Did the Sri Lankan Army kill LTTE chief V. Prabakaran's son, Balachandran, in cold blood on May 18, 2009, around the same time that Sri Lanka won the last Eelam War?
This is the main question raised in a new Channel 4 video, to be aired on Wednesday.
Writing in United Kingdom's Independent newspaper Callum Macrae, the maker of Sri Lanka's Killing Fields: War Crimes Unpunished, narrates the scene: “A 12-year-old boy lies on the ground. He is stripped to the waist and has five bullet holes in his chest. His name is Balachandran Prabakaran, and he is the son of the LTTE leader, Vellupillai Prabakaran. He has been executed in cold blood.” Mr. Macrae says the footage “seems to have been shot [as] a grotesque trophy video by Sri Lankan forces.”
The video is a sequel to the earlier Channel 4 film, The Killing Fields. In that too, Channel 4 showed executions of LTTE cadre.
Asked about the new video, and specifically about the execution of Balachandran, Sri Lankan President's spokesperson and International Media Advisor Bandula Jayasekara said he had not seen the video.
LTTE rump across the world were busy preparing such videos to embarrass and bring disrepute to Sri Lanka, he said and added that their bluff will be called, just as Sri Lanka had frame-by-frame rebutted the first Channel 4 video.
“We can produce thousands of videos where LTTE has killed children, infants and women. We have proof of them banging heads of children against walls and killing them. Sri Lankan forces do not indulge in these things. We conducted a humanitarian operation,” he said.
Keywords: Channel 4 video, LTTE, Sri Lankan Tamils, ethnic conflict, Eelam War, Prabakaran, Balachandran
This is such a biased article. This is not what the media is about. The Channel 4 doc,
never said that the LTTE was innocent-- it just highlights the reality that the
Sinhalese government and how its army killed and is continuing to kill Tamils.
Whether the kid was a "terrorist's" son is not the question. He was killed and he was
innocent. For the imbecile who talked about the kid being a potential threat, that's
bogus. For those that are saying that Sinhalese Buddhists can't do such a thing, think
again. If you have something good to say, please do-- for the rest of trolls here,
leave and let the Tamil people find hope for their race and ethnicity.
Channel 4 is a pervert channel.Who is going to gain by this filming.Let a new chapter begin.India should ensure that devolution of powers to the Tamil area will go a long way to ensure lasting peace.Srilanka can learn a lot from India's complex issues and especially how people are living in each state in harmony with their individual language.Minor issues and aberrations are there in every state, but overall India is a country which has absorbed many cultures over many centuries.This itself is great example for many countries.
@dilshanferdi:
"Those who know know it well. The young son WAS killed by the guards.
Face it face facts."
And then the guards killed themselves after blindfolding themselves? Is
it any wonder that no one believes the Sri-Lankan Government anymore?
There is absoloutely no evidence that the Sri Lankan Army executed this young boy. It is a well known fact that Prabhakaran himself had given instructions to his bodyguards to kill him and not let him fall into the hands of the Sri Lankan Army. All evidence points at this fact. Many leading LTTE wives and children were rescued and held by Sri Lankan Army. LTTE "navy" Soosai's wife and children are looked after well even now.
THose who know know it well. The young son WAS killed by the guards. Face it face facts.
Have you guys not seen images of many a 12 year old or younger kids
in LTTE camouflages or training in LTTE camps or marching in LTTE
parades? If you have, what makes you think that this boy who you
claim is Pirapakaran's son Balchandran is not also a trained child
soldier of LTTE? Sure Balchandran had been a child soldier, that is
why he hadn’t join his grandparents and walk to safety like 300,000
others.
Macrae may have visualised murders of Afghan and Iraqi children by
American GIs gone berserk and eulogise more than aptly for dollars
he get. Now about the bullet wound that Macrae alleged as emanated
from a close range shot: Like father, like son, young Balachandran
is sure to have had a cyanide pill around his neck too.
