"Java Gulf" at sea at night

Music

Corcoran:  It's midnight and we're aboard the Java Gulf, steaming towards the dark heart of a civil war. The Java Gulf used to be an oil rig work-ship - now she's a Red Cross medical shuttle making a weekly run to Jaffna on the northern tip of Sri Lanka.

00:06

People on board

The people on board are returning home from the relative safety of the south, where they've been receiving hospital treatment unavailable in Jaffna.

00:32

Still hours ahead in the darkness, Jaffna is a city under siege - isolated by a struggle between the Sri Lankan army and one of the world's most formidable guerrilla forces - the LTTE or Tamil Tigers.

00:46

Captain

Super:

Capt. PETER ABAPO

"M.V. Java Gulf"

Abapo:  This is the navy instruction that don't pass this close to the coast because sometime there is sea mine and we don't know, because nobody knows who is the one who put the sea mine.

1:03

Corcoran:  Sea mines have already sunk a Red Cross ship  here, and while both sides respect the Red Cross's neutrality there's a clear threat by the Tigers to destroy any ships or aircraft that dare approach Jaffna. Captain Abapo is taking no chances of mistaken identity.

1:17

Corcoran with captain

Corcoran:  I notice the whole ship is lit up like a Christmas tree. Is that for any reason? Why is that?

Abapo:  We open all the light - easy to distinguish by the navy and maybe the LTTE that we are Red Cross ship.

Corcoran:   So people don't shoot at the ship? 

Abapo:   Yeah.

1:36

Red Cross insignia on ship

Corcoran:  It's a precaution that paid off this very night. Beyond the glow of the ship lights, we'd learn weeks later, was a darkened freighter unloading a huge arms shipment for the Tigers. The lightshow had saved Java Gulf from attack.

2:00

Java Gulf

FX:  Ship horn

2:24

Corcoran:   At the entrance to Jaffna's seaport Java Gulf dodges the wreckage of 16 years of civil war.

2:30

Corcoran:  This what the military doesn't want you to see - navy supply ships sunk by Tiger frogmen. On the wharf, the remains of a navy patrol boat, testament to the Tigers prowess.

2:46

Map Sri Lanka

Music

2:59

Ruined buildings in Jaffna

Corcoran:   Jaffna is a city of symbolism this ethnic conflict between the Tamil minority and Sri Lanka's Singhalese majority. For the Tigers this is the heartland of Tamil nationalism.

3:25

Music

3:39

Corcoran:  They sprang from these ruined streets to wage their war for an independent homeland -- nothing less than a third of the country, a demand the Sinhalese were never going to accept.

3:43

Three years ago the city was re-captured by the Sinhalese-dominated. Now amid reconstruction, the Government portrays an image of normality - that Jaffna's half million Tamils have returned to the national fold.

Gunawardena:  Normal civil administration is functioning.

3:58

Gunawardena

There are a few hiccups on and off like should happen in any area where there is a terrorist problem. But security is being provided and there is a certain amount of stability and normalcy in the area

4:15

Dixon and Corcoran in car

Dixon:  You'll notice the fishnet around the checkpoint - the idea of that is to stop people throwing hand grenades into the checkpoint in as they go cycling past.

4:40

Corcoran:   Australian John Dixon has run the United Nations refugee operations here for two years.

He's seen it all before in Cambodia and Bosnia - and believes the government's story is flawed, its control precarious.

4:49

Dixon:  I think the government would like everybody to believe things are normal and getting back to normal in Jaffna - and very, very slowly they are - but it's not anywhere near at the speed or the rate of reconstruction which the Government says it is. And basically the Government is shooting itself in the foot by not being able to resolve the problems of security, of transport and the closed market economy.

Corcoran:   And of course this could all change again overnight - the opposing forces

5:05

could sweep in here overnight again?

Dixon:  Absolutely, in fact we believe there's a very strong cadre in town at the moment, in the peninsula at the moment. The LTTE are here in force and can - if not take the peninsula at this stage - can certainly disrupt the lifestyle here very, very quickly.

5:35

Soldiers on street in dark

Corcoran:  In the pre-dawn gloom, the soldiers begin their daily ritual.

