SMS campaign by LTTE claims Prabhakaran is alive

London, May 21 (ANI): Sympathizers of the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Ealam (LTTE) have launched an SMS campaign claiming that their chief, Vellupillai Prabhkaran, is alive and will continue to lead the movement for a Tamil homeland in Sri Lanka.

European branches of the LTTE have been flooding local mobile users with text messages that Prabhakaran is alive and that the Sri Lankan Government used a body double to try to prove to the world that the LTTE chief had been killed in a two-hour firefight with Sri Lankan Special Forces near a lagoon in the northern part of the island-nation.

The text messages have been emanating from Norway, Germany and the United Kingdom, and are basically designed to lift the morale of LTTE sympathizers and ensure that the funding process for the rebel outfit does not dry up.

The SMS's are going out to LTTE sympathetic petrol bunk owners and grocery stores etc, with a clear message that Prabhakaran is very much alive and continues to lead from the front.

Rebel sympathisers continue to question the credibility of the images flashed on screens across the world, saying it couldn't be that easy for a man who is reputed to have had numerous look-alike doubles.

Norwegian capital Oslo has witnessed several demonstrations in recent weeks by Tamils settled there over the Sri Lanka army's offensive.

Norway was the facilitator of talks between the Sri Lankan Government and the LTTE and brokered the 2002 Cease Fire Agreement (CFA). Colombo abrogated the CFA in January 2008 on the ground that the Tigers had violated the agreement over 4,000 times and it was futile to continue with the pact.

In the recent past, LTTE supporters attacked the embassies of India, Sri Lanka and China and even sent out an open letter to UN Secretary General Ban ki Moon demanding the international body's intervention in halting the conflict and providing justice to deprived Lankan Tamils.

Tamilnet, a pro-LTTE website, claimed Prabhakaran was "alive and safe" and had escaped months ago. (ANI)