Minister Paulraj’s recent UK statement, celebrating her party’s success while seemingly downplaying the brutal legacy of LTTE terrorism and the fears it instilled in the Tamil community, risks reigniting painful historical divisions for political expediency.
Women and Child Affairs Minister Saroja Savithri Paulraj made a notable declaration recently, asserting that the National People’s Power (NPP) electoral victories last year had fundamentally improved Sri Lanka. She claimed that this change elevated all citizens, regardless of their ethnic or religious background, to a position of equality before law enforcement.
Minister Paulraj, the first Tamil Member of Parliament ever elected from the Matara District and a member of the NPP’s National Executive Committee, shared a significant observation regarding the Tamil community’s previous relationship with state institutions. She stated that the community had harbored deep fears concerning the prospect of receiving justice when dealing with police stations. Furthermore, she noted their apprehension that the armed forces might treat them differently, and a broader concern about their acceptance as full citizens of Sri Lanka. Paulraj credited the NPP’s triumph with successfully altering this challenging reality on the ground.
She then made a point of repeating her declaration in Tamil, a move that underscored the ethnic dimension of her message. This statement was delivered during a public gathering in the UK. Sharing the stage with her were other key government figures: Justice and National Integration Minister Harshana Nanayakkara and Health and Mass Media Minister and Chief Government Whip Dr. Nalinda Jayatissa.
The writer recalls a contrasting period during the second Janatha Vimukthi Peramuna (JVP) insurgency from 1987 to 1990, where anti-subversive operations predominantly targeted the Sinhalese population. Observations at checkpoints frequently showed the police and military selectively checking buses entering the City, often exempting Tamils, Muslims, and Sinhala Catholics. This, according to the writer, was the common practice across the nation at the time.
Minister Paulraj’s UK pronouncements drew criticism from a segment of the social media community. Her presence in the UK was part of a parliamentary delegation, led by Speaker Dr. Jagath Wickramaratne, that visited from October 26 to 29, 2025. The visit was reportedly funded by the UK, and a parliamentary statement issued afterwards outlined its aims: to strengthen inter-parliamentary collaboration, advance democratic governance, and promote institutional transparency and accountability.
Minister Paulraj holds key parliamentary positions, serving as the President of the UK–Sri Lanka Parliamentary Friendship Association and the Chairperson of the Women Parliamentarians’ Caucus.
The delegation also included Hansa Abeyratne, the Assistant Secretary General of Parliament. A significant engagement for Minister Paulraj during the trip was a focused discussion with Harriet Harman, the UK Prime Minister’s Special Envoy for Women and Girls, centered on advancing gender equality and women’s empowerment through parliamentary action.
British High Commissioner to Sri Lanka Andrew Patrick accompanied the delegation. This raises a pertinent question: did the British High Commission request that the delegation be restricted solely to members of the ruling NPP? The NPP, led by the JVP, secured a sweeping victory in the last parliamentary election, winning an unprecedented 159 seats out of 225, giving them a commanding supermajority.
A frontline Member of Parliament from the Samagi Jana Balawegaya (SJB), Mujibur Rahman, publicly questioned the decision to restrict the UK visit to NPP lawmakers. The former UNP member also argued that if the invitations were extended privately by the UK to a selected group of NPP members, the Parliament must then account for the inclusion of the Assistant Secretary General of Parliament, Hansa Abeyratne, in the delegation.
It is necessary to examine Minister Paulraj’s recent controversial comments made in the UK against the backdrop of the evolving dynamics of the armed forces and police, which were adapting to counter the increasingly sophisticated separatist Tamil terrorist threat. This threat escalated over the years into an unprecedented conventional military challenge. For decades, the British government largely disregarded LTTE operations directed from its soil, even as Sri Lanka struggled against the group on the Northern and Eastern battlefields. The UK allowed this terrorism to thrive, even after the LTTE’s high-profile assassinations of two world leaders: Rajiv Gandhi of India in May 1991, and Sri Lankan President Ranasinghe Premadasa in May 1993. Both leaders, who had at various times engaged in dealings with the LTTE, ultimately paid with their lives.
