PTI
COLOMBO, March 12
Tamil political prisoners, who were on a hunger strike in Sri Lanka in protest against their prolonged incarceration, ended their protest after they were assured of speedy trials.
The 13 former LTTE cadres launched the hunger strike on February 23 demanding the government to expedite the cases against them or release them.
They suspended their fast after Prisons Reforms and Rehabilitation Minister D M Swaminathan assured them of speedy trials.
Prison Commissioner General Nissan Danasinghe informed them that the Minister has given an assurance that he would discuss the issue with the Attorney General’s Department officials.
Prisons spokesman Thushara Upuldeniya has told Colombo Page that the 13 prison inmates had their mid-day meal on Friday as usual.
Four inmates who had fell ill due to hunger strike were admitted to the Prison hospital.
Meanwhile, the students at the University of Jaffna on Friday have reportedly launched a one day hunger strike to protest the ongoing imprisonment of Tamil prisoners.
Hundreds of ethnic Tamils have been lodged in jails without trial since 2009, when Sri Lanka’s military crushed Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) rebels in a decades— long conflict for control of the island’s northern Jaffna peninsula.
