Prabhakaran was on field till May 15: LTTE ex-combatants' reactions

CHENNAI: After Tamil nationalist leader Pazha Nedumaran's claim that Prabhakaran, leader of the Liberation Tigers of India, is alive, several ex-militants have been leaking misinformation on his survival and Sri Lankan's Army denial.

Accordingly, one of the militants said: "Prabhakaran was on the battlefield until May 15, 2009. We don't know what happened to him after that. He is unlikely to be alive, and at the same time, the visuals of a dead body shown by the Sri Lankan Army in May 2009, were not him."

They also said that the truth will come out only if he is alive and declares it himself.

While the chief of Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam, Prabhakaran was killed in 2009, marking the end of the decades-long civil war in Sri Lanka between the Army and the LTTE, Tamil Nadu leaders toeing the Tamil nationalism ideology had time and again claimed over the years that the slain leader was still alive.

However, the Sri Lankan Defence Ministry dismissed the claim as a "joke" and referred to DNA proof to assert Prabhakaran was killed way back in 2009. "It is confirmed that he was killed on 19 May 2009. The DNA has proved it," Colonel Nalin Herath, Sri Lanka's defence ministry spokesman said in Colombo.

In the press conference, Pazha Nedumaran, prefixed his declaration as a 'true announcement' and said the international (political) atmosphere and fierce opposition to the Rajapaksas by the Sinhalese people in Sri Lanka have created the right conditions for the leader of the Eelam Tamils, Prabhakaran to emerge.

Nedumaran's assertion, however, did not find acceptance with even well-known sympathisers of the cause of Tamil nationalism, including MDMK general secretary Vaiko.