One respect in which developments are favourable in the LTTE controlled area from a democratic point of view, is that the people are beginning to assert themselves. But the causes are rooted in enormous tragedy in great losses in life and material welfare suffered by the people.

Recently the LTTE floated proposals to place the Vanni under a proclamation of state of war similar in tone to that declared by Mahattaya soon after the outbreak of war in June 1990.

Under the new proclamation it was proposed to close the schools for three months and students of about the age of 13 (i.e. year 9 or standard 8) upwards to be given military training.

This was strenuously opposed by principals and associations of parents and teachers. It was pointed out by principals and teachers that they were running the schools with great difficulty under enormous drawbacks, shrewdly pointing to the schools running smoothly in Jaffna, Vavuniya and Mannar Island. The LTTE has since modified its proposal to one hour a day of ARP (Air Raid Protection ) training.

An intense campaign of recruitment has been going on with a target of 5000. Political speeches areregularly made in schools and public places followed by street drama performances.

In Madhu refugee camp a spokesman recently said, You are all happy about the heavy casualties we inflicted on the Sri Lankan forces at Mankulam. But we too suffer casualties in dead and injured. We have got plenty of money, weapons and ammunition. Unless you join and support our heroic fighting forces, we cannot continue to resist the enemy with the same intensity.

Despite these intensive efforts the response to the recruitment drive has been poor. Those who join are scattered individuals here and there, rather than groups of persons.

For this reason reliable estimates are not possible. For example the LTTE claimed recently that it had recruited 1000 in Mallavi, the main refugee settlement in the Mullaitavu District. But local sources place the number at less than 200. The number of recruits in the whole of Vanni in recent months is generally estimated to be about 500 although figures such as 1500 are also floated about.

None of those we have spoken to recall cases of child recruitment (say 12 and below). This is partly because recruitment itself is scattered and no longer a prominent phenomenon. In general the target age seems to be about 14 or 15 and above. This is a sign that the short-term need for immediate combat is paramount. The situation is unlike the early 90s in Jaffna when the LTTE proudly displayed recruits aged 10 and sometimes even 8. That was when the LTTE ran a virtual mini state with a command of resources supplied by the government, making it feasible to sustain a reserve army of children.

The LTTE has been campaigning for recruits in the cleared areas around Vavuniya too. Their message was that they had killed 3000 soldiers who were part of the Army's northern advance, and wanted others to join them and share in the LTTE's triumph. The response is reportedly negligible.

There are several other indications that the LTTE is stretched for manpower. An appeal has gone out to former members of the LTTE who have married and settled down to rejoin the fighting forces, on the pledge that it would look after their families. In earlier years those wanting to leave after seven years were normally given permission to leave if they so wished.

Currently there is much foot-dragging on applications for release for those who have completed seven years. Methods of recruitment too have become increasingly questionable with the passage of time. They capitalise on momentary indecision, quick removal and isolation from families. Many of the recent recruits are persons who have been stopped on the street, brainstormed, given promises of glory and pledges to look after the family, were urged to get onto the bar of a bicycle the moment they showed some vacillation, and quickly taken away. Under these conditions one would have expected marked desertion, but for the fact that escape was difficult and prospects in the cleared (army controlled) area uncertain. Yet desertion is prominent enough for people to be aware of it despite every village having LTTE informers.

Recently for example a group of more than half a dozen Women Sea Tigers walked away in Mullaitivu after handing over their cyanide capsules to colleagues. Some of them have experience of seven years and are known to have been fierce fighters.

Those who had encountered them said that out of the organisation they were behaving like lambs. Most of them have been caught and punished.

The LTTE's recruitment campaign is obviously running into increasing reluctance on the part of civilians. The more senior students in school see the LTTE's cause as a death trap with no end in sight. With the older folk it is not so much whether the LTTE's cause is right or wrong, as they rather feel that they have already sacrificed much and have lost far more than their due.

The many families of both Vanni and those displaced from Jaffna, who have lost one or two children in the war, now have a very modest desire to protect their remaining offspring. Many of those with children coming to the age of 12 or 13 are making plans to move out into the army controlled area, simply to protect their children from the pressure posed by recruiters.

The LTTE's street drama themes are also reflective of the public mood. There are of course the usual themes: The older members of a family try to prevail on a younger member not to join the LTTE on the plea that security and studies are more important. The next thing is that the same older members are killed in aerial bombing by the Sri Lankan Air Force.

The message is clearly that studies and security are meaningless until the state forces are defeated. More ironical are street drama themes which focus on issues that some the LTTE's strongest critics have been raising.

For example, one such criticism is the LTTE's ardent cultivation of rank hypocrites and opportunists among the elite. The latter are portrayed in the LTTE's current dramas as making stirring speeches to inveigle other people's children to join the LTTE while being very careful in ensuring that their own children do not join.

It reveals a mood of such skepticism in the Vanni, that to get any sympathy from the audience the LTTE now finds it necessary to attack this segment among its former supporters, who are again very typical of its overseas support base.

