Tigers raise flag over Kilinochchi

[TamilNet, Friday, 02 October 1998, 10:40 GMT]
The Liberation Tigers marked the recapture of the key northern town of Kilinochchi from the Sri Lanka Army by hoisting the Tiger flag yesterday evening at 5.55 p.m. said the Voice of Tigers (VoT) radio. A large number of people attended the ceremony which was held where the SLA Brigade Head Quarters had been situated, the radio said.

The radio said commanders of the LTTE units which had taken part in the assault on the Kilinochchi SLA base spoke at the ceremony.

Meanwhile, reports from Kilinochchi said that the Tigers are continuing to collect more bodies of SLA soldiers killed from debris of buildings, bunkers and the surrounding shrub jungles.

The Liberation Tigers said earlier that those bodies which are in highly decomposed stage are being cremated "with full military honours".

The Liberation Tigers relocated their civil administration structures from Jaffna to Kilinochchi when the SLA took control of Jaffna in early 1996. In August 1996, the SLA launched an offensive and took control of the town after bitter fighting.

The SLA is currently engaged in a 16 month old military operation codenamed 'Operation Jeyasikurui' which is intended to open the A9 highway between Vavuniya and Kilinochchi.

The SLA said on Wednesday that its troops had captured the strategic town of Mankulam, outside which Operation Jayasikirui had been stalled for several months.