After Madhu debacle:

‘Tigers in for another jolt in Wanni shortly’

by Shanika Sriyananda

[email protected]
 

With a firm belief in the successes of the on-going battles in the North, the Commander of the Army reiterated that the military will destroy the LTTE terrorists and would capture Wanni, shortly.

In a special interview soon after the military captured the Madhu Shrine, Lieutenant General Sarath Fonseka said that those who rejoiced with a false notion of last week’s attack on Muhamalai can very soon witness the capture of Wanni, the last bastion of the LTTE outfit.
 

He said that the LTTE Leader Prabhakaran would never make his dream - Eelam - a reality during his lifetime and if he wanted to realise that dream still it would take some long years to rise from the present situation.

“His dream will come to an end soon as the military has already entered into the Kilinochchi boundary. We are 12 kilometres ahead of the Madu area and six kilometres away from the Omanthi checkpoint”, he said.

The Army Chief is confident that the situation in the North would completely change if the military advance further another 10 kilo metres along the Vavniya-Madu front.” The morale of the soldiers in all ranks is high.

The Military is receiving the correct guidance. The welfare of the soldiers is looked after by the military. All the precautionary measures have been taken to protect the soldiers in the battle front. So we do not have barricades in slowing down advancing into Kilinochchi”, he said.

Lt.Gen. Fonseka said those who wanted the military to end terrorism could patiently wait. “Those who have hopes can keep their hopes”, the army chief said.

A veteran commander who fought several major battles, the army chief said that the twenty-five-year-old wound - the LTTE terrorism - could not be easily healed and would take some years to disappear the scars though it was healed through militarily.

According to Lt. Gen. Fonseka, the military took the initiatives to clear the East, after the Vakarai battle and the LTTE lost its ground gradually. He said that military did not achieve its target easily as some people claimed but the dedication of all soldiers brought the military victories starting from mid 2006.

“Our dedicated soldiers are on battle fronts round the year and they did not leave for the new year nor on poya days. When the people in the South celebrated New Year with fire crackers, the soldiers in Northern battlefront celebrated it with multi-barrels”, he said.

Refuting the allegations that over 150 soldiers died at the last week’s Muhamalai attack, Lt. Gen. Fonseka said that over 43 soldiers were killed, 33 missing and nearly 300 were injured.

According to his assessment, only 100 soldiers got serious injuries, which need long-term treatment and the rest with minor injuries had already reported to the battle front.

“This is not a big blow to the military,” he said. In the last battle at Muhamalai over 160 soldiers died and reported heavy casualties”, he added.

Taking about the damage caused to the LTTE, the Army Chief said, according to military intelligence, over 160 terrorists have been killed and it is difficult to say the exact number of LTTE cadres died at the LTTE treatment centres.

He said the LTTE suffered heavy casualties and it was four times greater than the number of army casualties. The LTTE transmissions revealed that truck loads of dead bodies and casualties of the LTTE cadres were taken into Wanni.

“In their web-site they have announced the number of cadres killed at the attack and it was 92. Over 50 percent of the LTTE cadres in the FDLs were killed”, he said.

Leading an army of 167,000 men, Gen. Fonseka said the last week attack on Muhamalai would not hinder any further military offensives against the LTTE in any of the battle fronts and the well trained soldiers know that they would die in achieving the military targets with national interests.

The Army Chief claimed that those who groomed the LTTE and brought them to this level should be blamed for these losses and they should be held responsible for when a soldier lost a limb.

He said that the military does not want to underestimate the fighting capabilities of the LTTE, though it is facing a major defeat due to less man and fire power, but would gradually and steadily weaken the outfit soon. The LTTE, which put its all efforts and strength to hold their strong points, while trying to survive with limited resources, still make efforts to capture Jaffna Peninsula.

“Still they hope that they can capture Jaffna. Instead to realising that dream they are moving away from their targets daily due to strong and continuous military offensives, when over 34,000 soldiers with two additional battalions - 53 and 55 - are fighting to protect the Peninsula from the LTTE”, he said adding that the end of the LTTE would be the day the outfit try to capture Jaffna Peninsula.

According to the Army Chief, the military is strong in and out of the Peninsula and there are over 1,400 terrorists including 1,000 fighting cadres in Jaffna and over 7,000 terrorists have been killed since 2006 August.

He said that according to intelligence there were 10,000 LTTE cadres in the Peninsula and 2000 in the East. He said that these numbers would not say that the LTTE’s man power has been reduced to 3,000.

“The number keeps on increasing as they recruit young and old to the outfit forcibly”, he said giving the estimated number of LTTE terrorists - 1,400 in Muhamalai, 1,500 in Weli Oya, Vavuniya and Mannar and another 1,000 standby.

Gen. Fonseka said that the dead bodies belong to Sea Tiger cadres and confirmed that they lack cadre strength. Female cadres of the Sea Tigers, the LTTE Police cadres were among the dead, he said.

He also said that the LTTE could not survive at the rate their cadres were getting killed and difficult to continue attacks for long periods with fresh untrained cadres, mostly who were taken to arms forcibly.”

People have realised the situation as the LTTE is continuously losing its ground. They have started coming to the government-controlled areas. Last month 70 have fled the LTTE controlled-areas and during this month it was 70”, he said, adding that if this trend of people fleeing the LTTE, controlled areas continues, this would seriously affect the outfit.

The Army Chief said that his men, who were battling strongly and confidently against the LTTE, would not be demoralised easily but unfortunately their morale was affected due to mud-slinging campaigns by those in the South who do not want to accept that military achieve success since the Vakarai battle.

He said that until the last LTTE terrorist was destroyed from the East, the military will continue to maintain the security in the East.

Vowing to wipe out the LTTE terrorism before the end of his tenure, Lt. Gen. Fonseka said that the major hinderance faced by the military was the unrealistic criticisms by those who want to underestimate the military capabilities of the soldiers.