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<strong>Lest</strong> we forget – Massacres of Tamils 1956 2002<br />
and attacked the principal, teachers and students. Eighteen people were killed in the<br />
school.<br />
While this killing was going on, the military also attacked people working in the<br />
fields and people on the street. This attack went on for six hours. At 2.00pm the<br />
military ordered the people to load the military vehicles with the dead bodies and<br />
took the bodies to the Thalladi military camp. 52 people died in this massacre and<br />
40 were injured.<br />
Mayilvahanam Mohan’s account of what happened is as follows,<br />
“The SLA from Thalladi Army Camp surrounded the following 3 villages,<br />
Palaperuman Kattu and Vaddakandal and Parapankandal. Around 1.00am, we<br />
heard vehicle noise. <strong>We</strong> had no idea they were coming or what they would do. At<br />
about 5am in the morning – we heard gun fire from all directions. People woke up<br />
and started running everywhere. There was a helicopter in the air which started<br />
firing.<br />
They did not worry about a person’s age. Young or old – they were all shot and<br />
killed that day. They went into the paddy fields and picked up people with both<br />
hands, held them up and shot them for others to see. This is the first time we saw<br />
this happen. 35 people were shot in the fields, 15 people were shot in town.<br />
At the school there were about 250 children studying. They dragged the principle<br />
and all the teachers out, tortured and shot them in front of the villagers. They were<br />
all asked to stand in a line – when they were shot. A few people escaped. I was one<br />
of them. 18 people were shot there.<br />
Mayilvaganam Ganesh was made to shoot his cousin and asked to drink his blood.<br />
He was beaten severely. Every time he refused to drink the blood – they hit him<br />
some more. His legs were broken.<br />
After all of this happened, the Army brought a villager’s lorry. Three of us had<br />
been captured and not yet shot. They made us put all the bodies in the lorry and<br />
took us with them. A little while away – they told us that since we had helped them,<br />
they would spare us our lives. <strong>We</strong> ran away and escaped. They took some of the<br />
bodies to Thalladi Army camp and took some to Mannar Hospital. The Grama<br />
Sevakar helped the villagers to carry out the investigation.<br />
Beside this village there was a Muslim village – but nothing happened to them.<br />
Three days later, there were funerals happening in every house. The army returned<br />
and surrounded the forest. At that time we did not have any associations with the<br />
LTTE. They may have been there, but we did not know where they where. The SLA<br />
kept coming back after that and tormented all the villagers who had to live in<br />
constant fear.”<br />
Report by NESOHR,<br />
Information Collected by SNE<br />
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