Kagusthan Ariaratnam, a former child soldier turned defense analyst, speaks with JURIST about his new memoir Spy Tiger: The 05 File. The book, co-written with Michael Bramadat-Willcock, details Ariaratnam’s experiences during the Sri Lankan civil war (1983-2009). Forcibly recruited by the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) as a youth, Ariaratnam later became an informant for both Indian and Sri Lankan governments. The conflict, which pitted the LTTE against the Sri Lankan government, resulted in an estimated 100,000 deaths. In this interview with JURIST Senior Editor for Long Form Content Pitasanna Shanmugathas, Ariaratnam discusses his role in the war, its lasting impacts, and the ethical challenges he faced. His account offers insight into one of South Asia’s most complex conflicts. Ariaratnam’s memoir is available for purchase on Amazon.

JURIST: Being a child soldier exposes one to extreme violence at an early age. You discuss this at length in your memoir, but to the readers of JURIST, talk about how you became forcibly recruited as a child soldier into the Tamil separatist rebel group, the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE), also known as the Tamil Tigers. 

Kagusthan Ariaratnam: I was born and brought up amid Sri Lanka’s bloody civil war. As the first-born son in a family of five, I was targeted by the Tamil Tigers to be forcibly recruited. The LTTE required the eldest child of each family to join the brutal terrorist group and become a Tiger.

As the eldest boy, I had no choice but to join; otherwise, my younger brothers would have been targeted. Despite our efforts to protest against the organization’s conscription policy, my family and I were unsuccessful.

In 1991, while I was studying Advanced Level mathematics at Kokkuvil Hindu College, I was one of 19 students taken to an LTTE camp [in a] raid. We were forced to build trenches to supply food and ammunition to the front defense line.

We were told we would return to school when we were finished, but an aerial attack on the camp by the Sri Lankan Air Force took place. We were wearing white shirts as part of our school uniforms and had drawn their attention. Many LTTE commanders and some of my friends from school died in the battle. Some LTTE cadres became upset with those of us who survived. They beat us, some to the point that we never recovered from our wounds, and put us in a dark underground bunker for five days.

While imprisoned in the bunker, LTTE underlings forced us to decide between joining them or staying in the underground bunker to die. We had no real choice but to join; for every day we refused, the longer we declined, the more the LTTE cadres would shout at us that they were going to our families and would take another son or daughter to our place. We all knew that we would die from starvation if we didn’t agree to their demands. Our lives and our dreams for the future were over as we were coerced into joining the LTTE right out of the bunker.

JURIST: What were some of the lasting psychological effects of your experience as a child soldier and later informant? 

Ariaratnam: In eradicating the Tamil Tigers, many innocent people — youth, elderly, women, and children — were killed as collateral [damage]. Some of those deaths resulted from my actions due to my role as an intelligence operative for the Tigers, India’s intelligence, and the Sri Lankan military. I knew the unthinkable was my only option at the time — my survival, and that of my family, depended on it.

Kidnapped from high school and forced to fight as a child soldier, I quickly rose to become an intelligence officer, working closely with the Tigers’ leadership. After breaking their code by falling in love, I was blackmailed into working for India’s Research and Analysis Wing (RAW). Fear and despair led me to defect to the Sri Lankan security forces in 1995. As a former naval intelligence officer, I became a valuable source for the Sri Lankan government, knowing the Tigers’ operations intimately. While still within the Tigers’ intelligence wing, I provided intelligence to RAW.

The Tigers forbade cadres from love, music, or TV, with the doctrine: “You are born to die, and you might as well die nobly as a martyr.” Yet, when music composer A.R. Rahman’s album Roja came out, I couldn’t resist secretly listening. Tired of constant news of war and death, I found solace in his music’s fusion of Western and Eastern influences.

The wounds of the Sri Lankan war still haunt me — scenes of death and destruction replay in my mind. After being kidnapped and forced into conflict, I had to decide where my loyalties lay. While my people were torn apart, I fled to Canada, not to betray my family, but to protect them.

JURIST: Do you believe international humanitarian law adequately addresses the post-conflict trauma faced by individuals like yourself?

Ariaratnam: International humanitarian law, mainly through the Geneva Conventions and their Additional Protocols, provides protections for children in armed conflict and addresses issues like the recruitment of child soldiers. However, it does not adequately address the long-term post-conflict trauma and reintegration needs of former child soldiers, including those who were part of the Tamil Tigers in Sri Lanka.

While international humanitarian law prohibits the recruitment of children under 15 for hostilities and mandates humane treatment of those caught up in conflict, it focuses primarily on the conduct of war and immediate humanitarian protections. It lacks specific provisions for post-conflict psychological rehabilitation and social reintegration, which are critical for former child soldiers like those in the LTTE, who often suffer from severe psychological trauma, stigma, and a lack of education or vocational skills.