5:52

Officially they say Jaffna is a cleared area, but in reality at least 600 Tigers operate underground here  -- an enemy that's everywhere and nowhere.

6:16

Each night Tigers lay remote controlled landmines, hoping to kill senior officers or Tamil collaborators.

6:35

And every morning the troops are out clearing them. They don't always succeed.  In the past year, two generals and two Tamil mayors have been killed.

6:48

Video footage of shootings

FX:  Shooting

7:01

Corcoran:   They're undercover in Jaffna, but on the city's doorstep the Tigers field a formidable force. Last September they filmed their greatest victory of the war - overrunning this huge military complex just south of Jaffna.

7:07

FX:  Shooting

7:25

Corcoran:   Waves of young Tiger fighters, mainly teenage boys and girls, inflicted staggering losses on the army. Fifteen hundred dead, two thousand wounded.

7:29

Corcoran greets General Gunawardena

The man in charge of this military disaster was none other than General Gunawardena who was soon promoted to command all of Jaffna.

7:45

Gunawardena

Corcoran:   You are trying to win a hearts and minds campaign, you're trying to gain the confidence of the local people, and yet a large well-equipped army can lose such a battle.  I mean what does that do to your standing - your reputation here?

7:53

Gunawardena:  I don't consider it a loss as such because it was - as I say - when the odds are against you - you've got to take certain measures.  Now I was the commander of that division when this took place and I gave the instructions for them to withdraw to a particular point from which they could defend themselves better.

8:08

Soldiers

Corcoran:  Army morale is now on the brink of collapse.

A visible sign of this military malaise -- increasing numbers of female soldiers and police on the streets of Jaffna- recruited to replace casualties -- and the 20 thousand men - one fifth of the entire army -- who've given up the fight and deserted.

Most soldiers say this war is unwinnable, and surprisingly their General agrees.

8:38

Gunawardena

Gunawardena:  Our aim mainly is to keep on weakening the enemy, so that the political solution can be reached. There is no military solution to this type of problem.

9:06

Interior of hospital

9:21

Corcoran:   The truth is a political solution is as impossible as a military breakthrough,  because for the Tigers,  it's all or nothing -- a homeland or a glorious death.

9:25

We'd arranged to interview a Tamil Tiger leader - expecting, no doubt we'd hear first hand  why there's no room for compromise.

9:38

But on the day we planned to meet, the Tiger's Jaffna commander and his two bodyguards were killed in a shoot out at their safe house.

9:53

Bodies in safe house

Red Cross official: The army surrounded them and they fired and these people returned fire

And they threw a hand grenade.

10:04

Corcoran:   Even though a senior Tiger commander was killed, the war-weary people of Jaffna showed little interest - just three more dead in a conflict that's already claimed 70,000 lives.

10:13

Interior Jaffna Hospital/Erlich

At Jaffna Hospital,  volunteer doctors from Medicens Sans Frontieres have enough trouble coping with the living.

10:33

Erlich:  We averted a disaster. The ceiling in one of the paediatric wards where we store - I hate to say excess patients, which we've had  a ton of excess patients almost like a store room.

Corcoran:  Fell down?

Erlich:  Yeah, the roof fell down - thank God there were no patients there. We had moved them out the night before but it could have been a disaster!

10:40

Corcoran:   Once again the scenes here starkly contradict the Government line that Jaffna is rising from the ruins.

Kids in hospital

There's a desperate shortage of medical supplies. The hospital has just run out of plaster and is forced to use cardboard splints.

11:14

Erlich

Super:

Dr. JERRY ERLICH

Medecins Sans Frontieres

Erlich:  Yes, people are dying every day and every minute from lack of proper care.  And then of course, drugs is a whole other story. Shortage of nurses  -- I mean the other day I look around in ward 11 - I could have  cried - because I mean with all the mess, with all the patients we had there - two nurses trying to do the work of eight.

11:25

Music

11:51

Jaffna lagoon wharf

Corcoran:   Each morning the Jaffna lagoon wharf is the scene of an extraordinary homecoming.

12:00

The other side - four kilometres distant -- is Tiger territory. When the Tigers retreated in 1996 they took the entire population of Jaffna with them -- a forced evacuation to the far side of the lagoon.

Now through the tacit and uneasy agreement of both sides, the refugees are coming home.

