Colombo deploys paramilitary operative to intimidate Tamils in PC elections in East

[TamilNet, Thursday, 28 June 2012, 07:28 GMT]
SL President Mahinda Rajapaksa has deployed his district coordinator Kanthasamy Nishanthan alias Iniyabarathy, a paramilitary operative, to intimidate the Tamil people in the district in the run up to the next provincial council elections in the East. Iniyabarathy, an operative aligned with Vinayagamoorthy Muralitharan alias Karuna, has been found guilty by the courts of the SL State itself. The notorious paramilitary operative has been widely alleged as being behind various human rights violations in the district.

Two years ago he was charged in the Kalmunai High Court for issuing death threat to a former district parliamentarian Chandiranehru Chandrakanthan. On being found guilty the High Court Judge Ms Chandramani Visuvalingam sentenced him to two years rigorous imprisonment but it was suspended for a period of ten years in addition to a fine of twenty five thousand rupees with a severe warning that he should not engage in intimidating civilian population anymore.

Iniyapaarathy is one of the twenty criminals named in the Lessons Learnt and Reconciliation Commission (LLRC) report for committing criminal offences against civilians.

Global rights bodies, including that of the United Nations, had identified Iniyabarathy as a person involved in the abduction of children and civilians in the period between the years 2006 and 2007.

Iniyabarathy was instrumental in unleashing terror against Tamil people in the 2008 provincial election in the eastern province and terrorized them to vote for a political party that supported the Colombo government then.

He has been brought back to the east at a time the Colombo government is expected to dissolve the Eastern Provincial Council and to order for fresh election in September.

Similarly, the Colombo government has re-recruited paramilitary operatives it has found useful to carry out a terror campaign in the East, informed sources at the District Secretariat told TamilNet.