More Than 300 LTTE Fighters Left Behind at Anandapuram Were Killed, New Report Says

30-Oct-2026

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More than 300 Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) fighters who had been left inside a single building in a severely injured condition were killed after the Sri Lankan Army captured Anandapuram in April 2009, according to a new report by the International Truth and Justice Project (ITJP).

The findings are contained in a report titled “The Anandapuram Encounter”, prepared by the International Truth and Justice Project on the basis of testimony from survivors of the final phase of the war.

According to the report, hundreds of injured fighters had gathered at a computer centre on the eastern side of the besieged area of Anandapuram during the final days of the war. The injured were left behind there on 3 April 2009, after which the survivors said they had not seen them again.

One survivor who escaped from the area stated: “When I left, the injured were still alive. They had no guns, explosives or cyanide.”

Another individual, who had trained alongside more than 30 of those left behind and knew their families well, said: “They never came back. We never imagined that they would kill all of them. We later learnt that the injured people who had been left behind were burnt alive.”

Commenting on the report, Yasmin Sooka, Executive Director of the International Truth and Justice Project, said that the organisation had believed for many years that no one had survived to testify about the Anandapuram killings.

However, some survivors had now broken their silence, she said.

She stressed that military victory did not confer the right to kill wounded people. The absence of punishment over the past 17 years did not extinguish criminal responsibility.

Against this background, she urged Sri Lanka to disclose what had happened in the past and bring those responsible for violations to justice.