BBC SINHALA SERVICE QUOTING LTTE’S PROXY PARTY PARLIAMENTARIAN SAYS COLONEL BANU IS STILL ALIVE
(By Walter Jayawardhana)
Los Angeles:- The man called Colonel Banu , speculated by some as seriously injured or dead by the Sri Lanka Air Force bombing of the Thenham Conference and Military training center off Batticaloa is not dead or injured after all, according to a news broadcast by the Sinhala Service of the BBC, Sandeshaya.
The July 30 broadcast said, at a funeral of seven LTTE cadres at Tharawai and Kandiyadi Colonel Banu who is hated by the Sinhalese as the butcher of Kebithigollewa- the man who planned the double claymore bomb attack on a civilian bus killing 65 passengers mostly of women and children- was present to pay his last respects to seven LTTE cadres who died of an air raid.
The news broadcast only quoted a parliamentarian of the LTTE’s proxy party the Tamil National Alliance (TNA) to that effect.
The TNA parliamentarians are being used to express statements for propaganda regularly by the LTTE. The news broadcast did not independently confirm about the condition of Colonel Banu.
It only said he was present at the LTTE cemetery with another military leader Jeyam.
Meanwhile the BBC Sandeshaya also quoted Minister Keheliya Rambukwella as saying that according to the latest intelligence and civilian reports the number of dead at the Thenaham Center was 42. Earlier the defense website speculated about 50 would have died of the bombing at the Conference Center which was being also used as a military training Center
