| Nagarkovil school bombing | |
|---|---|
| Part of theSri Lankan Civil War | |
  | |
| Location | 9°42′02″N80°18′31″E / 9.70056°N 80.30861°E /9.70056; 80.30861 Nagar Kovil,Sri Lanka |
| Date | September 22, 1995 (+6 GMT) |
| Target | Sri Lankan Tamils |
Attack type | Aerial bombardment |
| Weapons | Bomb |
| Deaths | 71[1][2] |
| Injured | 150[3] |
| Perpetrators | Sri Lankan Airforce[4] |
TheNagarkovil school bombing was an airstrike on 22 September 1995 in which theSri Lankan Air Force bombed theNagarkovil Maha Vidyalayam school inJaffna in northernSri Lanka, resulting in the death of, by varying accounts, 34-71Sri Lankan Tamil civilians, primarily schoolchildren, and injuries to many more.[5][6][7][8][3] Sri Lankan Defense spokesman admitted the incident but claimed that it was a LTTE facility and several of the dead were LTTE cadres. The airstrike took place 12 hours after theSri Lankan government had imposed a presscensorship on war-related events.[9][10]
According to University Teachers for Human Rights (UTHR), a Jaffna-based organization, the staff of Nagarkovil Government School noticed bomber activity by theSri Lanka Air Force around the school the morning of Friday, September 22, 1995. Several children who had come out of school had sheltered under a tree, waiting for the bombers to leave. About 12:45 pm a bomb fell near the tree, instantly killing 39 and injuring others. Some people injured by the bombing later died from their wounds.[11]
The 1996HRW annual country report described "a major offensive on the Jaffna peninsula" by the Sri Lankan government which began on September 22, and which included curbs on war-related reporting by both the domestic and international press. "Among the first stories to be subjected to these censorship requirements were reports that on September 21 and 22, heavy shelling and aerial attacks by government forces on the northernJaffna region had killed some seventy civilians, including many school children." Human Rights Watch also cited aReuters report from September 23 that the army had denied the incident and that the story had been "subjected to military censors, who deleted quotes from civilians on the reported deaths of twenty children."[10]
In a letter of October 6, 1995, theAustralian government expressed a concern about "tragic incidents where non combatant Tamil civilians have been killed in military exchanges," mentioning "the reported deaths of 44 school children when a school was bombed at the village of Nagarkovil on September 22."[12]