Minister Paulraj is correct in her assertion that the Tamil populace harbored fear towards the police and armed forces, a fear directly linked to the fact that the LTTE was composed of Tamil men, women, and children. The armed forces and police were compelled to implement stringent security measures and consider all possibilities, especially given the LTTE’s pervasive tactics. The organization successfully infiltrated political groups at all levels and brazenly exploited any security loopholes to advance their brutal agenda.
The Matara district, which Minister Paulraj represents, was itself not spared from the reality of LTTE terror. On March 10, 2009, a suicide bomber detonated an explosive device at a religious parade near the Godapittya Jumma mosque in Akuressa. The attack resulted in the deaths of 14 civilians and injuries to 35 others.
Members of the NPP delegation, who were invited to the UK, surely would have been aware that the operational supervisor of the terror campaign, Anton Balasingham, held the privileged status of a British citizen. Balasingham, a former employee of the British High Commission in Colombo, was married to Adele, who currently resides comfortably in the UK. Adele was known for encouraging the conscription of child ‘soldiers,’ including young girls, a practice that continued with the knowledge of successive British governments.
Child soldiers
The Tamil community’s fear extended to every group sponsored by the LTTE. Velupillai Prabhakaran’s LTTE was no different. The group notoriously utilized children as cannon fodder in intense battles. Even during the final stages of the conflict, specifically the Puthumathalan evacuations between January and May 2009, Prabhakaran desperately attempted to forcibly conscript child soldiers. This occurred as the ground forces fought their way into a rapidly shrinking territory held by the demoralized Tiger units, who were using a human shield of their own hapless people, many of whom were held against their will.
If the NPP government were to review the reports compiled by the Norway-led Scandinavian truce monitoring mission between February 2002 and January 2008, Minister Paulraj, in her role as Women and Child Affairs Minister, would gain a clearer understanding of the severity of the situation. The data from that period would show that the LTTE forcibly conscripted children and deployed women in combat roles, without regard for the consequences. According to UNICEF data, the LTTE was reported to have recruited a total of 6,183 children (under the age of 18) between February 2002 and February 2007, with approximately one third of these child recruits being girls. The full extent of child soldier deaths and the casualties among women cadres should gravely concern the Matara district NPP leader.
The LTTE innovatively deployed women suicide cadres as a critical strategic weapon. In her capacity as Chairperson of the Women Parliamentarians’ Caucus, Minister Paulraj should initiate a thorough examination of the LTTE’s systematic use of women in combat and suicide missions. Women fighters constituted an estimated 20-30% of the LTTE’s combatants, and they were responsible for approximately 40% of all LTTE suicide attacks. This murderous enterprise only ceased when a soldier killed Velupillai Prabhakaran on the banks of the Nanthikadal lagoon.
The NPP had not yet been established when the military concluded the war in May 2009. The JVP, which is the primary constituent of the NPP, initially supported the war effort at the beginning of the Eelam War IV in 2006. However, they later withdrew their support and eventually joined a coalition, led by the UNP, to back retired General Sarath Fonseka’s bid in the 2010 presidential election. This coalition included the now-defunct Tamil National Alliance (TNA), a group that, in 2001, had formally recognized the LTTE and Velupillai Prabhakaran as the sole representatives of the Tamil-speaking people. This recognition, which was granted under duress, persisted until the LTTE’s fighting machine was finally dismantled during the two-year and ten-month all-out campaign by the security forces to defeat LTTE terrorism.
Lawmaker Paulraj should deeply consider the fact that the Tamil community, including those residing in the Northern and Eastern regions, overwhelmingly cast their votes for Fonseka, whose Army was responsible for eradicating the LTTE’s conventional fighting capability. The Tamil people, particularly those in the former war zones, were the primary beneficiaries of the LTTE’s total annihilation. Had the LTTE managed, through some maneuver, to secure a ceasefire in May 2009 and preserve its top leadership, the forcible child conscription would likely have continued.
