‘I want the world to know my sister’s name’: friends and families of 17 aid workers killed in 2006 Muttur massacre demand justice

Mourners by the coffins of G Kavitha and S Ganesh during a funeral at Trincomalee, Sri Lanka, on 8 August 2006. Photograph: Lakruwan Wanniarachchi/AFP via Getty Images

By the time their colleagues were able to reach them, their bodies had been lying in the dirt for around two days and were starting to decompose in the heat. On 6 August 2006, 17 Sri Lankan workers for the international NGO Action Against Hunger were found dead in the organisation’s compound in Muttur, Sri Lanka. They had been lined up and shot.

Many were recent graduates, brought on board to help with the NGO’s increased workload in the aftermath of the Boxing Day tsunami of 2004. All but one were Tamil. Four were women. Two were father and daughter.