So like father, like son, Balchandran may also have decided to fight
on for his cause, and he may have taken an aim at a soldier
approaching at close quarters, and the better trained soldier may
have been quicker to shoot him dead. For one thing, Rajapakse hadn't
witnessed it like Obama and co watched unarmed Bin Laden shot dead
in the head and the woman who shielded him in the leg live.
Leela
War crimes are war crimes. Sri Lanka should pay its dues sooner or later. Don't forget Karma - what you SOW is what you will REAP.
Please put your own version of this news first then publish srilankan govt comments.No one cannot hide the truths it will come out,this is as per nature's choice.
If India can still be united as a country despite her linguistic division as States, why couldn't this simple precedent be applied to Sri Lanks? A federal system with a Tamil and Sinhala state should have been suggested by India some 3 decades ago and consistently maintained with friendly pressure on Sri Lanka. The Sinhalese should look at South India and learn.
It is time to ban Sri-Lankan products in the western countries.
IF Sri-Lanka is not accepting our values we should go ahead with import bans for such a criminal government. That it. We shloud not support the Sri-Lankan economy.
Very dis-heartening to see many pro-Sinhalese and Sinhalese supporting
and justifying the killing of a 12 year old boy. Does it really matter
who his father is ? Don't you all have sons and daughters ? Is your
heart made of stone ?
I do not deny LTTE did commit such atrocities, but "an eye for an eye
makes the whole world blind" and ironically now the Sinhalese want the
whole world to be blind, and they don't want the world to realize the
plain truth they see.
End of LTTE is just one side of the coin, when will be 'terrorists'
i.e. the Sinhalese government will be brought to justice ?
Indian Congress regime at the Centre is showing its weakness in dealing with the Sri Lanka’s human rights and accountability issues. The current Congress regime is the worst since independence due to the widespread corruption and poor leadership and everyone may agree with the LSE, UK’s recent conclusion on this.
India needs leaders like Mrs. Gandhi who sent eminent diplomat G. Parthasarathy to deal with the Sri Lankan issue. At present the Malayalee mafias have hijacked Indian foreign policy and brought shame and their hands are soaked with Tamil blood stains. Former Indian foreign Secretary paid a private visit to meet the alleged war criminal Rajapakse and it shows how these people are corrupted, collaborated and favoured the alledegd war criminal instead being neutral.
Indians have voted out the Congress leaders in the recent state elections and its time for the Indians to dump corrupt and criminal leaders for a better India.
What Sri Lanka does to Sri Lankan Tamils is their internal matter.Indian Tamils should understand this. Absolutely no sypathy we Indians including Indian Tamils should ever have for these killers of Rajiv Gandhi. Indian government is right in consolidating our relationship with Sri Lankan Government.
Hindu knows this information during end of 4th Elam war in srilanka, because Hindu is well cohersive with srilankan news, what ever the information srilanka had at time was avaialable with The Hindu news paper also.this is true.Please hindu atleast now you have to support our tamil cause because our people like lot of brahmins also loss their lives with the hand of srilankan forces
Any person who really understands the complexity of the problem in Sri Lanka will know the only solution to Sri Lanka crisis is a separate country for the Tamils living there. Any other solution suggested is to just waste time. Countries like India, US, China are playing political game with their self interest as the core in this game. Poor Tamils are caught between them and there is no one genuinely interested to help them.
Someone here said fragmentation is not a solution. He should think why this world has fragmented into so many countries and why they all did not stay together.
Crimes against humanity by democratically-elected governments should simply not be tolerated if we want to consider ourselves civilized. The civilized world should demand the Sri Lankan government to be fully responsible for the actions of its military during the final assault on the LTTE. India should lead that demand but won't because of its self-serving geopolitical considerations such as not wanting the Sri Lankans to align with China and Pakistan and its own dubious record in Kashmir.
If the Sri Lankan government had such alleged videos of attrocities committed by LTTE what has thus far prevented them from making them public -atleast over the internet?
