EPRLF officials threaten expatriate Tamils

(September 08, Colombo, Sri Lanka Guardian) One of the paramilitary groups, Ealam Peoples Revolutionary Liberation Front (EPRLF), operating in Jaffna with the blessings of the Defence Ministry is said to be involved in heavy handed activities against those whom have been implicated by the complainant.

The EPRLF has established a network of secret offices in Jaffna and are acting like police stations to entertain complaints from the people.

They go to the extent of finding out the relatives of the accused and harass them to pay compensations to the complainant. In some instances, they have phoned their relatives living overseas and have demanded large sums as compensation for the complainant.

A Bonn based Tamil family was contacted by an official of the EPRLF and was asked to pay some undisclosed sum to settle a family dispute in favour of the complainant. They have been threatened of dire consequences if they did not settle the sum.

In another incident involving a family based in Paris, they have been demanded to pay a sum to the accuser over a violent family dispute. The family members said, the accuser had damaged the properties of his in law and had used his influence with the EPRLF to get them to act on his instructions.

Both victims said that their relatives in Jaffna are scared to complain to the Police fearing retribution from the EPRLF cadres.