The Nelliaddy government school in northern Jaffna peninsula is nondescript except for a statue that honours the first suicide bomber who blew himself up on behalf of the LTTE. On July 5, 1987, Vasanthan Vallipuram alias Captain Miller drove an explosives- laden truck into the barracks of the Sri Lanka army, then housed at the school. That attack by the first of the ‘Black Tigers’, as the suicide squads of the LTTE are called, left 55 soldiers dead and halted a plan by the army to capture Jaffna town.

With a four-year-old ceasefire between the government and the LTTE faltering, the army did not take any chances on or around this year’s Black Tiger Day, which fell on July 5. Security was tightened and additional troops were deployed in the capital. Where the Black Tigers are concerned, no precaution is good enough. Their ‘high value’ targets have included Lankan president Ranasinghe Premad-asa in 1993 and former Indian PM Rajiv Gandhi in 1991. In 1999, then president Chandrika Kumaratunga narrowly escaped a suicide bomber. Such successful strikes, penetrating tight security cordons, are attributed to high levels of motivation as well as meticulous planning.

There is no accurate figure as to how many people have fallen victim to the carnage wrought by the Black Tigers. What is certain is that 138 men and 135 women have blown themselves up to help the LTTE achieve military or political objectives. The Black Tigers have honoured the truce but are now back in the limelight. In April, Lankan army commander Lt. Gen. Sarath Fonseka survived a suicide attack carried out by a woman inside army headquarters in Colombo. Two months later, in June, a motorcycle-borne suicide bomber killed the army’s third highest-ranking officer Maj. Gen. Parami Kulathunga. Since December, 700 persons, including 450 civilians, have died in hostilities involving the LTTE and the security forces. And the Black Tigers are known to have taken part in some of the worst incidents, including in devastating attacks at sea against the Lankan navy.

The Black Tigers have destroyed with deadly precision the nerve-centre of the Sri Lankan security forces, the central bank, key petroleum installations and airline fleets. They have only appeared in public once. In November 2003, 27 members took part in a parade in the LTTE’s political capital of Kilinochchi, wearing black hoods. They carry out reconnaissance on the front lines or specialise in infiltrating government areas. The Tigers also talk of another group known as ‘champion Black Tigers’. Though exact figures are not made available, a senior Tiger leader said, during July 5 commemorations in 2003, that there were at least 500 Black Tigers ready to go into action.

But if July 5 passed quietly, this year, it could be because it also marks the evolution of the worst internal threat the LTTE has ever faced. On July 5, 2004, Ramalingam Padmaseelan alias Seenathiraja, who headed the Tiger political office in the eastern town of Batticaloa, was shot by the breakaway Karuna faction. His death, eight days, later, triggered severe bouts of internecine fighting. The LTTE and its breakaway group, led by its former eastern military commander Vina-yagamoorthi Muralitharan alias Karuna, have since fought each other fiercely with both sides losing high-ranking members. — IPS