04 February

● More than 300 people, majority of them Tamils, were arrested during a cordon and search operation in Colombo (see separate report).

● Pushparajah Navaneerathan, 27, was shot dead by armed men on a motorbike near his house in Thuwarakandu, Chelvanayakapuram, Trincomalee.

● SLA soldiers shot dead a Tamil youth in Maniarasankulam, Kinniya, in Trincomalee district, and claim the victim was an LTTE cadre. The SLA said they recovered a communication set and food items near the body.

● SLA troopers and Liberation Tigers exchanged artillery and mortar fire near Thenmaradchy FDL near Muhamalai. Two shells fell within the Usan SLA camp at behind the FDL position. Another shell fired by the Liberation Tigers exploded in areas close to Usan and Mirusuvil SLA camps, causing minor injuries to two civilians. Though residents close to the SLA camps had moved out of their residences when clashes erupted between the SLA and the LTTE last year, some had returned to their houses.

● Murunkan Police reported exchange of gunfire between a road patrol of Police commandos and a group of Liberation Tiger cadres at Pannavedduvan, Mannar. The police said a Tiger cadre was killed and that the Tigers had taken the body of their dead cadre, but claimed to have located a T-56 automatic rifle after the clash. Five hours later, the SLA fired artillery shells towards LTTE controlled Arippu.

● A Sri Lanka Police constable sustained serious injuries when armed men hurled hand grenades at the police sentry point in Thonikkal, Vavuniya.

● A civilian was injured in a hand grenade explosion near Pandarikulam Muniyappar Temple in Vavuniya.

● The SLA cordoned off Vankalai area and the brigade commander of Thalladay SLA camp addressed around 4000 Tamil Catholics gathered for Sunday mass at St. Anne's Church, instructing them to inform on any strangers seen in the area.

● The body of a male was found in a road-side drain along Green Road in the centre of Trincomalee town, bearing injuries and covered with dried coconut leaves.

● Four civilian commuters travelling on a Trincomalee bound Colombo train were taken into custody during a search of the train by Sri Lanka security forces. Police said the suspects were in possession of documents for about 90 vehicles, but the ethnicity of the suspects was not revealed.

● Pushparajah Navaneerathan, 27, was shot dead by armed men on a motorbike near his house in Thuwarakandu, Chelvanayakapuram, Trincomalee.

03 February

● An armed person shot dead Sahathevan Vijayakumar, 38, a father of two children, at his mother's house at Aiyankerni, Batticaloa. Vijayakumar, a daily labourer from Nagathambiran Kovil road in Aiyankerni, used to spend the nights at his mother's house and was shot by a killer who was waiting for him when he went to close the compound gate.

● Fifteen Tamil youths were arrested in Wennapuwa, coastal town in the western province during a cordon and search operation by the government security forces. Most of the arrested are natives of Batticaloa district who found employment in the area. Police said that they took the youths into custody when they failed to prove their identity and the purpose of their stay in Wennapuwa.

● 266 Tamils were arrested in a search operation in Colombo (see separate report).

● Rajeswaran Senthooran, 22, a native of Mallavi in Vanni and an auto-rickshaw driver, was dead by gunmen riding two motorbikes at Kulumadu junction in Vavuniya.

02 February

● The Legal Advisor of the Jaffna SLHRC, Mudiyapu Remedias, registered a complaint with the Jaffna Commanding Officer of SLA that he was severely assaulted by a group of SLA soldiers near Stanley Road in Jaffna Town, despite his presenting his credentials as the Legal Officer working for the SLHRC.

● S. Surenthirarajah, the Jaffna Co-ordinating Officer of the SLHRC registered a complaint with Jaffna police that he has been subjected to continuous threats to his life. Mr. Surenthirarajah said that a person alleged to be the member of a "political party" had threatened him with a weapon and made several phone calls warning him. He has also mentioned that these threats to life and intimidations are being made due to the prominent role the Jaffna SLHRC takes in investigating, and exposing the continuing arrests, disappearances and killings in the Jaffna peninsula. Already, two Coordinating Officers working for the Jaffna SLHRC vacated their posts and had sought asylum in Canada because they were assaulted by the police when they went to the Jaffna police station to register complaints against the threats to their lives. A Sinhalese Coordinating Officer also vacated his post because of the continuous threats to his life and to Surenthirarajah.

● The Police recovered the body of Sinniah Palaniappan, 59, along the sea beach in Pulmoddai, Trincomalee. Injuries were found on the body.

01 February

● The President of the Jaffna Multi Pupose Co-Operative Society (MPCS) and an active social worker in the Jaffna Peninsula, S. T. Gananathan, 64, was shot dead near Mampalam junction SLA camp in Ariyalai, a suburb of Jaffna. Mr. Gananathan went to fetch water from a well close to his house in Punkankulam, along A-9 highway, when he was assassinated by two armed men about 200 metres from Mampalam junction SLA camp.

● Residents of Rasa Veethy, Kopay found the body of Jeyakumar Mayooran, 27, near the Martyrs Resting Home on that road. His family members had earlier complained to the Jaffna SLHRC that he had been abducted by SLA soldiers while riding his motorcycle near Nallur temple. The body had signs of torture and gunshot injuries. Residents said they heard vehicles moving and gunshots the previous night from the area where the body was found. Mayooran's hand phone and motorcycle are missing.

● Chinabay Police recovered the body of an unidentified male person with gunshot injuries at Kandalayweduwan in Upparu village, Trincomalee. The victim, aged about thirty, had been murdered elsewhere and dumped in Kandalayweduwan.

● Fifty six Tamil civilians including two women were arrested in a combined cordon and search operation by Sri Lanka forces in Uppuveli division, Trincomalee. Most of them are residents of Allesgarden and are detained in Uppuveli police station.

