Muslims lash out at LTTE terrorism

    Recall Tiger atrocities against community:

    Muslim families butchered in their sleep :

A cross section of the Muslim community in Sri Lanka yesterday condemned LTTE terrorist atrocities which were aimed at ethnic cleansing. They recollected the gloomy era of the country when Muslims in the North and East were subjected to untold  hardships and harassment from LTTE terrorists who wanted to carve out a separate homeland by killing tens of thousands of Muslim and Sinhala civilians. They said that their basic rights were snatched by the LTTE during this era. Mohammed S Anees , a farmer living in Eravur remembers how the LTTE brutally killed 173 civilians in his village on August 4, 1990. Anees said hundreds of LTTE cadres who invaded the village with clubs and swords, began killing innocent civilians in the village who were asleep at midnight. He said even pregnant women were not spared by LTTE terrorists. "Infants were dashed to death," he added.Anees said that the Muslim community in the Eastern region depend on fishing and farming.

He said that their farming activities were hampered by LTTE attacks on Muslim villages. Vast areas of arable paddy lands were left uncultivated and the economy of the people in the area also collapsed, he said.

Child Development and Women's Affairs Deputy Minister A L M Hisbullah said that the Muslim community in the North and East had to face many hardships and obstacles during the conflict.

He said that thousands of Muslims were killed and their villages destroyed by the LTTE as part of the ethnic cleansing drive to achieve what they termed a separate state for Tamils. The deputy minister said that the LTTE plundered banks in Muslim dominated areas in the North and East.

"LTTE terrorists evicted Muslims from their lands and handed them to their members in Muslim villages. The Muslim community left the villages in fear of LTTE attacks," he said. The Muslims were deprived of their basic human rights by the LTTE, Hisbullah said. "Their main sources of livelihood were fishing and farming.

The terrorists did not allow them to engage in fishing or farming during the conflict".

Western Province Governor Alavi Mowlana said that the US is suffering from a phobia and is scared of Islam which is peace.

"Islam is peace and not violence. Before preaching about human rights to Sri Lanka and other countries, the US has to rectify what they did. The LTTE did the same and brutally massacred thousands of innocent Muslims in the North and East.

The US has now forgotten what the LTTE did to innocent Sri Lankan Muslims. First of all they have to rectify it."

Technology and Research Deputy Minister Faizer Mustapha said that when the LTTE was brutally massacring innocent Muslim civilians, the US turned a blind eye and was now preaching human rights.

"The US resolution at the UNHRC will only create new problems for the smooth progress of the reconciliation process in Sri Lanka and will cause severe damage to it," he said.

Journalist and artist Nilar N Cassim said that massacring innocent Muslim civilians worshipping in mosques is one of the many barbaric acts carried out by the LTTE.

"Massacring innocent civilians who practise their religion in their religious institutions is not acceptable.

It cannot happen anywhere in the world. It is an act of beasts. The LTTE shot and chased away thousands of innocent unarmed Muslim civilians from their traditional villages," Cassim said.

Courtesy : Daily News