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The Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam are stockpiling essential medicines, contributing to the creation of artificial shortages of important critical care items, defence ministry sources said today. Truck loads of important drugs and other medical supplies supplied by the government and intended for civilians in Tiger-controlled “uncleared” areas are routinely hijacked by the terrorists, adding to the health difficulties already faced by civilians in those areas. In a recent interview with influential French newsmagazine “Le Point,” one female terrorist cadre calling herself “Mariana” admitted that the Tigers held such vast stores of essential drugs that the terrorists could regularly “sell them to the enemy.” Concerns amongst humanitarian agencies over medical shortages have grown during three weeks of recent fighting between the separatist terrorists and government forces in the Jaffna Peninsula. Humanitarian aid agency Medicine Sans Frontieres (MSF) said that it had been refused permission by security forces to transport drugs and medical supplies to Mallavi Hospital in the terrorist-held Mullaitivu area. However an army spokesman said that the MSF requests had come largely from Vavuniya. Defence Ministry spokesman Brigadier Palitha Fernando said that the sudden request for increased supplies to Vavuniya was a probable indication of an influx of wounded terrorists to the civilian hospital there. The army reports that a large number of terrorists injured in recent fighting in the Jaffna Peninsula are being smuggled into civilian hospitals for treatment. Brigadier Fernando said that there were no restrictions on the type of antibiotics or other medicines that could be supplied, but that there were restrictions preventing the supply of unusually large quantities of broad spectrum antibiotics and surgical medicines. However, Brigadier Fernando said that these were not new restrictions.
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