In a case seen as a test of Sri Lanka’s commitment to protecting minorities, four soldiers and a police officer were convicted and sentenced to death Friday in the murder of four Tamils.
The officers were found guilty of raping and strangling an 18-year-old student and murdering three others at a military checkpoint near the Jaffna Peninsula village of Chemmanihi in September 1996.
A three-judge panel handed down the tough sentence despite pleas for lenient treatment from the defendants, who said they did not have a hand in the murders–only in burying bodies.
The government acknowledges that as many as 500 Tamil civilians have disappeared in the northern Jaffna Peninsula since the military drove out Tamil rebels and took control of the Tamil heartland in May 1996.
Tamil politicians and human-rights groups say many Tamils vanished after being arrested by government troops looking for guerrillas.
