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Arms surrendered in Sri Lanka

COLOMBO: Sri Lankan military on Sunday announced that “factions of Islamic militants” — who took to arms for various reasons — delivered them to police on Saturday evening in Kathankudi town in Batticaloa district in response to the government’s appeal even as a soldier died in clash with a group of suspected Tiger cadres in the same district.

The death of the soldier is the first military loss of life since troops on May 19 announced the killing of the top leadership of the LTTE including its leader Velupillai Prabakaran.

“An army soldier had spotted this suspicious boat with one man on board and tried to search it after talking to the boatman,” said Army in a statement. The man was later identified as a regional leader of the LTTE.

Two other soldiers opened fire and overpowered the boatman who sustained injuries and was admitted to hospital, said the Army. A search is on in the area for remnants of the Tiger cadres.

The military said the illegal weapons were handed over through the Association of Muslim Mosques in the Eastern Province.

An amnesty given by the police to handover all illegal weapons in Eastern Province ended on Saturday. Receiving the weapons, DIG of eastern province Edison Gunatilake described the event “historic” and called for the surrender of all such weapons.

Minister of Health, Eastern province, M. L. A. M. Hisbullah said he distributed 600 weapons to villagers to be used to defend the Muslims from Tigers.

He said he received them from the late President R.Premadasa and distributed them a day after an incident of massacre in Kathankudi in August 1990. “We never kept these weapons to fight the security forces. We used them to fight against the Tamil Tigers.” The English weekly Lakbima said a joint military operation would be launched to track down arms and ammunition in the hands of the “jihadist groups in the East, after the extended deadline given for the hand over of the weapons lapsed”.

It quoted Mr. Gunathilake as saying the response from the Muslim armed groups to the government’s call to hand over weapons was poor.

The weekly further quoted him as saying aid intelligence reports reveal that jihadist militants’ possess 250 T 56 assault rifles, a fraction of which had been handed on Saturday.

The deadline, which was initially set for July 2 was extended to July 4 on the request of the Muslim community leaders.

State run weekly, Sunday Observer quoted Mr. Hisbullah as saying Muslims did not need a separate political party but should remain part of the mainstream political parties, to achieve their political aspirations and legitimate rights.

He also denied recent reports about the presence of a Jihad militant movement in the eastern province.

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