War and disregard make Tamils hard and determined

“After looking at the people dying and dead bodies everywhere, it is like nothing threatens me any more, it is like I have had the hard time in my life and I think I am prepared to take up whatever happens in life now,” says Damilvany Gnanakumar, an Eezham Tamil of British citizenship, who witnessed war and internment camp in the island of Sri Lanka. "I'm not that old Vany that sits down and cries for little things. I'm stronger now after going through and seeing all that problem. My mind is clear now," she told Gethin Chamberlain of The Guardian in an interview Tuesday, asking at the same time, what have the people done wrong? Why are they going through this, why is the international government not speaking up for them?

Damilvany Gnanakumar, 25, a British Tamil biomedical scientist who witnessed the war in Vanni [Photo: The Guardian]

The 25 years old biomedicine graduate of Greenwich University was one of a small group of medics treating the wounded in Vanni.

The pressure from The Guardian, UK, was partly responsible for her release from Colombo’s internment camp.

Her horrifying eyewitness accounts not merely put to shame Colombo and the establishments of the International Community, but indicts them of serious crime against human civilisation, commented Tamil circles.

Even those who now shed tears in the international community still miserably fail in recognising the fundamental need that Eezham Tamils should get independence, the Tamil circles pointed out.

Damilvany born in Jaffna in 1984, and migrated to UK in 1994, chose to go to Vanni in February 2008 to serve the people. She is a classic example for the younger generation of the Tamil diaspora sharing ownership of the national liberation struggle, Tamil circles said, adding that this generation cannot be taken for a ride by anyone without resolving the fundamentals of the Tamil national question in the island.