illustration by Delaney Kuric
-May 1st, 1993-
Ranasinghe Premadasa was the third President of Sri Lanka. During his tenure, the main goal of his Presidency was to bring an end to the ethnic conflicts that had ravaged the country for the past decade. However, he was met with some opposition. Up in the North, Tamil militant groups had started rioting against the Indian peace-keeping forces that brought an end to Eelam War I. Down South, a Sinhalese-led marxist party known as the JVP was aiming for an overthrow of the Sri Lankan government to bring an all Sinhalese power.
During a May Day parade in 1993, Ranasinghe Premadasa was assassinated by an LTTE suicide bomber, giving rise to a resurgence of the ethnic war. This attack came two years after Indian Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi was murdered by an LTTE suicide bomber and two weeks after the leader of Premadasa’s opposing political party was gunned down.