12:13

Corcoran with soldier at wharf

Corcoran:  And you get a lot of people coming through now?

Soldier:  Yes today I think about 100 people.

Corcoran:   A hundred people? That's a lot of people to move through here?

Soldier:  We always welcome people because we are all Sri Lankans you know.

12:38

Corcoran:   They may be welcome - but soldiers aren't going risk getting shot at in saving them. That task falls to the fishermen - many of them boys no older than 12.

12:54

Corcoran gets into boat

Corcoran:   So the police, the army don't come with us? No? We're on our own?

13:09

Corcoran:   The boys are forced to pole their way across, as the army bans fibreglass boats and outboard motors,  fearing they could be used in Tiger suicide attacks.

13:21

People on outcrop of rubble

Atop the rubble of what was a lighthouse, they patiently await our arrival -- 23 people, three bicycles and a chicken.

13:39

They've waded half way across the lagoon under the cover of darkness, but dare come no closer, fearing Jaffna's nightly shoot-on-sight curfew.

13:51

Corcoran

Corcoran:   And all these people from Jaffna?  Is Jaffna their home town?

14:00

Man:  Yes, Jaffna... all Jaffna. Jaffna area.

Corcoran:   How many people still on the other side?

Man:   We don't know exactly - one hundred thousand... two hundred thousand.

14:07

People getting into boat

Corcoran:  These people have endured a life of hardship in Tiger controlled villages and jungle since 1996.

The Government says their return is a vote of confidence but they're simply tired of the fighting and they want medical treatment. As we've seen they're in for a bitter disappointment.

14:26

Soldier

Soldier:  There are twenty-seven... but you said twenty-three.

14:50

Tamil speaking soldiers are a rarity. Most soldiers and civilians simply can't communicate,  but they do recognise suspicious body language.

14:56

Soldier:  Are there LTTE people among you?  Tell me... don't be afraid. We know there were LTTE among you before - but not now. Don't be afraid - tell me.  We know there's one.

15:04

Corcoran:   But this is only the first round.  The next stop in the interrogation process, a detention camp where the questions are tougher and the suspicion greater.

15:20

Woman at camp

Woman:  I want to go home - then go to the hospital.

Corcoran:  Are they giving medicine here?

Woman:  No. Yesterday they were giving it.

Corcoran:  Did they give it to you?

Woman:  No, they didn't give it to me.

15:32

Red Cross officials handing out mats

Corcoran:   The Red Cross does what it can -- handing out sleeping mats to the new arrivals -- including 56 year old Najalingham Somasundram.

15:47

The Army promises he'll only be here 10 days, until he can prove he's not a Tiger. But some have already been interred for five weeks.

15:57

For Najalingham -- with his wife killed and news that his Jaffna home has been destroyed -- the future is bleak.

16:09

Najalingham

Najalingham:  My children are here - I can stay with them... and die with them.

Corcoran:  What meaning does life have now?

Najalingham:  What is the meaning of life? We will have to face more atrocities... and we will die.  Who knows?

16:18

Najalingham with papers

Corcoran:   The Government gains few converts through the endless cycle of arbitrary arrests.

16:33

Leo Dickson, a Tamil security guard at the United Nations compound, has some bad news. He's just been handed a receipt for his son -- detained by the army -for being an acquaintance of a suspected Tiger.

16:46

Dickson at front of house

Dickson:  Come, come! They have taken away our son. I wanted to see him, but they wouldn't allow me.

17:00

Photo of Leo's son

Corcoran:   His son, 20 year old Patrick, was a Red Cross worker further south in the war zone, until  Leo asked him to come home and help the family by getting a local job.

17:08

Dickson

Dickson:  He's not helping either LTTE or the army --  he's working hard to earn money, and he's doing carpentry work, and giving about 50 or 25 to his mother.

Corcoran:  When the army arrests him, what do they do?

Dickson:  If they take him they beat him and torture him and they will not allow me to see him --  sometimes they die from the beating.

17:21

Dickson with family

Corcoran:  The arrest  places Leo's other teenage children under suspicion.  All too often in the past, those detained simply disappeared.