Sri Lanka’s decisive triumph over terrorism brought an end to the practice of child conscription. While this immense achievement may not garner approval from insincere and insensitive politicians and political groups, the ordinary Tamil populace appreciates the resultant peace and security.
During President Chandrika Bandaranaike Kumaratunga’s tenure, her government launched a concerted effort to halt the LTTE’s forcible conscriptions. This initiative involved the participation of both the UN and the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC), yet the LTTE consistently failed to honor its commitment to stop the practice. Despite signing agreements with the international community, the LTTE continued to abduct children, sometimes seizing them while they were going to or returning from school.
The LTTE’s actions were largely ignored by the British establishment, though a few Colombo-based diplomats took a courageous stand. David Tatham, who served as the British High Commissioner from 1996 to 1999, recognized the destructive role played by the Tamil Diaspora in Sri Lanka. Tatham made his opposition public in Jaffna, explicitly condemning the Tamil Diaspora’s practice of funding the war. This statement was made in August 1998, three years after the armed forces had reclaimed the Jaffna peninsula for government rule.
During his visit to Jaffna, Tatham urged the Tamil community to cease financing the ongoing war, fully aware of the destruction caused by this unlimited funding. The British diplomat displayed significant courage in making a public appeal to end the Tamil Diaspora funding at a time when the British government permitted the LTTE to operate with impunity on UK territory. The Tamil Diaspora received direct operational orders from the North and acted strictly at the LTTE’s behest, a dynamic that finally ended in May 2009.
The LTTE-Tamil Diaspora employed a simple but effective political strategy: they guaranteed support to major political parties in Europe during parliamentary elections, an arrangement that worked perfectly to their advantage. This influence enabled the LTTE-Tamil Diaspora to pressure British parliamentarians into making unsubstantiated allegations against the Sri Lankan government. These political accusations eventually culminated in the Canadian Parliament formally declaring that Sri Lanka had perpetrated genocide against Tamils.
LTTE sets up own ‘police’ unit
The LTTE established its own police unit in 1992 and also instituted a parallel court system. Unfortunately, many interested parties conveniently overlook the severe control the LTTE exercised over the civilian population residing in areas under its command. Before Velupillai Prabhakaran formalized and rapidly expanded this ‘law enforcement’ arm in the wake of the 2002 Ceasefire Agreement, the LTTE and other Tamil militant groups routinely targeted and attacked the police.
Minister Paulraj, as the Minister in Charge of Women and Child Affairs, should be acutely aware of how the LTTE’s strategies instilled widespread fear within the Tamil community itself. She should recall two highly senseless political assassinations carried out by the LTTE. The LTTE assassinated Rajani Thiranagama (née Rajasingham) in Jaffna on September 21, 1989. This occurred during the deployment of the Indian Army, which had been forced upon Sri Lanka by agreement. The LTTE ordered her death because she was outspokenly critical of the atrocities they perpetrated.
At the time of her high-profile assassination, Thiranagama was the head of the Department of Anatomy at the Medical Faculty of the Jaffna University and a founder and active member of the University Teachers for Human Rights (Jaffna). The LTTE later assassinated Jaffna Mayor Mrs. Sarojini Yogeswaran on May 17, 1998, at her residence in Jaffna.
It is noteworthy that those who persistently criticize the Sri Lankan military and police rarely condemn the LTTE or other Tamil militant groups for the senseless violence they unleashed on the Tamil community itself. Perhaps a comprehensive census should be undertaken to accurately document the individual killings carried out by both successive governments and Tamil militant groups throughout the conflict.