In Sri Lanka’s case, the post-war reintegration of former Tamil Tigers, especially child soldiers, was a complex issue. Many of them experienced severe trauma from being forcibly recruited, trained to fight, and often involved in violent acts from a young age. After the conflict, these individuals faced social stigma, marginalization, and mental health issues. Though the Sri Lankan government, along with international organizations, initiated rehabilitation programs for former LTTE cadres, the efforts were often criticized for being inadequate or not addressing the deep-rooted psychological issues faced by these former child soldiers.

JURIST: In your memoir, Spy Tiger, you describe your time as a child soldier as a battle for survival. How did you balance the instinct to survive with the conflicting emotions of loyalty — to your family, your fellow LTTE soldiers, or even to the cause you were forced into?

Ariaratnam: Balancing the instinct for survival with conflicting emotions of loyalty is likely one of the most challenging psychological struggles for me as a child soldier. I was forced into situations where survival became my primary concern. Still, this survival instinct is complicated by the emotional bonds I formed with my fellow soldiers, their family ties, and the ideology we were indoctrinated into.

The need to survive — facing life-or-death combat situations — dominated my mental landscape. I would need to learn quickly how to navigate the battlefield, avoid punishment, and stay alive under constant pressure. This survival mindset suppressed deeper emotions in the heat of combat, but those emotions, such as fear, loss, or guilt, often resurfaced later.

I was separated from my family at a young age, joining the LTTE out of fear for my family’s safety or after being promised protection. A sense of loyalty or duty to protect my family persisted in my belief system, adding to the psychological burden of fighting for a cause I didn’t fully understand or believe in.

The group dynamic within a group like the LTTE often fosters a strong sense of camaraderie. Child soldiers like me were thrust into a setting where my fellow combatants became my new family. Emotional attachment to these comrades can conflict with the natural desire to escape or avoid combat. The shared experiences of suffering and violence create a bond that complicates any thoughts of desertion or disloyalty to the group, even when I have doubts about the cause.

I was later indoctrinated into the ideology of the LTTE, which is Tamil nationalism, and the fight for an independent Tamil Eelam, believing deeply in the cause many Tamil youth like me were fighting for, even though I was forced into it. Over time, I felt a sense of purpose or loyalty to this cause, regardless of the trauma I endured. I often experienced intense emotional struggles as I processed what I did or was forced to do, how I survived, and how I reconciled loyalty to the Tiger cause that had been taken away from my childhood.

JURIST: What kind of rehabilitation programs do you believe should be in place to help former child soldiers reintegrate into society?

Ariaratnam: Rehabilitating former Tamil Tiger child soldiers, or any child soldiers, is a complex and delicate process. Many former child soldiers, including myself, suffer from PTSD, depression, anxiety, and other mental health issues. Programs must address psychological support and trauma healing, education and vocational training, economic reintegration and job opportunities, legal protections and human rights support, and cultural and identity restoration. By addressing not only the trauma but also the social, educational, and economic dimensions of reintegration, these programs can offer former child soldiers the chance to rebuild their lives and reintegrate into society.

JURIST: Spy Tiger delves into your complex role as an informant for various intelligence agencies. How did you reconcile working as a spy while still holding onto your Tamil identity, knowing your people could label you a “traitor?”

Ariaratnam: Working as a spy, especially for agencies that were aligned with the government or foreign powers, placed me in a moral and identity conflict. My Tamil identity, rooted in the struggle for self-determination and cultural pride, clashed with the role of informant, which was seen by the Tamil community as betraying the cause. The constant tension between self-preservation, duty to my people, and my role as an informant weighed heavily. I had to compartmentalize my identity — seeing my intelligence work as a means of survival or a path to a greater good, while still holding onto my Tamil heritage privately.

The role of an informant often involves ethically murky situations — gathering intelligence that might lead to arrests, killings, or the destruction of former allies. Balancing that with a sense of Tamil identity could mean redefining loyalty to the Tamil people. I believed that I was serving the broader interests of Tamils by preventing further violence, trying to undermine the group from within, and ensuring that innocent people were not targeted. My goal was to protect my people by operating in the shadows rather than remaining loyal to LTTE, which had lost its way or was causing unnecessary suffering.

Being labeled a “traitor” by my own people is deeply painful, especially in Tamil culture where loyalty and honor are highly valued. Reconciling with this would mean accepting that such accusations might never go away, and I would have to live with the social stigma and alienation. I, however, found solace in the belief that history would vindicate me — whether it was saving lives, ensuring my family’s safety, or bringing peace — which was my ultimate justification.