17:42

Music

17:53

Corcoran to camera

Super:
MARK CORCORAN

Corcoran:  A few weeks ago, workers digging a pit for a septic tank, here at the local football stadium, uncovered this mass grave.  So far 22 bodies have been exhumed from the site, but there's every indication that many more are still buried here. Without any firm evidence, the Sri Lankan army is already suggesting that this was the handiwork of the Indian Peacekeeping Force that was stationed here in the late 80's. The army has in fact shown very little enthusiasm for investigating this kind of thing. It was a local magistrate who insisted on this dig. And while this may be the first mass grave that's been uncovered, it may not be the largest.

18:12

Music

18:50

Grave site

Corcoran:   Army attempts to redress human rights abuses may have backfired.  When a young soldier convicted of murdering Tamil civilians claimed there was another mass grave, containing 400 bodies.

19:00

Fear prevents most Tamils from speaking out, but one institution that has endured the ravages of war and continues to confront the army  with its past.

19:17

Priest

Super:

Father JEYAKUMAR

Catholic Church

Priest:  During the time 1996 - there was nearly about 600 people missing within a short time. One of the soldiers who was caught in one of the murder case, he gave witness in which he said that there is a mass grave in Chemani. So from that day only the people know that all those people who are missing probably could have been buried there.

19:28

Travelling to Chemani site

Corcoran:  The Chemani site is just a short drive out of town.

Tamils suspect incriminating evidence has already been removed, a concern reinforced by the presence of earthmoving equipment.

A government inspection team has pegged the heavily guarded site with white flags, but media inspections aren't welcome.

19:58

Soldier blocks camera

Soldier: No, don't take it.

Corcoran:  Where were the bodies buried?

Man:  The bodies are there.  Four places have been recognised.

20:23

Corcoran:  Four places? Where are the others from here? Over there. Okay. How far? How far along here?

Man:  Over there... Not far away - just there.

20:38

General

Corcoran:   They've discovered a mass grave, allegedly with 400 bodies in it. There's another mass grave near the football stadium.

General: Where is the 400 bodies?

21:01

Corcoran:  That a young soldier being convicted...

General:   Yes - that is what he says.

Corcoran:   You don't believe him?

General:  Well, I don't - it's yet to be seen.

Corcoran:   There's another one that's already started over near the football stadium.

General:  Yes those are old - we were not even there when these bodies were buried - the army was not there.

21:11

Exhumation at Chemani

Corcoran:   The general's rebuttal may have been a little premature. Since our visit to Jaffna, a preliminary exhumation of Chemani has already uncovered the bodies of two men missing since 1996. One blindfolded and bound at the time of his death.

21:33

Dickson wheeling bike

Corcoran:   In the past, the relatives of those detained who protested too loudly, also disappeared.

Leo Dickson asks us to accompany him to the army base, in a bid to see his son.

21:58

Soldier:  Here is here.  Now investigation...after investigation, give permission to see you.  You!

22:15

Soldiers

Soldier:  Don't take my picture!

22:31

Corcoran:   The second officer immediately contradicts his colleague, claiming that prisoner has been transferred to another camp.

Ultimately Leo got his son back, but  lives with the fear that all his children are now suspects who can be seized at any time.

22:36

Dixon

Super:
JOHN DIXON

UNHCR

Dixon:  Without a political solution, there is no military solution. There has to be a political solution to this problem, and it's quite within the powers of both parties to achieve that.  While they procrastinate and continue to fight this senseless war - which it really is - the people suffer, and you've got not only half a million people in Jaffna suffering, but a lot more Sinhalese and Tamils in the rest of the country suffering.

22:55

Hindu parade to Ganesh

Music

23:23

Corcoran:   In Jaffna town, prayers are offered to Ganesh, the Hindu God of good luck and success -two commodities in short supply here.

23:32

Aeroplane

Meanwhile, just out of the city, war weary troops line up to fly home on leave, no doubt quietly thanking their own Gods that they have survived.

After 16 years, there's an air of mutual exhaustion on both sides, a mood ignored by Government and Tiger leaders determined to fight to the death.

23:45

The troops run the gauntlet of Tiger anti-aircraft missiles for a few weeks home leave in the south. Many will desert rather than come back.

But few Tamils have the luxury of flying out and leaving the wreckage of war behind -- a city they say has been reduced to an open prison.

24:10