Facts about Sri Lanka's government planned and executed brutal, island-wide, week-long killings in the streets, burning of homes, and destruction of businesses targeting Tamils in July 1983
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Read Firsthand Quotes Read Full Testimonies...I was close to President J.R. Jayewardene in the critical phase from 1978 to 1983. But as I kept reading with horror the operations by security forces of the island state, I realised I could no longer be a silent witness.
Someone seemed to have planned the whole thing and waited only for an opportunity. ... There is no doubt that someone had identified the Tamil houses, shops and factories earlier. Seventeen industrial complexes belonging to some of the leading Tamil and Indian industrialists were razed to the ground...
While they were [showering] a crowd collected at their houses and all 5 men were... All of them had been senior government executives. At the time no one knew why the men failed to return to the [makeshift safe] camps.