JURIST: The LTTE was determined to eliminate Tamils who held dissenting views. In July of this year, people commemorated the 25th death anniversary of Dr. Neelan Tiruchelvam, a Sri Lankan Tamil politician and academic, whom the LTTE killed in retaliation for his role in formulating a bold constitutional solution to end the civil war peacefully. Discuss the phenomenon of traitorization, which was such a potent tool used by the LTTE to keep the Tamil people obedient

Ariaratnam:  The LTTE’s use of “traitorization” was a powerful tool to suppress dissent within the Tamil community, labeling anyone who sought peaceful political solutions as traitors. This tactic ensured control by instilling fear and discouraging alternative narratives that could have led to non-violent resolutions. The assassination of Dr. Neelan Tiruchelvam is a clear example of how the LTTE viewed any attempts to resolve the ethnic conflict through peaceful, political means as existential threats. Tiruchelvam’s work on constitutional reform, particularly the devolution package that would have granted significant autonomy to Tamil-majority areas, was seen as a threat to the LTTE’s vision of complete independence. By killing him, the LTTE sent a message that no dissent from its militant path would be tolerated.

This phenomenon also reflects a deep irony within the Tamil struggle, particularly in relation to the Vaddukkodai Resolution. Passed in 1976, the resolution called for an independent Tamil Eelam and laid the ideological foundation for Tamil self-determination. Although it was intended to be a political framework for achieving Tamil rights through non-violent, democratic means, the LTTE twisted this vision to justify violent insurrection. Leaders like Amirthalingam, who had been instrumental in crafting the Vaddukkodai Resolution, advocated for Tamil rights through political engagement and negotiations. Despite this, the LTTE saw them as obstacles to their militarized agenda and assassinated these moderate leaders, undermining the democratic mandate that the Tamil United Liberation Front (TULF) had won.

The LTTE’s assassination of leaders like Amirthalingam and Yogeswaran highlights a profound contradiction. These figures were key architects of the very resolution that called for Tamil Eelam, the goal the LTTE claimed to champion. However, because they supported peaceful negotiations and constitutional reforms, the LTTE labeled them as traitors to the Tamil cause. This strategy of traitorization not only silenced alternative voices but also stifled any possibility of a peaceful resolution to the ethnic conflict. The LTTE’s violent approach alienated potential allies both within the Tamil community and internationally, closing off avenues for political dialogue and leading to a prolonged civil war.

The LTTE’s monopoly over the Tamil cause, achieved through violence and suppression of moderate voices, resulted in the destruction of the pluralism that had once existed within Tamil nationalism. By eliminating political leaders who sought a peaceful path, the LTTE not only prolonged the war but also contributed to its own downfall. Its refusal to compromise or accept anything less than full independence led to the brutal end of the Tamil Tigers in 2009 and the immense suffering of the Tamil people.

In the aftermath of the war, the loss of moderate Tamil leaders created a political vacuum, leaving the Tamil community divided and struggling to find unified representation. The LTTE’s militant path, which initially sought to advance the goals of the Vaddukkodai Resolution, ultimately destroyed the possibility of achieving those goals through peaceful means.

JURIST: Your memoir, Spy Tiger, touches on the moral complexity of being an informant for various governments. From an international law perspective, how do you reflect on the ethics of espionage, especially when it involves collaboration with opposing forces in a conflict? Do you think this raises specific concerns under international human rights law?

Ariaratnam: Informants, especially those working with opposing sides, often face the ethical dilemma of loyalty versus betrayal. I felt torn between serving my country, protecting personal interests, or safeguarding civilians. Many informants like me are recruited under duress or manipulation, raising ethical concerns about how intelligence agencies exploit vulnerable individuals, compromising autonomy and free will.

International human rights law guarantees fair trials, even for spies, but many countries use secretive or expedited trials for espionage, which can violate these rights. Informants may also endanger civilians by provoking increased military targeting, violating protections under international humanitarian law.

Collaborating with multiple sides creates moral conflicts about whose interests are served and whether actions prolong conflict or harm civilians. The ethical and legal complexities of espionage highlight significant moral ambiguities, especially under international humanitarian and human rights law.

JURIST: In your memoir, you discuss atrocities committed by both the Tamil Tigers and the Sri Lankan government during the civil war. Many in the Tamil diaspora are often reluctant to acknowledge the Tamil Tigers’ human rights abuses and war crimes. Can you talk about what were some of the atrocities committed by the Tamil Tigers and the challenges of addressing them within the Tamil community?