There is also an evident tactical change in the approach of LTTE recruiters to the civilian population in the Vanni. Some of them told civilians who usually move with them that their Leader himself has given them strict instructions not to alienate the civilian population.

They have been asked to bear with criticism, but to somehow get on with the job of recruitment. In practice what the recruiters do is to allow the people to criticise and change the subject by saying something like, We would even like you to come and help us. You don't have to do anything very risky, you could just carry ammunition or carry away the injured.

Thus even the little room the people now have to protest and assert themselves at least in the interest of protecting their children, has been paid for in enormous suffering. Even this could be lost overnight either through the LTTE pulling off some stunning action that catches the government off balance, or through the cumulative effects of the government's own inadequacies, routine callousness shown in aerial bombing and its corruption.

Economic Breakdown

Underpinning the developments sketched above, also lies the phenomenon of economic breakdown. During much of 1996 following the forced exodus from Jaffna, the LTTE's administrative machinery was trying at least to organise some kind of subsistence level economic life.

Very little of this is in evidence now. The LTTE has virtually thrown in the towel, confining itself to taxing what it can.

A significant part of the population without work depends on government rations and help from International NGOs. According to NGO sources malnutrition is on the rise.

The fate of paddy farmers illustrates some salient trends. When during 1996 Vanni filled with displaced persons from Jaffna there was a local demand for paddy.

The LTTE was a major purchaser but many farmers complain of not having been paid in full to date. Then private traders came into vogue once again. A year ago the price of paddy rose as high as Rs.900/- a moodai. The Jaffna population has since declined to a small fraction of what it was, thus sharply curtailing local demand and increasing marketing difficulties.

This year the harvest has been fairly good at 30 to 40 moodais per acre. A moodai fetches nearly Rs.700- in Vavuniya. Taking the cost of inputs at Rs.10000/- an acre,this means, under normal conditions, an income of Rs.11000/- to Rs.18000/- an acre.

But the LTTE first offered Rs.300/- a moodai. The farmers protested and refused to sell. The current going rate is Rs.500/- a moodai. The private traders are not willing to pay more since before getting the stuff to Vavunyia there is a tax of Rs.100- at the LTTE exit point and further costs in trans-shipment at the army entry point, since vehicles from the uncleared area are not allowed into the cleared area.

The farmer's profit is therefore reduced to between Rs.5000/- and Rs.10000/- for what is a good year. This is not a long-term framework for a stable economic life.

Another feature of economic life is that while many young and productive persons have been rendered inactive, the elderly have become breadwinners. It is generally easier for old folk to cross over into the army controlled area at Uyilankulam and proceed to Mannar Town. They then re-enter the LTTE controlled area with 4 litres of kerosene oil purchased at Rs.25/- a litre which they are allowed, 2 litres of coconut oil and 4 cakes of soap. These in turn are sold to traders. The trader buys the kerosene at Rs.100/- a litre and sells at Rs.125/-.

Responding & Not Responding: Waiting for Something to Give

Another recent episode is suggestive of the pressures faced by the LTTE. When the Roman Catholic Bishop of Jaffna came to Madhu for the festival during the middle of last year he was totally ignored by the LTTE. Circles close to him expressed disappointment that the LTTE appeared not to be interested in a settlement. They felt that the LTTE could have used the Bishop's visit to communicate some suggestion for a way forward.

But this year in March, we reliably understand that the LTTE sent an invitation to the Bishop in Jaffna to come to the Vanni and talk to them.

A meeting was duly held in early April with the LTTE side represented by Anton Balasingam among others. Leading circles in Madhu were aware that the Bishop of Jaffna had a meeting with the LTTE in Periya Madhu, but had no knowledge of Balasingam's participation which was revealed in the media.

Those at Madhu thought that the talks were about seeking the LTTE's cooperation to enable the displaced population to move back to the cleared areas in Jaffna, the south coast of Mannar District (e.g Arippu, Mullikulam and Silavathurai) and the newly cleared areas in Vavuniya District along the Army's northward advance. In this connection they thought that the talks had been successful and that many people are now moving out without hindrance from the LTTE.

A senior LTTE cadre from Mullaitivu confirmed several of these trends. The loss of Jaffna, he said, was among other things a crucial financial loss. Local running expenses were, according to him, met with funds collected in local currency and foreign collections played no role in the Vanni. Foreign currency was used for military supplies and logistics. In material terms, he said, the LTTE had what it needed, adding that where fighting cadre were concerned, the numbers coming in were inadequate. He said there were recruits from Batticaloa and Trincomalee, but were [agewise] in general small (chinnan). [See Addendum :- Recruitment in the Eastern Province.]

Their logistics, he said, were intact, and foreign travel to any part of the world was not a problem. Some of the fringe pan Dravidian groups in Tamil Nadu were sending persons to the Vanni for training by the LTTE.

From these same connections, an unspecified number of Indian mercenaries are said to be serving in the LTTE's ranks. There are no indications to suggest that these numbers are at present significantly large. But they are a pointer to the explosive tendencies inherent in delaying putting a political settlement into effect.

