Thamilchelvan’s Demise: Need for a Cautious Response

"Our destiny so defined, depart my dear deputy to your distant dwelling"

The question is whether there is a link between these news items and Thamilchelvan's death? Here is another (possibly far-fetched) speculation. Now that Karuna has been disowed by every one, and the post of 'Deputy Tiger Leader' is vacant, will there be a UK-sponsored Prabha-Karuna re-union?

(November, 03, Kandy, Sri Lanka Guardian) There is consensus in the published reports on the death of S. P. Thamilchelvam, chief of the LTTE ‘Political Wing’, on the following facts relating to its circumstances. On Friday, 2 November 2007, shortly after 6.00 a.m., Kfir and Mig fighter jets of the Sri Lanka Air Force bombed a target in a forested locality at Thiruvai aru, a few miles to the south of the township of Kilinochchi, identified on the basis of intelligence information, as an LTTE centre of activity. Six of the Tiger cadres including Thamilchelvam were among those killed by the bombing. No civilian casualties were reported.

Since the earliest of the reports of this event including the identity of those killed appeared in pro-LTTE websites between 10.00 and 11.00 a.m. that morning, it may be assumed that the information upon which the reports were based had been released by the Tiger head-quarters by 10.00 a.m. or even earlier. Subsequent announcements from the same source contain, apart from the expected eulogies on Thamilchelvam, the news that Prabhakaran has declared a week of mourning to be effective in the districts of Mullaitivu and Killinochchi.

As one would expect, there was barely concealed jubilation in the government response to the news of Thamilchelvam’s death, for, apart from all else, as a key leader (and, possibly, the ‘second in command’) in the Tiger hierarchy, he has to share with his supreme leader the responsibility for innumerable crimes committed over more than two decades. There was also a sense of satisfaction regarding the success of the raid in the context of the humiliating losses suffered by air force in the course of the LTTE attack on the airbase at Anuradhapura in the previous week.

The core of hard ‘facts’ regarding the destruction caused by the raid in its target area contained in the published responses to this incident, including reports by the foreign media and statements by spokesmen for the government and the opposition parties of Sri Lanka’s ‘South’, it must be noted, have been based on (and conforms to) the information released by the LTTE high command. It is mainly in this context that the attention of the reader is being drawn in the present sketch to certain considerations that could be of relevance to an evaluation of the ‘facts’ as they have been disseminated.

First of all, there is the fact that the LTTE headquarters has never released information on details relating to casualties of bomb-attack except when publicizing charges against the government regarding alleged onslaughts on civilian targets (as it did last year in the case of the bombing of its training centre at Sencholai). It is also unrealistic to assume that Prabhakaran would so readily and promptly offer bouquets to the Sri Lanka air force for successful precision- bombing of identified targets, or admit to the wide world (by implication) that there have been information leakages from the very heart of his domain. It is also extremely unlikely for the Tiger leaders to have been so prompt in releasing news which, from propaganda perspectives, would constitute a boost to the Air Force. If these musings have at least a modicum of reason, would it be reasonable to dismiss the speculation of a possible massacre by Prabhakaran of Thamilchelvam and a group of his loyalist, timed to coincide with an air raid (an almost daily occurrence), and then, promptly attribute the killing to an offensive launched by the Sri Lanka government?

Such a speculation, though not supported by any hard evidence, is also not discordant with certain known behavioural traits of the great leader. It is well known, for example, that those in the rank of Prabhakaran’s ‘deputy’ have had a relatively low life-expectancy even by the Tiger norms, as ‘Uma’, ‘Kittu’ and ‘Mahaththaya’ failed to appreciate at the cost of their lives. Moreover, there had been, for some time, a rumour regarding an emerging rift between Prabhakaran and Thamilchelvam which, according to certain informants, has been the outcome of a leadership struggle involving the place of Prabhakaran’s son in the Tiger hierarchy. Even if this rumour is groundless, there is the well known tendency of terrorist groups to disintegrate into mutually rival camps during times of recession and defeat.

Thamilchelvam was probably popular among the rank-and-file of the LTTE, and would hence have had many loyalists. In such circumstance, attributing his death to an air attack could also have constituted a prudent 'cover-up', one that would certainly generate some sympathy among the Tiger supporters and those endorsing their cause here in Sri Lanka and abroad. Within a few hours of the LTTE announcement on air attack, for instance, several personages who could be so identified blamed the government for causing further damage to the peace process by killing the “moderate” Thamilchelvam in such brutal fashion. The Norwegian's are already said to be in mourning, and, it would be no surprise if the UN Secretary General issues a message of condolence.

Yet another discordance in the story that has hitherto unfolded – perhaps a minor one – is this "meeting of LTTE leaders at 6 in the morning” (not in Killinochchi, but) at a jungle hideout away from it all. Why, this time and this venue? If it was a secret meeting under the cover of darkness (at night), yes, that would have been plausible. If it was latter in the day when security precautions could have been more effective, that too could have been more credible. It is not the impossibility of a meeting at dawn that is being suggested here. But such a meeting, to say the least, is curious.

Two other bits of news also cause some discomfort in my mind. One of these is the arrest of Karuna in Britain for alleged illegal entry. Now, Karuna had entered the UK a few weeks ago. It is hardly possible for someone like Karuna (a well known personage) to enter UK with forged documents because immigration checks in that country are extremely strict. In this context, why was Karuna arrested yesterday? The other is a BBC news item (also published yesterday) that more than one hundred of Sri Lankan soldiers attached to the peace-keeping forces in Haiti are to be deported on charges of engaging in paedophile activities. The question is whether there is a link between these news items and Thamilchelvan's death? Here is another (possibly far-fetched) speculation. Now that Karuna has been disowed by every one, and the post of 'Deputy Tiger Leader' is vacant, will there be a UK-sponsored Prabha-Karuna re-union?

What prompts me to present these observations is my belief that, in matters involving the Tigers, an event is seldom what it appears to be at the surface. I most ardently hope that my speculations are way off the mark, and that the widely believed version of what took place in the Vanni yesterday is really what did happen.

(G. H. Peiris, Professor Emeritus, University of Peradeniya, Sri Lanka)