In the early hours on 18 September 1999, LTTE Tamil Tiger Terrorists struck at three villages of Gonagala, Borapola and Bedirekke of Ampara, about 270 km from Colombo, Sri Lanka. During the past 16 years, they have launched several attacks on the Sinhala and Muslim civilian community, and this is the 131st such attack.

At least 58 Sinhalese villagers, including 17 women, 2 pregnant mothers and 14 children, were hacked to death with machetes and knives. The victims were dragged from their sleep and butchered. Those who tried to seek refuge in the nearby dense jungles were chased and killed. Some of the villagers who fled their burning homes as gunmen fired at them were chased and hacked to death in rice fields. Others were killed as they slept.

"The attackers broke down the doors of the huts and entered. They hacked and chopped to death the victims, some of them still lying in bed," local MP Yasendra Bakmeewewa told Media.

The LTTE is an organisation banned by the USA, India, Malaysia and Sri Lanka. USA State Department in its annual listing of international terrorist organisations repeatedly includes the Tamil Tigers as one of the 30 most dangerous international terrorist organisations in the world. The Canadian Federal Court has ruled that the LTTE is an international terrorist organization. They have killed over 20,000 innocent Tamil, Muslim and Sinhala civilians deliberately.

LTTE’s killing spree started with the murder of their Tamil Mayor of Jaffna, Alfred Duraiappa, in 1975. Since then, they have killed over 40, Tamil leaders who are against their terrorist activities. To date, they have killed over 18 parliamentarians in Sri Lanka such as Ranasinghe Premadasa (former President of Sri Lanka) and three senior Ministers, Ranjan Wijeratna, Lalith Athulathmudali and Gamini Dissanayake of the democratically elected Sri Lankan Government. Apart from the political leaders in Sri Lanka, LTTE killed Rajiv Gandhi (former Prime Minister of India). Recently, they attempted to assassinate Sonia Gandhi, the widow of the LTTE victim, Rajiv Gandhi.

More than half of Tamil Tiger cadres are children some aged as low as 10 years. UN special representative, Olara Otunu who visited Sri Lanka and Amnesty International have condemned the Tigers for forcible recruitment of children into war. The recruitment of children as soldiers is a violation of the UN Convention on the right of the children. Further, the new International Criminal Court Statute makes child recruitment a war crime.