What all this means is that the LTTE is in a situation of natural disintegration within the organisation itself and also with its base population unable to take anymore. It is once more forced to go through the motions of responding as well as not responding as to the latter its history as we have explained many times previously, precludes any response admissive of democracy and accountability.

The classic way of responding and not responding is to field Balasingam without the Leader himself making any personal commitment. Balasingam said in early 1990 that the LTTE would lay down arms when the last Indian soldier left the country. This happened on 31st March 1990. But Balasingam kept on talking to the Premadasa government even after the war had recommenced on 11th June 1990.

The LTTE will not and cannot give up other violent options. For instance the LTTE recently met the senior UN representative Olara Otunnu and gave him assurances which raised hopes of civilian concerns being respected.

Yet the LTTE was prepared to risk these gains in recognition and face universal opprobrium a few days later in assassinating Mrs. Sarojini Yogeswaran (17th May), mayoress of Jaffna who increasingly voiced the aspirations of the people for a settled order free of violence and gun culture.

Among its expectations was to bring back fear among the people and create panic among the security forces leading to violations, thus creating a turn of events in its favour.

These actions combined with the LTTE Leader's and Balasingam's statements about the LTTE's strength as a conventional army aspiring to be on par with the Sri Lankan Army, manifest its enormous destructive capacity. [See press reports mid April on Balasingam's talks with the Bishop of Jaffna and mid May on the LTTE Leader's speech.]

Placed against the tragic social realities in the Vanni, the Eastern Province and among Tamils in general, such attitudes amount to cruel megalomania. This would in turn suggest that the LTTE's recent attempts to present an accommodative face to civilian objections would be short-lived, leading to a more coercive approach to recruitment.

Smuggling

We had further confirmation coming from both sides that there is now an unofficial stand-off between the LTTE and the other Tamil militant groups.

Members of the LTTE intelligence wing and LTTE helpers have been seen in Mannar town. LTTE intelligence men have also been seen making contact with interests that act as middlemen in rackets. Such stand offs are purely opportunistic, temporary and whose vagaries are dictated by the LTTE with no firm commitment on its part. Even the LTTE's occasional calculated attacks on other groups (e.g. the mine attack on PLOTE leaders in Vavuniya (12th May) and on the EPDP in Pungudutivu in January) seem to have led to mutual recrimination among the latter rather than to any cool reflection.

There are also indications that the LTTE too may be trying some reverse smuggling. During the middle of March a motor cycle packed with explosives set off from Madhu on the road to Vidathal Thivu, apparently to be smuggled to Mannar Island in the first instance. The brother of the cadre who was to deliver the motor cycle also went with him.

At the fourth milepost before the Parappu Kadanthan the motorcycle descended a slope, ran into a patch of loose sand at the bottom and, the rider loosing his balance, the motorcycle fell on its side resulting in a huge explosion. Both the rider and his brother were killed. The gherkin worn by the rider is said to have been torn into tiny shreds and passers by got a strong smell of decaying flesh for several days.

The LTTE has further recently shown its utter contempt for the people by using a suicide bomber to assassinate Brigadier Larry Wijeratne, a much-valued friend of the people of Vadamaratchy.

Wijeratne at the time of his death was in Pt Pedro as a guest of the people who were spontaneously expressing their appreciation in a series of farewell functions. By this act the LTTE grossly offended the most basic and strongly felt cultural sensibility among all peoples that of the obligations of hospitality.

The late Brigadier Larry Wijeratne is unique in many ways and by example has given hope that it is possible to restrain the security forces from unleashing terror and keep the civilian concerns in the forefront during military operations. His approach was not merely the strategical or tactical one of a clever military officer.

The LTTE has manifested its destructive intentions and contempt for the people by the two recent killings in Jaffna that have resulted in fear and despair. What is most needed now is a clear policy of giving hope to the Tamil people.

The LTTE's recruits are again young. Among the boys several are said to be about 13 years of age, but who are strong for their age owing to having worked as labourers. Also smartly dressed LTTE cadre with their gadgetry and modern conveyances strike a fashionable posture in this area where the war has drastically limited the horizons of the people. Observers have particularly noted the effect of the sight of the women cadre on young girls of the area surrounded by drabness. Yet the numbers joining the LTTE are said to be small in comparison with the 80s and early 90s.

The University Teachers for Human Rights (Jaffna) (UTHR(J)) was formed in 1988 at the University of Jaffna, as part of the national organisation University Teachers for Human Rights. Its public activities as a constituent part of university life came to a standstill following the murder of Dr. Rajani Thiranagama, a key founding member, on 21st September 1989.

During the course of 1990 the others who identified openly with the UTHR(J) were forced to leave Jaffna. It continues to function as an organisation upholding the founding spirit of the UTHR(J) with it original aims:
To challenge the external and internal terror engulfing the Tamil community as a whole through making the perpetrators accountable, and to create space for humanising the social & political spheres relating to the life of our community. The UTHR(J) is not at present functioning in the University of Jaffna in the manner it did in its early life for reasons well understood.

The work of UTHR(J) receives support from the European Human Rights Foundation among others.

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