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TRINCOMALEE MAGISTRATE ISSUES AN OPEN WARRANT TO ARREST LTTE EASTERN LEADER FOR DEFYING HIS ORDER TO APPEAR IN COURTS By Walter Jayawardhana reporting from Los Angeles February 11,11:13 AM:The Trincomalee magistrate S. Thiyagendran issued an open warrant to arrest and produce a local LTTE leader in his courts who defied the magistrate’s notice to appear in the courts regarding a complaint filed against him by the Kuchchaveli police. M. Thooyavan, the local LTTE leader for Kamburupitiya who was recently served with a notice to appear by the magistrate in the Trincomalee courts wrote on the other side of the notice that he did not intend to appear in the courts and returned the magistrate’s notice to the Kuchchaveli police station. On the day of his scheduled appearance , February 10, 2003 Thooyavan also did not appear in the courts forcing the magistrate to issue an open warrant for his arrest. Involved in the separatist activities of the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam , Thooyavan has challenged the sovereignty of Sri Lanka by defying an order of a Sri Lankan magistrate The Senior Superintendent of Police , Trincomalee Upali Hewage said the police would promptly carry out the magistrate’s orders and arrest M. Thooyavan and produce him in the courts. The controversy arose when Thooyavan and his colleagues were attempting to build a war memorial for some dead LTTE colleagues who died in a boat mishap while returning after a triumphant massacre of many fellow Tamils who belonged to a rival group called Eelam National Democratic Front. In the boat mishap 22 LTTE people died and Thooyavan was the only survivor of the boat mishap. The Sri Lanka Navy complained to the Kuchchaveli police that the LTTE team led by Thooyavan was trying to build an illegal war memorial on a land owned by a Sri Lankan government agency, the Road Development Authority at Gopalapuram junction in the Sri lanka government controlled area. Pointing out that it was an act violating the ceasefire agreement the Navy requested the police to act. Pointing out that this was an act disrupting the peace of the area the Kuchchaveli Police seeked the intervention of the Trincomalee magistrate to restore peace. This was when the magistrate issued a notice for Thooyavan to appear in the courts (11/01/03 go2lanka.com) |