Originally published by the Voice of America (www.voanews.com).
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May 18, 2009

LTTE Leader Killed, Sri Lanka Claims Total Control of Island Nation
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Media reports say Velupillai Prabhakaran was killed while trying to flee
the war zone early Monday in an ambulance 
The quarter-century civil war in Sri Lanka has come to a dramatic end.
The army says it has wiped out the entire leadership of the Liberation
Tigers of Tamil Eelam, including the founder-leader of the rebel group.
And for the first time in 26 years, the government says all territory of
the island nation is back under its control. Tamil Tiger rebel leader
Velupillai Prabhakaran (File)Sri Lanka's state-controlled broadcasters
switched to patriotic programming and special reports to announce a
total victory and that the military had vanquished the entire leadership
of the rebel organization that had terrorized the island nation for
decades. "It has been revealed that the LTTE supremo, Velupillai
Prabhakaran, has been killed owing to the attacks of the advancing
troops today, in the morning," the announcement said. Media reports say
the rebel leader, along with other top commanders, was killed trying to
flee in an ambulance. The Defense Ministry says the bodies are in the
process of being identified and that 250 rebels were killed during the
final burst of fighting Monday. News of the decisive victory and the
destruction of the rebel's upper echelon prompted a second consecutive
day of street celebrations in the capital. But there have also been
angry protests targeted at those seen as having supported the rebels.
Demonstrators gathered outside the British Embassy, upset with London's
warning that Colombo would face "consequences" for not halting the
fighting to allow humanitarian access to the combat zone. Sri Lanka says
that was not necessary because the military freed 80,000 civilians who
had been held "hostage" by the LTTE. The rebels last week claimed
thousands of Tamil civilians were dying because of military shelling.
Sri Lanka accused the rebels of targeting any civilians who tried to
flee. United Nations spokesman Gordon Weiss tells VOA News independent
access to the strip of northeastern coast where heavy fighting took
place for days is essential to treat the remaining who might be wounded
or ill. "We need
 access to the area. I imagine that the authorities are busy
transporting wounded civilians to hospitals and so forth. But
nevertheless the U.N. has consistently asked that the U.N. and other
humanitarian agencies have access to those areas," said Weiss. "So far
we've been restricted to the reception camps, the internment
camps."Access to those camps by international aid agencies and
journalists is also restricted, making it difficult to ascertain how the
estimated 300,000 displaced Tamils are faring and to get independent
accounts of what really happened in the combat zone.


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