TAMIL MUSLIM ETHNIC RIOTS SPREAD FROM TRICOMALEE DISTRICT TO BATTICALOA DISTRICT AND THE TOLL RISES TO ONE DEAD, 100 INJURED

By Walter Jayawardhana reporting from Los Angeles

One person died and nearly one hundred people were injured with some being admitted to critical care unit of a hospital as Tamils and Muslims clashed in renewed ethnic rioting which spread to Valachchenai area in the Batticaloa district of the Eastern Province of Sri Lanka.

The dead person identified as Gunasekeram Nagalingam (19) died in a grenade explosion at Valachchenai. As the riots, which originally started with LTTE organized Tamils and Muslim youth in Muttur spread further South in the province, rows of shops in Valachchenai were set on fire by rioting arsonists and more than 20 were reported injured and admitted to hospitals from that place alone. Shops were seen burning near the Valachchenai bus stand, as the riot spread from the original Trincomalee District to Batticaloa District.

Interior Minister John Ameratunga, who is in charge of the island nation’s police force with Muslim Affairs Minister Rauf Hakeem flew to Trincomalee and visited the Muttur area where the rioters torched mosques and residences. They ordered preventive methods to stop the riot spreading further. Police posts were immediately ordered to start functioning at trouble spots. Police and army patrols were increased in the rioted areas.

Police also declared a curfew in the Valachchenai area. Kathankudi in Batticaloa District was another area where arson was reported.

Security sources said trouble renewed in the Muttur area following a clash between two groups of LTTE supporters and Muslims in which four people were injured. Ten houses also had been set on fire in Muttur.

Meanwhile the state run Daily News reported Muslims and Tamils were also involved in abductions of people of each other’s group during the riots. The LTTE’s official news web the Tamil Net said, "Ten Tamil women were abducted by the extremists in Oddamaavadi near Valachchenai."

Police reports said all government offices and shops were closed in Kalmunai. Akkaraipattu, Samanthurai, Pothuvil, Kathankudy and Valachchenai in support of a Muslim hartal organized in response of the LTTE organized hartal earlier.

An organization calling itself "a Muslim Brotherhood’ said in a pamphlet that the hartal was organized to protest the incidents at Muttur and extortion of money from the Muslims by the LTTE. It further pointed out six hartals had been forced on the Muslims by the LTTE since the MOU was signed between the Wickremesinghe government and the LTTE.

In Valachchenai area three buses were attacked and damaged and an ambulance was also attacked after it was returning from Batticaloa hospital after transporting some riot victims.

A grenade attack was also reported in the Valachchenai market where four people were critically injured. In another area shops belonging to Muslims were also reportedly set on fire.

Twenty seven Muslim families resident in Jinnagar, Pachanoor and 58/59 villages fled their homes on 26 June and sought shelter in Muttur town and its suburbs, about 13 km South of Trincomalee.

The police said, "These Muslim civilians, who fear reprisals after a chain of violent acts in their areas were forced to seek security in these alternative shelters. Some Muslim families from Jinnagar and Pachchanoor areas remain sheltered in Muttur town where some of their relatives were residing." A section of members from the families, who had left from 58/59 villages have received shelter in a nearby mosque."

Another security report said that M. Shavul of Jinnagar, Muttur, who was injured after a quarrel with a Tamil civilians was admitted to the Muttur hospital, June 26.

A quarrel between a section of Tamils and Muslim civilians in the Alankerni village, about 11 km Southwest of Trincomalee town had resulted in the injury of the said person.

A passenger bus plying from Trincomalee to Muttur had been waylaid by a group of unidentified persons in the general area of Kiliveddi, about 23 km Southeast of Trincomalee June 26 , another report said.

"According to eyewitnesses, this Tamil speaking group that stopped the bus had allegedly attempted to abduct three Muslim men and two children who were on the bus.

However, the attempt was foiled when the group began to run away on seeing the approach of Police personnel to the scene, " the report added Police provided security to these Muslims on board until up to their destination.

An unidentified group of people had set fire to 15 houses belonging to Tamils in Alanchenai, a suburb in Muttur town June 26. The fires that ravaged their houses and belongings had been brought under control, the report further said.

Tensions were building up between the Muslims and the terrorist group Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam as the Muslim traders and farmers were subjected to alleged extortions of the LTTE . Tactics mostly adopted by the Tamil rebels were hijacking tractors, trucks etc. of the Muslims and releasing them on ransom.

Since the ongoing peace process between the administration of Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe and the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam, the Sri Lanka government was of little help to the Muslims ,they complained. Although Rauf Hakeem, Leader of the Sri Lanka Muslim Congress signed an agreement with the LTTE leader Velupillai Prabhakaran, no concession has come so far to the more than 100,000 Muslims who were chased out of Jaffna in 1990 in an ethnic cleansing program of the LTTE.