Sri Lankan troops killed 115 Tamil Tiger rebels in weekend fighting in the far north of the island, the military said on Monday, as government forces continued their push into the rebels’ northern stronghold.
Government jets also bombed rebel positions in rebel-held areas in the north, military officials said.
”Troops had killed 60 LTTE terrorists and 28 were wounded from Sunday’s confrontations,” said military spokesperson Brigadier Udaya Nanayakkara, adding that three soldiers were also killed and 12 wounded in the fighting.
The Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) were not immediately available for comment on rebel casualties from the fighting but said air raids had killed two civilians, including a school teacher.
”The death, injuries and loss due to this attack, typical when Sri Lanka Air Force bombs a heavily populated area in Vanni, have been repeated more than one hundred times over the Vanni area over a period of two years,” said Selvy Navaruban, rebel spokesperson on humanitarian issues and human rights, in a statement emailed to Reuters.
The fighting came days after the military claimed they had entered the vast Vanni region in the north where the rebels’ de-facto capital, Kilinochchi, is located, amid an almost-daily barrage of land, sea and air attacks.
The military also said 55 Tamil Tiger rebels were killed and 47 wounded from the fighting on Friday and Saturday also in the north. Four solders had also been killed.
The Tigers are fighting for an independent state in north and east Sri Lanka for ethnic Tamils, a minority in the predominantly Sinhalese country.
Sri Lanka’s government is pursuing a strategy to gradually retake the Tiger’s northern stronghold and win the 25-year civil war that has killed more than 70 000 people.
Analysts say the military has the advantage in the latest phase of the war, given its superior air power, strength of numbers and swathes of terrain captured in the island’s east. But they still see no clear winner on the horizon. – Reuters