A day at the front line in Sri Lanka
Access for foreign journalists to Asia’s longest running civil war between the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) and government troops, is very tightly controlled by the Sri Lankan government. Getting near the front line area known as the ‘No Fire Zone’ is only possible with an officially sanctioned trip organized by the Ministry of Defence. Last Friday, April 24, I went on one.
The trip started at 3.30am, when I arrived at the military air base in Colombo. We went through 3 security checks, before boarding our plane at 6.30am. We flew north for about 30 minutes to a small airstrip at a place called Mankulam. From here, we boarded two Mi-8 helicopters. To avoid any ground fire, the choppers fly at maximum speed just above the height of the tallest trees, and when I say just, I mean scraping the leaves. This fast and furious ride lasted just 30 minutes to the town of Kilinochchi.
We had a quick briefing, and then we set off in a convoy of armored personnel carriers towards the front. The carrier that I got into was a very old, clunky thing of which there was not much evidence of suspension. The roads in the area had suffered 25 years of a civil war, and were in seriously bad condition. Myself and and a TV cameraman tried our best to grab pictures as we sped along at around 50 miles/h but we were being thrown around so much, even for me to get the camera up to my face and see through it, was near impossible. We held on the best we could, and I managed to get a few ‘usable’ frames of a scorched and destroyed landscape. Every single dwelling was either destroyed or uninhabitable. It reminded me of East Timor in 1999. Burnt out vehicles lined the road. What was most noticeable was the absence of people. There were simply no civilians anywhere.
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Resident Photographers Blog Expert
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The Wall
1)This coverage is of only 20% remaining 80% depands on people word’s in war zone.
2)It’s not LTTE who kept people as human sheild as once LTTE asked people to go under UN eye, but people refused as they were afraid of SL Army torture.Only a seperate Homeland for tamil “EELAM” would be a solution to this.
3)Let UN take poll on North for people’s desire on seperate homeland.
4)Norway knows the fact about LTTE & SL Army,were they did not ban LTTE
5)SL Killed a fellow sinhalese Lasantha Wickrematunge(Journalist) for his publications against Govt. move in Tamil’s freedom act.Lasantha wickrematunge baged UNESCO World Press Freedom Prize in 2009.
6)SL hold’s 165 place of 173 countries for Reporters Without Borders.As they try to cover up their flaws.
7)Northern part under LTTE rule was well packed and diciplined
*Let all our tears vanish and EELAM Rise…..*