Sri Lanka’s longest ongoing protest, launched by war-affected mothers seeking international assistance to find out the truth about their relatives who were forcibly disappeared during and following the war, has marked the 2,700th day.
The protest seeking justice for disappeared relatives began in February, 2017, and completed 2,700 days on 13 July, 2024. Joining the protest held in Vavuniya, secretary of the Association for the Relatives of Enforced Disappearances in the Tamil Homeland emphsised that their struggle also aims to protect Tamil people from any future genocides.
“The struggle is seeking United States’ and European countries’ assistance to get justice in order to find out the disappeared Tamil children, protect Tamil people from any future genocides, and to protect Tamil autonomy,” Secretary M. Raj Kumar said.
Adding that enforced disappearances is not merely an issue about Tamil mothers but also about Tamil people’s right to life, Kumar stressed that Tamil people can live only if they fight.
“The issue of enforced disappearances is not just an issue faced by Tamil mothers. It is also an issue about Tamil people’s right to life. This is the trump card of the ethnic issue. We should handle it correctly. Autonomy is the only solution to the national issue. Tamil people should do everything to get it. Tamil people can live only if they fight.”
In February and March, 2017, ‘Satyagraha’ protests were launched in the Vavuniya, Killinochchi, Jaffna, Mullaitivu, Trincomalee, and Ampara districts urging the government to reveal the fate that befell their relatives who disappeared after surrendering to the defence forces and during the final days of the war.
Even though the Maithripala-Ranil government established the Office on Missing Persons (OMP) on 28 February, 2018, to investigate what happened to the disappeared, the OMP has not been able to find out at least one disappeared person.
Almost a year after the commencement of excavations at the Kokkuthoduvai mass grave, OMP Chairperson attorney Mahesh Katulanda had expressed doubts in Vavuniya as to whether the human remains found in the pit belonged to those who disappeared during the final stages of the war.
“While adhering to the highest standards, we expect to find out the fate that befell the disappeared people, and also whether there is a connection between the disappeared, regarding whom complaints have been lodged, and the bodies that have been found,” Katulanda told journalists on 5 July, 2024, at the Kokkuthoduvai mass grave site.
Meanwhile, Mullaitivu District Hospital’s Judicial Medical Officer (JMO) Dr. Kanagasabapathi Vasudeva had said that biological data has been collected in order to ascertain whether the bodies buried in the Kokkuthoduvai mass grave belonged to forcibly disappeared individuals.
He further said that following the resumption of excavations earlier this month (July), teeth have been extracted from unearthed skulls and stored in a manner that is suitable for DNA analysis.
The JMO had told journalists about the possibility of conducting DNA examinations upon request of any relatives of the disappeared who suspect the bodies buried in the mass grave are of their loved ones.
“If the relatives of the disappeared suspect that it is their relatives that have been buried (in the mass grave), their blood samples will be obtained and compared with this DNA data.”
Speaking to Vanni-based journalists on 10 July, forensic archaeologist Prof. Raj Somadeva, who led the excavations of the mass grave, revealed that the Mullaitivu Magistrate has informed that several affidavits have been submitted seeking action to identify the disappeared.
