IPKF begins its withdrawal. The Tamil National Army and the Sri Lankan Army move into the areas vacated by the IPKF. International Committee Red Cross (ICRC) arrives in Sri Lanka.
Source
Ending Civil Wars: The Implementation of Peace Agreements, Stephen John Stedman, Donald Rothchild, Elizabeth M. Cousens, 2002.
“From the autumn of 1989 onward, fighting between the IPKF and the LTTE de-escalated considerably, and on March 31, 1990, the last unites of the Indian expeditionary force departed Sri Lanka’s shores.”
“The cost in human terms is heavy – 1,155 Indian soldiers had been killed in action and over 3,000 seriously injured. The LTTE had lost 711 of its members confronting the Indians, but membership in the Tiger movement more than tripled between 1987 and 1990, with almost 10,000 fighters mobilized by the time of the Indian withdrawal. These fighters moved rapidly to establish LTTE control over the north and east as the Indians pulled out.
“Between December 1989 and March 1990, one Tamil population center after another – Batticoloa and Trincomalee in the east and above all, the Jaffna peninsula including the city of Jaffna in the north – were triumphantly recaptured by hardened Tiger guerillas returning from forest and rural bases, in conjunction with local LTTE underground groups.
“By April 1990, the entire northeastern region, barring a few pockets, was effectively under LTTE administration. The Tigers augmented their arsenal considerably in these final months.
“Since mid-1989, they had surreptitiously received weapons and supplies to fight the Indians from their old enemy, the Sri Lankan armed forces, under orders from the Premadasa government. Now they captured large quantities of arms and ammunition left by the Indians to their Tamil collaborator militias, who collapsed and disintegrated virtually without a fight as the IPKF withdrew.
“The worst sufferers of the ISPA/IPKF, however, were the Tamil and Sinhalese civilian populations. Between 5,000 and 8,000 civilian Tamils (estimates vary) died in the violence in the north and east between October 1987 and March 1990, mostly at the hands of the IPKF – which earned the sobriquet “Innocent People Killing Force” as a result – and its armed Tamil collaborators (the LTTE also killed sizeable numbers of Tamils opposed to it and those viewed by the Tigers as “collaborators” for one reason or another).” Source: Ending Civil Wars: The Implementation of Peace Agreements, Stephen John Stedman, Donald Rothchild, Elizabeth M. Cousens, 2002.
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