‘Suspected mass grave a cemetery’
10 March 2014 4:48 AM IST
Officials investigating a suspected mass grave in Sri Lanka’s former northern war zone called off the digging on Friday because the 83 skeletons unearthed there seem to have been buried in an old cemetery.
The Sri Lankan army has been accused of killing tens of thousands of civilians in the final weeks of its 26-year war against northern Tamil separatists in 2009 and Colombo has been under pressure to investigate reports of mass graves there.
Police at first suggested the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) separatists could be responsible for the burial site near a Hindu temple in the northwestern town of Mannar.
But Senerath Dissanayake, director general of the state-run Archeological Department, said it is not a mass grave as the bodies had been ‘buried systematically’.
‘These are about 50 years old. It is a grave yard. Even our officers can identify and see the cut marks of the graves. We have found 83 skeletons so far and we will stop (excavation)from tomorrow,’ he said.
More than 100,000 people were killed in the war since its start in 1983 and thousands, mainly from the minority Tamil community living mostly in the north, are still missing.
The United States plans to submit a resolution criticising Sri Lanka at this month’s session of the UN Human Rights Council in Geneva, calling the Human Rights High Commissioner’s office to investigate the charges of war-related rights abuses.
A UN panel has said around 40,000 mainly Tamil civilians died in the ferocious final months of the conflict, but Sri Lanka has disputed that figure. Both sides committed atrocities, but army shelling killed most victims, it concluded.
NO FORENSIC TESTS YET
Dhanajaya Waidyaratne, the judicial medical Officer in charge of the excavation, described the bottom of the suspected pit as ‘an area which looks like an old cemetery’.
‘We excavated up to 2 meters depth. We have not started any forensic tests. That is still pending,’ he said, adding the bodies had been buried in layers. Three area residents said in January there was no cemetery in the area from the time they moved there around 1970.
The Sri Lankan army has been accused of killing tens of thousands of civilians in the final weeks of its 26-year war against northern Tamil separatists in 2009 and Colombo has been under pressure to investigate reports of mass graves there.
Police at first suggested the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) separatists could be responsible for the burial site near a Hindu temple in the northwestern town of Mannar.
But Senerath Dissanayake, director general of the state-run Archeological Department, said it is not a mass grave as the bodies had been ‘buried systematically’.
‘These are about 50 years old. It is a grave yard. Even our officers can identify and see the cut marks of the graves. We have found 83 skeletons so far and we will stop (excavation)from tomorrow,’ he said.
More than 100,000 people were killed in the war since its start in 1983 and thousands, mainly from the minority Tamil community living mostly in the north, are still missing.
The United States plans to submit a resolution criticising Sri Lanka at this month’s session of the UN Human Rights Council in Geneva, calling the Human Rights High Commissioner’s office to investigate the charges of war-related rights abuses.
A UN panel has said around 40,000 mainly Tamil civilians died in the ferocious final months of the conflict, but Sri Lanka has disputed that figure. Both sides committed atrocities, but army shelling killed most victims, it concluded.
NO FORENSIC TESTS YET
Dhanajaya Waidyaratne, the judicial medical Officer in charge of the excavation, described the bottom of the suspected pit as ‘an area which looks like an old cemetery’.
‘We excavated up to 2 meters depth. We have not started any forensic tests. That is still pending,’ he said, adding the bodies had been buried in layers. Three area residents said in January there was no cemetery in the area from the time they moved there around 1970.
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