West tried to save LTTE chief: Fonseka

Earlier,in an interview with the Rivira newspaper that will be published on Sunday,Fonseka said that Prabhakaran’s body was cremated by Lankan security forces.

“We cremated the body in the same area and threw the ashes into the (Indian) ocean,” Fonseka told the paper. “Even before Prabhakaran was killed,I knew we had won the war,but I was overjoyed when I had confirmation of his death.”

The Army Chief said the bodies of Tiger intelligence chief Pottu Amman and Prabhakaran’s wife Mathiwadini had not been identified. The Government showed the footage of Prabhakaran’s body after pro-rebel website TamilNet claimed on May 18 that he was alive and well.

Prabhakaran’s former deputy,Vinayagamoorthy Muralitharan alias Karuna and former Tiger spokesman Daya Master identified Prabhakaran’s body.

On Monday,military sources had said Prabhakaran was shot dead along with his two deputies as they tried to flee in an ambulance and another van. But Fonseka said his body was found in a mangrove a short distance away.

A report in The Daily Telegraph stated that Britain and Norway made a last-minute bid to save the lives of two Tamil Tiger leaders — LTTE’s political chief B Nadesan and ‘peace secretariat’ head S Pulidevan. The two had attempted to surrender,the report said quoting UN Secretary General Ban ki-Moon’s envoy Vijay Nambiar.

The men were later found dead amid claims that they were shot while waving a white flag. Western diplomats warned that the Sri Lankan Government could face a war crimes investigation.

Meanwhile on Saturday,Ban ki-Moon,who is now in Sri Lanka,asked the Government to initiate steps for a “political process of dialogue,accommodation and reconciliation” with its Tamil minority as he visited refugee camps to see first hand the plight of 300,000 displaced people.

“Families must be reunited and people must be able to begin rebuilding their lives” Ban said after a 90-minute visit to the sprawling Manik Farm camp near Vavuniya,160 km from Colombo,which Tamil activists and groups have likened to a “concentration camp”.

Appealing to a triumphant Government to “heal the wounds” left by three decades of ethnic conflict,Ban asked the authorities to expedite the screening and processing of refugees and settle them back in their homes. From relief camps and the battle zone,Ban flew to Kandy to meet President Mahinda Rajapaksa.