Death of the Tiger - Ilankai Tamil Sangam

organization that had controlled much ofnorthern and eastern Sri Lanka for nearlya decade, it was a devastating reversal.Their remaining fighters, a force of aboutfifteen thousand, retreated into the junglenear the coastal town of Mullaittivu, takingalong more than three hundred thousandTamil civilians who were trappedwith them. With international concernmounting over the safety ofthe civilians, the Sri LankanArmy designated a series of“no-fire zones” and told civiliansto assemble there. It thenshelled those zones repeatedly,while issuing denialsthat it was doing so and forbiddingjournalists access tothe area. Hundreds of peoplewere killed every day. By mid-April, the Tamil rebels andthe civilians were trapped on a bloodystretch of beach about a mile long.Hemmed in by the sea, a lagoon, and ahundred thousand government soldiers,they were all but helpless, as the Armykept up a barrage of fire from gunboats,aircraft, and field artillery.On April 21st, the Army broke throughthe Tigers’ defenses, creating a chaoticcorridor that, over several days, allowednearly two hundred thousand famishedand wounded civilians to flee into itscustody. The Army had ordered mostrelief workers and all international observersto leave the area, but it nonethelessbilled its offensive as a “humanitarianoperation” to rescue hostages fromthe Tigers. (The Tigers did in fact preventsome civilians from fleeing, andshot hundreds of them as they tried toescape.) The Tigers’ defenders, meanwhile,claimed that the Army was committinggenocide. Secretary of StateHillary Clinton admonished Sri Lanka’sgovernment, saying that “the entireworld is very disappointed” by the “untoldsuffering” that was being caused byits efforts to end the war. There werelater reports, which the government denied,that as many as forty thousand civilianswere killed during the Army’sfinal offensive, and that their bodies wereburned or buried in secret mass graves.The foreign secretaries of France andGreat Britain flew to Sri Lanka, wherethey pleaded with the government tocall a ceasefire in order to rescue the civilianswho were still trapped. Suspiciousthat the diplomats also wanted tosave the Tiger leaders, the governmentignored them. Tens of thousands of civiliansremained in the kill zone, whichcontinued to shrink until it was no biggerthan four football fields.A survivor of the final stand at Mullaittivu,a young pastor, described thescene to me. He and four other pastorsand a group of sixty orphansin their care had been duginto shallow bunkers on thebeach. “It was the first thingwe did whenever we reacheda new position—diggingand making bags with cutupwomen’s saris,” he said.“Only afterward would wego and look for food orwater.” The Tamil fighterswere in bunkers all aroundthem. “Most of them were Black Tigers,”he said, referring to the Tamil suicidesquad. “Prabhakaran was amongus, too, but none of us saw him.” He describeda charnel ground, with artilleryshells landing at random. “All we couldsee was dead people, people crying forfood and for water, and burning vehicleseverywhere.”On May 16th, Army troops took thelast coastal positions, and, as they pursuedthe remaining Tigers, the Armycommander, General Sarath Fonseka,declared victory. The next day, a Tigerspokesman posted a statement on theorganization’s Web site: “This battle hasreached its bitter end. . . . We have decidedto silence our guns. Our only regretsare for the lives lost and that wecould not hold out for longer.”In the bunker, the pastor’s grouptalked by cell phone with a brigadiergeneral in the Sri Lankan Army whotold them to stay there until they sawsoldiers, then identify themselves withwhite flags. The group had run out offood and went foraging in an abandonedbunker nearby. “We found foodpackets—meat, chocolates,” the pastorsaid, and they took as much as theycould carry, dodging incoming fire.The next morning, a young man intheir group was fatally shot as he defecatedoutside.By evening, they could see soldiersapproaching. “Two or three of us wentout with several children, and we tookwhite flags, as the brigadier had suggested,”the pastor recalled. “But as weapproached they said, ‘Don’t come,’ andfired guns in the air.” The soldiers hadbeen told there could be suicide bombersamong the last Tigers, and in factseveral insurgents blew themselves up inthe midst of civilian refugees turningthemselves in to the Army. “We fell onthe ground. They were about fifty metresaway. We crawled back to the bunker,and then they fired at the bunker. Thewhole night, I could hear the Armythrowing grenades in the bunkers nearus. There were explosions, and peoplewere crying and saying, ‘Help us.’ ”At dawn, the pastor said he “feltcourage” and decided to go out and confrontthe soldiers. “I went with anotherpastor and a white flag,” he said. “Weexplained who we were, and they toldeveryone to come forward out of thebunker. They ordered us to kneel down.There were about fifteen soldiers. Theirfaces were covered with black cloth.One soldier said, in Sinhala—I understanda little—‘We have orders to shooteveryone.’ We were shouting for themnot to shoot.” After a tense standoff, thepastor was strip-searched, along withthe children, and then allowed to collecthis belongings from the bunker. “Apastor came behind me, but he waspunched in the chest by a soldier. Hefell down. He died later that day. Thesame soldier who hit him stuck hisfingers in the wounds of the young menwith us who had been injured.”After another strip search and a longinterrogation, the pastors were reunitedwith the children and put in a detentioncamp. When I asked the pastor howthe experience had affected him, hesaid, “It is in my mind. When I sleep,automatically it comes out—things Ionly saw in films in my youth. Bodieswithout heads. Bodies with the stomachopen and the liver coming out.” Headded, “At the end, we were walkingout through fire and past dead people,and the soldiers were laughing at us andsaying, ‘We have killed all your leaders.Now you are our slaves.’ You can imaginehow I feel about my country.”On the same day, May 18th, theArmy announced that the Tigerleader, Velupillai Prabhakaran, hadbeen killed, along with two hundredand fifty others, during an overnight42 THE NEW YORKER, JANUARY 17, 2011