● Two Sri Lanka Police were injured in a grenade attack on a police post at Pandarikkulam in Vavuniya. The policemen were on guard at a mini police camp when they were attacked.

● A SLA soldier was killed when a foot patrol was hit by claymore attack at Maharambaikkulam, in Vavuniya.

31 January

● Seven police constables, three army personnel and a civilian were killed and seven army personnel, five policemen and three civilians injured in claymore attack in Batticaloa. The claymore mine was triggered along the roadside near the Eastern University premises targeting a bus transporting army and police personnel. 55 people, including 25 undergraduates and university employees, were arrested by Eravur police after the blast. The arrested, including three female undergraduates, were detained at Eravur police station for further questioning. After the bomb blast, the SLA cordoned off the university premises, and campus staff and students were allowed to leave only after an extensive search.

● Vavuniya Police recovered two bodies with gunshot wounds in Maharambaikulam, Vavuniya. The bodies were identified as belonging to Singaram Santhakumar, 28, and Veeraiya Logeswaran, 28. These latest killings bring the number of homicides in Vavuniya during the first month of the year to 59, of whom 9 are SLA soldiers, 8 Sri Lanka Police, 6 alleged members of the LTTE, and the remaining 36 are civilians, 4 of whom as Sinhalese.

● Vijayakumar, 55, a trader dealing in foreign exchange and money transactions, residing at Perera Lane in Wellawatte was abducted by armed men in a white van near Perera Lane as he was returning home. He is a cousin of Professor K. Sivathamby.

● Yogaraj Mathanraj, who had come to Colombo from Jaffna and been staying at a lodge in George R. De Silva Mawathe in Kotahena, was abducted by armed men in a white van. Kotahena police had arrested Mathanaraj on suspicion and as he was returning to his lodge after being interrogated by the police, armed men in a white van abducted Mathanraj near Kotahena police station.

30 January

● Jaffna police recovered the body of a youth aged around 23, at Arukaalmadam area in the Jaffna Municipality limits with gunshot injuries. They suspect he was abducted elsewhere earlier, brought to Arukaalmadam, and shot dead.

● Gunmen shot dead a disabled civilian at Rajakiramam, Karaveddy in Vadamarachchy, Jaffna. Pirammiah Tharmaseelan, 32, a family man, was at his home when gunmen approached his house, called him out, shot and escaped. Mr. Tharmaseelan has already lost an arm and a leg in an earlier shell attack.

● Armed men in a white van forcibly abducted Rajamanoharan Suthaharan, 34, from his house on Railway Station Road in Kondavil, Jaffna, and took him away.

● SLA troopers arrested Ramachandran Rajeevan, 24, of Thavady, Jaffna, while he was playing in the Thavady Pathirakali Amman Temple grounds and he has been missing since.

● Chelliah Kajendran of Ainthu Vembadi area at Thavady in Kokuvil, Jaffna, has been missing after he was arrested by the SLA.

● Thambirasa Thamayanthan from School road in Annaikottai, arrested on 10 January by the SLA, was reported missing by his family members.

● The body of Gunaratnam Gajendran, 30, of Suthumalai North, Manipay, was discovered in Arukalmadam with visible marks of severe torture and cut wounds. Gunaratnam, employed in a business establishment in Jaffna, disappeared a week earlier while returning home.

● Unidentified persons shot dead Tharman, a fifty-year old Tamil farmer at Aathimoddai, a suburb of Sambaltivu village, Trincomalee.

● SLA and SLAF soldiers and police conducted a combined cordon and search operation in Morawewa, Trincomalee following a mortar attack on the SLAF camp in Morawewa by LTTE cadres. Military reports from Colombo said there were no casualties on the security side and that Government forces had successfully retaliated the attack.

● 38 civilians, majority of them Tamils, were arrested in Colombo north (see separate report).

● A SLA trooper was killed in a bomb blast at Kathiraveli in the SLA seized Vaharai area in Batticaloa during duty time.

29 January

● Two policemen and a civilian were injured when unidentified men hurled a hand grenade at a police post at Soosaipillaiyar Kulam in Vavuniya. Another civilian working in a near by garage was injured when police opened up with retaliatory fire.
The civilian injured in the grenade blast was identified as Dhanabala, a driver working at the Vavuniya secretariat.

● Armed men on a motorcycle shot and seriously injured an employee of Jaffna University at Nayanmarkattu in Nallur. Muthu Peter, 29, father of one, a native of Navatkuli in Thenmaradchi and a resident of Nachimarkovilady in Jaffna, was rushed to hospital where he succumbed to his wounds. Peter was returning home on motorcycle after visiting his parents in Navatkuli when he was shot.

● Thinesh Ananthan, 24, from 3rd Mile Post in Aanaikottai, arrested by the SLA is reported missing by his relatives.

● More than 600 prospective passengers, planning to travel out of Jaffna by private planes and queuing outside the airline office, turned angry when they were told that only one hundred would be given tokens for issue of air tickets. The irate civilians smashed the windows of the office and caused damages to property inside the building. The civilians later attempted to attack employees but were prevented when a large number of SLA troops arrived at the scene. Several of the civilians were injured when the SLA soldiers attacked the passengers to bring the situation under control.

● A youth from Kokuvil west, Jaffna, surrendered at Jaffna police station fearing danger to his life by unknown armed men. Tharmalingam Ramesh Babu, 22, complained that he has been receiving threats to his life from unknown men and said he feared he will be killed if he stayed at home.

● Unidentified men shot dead a Tamil youth at Anpuvallipuram junction on Trincomalee-Kandy highway, near Trincomalee town. The armed men on a motorbike shot Sriharan Sasinthan at point blank range.