Why have they been so silent on this so far?
I totally agree with Sebastin Lingam. RADHAKRISHNAN reporting all along has been biased against Tamils. I do not know when HINDU will come openly and say we did mistake in SL and we will correct henceforth. This will take HINDU only to greater heights. Hope people running them realize it. It is never too late.
History is written by the victors. The genocide in Sri Lanka happened because of the
Indian government's position towards the LTTE. Whether this would have happened if
a non congress government was in power or if Rajiv Gandhi was not assassinated
can't be debated although the answer may be obvious. As it stands today the losers
unfortunately are the Tamils and not just the tamilian population in Sri Lanka. India
should support the UN to force the Sri Lankan army to answer for the genocide.
Unless that happens Congress will be seen as a traitor to the Tamils of the world.
Anyone can ask qiuestions such as this. The simple truth is that Sri Lanka had to do it had to. That is to completely destroy the enemy; in this case Prabhakaran and his entire family and the generation, so that no remnants could have been revered by the murderous followers. Now the only way to protect its sovereignity is through peaceful means and if that fails; nothing but through the barrel of the guns as same as Israel,South Korea, and a host of pro Western nations are doing or have done; where the warmongering West either are with them of supporting through unehical ways and means not having to face the so called UNHRC and other useles organizations financed by the West.
Where was Channel 4................................. ? -:when TULF leader Mr. Selvanayagam was killed in COLD BLOOD .........-:when >18 people were killed IN COLD BLOOD in while praying.........
:when Rajiv Ghandi was killed IN COLD BLOOD.......................
:When >60,000 people were killed IN COLD BLOOD in >20 years......
Somebody here has stated that there is nothing wrong in killing a terrorist's son since snakes whether small or big are all the same. What kind of nonsensical and ruthless theorizing was that? Can he prove this theory in any court of law? There is no scientific evidence to suggest that a terrorist or a thief's progeny will become the same. What the SL authorities had done i.e killing a 12yr old son of a terrorist leader in cold blood is cruel,atrocious,inhuman and against international conventions.The UN Convention against Torture is enacted to prevent 'torture and other cruel inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment throughout the world'.No circumstances like internal turmoil, civil war or any form of emergency can be invoked as a reason to justify torture and killing.The Committee against Torture(CAT) which monitors the implementation of conventions by countries makes torture (extrajudicial killings) a criminal offense &it is empowered to prosecute the perpetrators.
Mr Jayasekera keeps comparing the SLA to the LTTE, a listed terrorist organisation.
That in itself says something!
Justice will never die. It will come to the light one day. The world will then get to know the real faces of the Sri Lankan war criminals,
Reading this article in Hindu is unimaginable before 2 years. For last
2 decades hindu paper vigorously writing against LTTE and always its
editorial page says once LTTE out of the scenarion immedaitely
srilankan government will accept reasonable rights for Tamil people.
The Hindu was almost acting like a advocate for Mr. Rajapakse during
the final war. Now LTTE no more for the past 3 years. What happened in
srilanka. already half of the tamil population systematically
eradicated. Now remaining people (They will remain for few years. then
they became history thanks to white vans). Now Hindu concentrating
about middle east revolutions. Isnt Its duty to bring the srilankan
govt to negotiating table by continuous publishing of srilankan
issues. if Hindu does this then we tamilians beleive It was only
against Prabakaran but not against innocent tamils.
It is Prabakaran who recruited under age childresn young as 12 years old to LTTE terrorist organization and these kids were dead during the war. So why this crocodile tears now only for Prabakaran's kid? How many Sinhalese and Muslims kids have been killed by LTTE????
