Vakarai or Vaharai (, ), The Sinhala name වාකර is pronounced 'vākara'.It is a town in the
Batticaloa District
Batticaloa District ( ; ) is one of the 25 districts of Sri Lanka, the second level administrative division of the country. The district is administered by a District Secretariat headed by a District Secretary (previously known as a Government A ...
of
Sri Lanka
Sri Lanka, officially the Democratic Socialist Republic of Sri Lanka, also known historically as Ceylon, is an island country in South Asia. It lies in the Indian Ocean, southwest of the Bay of Bengal, separated from the Indian subcontinent, ...
, located about 65 km Northwest of
Batticaloa
Batticaloa (, ''Maṭṭakkaḷappu'', ; , ''Maḍakalapuwa'', ) is a major city in the Eastern Province, Sri Lanka, and its former capital. It is the administrative capital of the Batticaloa District. The city is the seat of the Eastern Univers ...
. The Anglicization vākari should be preferred to vāhari.
This a predominant Tamil area, and headquarters the Koralai Pathu North Division with a population around 21,000. The residents are predominantly poor fishermen or farmers.
Civil War
Vakarai was the
LTTE
The Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE; , ; also known as the Tamil Tigers) was a Tamil militant organization, that was based in the northern and eastern Sri Lanka. The LTTE fought to create an independent Tamil state called Tamil Eelam ...
stronghold in the Eastern province and served as a strategically important city for the communication between the Eastern Province and the Northern Province. Since 1985 it has served as a major battleground with its control often shifting between the Sri Lankan government, the Indian Peace Keeping Forces and the LTTE. the Karuna faction broke from the LTTE here and the LTTE was pushed out in 2007.
See also
*
Vakarai Bombing
The Vaharai bombing is a disputed event in the Sri Lankan civil war. It occurred on November 7, 2006 when, according to survivors of the incident interviewed by Reuters, the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam fired artillery at Sri Lankan military ...
References
{{EasternLK-geo-stub
Towns in Batticaloa District
Koralaipattu North DS Division