ITAK demands immediate release of all findings related to Chemmani mass grave probe

The Ilankai Tamil Arasu Katchi (ITAK) yesterday demanded the immediate public release of all forensic reports, and DNA findings, related to the Chemmani mass grave investigation, warning that symbolic gestures of reconciliation will remain hollow without legal accountability.

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In a strongly worded three-page letter to President Anura Kumara Dissanayake, the party urged urgent action to ensure truth, justice, and international collaboration in the ongoing exhumation process in Jaffna.

The letter, signed by senior party leaders C.V.K. Sivagnanam and M.A. Sumanthiran, raised concerns over the transparency of the current procedures and emphasised the need for independent international forensic oversight. The ITAK also called for the consolidation of legal cases filed in 1999 and 2025 and the return of remains held in Glasgow for further forensic analysis.

ITAK said that more than 65 skeletons, including those of infants, have already been recovered-pointing to the scale of atrocities allegedly committed in the area.

The party stressed that forensic transparency, proper victim identification, and prosecution of perpetrators are essential for genuine national healing and justice.

Full text of the ITAK letter: “We write on behalf of Ilankai Thamil Arasu Katchi to express profound concern regarding the ongoing exhumation at Chemmani. We urge urgent and decisive action to uncover the truth, ensure forensic protocols meet internationally recognised standards, and bring the perpetrators to justice.

"Chemmani has come to represent Sri Lanka's unresolved legacy of enforced disappearances and extrajudicial killings extending into the mid-1990s.

In 1998, Lance Corporal Somaratne Rajapakse convicted for the rape and murder of Tamil schoolgirl, Krishanthi Kumaraswarny, and family members, revealed at his sentencing hearing that between 300 and 400 Tamil civilians had been buried there. This disclosure prompted excavations in 1999 that yielded fifteen skeletons, two of which were identified as disappearances from 1996. Despite forensic confir mation of assault and execution prosecutions stagnated and no meaningful justice was delivered to the day.