Eelam War II


Eelam War II is the name given to the second phase of armed conflict between Sri Lankan military and the separatist Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam. The war started after the failure of peace talks between the Premadasa government and the LTTE. This phase of the war was initiated by the LTTE who massacred almost 600 Sinhalese and Muslim police personnel after they were ordered by the Premadasa government to surrender to the LTTE. The truce was broken on June 10, 1990 when the LTTE in October expelled all the 28,000 Muslims residing in Jaffna.

Civilian killings

Massacre of police officers

In June 1990, the LTTE eastern cadres, led by then-LTTE Eastern commander Karuna Amman, massacred 774 police officers stationed in the Eastern province after they surrendered to them on orders from the government.

Palliyagodella massacre

The Palliyagodella massacre is an incident in October 1991 in which LTTE cadres massacred 109 Muslim men, women and children in Palliyagodella.Female LTTE cadres and child soldiers were accused of being involved in this attack. The background to this massacre was seen as a retaliation by the LTTE against Muslims living in the Eastern region of Sri Lanka, allegedly for their roles as Home Guards. The Palliyagodella villagers had asked the Sri Lankan military, fearing an attack by the LTTE. The Sri Lankan forces issued shotguns to the Muslim villagers, which some Muslim home guards used to attack Tamil civilians.