A massacre is carried out by an Indian Peace Keeping Force in Sri Lanka killing 64 ethnic Tamil civilians.

The 1989 Valvettiturai massacre occurred on 2 and 3 August 1989 in the small coastal town of Valvettiturai, on the Jaffna Peninsula in Sri Lanka. Sixty-four Sri Lankan Tamil civilians were killed by soldiers of the Indian Peace Keeping Force. The massacre followed an attack on the soldiers by rebel Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam cadres. The rebel attack had left six Indian soldiers, including an officer, dead, and another 10 injured. Indian authorities claimed that the civilians were caught in crossfire. Journalists such as Rita Sebastian of the Indian Express, David Husego of the Financial Times and local human rights groups such as the University Teachers for Human Rights have reported quoting eyewitness accounts that it was a massacre of civilians. George Fernandes, who later served as defense minister of India (1998–2004), called the massacre India’s My Lai.

Indian Peace Keeping Force (IPKF) was the Indian military contingent performing a peacekeeping operation in Sri Lanka between 1987 and 1990. It was formed under the mandate of the 1987 Indo-Sri Lankan Accord that aimed to end the Sri Lankan Civil War between Sri Lankan Tamil militant groups such as the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) and the Sri Lankan military.

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 peninsula by the Gulf of Mannar and the Palk Strait. It shares a maritime border with the Maldives in the southwest, India in the northwest, Andaman and The Nicobar Islands in the northwest, and Myanmar through the Bay of Bengal. Sri Jayawardenepura Kotte is the legislative capital of Sri Lanka, while the largest city, Colombo, is the administrative and judicial capital which is the nation's political, financial and cultural centre. Kandy is the second-largest urban area and also the capital of the last native kingdom of Sri Lanka. The most spoken language Sinhala, is spoken by the majority of the population. Tamil is also spoken by approximately five million people, making it the second most-spoken language in Sri Lanka.