Photograph: LankaFiles
Sri Lanka's intelligence officers are surveilling Tamil organisers at the Kanchikudiyaru thuyilum illam, in an attempt to intimidate Tamils remembering fallen cadres.
Lanka Files reported that Pushparaj Dushanthan, the head of the memorial committee at Kanchikudiyaru thuyilum illam in Amparai, was being followed by intelligence officers due to his role in organising Maaveerar Naal - or Great Heroes' Day - commemorations at the destroyed LTTE cemetery.
“We have learned that intelligence agencies are constantly monitoring our activities even when we clean Maaveerar cemeteries. That means that intelligence agencies are present wherever we go. When we are at the Maaveerar cemetery cleaning it, 10-15 intelligence agency personnel show up," Dushanthan reportedly said.
"When I travel from Kalmunai to Thirukkovil and back, I am being followed. On my way back from Kanchikudiyaru, intelligence agencies followed me on motorbikes all the way to Akkaraipattu. I saw that. So, they are sending intelligence agencies to intimidate us and the Tamil people, while pretending to be good and claiming to have given equal rights to the Tamil people,” he added.
Earlier this week, two Tamil women organising the Maaveerar Naal commemoration at Uduthurai thuyilum illam were ordered by Sri Lankan police to not light lamps in front of photographs of fallen Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) cadres, they can not use the karthigai flower (a traditional flower of remembrance) in any form and they can not play Maaveerar songs. Instead, they will have to play cinema songs at the commemoration event.
Despite these acts of intimidation, Tamils in the North-East have been been defiantly marking Maaveerar remembrance week by publically paying tribute to fallen cadres and honouring Maaveerar families.
