Published on - 3/1/2005
Barely a couple of hours after the UN Security Council called on the LTTE to renounce its continued conscription of children as LTTE soldiers, an irate mother of a seventeen-year old Tamil girl has assisted troops at the MUHAMALAI Entry/Exit point in order to rescue her child from LTTE grips while her daughter was being abducted on 25 February 2005 around 1.15 p.m.
The victim's mother, MAHENDRAN WASANTHI (42), after learning that LTTE men were preparing a forged identity card to alter her daughter's real age after she was abducted by LTTE, has provided copies of photo of her teenage daughter to the MUHAMALAI Entry/Exit point, MANIPAY Police station, Human Rights Office and the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) in JAFFNA, pleading them to help rescue her loved one.
Teenage girl's LTTE abductor, MAHALINGAM MANIVANNAN who was also arrested at the Entry/Exit point along with the girl, has gone on record saying to the Police that LTTE, within February (2005) month alone, has managed to abduct over 20 such minors and subsequently detained them under an LTTE woman cadre, named MADHAVEE at a transit in PALLAI before those minors were handed over to LTTE women's 'corps' at KILINOCHCHI or elsewhere for LTTE weapon training.
The victimized girl has allegedly fallen victim to LTTE when she approached KOKKUVIL, POTHPATHY LTTE office after she reportedly developed a personal dispute with an unknown party.
During her stay at the LTTE office on 23 February 2005, those LTTE men had duped the girl in question into believing that they (LTTE) were in the process of issuing a new Identity Card to her, similar to those being issued to JAFFNA residents.
Both teenage girl and the LTTE abductor were arrested by the Police at MUHAMALAI Entry/Exit point while she was being abducted and handed over subsequently to the KODIKAMAM Police for further investigations.
The girl was to be handed over to her parents after necessary investigations were over.
The Sri Lanka Monitoring Mission (SLMM) was also to be intimated.
Name & particulars of the victim are withheld for obvious security reasons and questions of human rights.
