COLOMBO: Sri Lanka’s military air strike on the rebel Voice of Tiger radio station in the island’s north that killed 11 people violated international law, Reporters Without Borders said on Wednesday.
Sri Lankan warplanes on Tuesday dropped 12 bombs and virtually flattened the radio station, killing 11 and injuring 15, just moments before it was due to broadcast rebel leader Velupillai Prabhakaran’s annual address.
“Voice of Tigers is a propaganda radio operated by the LTTE (Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam), but the rules of war are clear — military bombardment and bombing must be limited to strictly military targets,” the Paris-based media rights group said in a statement.
LTTE spokesman Rasiah Ilantheriyan said that the rebels managed to broadcast the pre-recorded speech to the north and to Tamils overseas — who are a key funding source — using “alternative arrangements”.
Reporters Without Borders rapped Colombo, saying that “journalists have a right to perform their role in territories where fighting is taking place.”
“The government in Colombo uses the Geneva Conventions to condemn crimes of Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam but forgets the conventions when it bombs what is a civilian installation and therefore protected by the conventions,” the group added.
Government officials declined to comment on the group’s statements.
International media rights activists have described Sri Lanka as one of the most dangerous places in the world for journalists to work due to a worsening climate of violence and censorship.
The International Federation of Journalists said in June that 11 media workers had been killed in Sri Lanka since August 2005.
Ten of them were slain in government-controlled areas, the federation said, and no one has been formally charged in their deaths.
Sri Lanka is pressing for a military victory over the Tamil Tigers, who launched their campaign for an independent homeland in 1972.
A series of tit-for-tat clashes have left tens of thousands dead on both sides.—AFP
