The Tamil Eelam Army is a defunct Tamil separatist group in Sri Lanka. It was founded by Panagoda Maheswaran. It was implicated in a bomb attack against a Sri Lankan airliner at Madras airport in India. It was disbanded after that incident.
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 Eelam People's Revolutionary Liberation Front (EPRLF) is a series of Sri Lankan political parties and a former militant separatist group.
The Tamil Eelam Liberation Organization (TELO) is a Sri Lankan Tamil political party and former militant group. Initially, the TELO campaigned for the establishment of an independent Tamil Eelam in northeastern Sri Lanka from 1972 to 1987, until it later accepted the December 19th proposals. The TELO was originally established as a militant group, and functioned as such until 1986, when most of its membership was killed in a conflict with the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE). The surviving members of the TELO reorganised themselves as a political party which continues to function as such today.
The Eelam Revolutionary Organisation of Students (EROS), also known as the Eelam Revolutionary Organisers, is a former Tamil militant group in Sri Lanka. Most of the EROS membership was absorbed into the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) in 1990. The other half of EROS that did not join forces with the LTTE due was led by PLO trained Shankar Rajee, Senior politburo member and military commander of EROS from 1990 until his demise in 2005. The political wing of 'EROS' is known as the Eelavar Democratic Front.
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 Tamil New Tigers (TNT) was a Sri Lankan Tamil militant organization founded by Velupillai Prabhakaran on 22 May 1972. The group was composed of a few close associates of Prabhakaran, who was only 17 years old when he founded the group. The group was a predecessor to the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE).
The Mavil Aru is a waterway that supplies water to some regions of eastern Sri Lanka. The closing of the sluice gates is considered to be the official beginning of the Eelam War IV although violence including skirmishes and bombings happened before.
Vaithilingam Sornalingam was the founder of the air wing and marine division of the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) and a relative of the militant group's leader Velupillai Prabhakaran.
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 terrorist air attack without external assistance in history.
Tamil Nadu Liberation Army (TNLA) was a militant separatist group in India. It sought an independent nation for the Tamil people, and first appeared in the 1980s, when the Indian Peace Keeping Force (IPKF) was sent to Sri Lanka to fight against the Tamil Tigers.
Charles Lucas Anthony. commonly known by the nom de guerre Seelan, was a Sri Lankan Tamil rebel and leading member of the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE), a separatist Tamil militant organisation in Sri Lanka.
Ponnuthurai Sivakumaran was a Sri Lankan Tamil rebel and the first Tamil militant to commit suicide by swallowing cyanide.
The Meenambakkam bomb blast was a terrorist attack that occurred on August 2, 1984, at Meenambakkam International Airport in Madras, Tamil Nadu, India, now known as Chennai International Airport in Chennai, India. A total of 33 people were killed, and 27 others were injured. The bombing was perpetrated by the Tamil Eelam Army, a Sri Lankan Tamil militant group, and only five of its members were convicted for the bombing.
The Eelam National Liberation Front (ENLF) was a short-lived (1984–1986) umbrella organisation for leading Sri Lankan Tamil militant groups.
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.
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.
Nesadurai Thirunesan was a Sri Lankan Tamil militant and one of the founders of the Eelam Revolutionary Organisation of Students.