Sri Lanka army, Tigers trade charges before talks

Colombo, June 8 : Sri Lanka's government and Tamil Tiger rebels accused each other of attacks today, as the two sides prepared to meet for talks in Norway.

More than 400 people have been killed since early April and the island's north and east is now locked in a low-intensity conflict.

But the meeting in Oslo will only centre on the role of the Nordic mission monitoring what is left of a 2002 ceasefire.

The army said one army officer was killed and a soldier wounded in today's suspected rebel mine attack in the north-western Mannar district.

The Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) accused the military of shelling rebel positions near the town of Mutur, just south of the northeastern port of Trincomalee. They said there were no casualties.

''The army has shelled the LTTE forward defence line three times,'' Tiger political leader S Elilan told Reuters. ''We did not receive any injuries, nor damages. Our front defence line is perfect.'' The army said they had reports of an incident in rebel territory, possibly an attack by renegade ex-Tigers, the Karuna group, but denied any involvement.

The Karuna group have been attacking the mainstream rebels across the island's east. The government deny LTTE claims that the renegades are now backed by the army, but ceasefire monitors say the military has at least turned a blind eye.

Army spokesman Brigadier Prasad Samarasinghe said an army camp at Kiran near the eastern town of Batticaloa had also come under mortar fire today but no one was hurt.

That was close to where the Tigers said a civilian tractor was blasted by an army-laid mine yesterday, killing 10. The army has denied any involvement in that attack.

If violence continues, many fear that in time it could spiral back to a full scale civil war that killed more than 64,000 people and devastated the island's minority Tamil dominated north and east, where the Tigers want a separate homeland.

But discussions at the Oslo meeting, which continues until tomorrow, will not move beyond the operations of the 60-person Nordic-staffed unarmed Sri Lanka Monitoring Mission (SLMM).

SLMM has angered both sides by accusing them of repeated ceasefire breaches. They have blamed members of the armed forces for extra-judicial killings and ruled that the Tigers have no right to send their Sea Tiger warships to sea.

Angry after the European Union last month listed them as terrorists alongside Al Qaeda, the Tigers have hinted that they want monitors from EU states withdrawn from the SLMM.

Diplomats say bringing the two parties together for the first time since February -- even if only to discuss SLMM -- offers some hopes of a breakthrough on other issues, such as Tiger demands the government rein in Karuna. But most are cautious.

''If there is no progress, then I think there will be a slow escalation,'' said a western diplomat. ''If these talks fail I think there could be an attack on an economic target in Colombo.''

Reuters