Sri Lankan soldiers executed Tamils at end of civil war, human rights groups claim after watching fresh video evidence

• Female newsreader identified among victims

Isaippriya Oliveechchu: The newscaster of TamilNet news is believed to be dead - with claims she was executed by Sri Lankan soldiers

New video evidence has emerged linking Sri Lanka's military to the execution of prisoners during the final hours of the country's decades-long civil war last year, an international human rights group claimed today.
Human Rights Watch said the grisly content of a five-minute video clip aired by Britain's Channel 4 television last month warrants a United Nations investigation.
The video was an extension of a short clip aired by the station last year showing blindfolded, naked men being shot dead at close range.
The latest video shows the naked body of a young woman with a blood-spattered face identified by Tamil media as 'Isaippriya,' a news reader with the Tamil Tiger rebel television station.
A dozen other men and women, some with hands tied behind their backs, also lay dead beside her.
The New York-based rights group said an acquaintance identified the body as Isaippriya.
Human Rights Watch said the video links the Sri Lankan army's 53rd division, which conducted the final battle with the boxed-in rebels on a small beach strip, with summary executions.
'This horrific new evidence demonstrates graphically that the Sri Lankan army engaged in summary executions of prisoners during the final days of fighting in May 2009,' said Brad Adams, Asia director at Human Rights Watch.

Battle: Sri Lankan soldiers inspect heavy weaponry in Mullaitivu in 2009 after intense fighting virtually destroyed the Tamil faction

Training camp: Young Tamil Tigers learn to use machine guns in the rebel base of Vakarai

'The government's failure to investigate these serious war crimes in the face of overwhelming evidence shows the need for an independent, international investigation,' Adams said.
The video footage is currently only be seen by subscribers to Associated Press video channel but should be available for general view in 48 hours.
Sri Lanka's government said it 'categorically denies that the Channel 4 News TV video is authentic.'
'It is no secret that the anti-Sri Lankan separatist lobby, which is behind these moves, live in the comforts mainly in the West, and have not contributed towards restoration of normalcy and livelihoods of the deprived people affected by the conflict,' the Sri Lankan Embassy in London said in an earlier statement.

Abuse: Tamil Tiger soldiers patrol along the Verugal River. Video footage allegedly shows Sri Lankan soldiers executing rebels at the end of the war

Killed: Tigers leader Velupillai Prabhakaran died in battle with Sri Lankan soldiers in May last year

U.N. human rights investigator Philip Alston has said, however, the first video aired last year was authentic.
'Each time new evidence emerges of a wartime atrocity, the government's knee-jerk reaction is to claim that it's all part of some bizarre plot against it,' said Adams. 'How many more photos and videos need to emerge before the government recognizes that it can't hide the truth forever?'
Amid calls for a war crimes probe, U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon appointed a three-member panel to advise him how to ensure accountability. He said, however, it was not an investigative team.
The government has condemned Ban's move as an 'unwarranted interference' in the country's sovereignty, and appointed its own Lessons Learnt and Reconciliation Commission. But rights group say the commission has no mandate to probe alleged crimes, and it is a move to deflect calls for an international inquiry.
More than 7,000 civilians were killed in the last five months of the conflict, according to the U.N. An estimated 80,000 people died in the 25-year war that began in 1983.
The rebels, who once controlled a de facto state in the island nation's north, had been fighting since 1983 for a separate state for minority Tamils after decades of oppression by the Sinhalese majority.

 

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