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Article: Time ticking down for Sri Lanka's rebel leader
- Article from:
- AP Worldstream
- Article date:
- April 3, 2009
- Author:
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He has been the No. 1 target of Sri Lanka's military for 25 years. Now, Velupillai Prabhakaran's fate _ capture, death, flight _ is key to how the endgame in the island's civil war unfolds.
The ruthless leader of the Tamil Tiger separatists and his remaining fighters are widely believed to be trapped in a dwindling patch of jungle and beach as government forces close in to end the conflict that has killed 70,000.
Prabhakaran, 54, transformed the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam from a group of barefoot soldiers into a guerrilla force that not only held off the Sri Lankan army for years but also drove off the Indian army.
He did it with a brutal streak that saw his ...