Ravaged Jaffna Sri Lanka's gem

By Amal Jayasinghe

COLOMBO (AFP): For Sri Lanka's ethnic Tamil Tiger rebels and government troops the battle-scarred northern city of Jaffna is a prized possession.

Four years after troops wrested control of Jaffna, the Tigers are making a fresh bid to retake what they consider their cultural capital, once the country's second city after the capital Colombo.

Intense fighting has raged at the entrance to the Jaffna peninsula since March 26 as the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) try to put pressure on the military to retreat.

Recently the Tigers claimed a major victory by dislodging the army from the main garrison at the entrance to the 1,000 square mile (2,600 square kilometer) peninsula.

The peninsula could have been an island if not for the narrow causeway at Elephant Pass linking it to the northern mainland.

The LTTE's ideologue, Anton Balasingham, has made plain his group's determination to take back the peninsula where they ran a de facto state for nearly five years until December 1995.

"The LTTE is fiercely determined to open the gates to Jaffna to reach the cultural capital of the Tamil nation," Balasingham said in a March interview with the London-based Tamil Guardian magazine (DATE).

A day after the issue was published, Tiger guerrillas mounted ferocious attacks against military positions in the peninsula in a bid to isolate the Elephant Pass garrison guarding the entrance to the region.

The latest battle could cost both sides prestige.

The government dislodged the Tigers from Jaffna in December 1995 and raised the national flag there after a 50-day offensive that officially resulted in 500 government troops and 2,000 rebels killed.

It appeared a major blow to the Tigers who had their own administrative structures, police and courts in Jaffna and taxed the local population, while freely recruiting young men and women to swell its ranks.

But what appeared at first as a major victory slowly turned into a white elephant for the government.

The Tigers still controlled the main land route to Jaffna, making it difficult for the government to supply its 40,000 troops in the peninsula. To add to that burden was the some 400,000 civilians who poured back into the region.

However, Junior Defense Minister Anuruddha Ratwatte, who led the army's campaign to capture Jaffna, said at the time that despite the military's landmark success, the war was far from over.

The army tried to open a land route, but after nearly 19 months of fighting they called off the operation, ironically code-named "Sure Victory."

In November last year, the military lost further ground when the Tigers mounted a series of attacks on Sri Lanka's northern mainland, further distancing troops from opening the road to Jaffna.

Jaffna is regarded as the seat of Tamil and Hindu culture in Sri Lanka. In recent years, it has come to be seen as the fountain-head of Tamil separatism, soaking most of the country with blood and tears.

Located on the northern tip of this tear-drop shaped Indian Ocean island, Jaffna is believed to have been founded by a wandering minstrel. The capture of Jaffna in 1658 led to the establishment of Dutch colonial rule over Sri Lanka. Jaffna is the capital of the arid peninsula by the same name.

A tradition of non-violence in Jaffna has long given way to a new breed of militancy advocated by the LTTE, which is led by Velupillai Prabhakaran, 45, a native of Velvetithurai village.

More than 55,000 people have died in the struggle which erupted in the 1970s with Prabhakaran's men gunning down Jaffna's then-Tamil mayor Alfred Duriappah. The city has been in turmoil since.

The government's retaking of Jaffna in 1995 was regarded as Sri Lanka's "mother of all battles." But, Tamil politicians say, Jaffna is a symbol rather than a strategic base for either the government or the Tigers.

Jaffna's population was estimated at 128,000 in 1985, when the last official figures were released. But the peninsula now has many more people living there, although thousands have also left the region or have died in fighting.

"There is no great economic or geographic significance in Jaffna. But psychologically it is the center of Eelam," said Tamil legislator Dharmalingam Sidharthan, referring to the separate state the Tigers are fighting for.

He believes it will be difficult for the army to hold onto its remaining territory in the peninsula after its latest reversals.

The LTTE established absolute control over Jaffna in 1990 after forcing hundreds of Sri Lankan soldiers trapped in the 17th century Dutch-built Jaffna Fort to evacuate.