retaliate for the capture of the Eastern province from them. This was stated by the leader of the LTTE's political wing, S.P. Thamilchelvan, in a statement to Associated Press on July 12, 2007.
The Battle of Thoppigala took place between the Sri Lanka Army and the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) fought during a period of the first half of 2007 over control of the LTTE-dominated peak of Thoppigala, located 40 km northwest of Batticaloa, in eastern Sri Lanka.
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.
Velayuthapillai Baheerathakumar was a leading member of the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE), a separatist Tamil militant organisation in Sri Lanka. He played a leading role in the LTTE's military victories in the Vanni during Eelam War III, including Mullaitivu (1996), Kilinochchi (1998), Oddusuddan (1999) and Elephant Pass (2000). He was killed at the Battle of Ananthapuram in the last days of the Sri Lankan Civil War.
The Jaffna hospital massacre occurred on October 21 and 22, 1987, during the Sri Lankan Civil War, when troops of the Indian Peace Keeping Force entered the premises of the Jaffna Teaching Hospital in Jaffna, Sri Lanka, an island nation in South Asia, and killed between 60 and 70 patients and staff. The rebel Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam, the government of Sri Lanka, and independent observers such as the University Teachers for Human Rights and others have called it a massacre of civilians.
The Sri Lanka Armed Forces is the overall unified military of the Democratic Socialist Republic of Sri Lanka encompassing the Sri Lanka Army, the Sri Lanka Navy, and the Sri Lanka Air Force; they are governed by the Ministry of Defence (MoD). The three services have around 346,700 active personnel; conscription has never been imposed in Sri Lanka. As of 2021 it is the 14th largest military in the world, with 1.46% of the Sri Lankan population actively serving.
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.
The Indian intervention in the Sri Lankan civil war was the deployment of the Indian Peace Keeping Force in Sri Lanka intended to perform a peacekeeping role. The deployment followed the Indo-Sri Lankan Accord between India and Sri Lanka of 1987 which was intended to end the Sri Lankan civil war between separatist Sri Lankan Tamil nationalists, principally the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE), and the Sri Lankan Military.
General L. D. E. Cecil Waidyaratne, VSV, USP was a Sri Lanka Army general. He was 12th Commander of the Sri Lankan Army and a former Sri Lankan Ambassador to Thailand.
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.
