LTTE Headquarters,
                                                Tamil Eelam.
                                                08. February 1997


PRESS RELEASE
NEWS FROM TAMIL EELAM

MASS EXODUS AS BORDER VILLAGES ARE BOMBED
        Another humanitarian crisis is looming as Sri Lankan forces shell
        and aerial-bomb Tamil border villages on the edges of Vavuniya
        and Mannar districts in their latest offensive. Heavy artillery
        fire is raining down on a number of villages causing civilians to
        flee in massive waves. Many people are unsure where exactly to
        escape to since the direction of the offensive is not clear. At
        the moment there is shelling in various directions aimed
        deliberately at driving the population away in order that the
        army can occupy more territory. There is little or no LTTE
        presence in the targeted areas. Meanwhile, many shaken Tamil
        people have arrived at the Madhu refugee camp  which is run by
        the UNHCR, but this place is now over-crowded. Many
        newly-arriving displaced people are now sheltering beneath trees
        on the road, notably in the area of Iranai Illupaikulam.
        Meanwhile, the villages of Kannaddy, Kanesapuram, Periathampanai,
        Pandivirichan, Maduroad and Poovilunthan have become totally
        deserted. The last-arriving residents said the trees have all
        collapsed and the houses are burning. Sri Lanka routinely denies
        the deliberate targeting of heavily-populated civilian areas. But
        the government's block on journalists to the north-east ensures
        that the scale of the human tragedy goes unreported

MEDICINES DRY UP - AS DOCTORS HAD WARNED
        As predicted, the meagre medical stocks supplied last month by
        the Sri Lankan government to the main Tamil hospital in
        Mullaitivu have dried up. The stocks themselves arrived way too
        late. They were in fact the consignment from the last quarter of
        1996 but arrived only in mid-January this year. Now even this has
        gone due to the huge demand and residents of the area will have
        to endure many months without re-supplies. Even then, there are
        no guarantees of renewed stocks arriving for the next quarter.
        Doctors say the few drugs which had arrived in January vanished
        within a week. And, despite persistent requests to the government
        from doctors, many urgently needed medicines did not even show
        up, such as Primaquin, Chloroquin, Amoxlin, Tetracylin and
        various antibiotics. There are growing signs that Sri Lanka is
        deliberately imposing hardships on Tamils in unoccupied territory
        in order to facilitate its military strategy.

THOUSANDS DETAINED IN TRINCO
        Thousands of Tamils coerced by the Sri Lankan military into
        travelling by ship to Jaffna have been forced into detention
        centres at Trincomallee (in the East) owing to delays. The
        over-crowded conditions of the camps are described as horrendous
        by witnesses who say people are packed together like firewood,
        breathing into each other's faces. The conditions are identical
        to those faced by Tamil civilians in Vavuniya's notorious camps
        which have come under heavy criticism from human rights groups.
        Meanwhile, most of the people held in Trincomallee, including
        children, have been ordered by soldiers to go to Jaffna after
        they had travelled across the Thandikulam military checkpoint.
        The government forces Tamil people to go to Jaffna in order to
        present to the world the image of Tamils voluntarily choosing Sri
        Lankan army rule. There are currently 7000 Tamils detained in
        Trincomalle destined for Jaffna.

Political Committee,
Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam

(English translation of the LTTE statement released by
LTTE International Secretariat, 211 Katherine Road, London E6 1BU,
United Kingdom. Tel:0181- 503 4294 / Fax: 0181-470 8593)