Ariaratnam: The LTTE engaged in numerous human rights abuses and war crimes during the Sri Lankan Civil War from 1983 to 2009. While the LTTE initially sought to establish an independent Tamil state in response to the marginalization of Tamils in Sri Lanka, their tactics often involved violence against civilians and other non-combatants, such as suicide bombings and targeting civilians, forced child recruitment, ethnic cleansing of Sinhalese and Muslims, assassinations and political violence, use of human shields.

The Tamil diaspora, which grew significantly due to displacement from the civil war, has complex and often ambivalent feelings toward the LTTE. While many in the diaspora recognize the need to advocate for Tamil rights and acknowledge the injustices suffered by the Tamil people, addressing LTTE war crimes remains a sensitive topic. There are several challenges to openly confronting these issues.

Addressing LTTE atrocities within the Tamil diaspora requires a nuanced and honest discussion that can hold both sides of the conflict accountable. Advocacy for Tamil rights and justice can coexist with a recognition of the violence carried out by the LTTE. Some efforts have been made in this direction, but they often face resistance due to the complex legacy of the war.

Ultimately, for reconciliation and healing to occur, it is essential for both the Tamil diaspora and the Sri Lankan government to acknowledge and address the war crimes committed by all parties involved without diminishing the legitimate grievances of the Tamil population or overlooking the atrocities committed by the state.

JURIST: The scars of war, both emotional and mental, run deep in your story. How have you managed to find peace or closure, if at all, and what advice would you give to others who have survived similar traumatic experiences?

Ariaratnam: Healing from the emotional and mental toll of war, especially after a conflict like the Sri Lankan civil war, is a deeply personal journey that requires time, effort, and resilience. In my experience, the first step is acknowledging the trauma and its impact. Survivors often try to bury their experiences out of guilt, shame, or a desire to move on, but recognizing the lasting effects on mental and emotional well-being is crucial. Writing Spy Tiger was therapeutic for me, helping me confront painful memories and manage my mental health.

Support from others is key to healing. Therapy — whether talk therapy, trauma-specific methods like EMDR or CBT, or group therapy — can offer relief, while a trusted network of family, friends, and community helps lighten the emotional burden. Finding new meaning and purpose beyond trauma, whether through advocacy, peace building, personal growth, or creative expression, is also essential. Sharing my story through Spy Tiger helped bring attention to broader issues of conflict, peace, and reconciliation.

Forgiveness, though difficult, is a pivotal step. It’s not about excusing others’ actions but about releasing the anger and guilt that weigh you down. Survivors often carry guilt for surviving or not doing more during the conflict, and forgiving oneself is essential for finding inner peace.

Healing is not linear and takes time. There will be setbacks, emotional triggers, and regression, but the wounds do heal slowly. Rebuilding trust and relationships, and creating new experiences can help ease the burden of trauma.

Closure doesn’t mean forgetting the past — it means learning to live with it without letting it dominate your future. Honoring those lost and sharing your story can help you come to terms with the past and make space for growth and happiness. Finding peace after war is a long journey that requires self-awareness, support, and patience, but it is possible.

JURIST: How do you think Spy Tiger contributes to the historical testimony of the Sri Lankan civil war, and why is it important for stories like yours to be told from a personal and insider perspective?

Ariaratnam: Spy Tiger offers a significant contribution to the historical record of the Sri Lankan civil war by providing a rare insider’s perspective on the LTTE and revealing the role of foreign intelligence agencies. This is crucial because much of the available history is shaped by government narratives, media, and external analysts, often lacking the experiences of those within the Tamil Tigers. Spy Tiger fills these gaps by sharing first-hand accounts that are often untold or suppressed due to political sensitivities, offering a more balanced view of the conflict.

The book challenges simplistic narratives that frame the war as a black-and-white struggle between good and evil, instead highlighting the complexities and internal struggles of those involved. It humanizes the Tamil Tigers, helping readers understand their motivations and internal dynamics, rather than viewing them solely through the lens of terrorism.

One of its unique contributions is the focus on foreign intelligence agencies’ involvement, adding a new layer of understanding to the conflict, which is often viewed only through Sri Lanka’s internal dynamics. This perspective helps historians and analysts grasp the broader geopolitical context.

Personal stories like those in Spy Tiger are invaluable because they bring authenticity, emotional depth, and a human face to the war’s impact — something statistics or policy documents can’t capture. These stories also build empathy, helping readers understand the psychological and emotional toll of the conflict on individuals.

In summary, Spy Tiger enriches the historical record by offering a personal, insider narrative that challenges official accounts, fills crucial gaps, humanizes the conflict, and sheds light on the often-hidden role of foreign powers, creating a more complete and nuanced understanding of the Sri Lankan civil war.