Mrs. Yogeswaran’s husband, former MP Vettivelu Yogeswaran, was also among the politicians murdered by the LTTE. Vettivelu and former Opposition Leader and preeminent Tamil leader Appapillai Amirthalingam were killed during the period of cooperation between President Premadasa and Prabhakaran (May 1989 to June 1990). LTTE assassins killed them on July 13, 1989, in Colombo. That heinous crime could have been averted if Amirthalingam had permitted his Sinhala police bodyguards to screen all visitors entering the premises. Tragically, Amirthalingam instructed the police not to interfere with the secretly arranged meeting, as he did not want to provoke the LTTE. However, one Sinhala police officer managed to shoot and kill all three LTTE gunmen. Had the assassins managed to escape, the killings could have been conveniently blamed on the government.
Those who frequently complain about security checks must be reminded of the countless senseless killings that necessitated such measures. For instance, the Fort Railway Station bombing on February 03, 2008, claimed the lives of 12 civilians and injured over 100. Among the dead were eight schoolchildren from the D. S. Senanayake College baseball team and their coach/teacher-in-charge.
JD before LLRC
It is a striking observation that the apologists for the LTTE, particularly in civil society, never demand justice for the victims killed by the LTTE. Their silence is deafening regarding the violence unleashed by the Tigers. For example, can any rational explanation be offered for the assassination of Dr. Neelan Tiruchelvam, PC, on July 29, 1999?
At the time of his death, the celebrated legal scholar was serving as a National List Member of Parliament and was the Director of the International Centre for Ethnic Studies.
The empowerment of the LTTE was significantly fueled by the support extended by foreign governments. The British government, despite officially banning the LTTE only in 2001 under the Terrorism Act 2000, and subsequent regulations that criminalized membership or support for the group in the UK, essentially allowed the LTTE to operate freely on its soil. Law enforcement authorities frequently ignored the public display of LTTE flags, which was perhaps the least serious of the group’s illegal activities being conducted there.
The late Jayantha Dhanapala, one of Sri Lanka’s most celebrated career diplomats, eloquently addressed the critical issue of accountability when he made his submissions before the Lessons Learnt and Reconciliation Commission (LLRC), chaired by the late C. R. de Silva, a former Attorney General, on August 25, 2010. The writer was present during this pivotal moment.
In his submissions, Dhanapala stated: “Now I think it is important for us to expand that concept to bring in the culpability of those members of the international community who have subscribed to the situation that has caused injury to the civilians of a nation. I talk about the way in which terrorist groups are given sanctuary; harboured; and supplied with arms and training by some countries with regard to their neighbours or with regard to other countries. We know that in our case this has happened, and I don’t want to name countries, but even countries which have allowed their financial procedures and systems to be abused in such a way that money can flow from their countries in order to buy arms and ammunition that cause deaths, maiming and destruction of property in Sri Lanka are to blame and there is therefore a responsibility to protect our civilians and the civilians of other nations from that kind of behaviour on the part of members of the international community. And I think this is something that will echo within many countries in the Non-Aligned Movement, where Sri Lanka has a much respected position and where I hope we will be able to raise this issue.”
Dhanapala further emphasized the imperative of accountability on the part of Western governments, which conveniently turned a blind eye to the massive fundraising operations conducted in their nations to support the LTTE’s operations. It remains an undeniable fact that the LTTE could never have evolved into a conventional fighting force without the necessary financial resources, primarily sourced from Western countries, to procure its vast arsenal of arms, ammunition, and equipment. Regrettably, the Sri Lankan government never acted upon Dhanapala’s astute counsel.
In March of this year, the UK government imposed sanctions on several former top officials of the Sri Lankan Armed Forces, including former Chief of Staff Shavendra Silva, former Commander of the Navy Wasantha Karamagoda, and former Commander of the Army Jagath Jayasuriya. Sanctions were also placed on Vinayagamoorthy Muralitharan, widely known as Karuna Amman, a former LTTE leader. Yet, Sri Lanka has historically lacked the political will and courage to directly challenge the UK on the critical issue of how it allowed the LTTE to develop a substantial conventional military capacity on its soil.
SOURCE :- SRI LANKA GUARDIAN
