[TamilNet, Thursday, 30 August 2012, 08:29 GMT]The genocidal Sri Lanka military occupying the country of Eezham
Tamils is routinely engaged in repeated sexual abuse of the former
female members of the LTTE to see them pregnant by the Sinhala soldiers,
in the model of former Yugoslavia, news sources citing a number of
cases and medical professionals told TamilNet. While Radha D’Souza views
the Tamil struggle “as one of the most significant movements since the
end of the Vietnam War,” the former US Deputy Secretary of State and a
current ICG trustee Richard Armitage in Oslo last year was harping on
the unawareness of the world on the happenings in the island. The
genocide is meant to be so by the architects, and the Akashi visit last
week viewing ‘rehabilitated’ female cadres was another effort to keep
the on-going genocide under the carpet, political observers in the
island said.
Many former female cadres of the LTTE are repeatedly abused with
determination to make them pregnant either in detention or by
‘summoning’ them after the so-called release.
When they refuse or not cooperate to the ‘summons’, their family members are harmed.
Confirming
the kind of genocide-intended pregnancies of ex-LTTE cadres, a senior
doctor in the North said that he didn’t know what to do about it.
A
recent case that had come to him had an eight-month pregnancy. She is
now handed over to the care of some nuns. “I don’t know what to do with
most of the cases,” the doctor said.
“There is no international
system to protect them in the island or provide refuge outside,” the
doctor further said, whose statement was also confirmed by a
gender-related social worker in the island.
Sexual abuses are
committed at two stages on the ex-cadres, first in the internment camps
and then after the so-called release, the feminist social worker said.
The
details of 2000 to 3000 female cadres who were captured by the SL
military are not yet known. Whether they are alive or still kept in
secret camps is not found in any local or international records. The
numbers of those who were captured and released do not tally. Colombo
says there are only around 600 left in detention. What had happened to
the remaining, asked the social worker.
The condition of senior
female cadres is pathetic, the social worker said, citing reports of
some released cadres. “Many have been seen in the detention camps, but
we do not know what has happened to them,” the social worker said.
In
the second stage, abuses take place after the so-called release of the
cadres. ‘Summoning’ them for interrogation and repeatedly abusing them
has become a routine and a past time in the SL military camps now. This
happens widely in the SL bases and intelligence camps of Vavuniyaa and
Jaffna, and in the camps of Vanni, the social worker told TamilNet.
In
another recent incident in Jaffna, a young ex-cadre from Vanni wanted
to hand over her 13-month old child to anyone who would take care of it.
The child was a result of repeated abuse of the woman by the
‘interrogating’ military but she wanted the child to live.
Genocidal
Colombo, elements clinging to it and their media, try to project the
situation as a result of current social conditions and deviations among
Eezham Tamils. But most of the cases are result of systematic and
genocide-intended military abuses, observed the feminist social worker,
agreeing with the doctor that there is no independent international
mechanism operative in the island to protect the ex-cadres.
* * *
Commenting
on the situation, TamilNet former war correspondent Mr. Lokeesan said
that by the end of the war, young Sinhala soldiers of the genocidal
military were given with pornographic material to induce them to commit
sexual assault on the captured female LTTE cadres.
A Sinhala
military cultivated in this way is what that is going to stay in the
country of Eezham Tamils, and the results could be imagined, he further
commented.
While China now builds permanent cantonments to the
occupying Sinhala military, and India ‘trains’ the genocidal military in
its bases, Mr. Akashi has come primarily to patch up relations between
the West and Colombo, media reports from Colombo said.
The
genocidal war is perhaps perpetuated by a system and not by individuals.
But the world needs an international people’s tribunal to identify the
ultimate elements of such a system to remedy it.
At least some
individuals or institutions articulating for the system on the question
of Eezham Tamils, such as the UN Secretary General Ban Ki Moon, Robert
Blake, Erik Solheim, Yasushi Akashi, Shiv Shankar Menon, his predecessor
MK Narayanan and institutions such as the International Crisis Group
(ICG), either coming forward or being made to answer to the world would
immensely help the progress of human civilization, commented an academic
in Jaffna.
The politicians and political activists who continue
to deal with this system, and in the process pressurized to take up a
patch-up course have to consider twice before deviating from the
grassroot realities, political observers in the island and in the
diaspora cautioned.
Meanwhile, those who whitewash the genocidal
regime to the world with the hoodwink of Relief, Rehabilitation and
Reconciliation, do many times more harm to humanity than the fault they
had found with the LTTE, social workers in the island said.
* * *
The following are further direct reports to TamilNet by a few among the affected who decided to talk: “I
don’t like to live here. I may be in peace if I go elsewhere. Otherwise
there is no option other than committing suicide with my entire
family,” says a tearful ex-LTTE female cadre. She has become a wreck by
continued sexual abuse in the name of summons and interrogations by the
occupying Sinhala military.
