For the first time, President Gotabaya Rajapaksa during a meeting with United Nations (UN) Resident Coordinator Hanaa Singer at the Presidential Secretariat in Colombo on January 17 admitted that thousands of people missing since the end of the brutal civil war between the Government and the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) rebels over a decade ago are "dead", reports Times of India. He told that after the necessary investigations are completed steps would be taken to issue death certificates to these missing persons. According to the Government figures, over 20,000 people are missing due to various conflicts including the three-decade separatist war with LTTE in the north and east which claimed at least 100,000 lives.