Soldier killed by friendly fire

[TamilNet, Thursday, 12 August 1999, 12:02 GMT]
A Sri Lanka Army soldier was shot dead by troopers of his own unit in the early hours of the morning today around 1 a.m. in the Forward Defence Localities (FDL) at Paappamoddai in Mannar.

Soldiers from a unit of the 12 Gajaba regiment on night patrol in the FDL at Paapamoddai had observed movement in the area and had opened fire fearing that the Liberation Tigers had infiltrated the point.

An hour later, according to the commander of the unit, Lt.Nisantha, they had found, upon returning to base, that one of the soldiers, private Sampath Athukorala, 22, was missing.

They had gone back to the spot where they had opened fire and found Athukorala lying dead.

The soldier is from Kegalle in the central province said SLA sources in Mannar.