Gunman who shot Kuveni worked for SLA intelligence – paper

[TamilNet, Thursday, 03 March 2005, 05:00 GMT]
The gunman who allegedly shot and grievously wounded head of Liberation Tigers’ political division for Batticaloa-Amparai (women), Ms. Kuveni and two female LTTE political activists, was a former Sri Lanka military intelligence operative, the Tamil daily Virakesari said Thursday quoting Sri Lanka army Headquarters sources. The man, now in Police custody, has been identified as Mr. Johnson Jeyakanthan (also known as ‘Pratheepan’) who had worked as an informant for Sri Lanka military intelligence, the paper quoted SLA Headquarters sources as saying.

SLA headquarters sources told Virakesari that Mr. Jeyakanthan had spent some years working abroad and had returned to Sri Lanka on 22 February this year.

Meanwhile, an LTTE official in Batticaloa said that Mr. Jeyakanthan was a member of the organization and had defected in 1992 when he was facing disciplinary action for attempting to molest a girl.

“He joined the Sri Lanka army intelligence unit in Batticaloa after he ran away. He worked as an informant for them and took part in sabotage operations against us by the SLA intelligence”, the LTTE official said.

Mr. Jeyakanthan is a native of Periya Kallar, 35 kilometres south of Batticaloa.