She was 6-months pregnant when she was released from the SLA internment camp, said her mother with a downcast face.
“We went to an illegal medical facility for abortion,” her mother was sorrowful about it.
The ex-LTTE female cadres have come to their worst point of predicament now.
The
occupying Sinhala military that summoned them earlier in the name of
‘monitoring and interrogation’, now openly summons them for its sexual
needs, comments a social worker of an organisation for the emancipation
of women in the North and East.
Many don’t tell the truth about
the sexual abuses. This may be due to the cultural stigma. So they keep
the sufferings within their mind and sulk secretly. When the situation
is perpetuated they are pushed to the end of committing suicide. Many
try all possibilities to get out of the island, the feminist social
worker said.
The situation is the same for the so-called released
female cadres, whether in Jaffna, Vanni or in the East, conceded
another human rights worker in the island.
* * *
A female ex-LTTE cadre, Pallavi (name changed), told TamilNet of her experience when ‘summoned’ to a local camp.
When
‘summoned,’ one has to first wait for hours in the camp, facing lewd
comments coming from the Sinhala soldiers. Then, a low-rank officer
would come for sexual assault in the name of ‘interrogation,’ followed
by the higher officer, if he is in the ‘mood’. They behave totally in a
sadistic way and it is very obvious that they get pleasure from our
sufferings, Pallavi said.
Some of those ‘summoned’ to the local
camps used to be sent to regional camps as well as bases in the towns.
The story is the same everywhere.
The SL torture camp at Achchezhu in the Palaali base is a nightmare for former female cadres.
The
Achchezhu torture camp is famous for the ‘disappearances’ of thousands
of Tamil youth since 1996. People in Jaffna call the camp as the
Slaughter House (I’raichchi-kadai). Sexual assault is a simple matter at
this camp.
* * *
Another female ex-LTTE cadre came out with shocking facts on the experience of those who are taken to the Palaali base.
After
being ‘summoned’ to the local camp and taken to regional and the
Achchezhu camps, some are chosen to ‘meet’ the top officials at Palaali,
the ex-cadre said.
When asked how it becomes possible to take
them around without being seen by people, the ex-cadre said that they
are taken in white vans or mini buses, sitting along with soldiers in
civil dress, so that it would look as though they are passenger
vehicles.
They have a large fleet of those white vans and such vehicles ply to and fro the base without any hindrances, she said.
Narrating
her experience of meeting higher officers at Palaali, another ex-cadre
said that after tiring her by interrogation for three hours, she was
given with cool drink. The drink fainted her and she awoke to find that
she had been sexually assaulted.
“I couldn’t do anything. I came alive out of that interrogation, crying,” she said.
“We
could go absconding or go out of the country. In those cases they get
hold of our family members. It could be my father, mother, brother or
sister,” she further said.
To escape from sexual harassment
another ex-cadre from Ki’linochchi used to hide in the houses of friends
and relatives. On those occasions her father was assaulted by the SL
military and was even hospitalized. Her brothers were threatened that
they would be killed.
For the sake of the family, the ex-cadres
accept the ‘summons’ and go back to the SL military camps. On returning
to ‘interrogations’ we face sexual assault with more vengeance and
sadism, the ex-cadre from Ki’linochchi told TamilNet.
* * *
A
senior doctor in the Jaffna teaching hospital admitted treating a
number of ex-cadres who had attempted committing suicide after
‘interrogation’ sexual assaults.
Some had been admitted to the
hospital after swallowing blade pieces in the camps in their attempts to
commit suicide. Some had attempted suicide by immolating themselves
after returning from the SL military camps, the doctor said.
Poverty
is attributed to the suicide of some of those who hanged themselves.
But there could be other reasons, the doctor further said.
Vanni
is the worst hit region. In Jaffna and in the other towns there are
social activists for the consolation of the victims. But no one could
raise a finger for what is happening in Vanni.
The SL military
camps mushroomed at very short distances in Vanni aim for the
exploitation of the ex-cadres. Going out from the region is the only
escape to a former female cadre. The parents would tell the SL military
that their daughter has eloped with someone.
The claim of ‘rehabilitation’ is a farce and the facility in Vavuniyaa is only a showcase, comments an ex-cadre from Vanni.
The
fate of thousands of female cadres who were captured at the end of the
war is not accounted yet; claim those who have managed to escape
disappearance in the camps after the war.
Many of us are
psychological wrecks after release from the internment camps of the SL
military. Many do not go out, meet people or even speak to their family
members. Many live only for the sake of their children, says another
female cadre.
Her husband became mentally retarded by the war.
Two of her kids were killed in the war. She lives for the sake of three
more children remaining.
Some of them want at least to send their children out. But they have no means.
Meanwhile,
in the cases of some, people who have personal animosities with them or
with their families send malicious information, providing opportunities
for the occupying military to harass them.
* * *