The Article Says: Writing in United Kingdom's Independent newspaper Callum Macrae, the maker of Sri Lanka's Killing Fields: War Crimes Unpunished, narrates the scene but Prabha's son was killed when they were in the battlefield but do you see what happened yesterday one US soldier just walked out of camp in Afganistan and killed 28 villagers just for fun. dont you western oriented journalists see these as crimes? LTTE killed tens of thousands of villagers and hit kids heads against the walls and killed them why you did not see those as crimes now you only want to cry for dead prabha and his son why?
you channel for is collaborating with LTTE to bring sri Lanka a desrepute because you western media mafia and LTTE terrorists were the same creed.
But the fact remains that Balachandran is no more and he died at the hands of the Sri Lankan forces. How does the Government account for this? Buddhism that these people say they practice does not permit this type of atrocity. To say that LTTE did similar things does not exonerate the Sri Lankan army. It is time the world realizes the horror of the internecine war and the suppression of rights of people who live in a broad tract of land where they are a majority. If Governments cannot give adequate regional autonomy and permit freedom then ultimately that government will fail. Atrocities cannot gain support in the long run from oppressed people. Sri Lanka must realize that the Tamils did not ask for partition at the time of independence and their subsequent revolt is the result of its own policies. It is time they act to accommodate the legitimate desires of the Tamil community with a serious dialogue. Fragmentation of nations is never a solution by itself but accommodation is.
This is no secret the LTTE leader's 12 yrs old son been killed in cold blood. This happened just after he has identified his fathers body. not only Bandula Jayasekara, no sinhalese accepting the truth of they were killing Tamils for last 60yrs where more than 100000 Tamils been killed. not a single person is still been arrested.. for a sinhalese Tamils killings are 'never' happens. exactly the same as they never killed a single Tamilnadu fishermen..
LTTE is a terorist group. so what is wrong killing prabaharan son??? Again he may lead to terroist organisation?? Small snake or big snake...the poison is same to kill...anything. so it should be destroid.
SL has no knowledge of any killings of innocent tamils. The 40000 of people were killed by Alians. SL soldiers are decedents of Mahathma Gandi. They just carry toy guns. Come on, what do you expect from SL government. The tamils never got justice from the SL government in the 30 years and does any one really expect SL government to accept this and investigate?
Prabhakaran killed. LTTE defeated. END OF THE STORY.
There are several unconfirmed reports of atrocities committed by Sri Lankan forces against the LTTE cadres and minority Tamils in that country. Why is the Indian Govt. not demanding and official inquiry into these reports and punishment for those found guilty?
Ask the spokesperson Bandula Jayasekara if he had watched 'Kony 2012' and he would answer; "yes, many times". So strange that the world is living in a completely denial to what's happened in Sri Lanka for three long decades whereas people went recently viral about a tiny charity video called 'Kony 2012'. Makes me ask, 'why this injustice on earth?' A whopping 70 million had watched last week the video about a warlord (Kony) kidnapping children for his LRA army in an African country on YouTube but they seem to have never heard about thousands of children lined up and shot for the only reason that they were Tamils in a Sinhala majority country. So sad.
channel 4 never made a video on how Bin laden was killed.What is the difference between Bin and Prabha...nothing except Bin's terrorist activities look like child's play compared to Prabhakaran's terrorist activities. These guys are always covering up atrocities at the hand of western forces and Sri Lanka is being tarnished for eliminating the worst terrorist group on earth.
What is really embarrassing and disgusting is to see the corrupt regime dinning and dancing with the LTTE Terrorists who now support them, including the current Leader, when the war hero General Fonseka is spending time in jail. The entire world is laughing at us.
Even in the face of overwhelming evidence to the contrary, Sri Lanka's official position is still to deny everything, with anger, hostility, frustration. As the saying goes: You can fool some of the people some of the time, but you cannot fool all of the people all of the time.
MR. RADHAKRISHNAN, how could you avoid all the important elements of the story in Independent? It discusses exceptional evidence from third parties linking the military to crimes against humanity. It is inexcusable for leading paper in India, to not report the evidence on the largest crimes committed in the South Asia since East Pakistan atrocities. Stunning.
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