The Northern and Eastern Provinces of Sri Lanka endured the harshest violence during the civil war. In October 1990, the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) forcibly expelled nearly 80,000 to 100,000 Muslims from the Northern Province. This act shattered centuries of coexistence and stands out as one of South Asia’s least acknowledged cases of ethnic cleansing. Thirty-five years later, many of the displaced remain marginalised. This article presents a concise, Islamic-oriented, rights-based account, aligned with credible academic and humanitarian sources listed below.
Context: War, Devolution and the Rise of an Exclusivist Project
The civil war lasted nearly three decades. Although the 13th Amendment created provincial councils to devolve power, Tamil nationalist demands for autonomy continued, led by the LTTE. Heavy fighting between the National Forces and the LTTE was unrelenting, trapping civilians as they tried to live ordinary lives. Despite hardships across communities, large scale migration between provinces did not occur before 1990, except among Muslims who constituted about 5 percent of the region’s population and had lived for centuries alongside Tamil neighbours in their towns and villages.
October 1990: Forced Expulsion of Northern Muslims
Sensing stronger military moves by the Government of Sri Lanka, the LTTE combined battlefield strategy with international lobbying for a mono ethnic Tamil Eelam. Within this calculus, the LTTE expelled the entire Muslim population from the Northern Province to project the territory as a Tamils only homeland and to imply that Muslims had left voluntarily because they did not belong. Between late October and early November 1990, Muslims were driven out of Jaffna, Kilinochchi, Mullaitivu, Vavuniya and Mannar. Orders blared from loudspeakers giving families 48 hours to leave. Checkpoints barred them from carrying jewellery, land deeds and even basic household goods. The operation had military precision and devastated a community that had coexisted with Tamils for generations.
Ideology and Instrumentalisation of Fear
The LTTE’s Tamils only homeland vision drove the expulsion. Although Sri Lankan Muslims speak Tamil, they were cast as outsiders to the nationalist project. Accusations of collaboration with the state were used to justify collective punishment. In reality, most Muslims were traders, farmers and fisherfolk living ordinary lives. The expulsion resembled other forms of ethnic cleansing observed in Bosnia and Palestine. While the Northern expulsion did not document mass killings or widespread sexual violence, it erased livelihoods, disrupted social structures and uprooted a deeply rooted Muslim presence.
2.0 Post Expulsion Positions
In later years, LTTE political strategist Anton Balasingham called the expulsion a political blunder and signalled willingness to support return, a statement widely seen as image management rather than repentance. Analysts link the decision to longstanding hostilities within the LTTE’s Eastern faction, reflected in atrocities such as the 1990 Kattankudy Mosque Massacre where 141 worshippers were killed during evening prayers. Further violence in Eravur and Ampara deepened Muslim insecurity across the East.
After the war, Tamil leaders like M. A. Sumanthiran urged formal acknowledgment of the expulsion as ethnic cleansing and proposed a Northern Provincial Council resolution. For credibility in post war justice, such an acknowledgment remains vital. During 1990, the state was militarily overstretched and could not prevent the expulsions. The post conflict response was limited to welfare camps in Puttalam and Anuradhapura. International response was also inadequate. While UNHCR and some Middle Eastern countries provided relief, meaningful resettlement and restitution mechanisms were largely absent. Critics argue that humanitarian programming at times sidelined Muslim IDPs, contradicting the Guiding Principles on Internal Displacement.
3.0 Impact of the Expulsion
The expulsion produced deep socioeconomic and psychological harms. Families lost homes, land, shops and boats. Self sufficient communities were pushed into dependency in welfare camps, in some cases for decades. Medical professionals recorded spikes in post traumatic stress disorder in the months after displacement. Gender roles shifted as Muslim women, often outside formal labour markets, entered agricultural work in host areas to sustain families. Education suffered as displaced children attended double shift schools with host communities, with long term effects on learning outcomes and social mobility.
4.0 Return and Resettlement After 2009
Following the LTTE’s defeat in 2009, some families returned to ancestral lands. Progress was uneven. Returnees encountered forest encroachment, damaged or occupied properties, absent infrastructure and unresolved land disputes. Government support was minimal and often ad hoc. UNHCR assistance tended to be logistical rather than transformative. Without a comprehensive resettlement policy, many Northern Muslims remain in limbo. Calls to establish an empowered Presidential Commission to address land, restitution and recompense have not been met with sufficient urgency.
5.0 Recommendations and Policy Proposals
5.1 Renewed UNHCR Engagement
UNHCR should reaffirm protection for Northern Muslim IDPs, ensure parity in assistance, and publish transparent monitoring and evaluation. Local implementing partners must be accountable to humanitarian standards.
5.2 Government Accountability and Independent Inquiry
The Government of Sri Lanka should create a Presidential Commission with clear powers to investigate historical injustices against Northern Muslims and to recommend binding remedies, building on but improving the inclusivity and follow through of previous mechanisms.
5.3 Land, Housing and Urban Design
Provide clear land titles and targeted housing. In dense urban areas like Jaffna, pursue mid to high rise community centric housing with services. In rural settings, prioritise single unit homes linked to livelihoods and farm recovery.
5.4 Livelihood Restoration
Fund vocational training, modernise agriculture and fisheries, expand microfinance with Sharia compliant options, and build value chains that reconnect Muslim producers and traders to regional markets.
5.5 Compensation and Reparations
Establish a compensation framework for lost property and income, aligned with international displacement principles, including options for restitution in kind, cash compensation and community infrastructure investment.
6.0 Conclusion
The 1990 expulsion of Northern Province Muslims remains an under recognised case of ethnic cleansing. Three and a half decades on, the community still faces structural marginalisation. A principled, rights based approach centered on restitution, return, compensation and equal citizenship is essential. For Sri Lanka’s durable peace, reconciliation must include Northern Muslims as rights holders, not as an afterthought. From an Islamic perspective, the community’s steadfastness reflects sabr and communal resilience. Justice, truthful acknowledgment and dignified return are the minimum requirements for a shared future.
References
Adaderana 2017. Amantha 2017. Badurussaman 2017. Department of Census and Statistics 2012. Google n.d. Haniffa 2015. Hasbullah 2001. Hoole 2009. Imtiyaz 2014. Imtiyaz and Hoole 2011. Imtiyaz and Stavis 2008. Jeyaraj 2015. Klem 2011. Peter n.d. Sri Lanka Muslim Congress 2017. Sufyan 2017. Thawfeek 2017. UNHCR 2014. Wikipedia 2017.
Note: This article is a summarised version of a research paper presented at an international conference in 2019. It is published today on the 35th commemoration of the October 1990 expulsion because many issues remain unresolved.
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