Air Force official killed, 3 hurt in LTTE attack

Colombo, Aug 8: A Sri Lankan Air Force official was killed and three others, including a civilian wounded, when a group of Tamil Tiger rebels attacked them in the restive eastern Trincomalee district this morning, military sources here said.

The Air Force personnel were on a routine route clearing patrol when they came under the LTTE attack at Morawewa in the Trincomalee district, an official of the military spokesman office told UNI over the phone.

Residents of Trincomalee town said large volley of long-range shells were heard being fired from the naval base this morning.

The latest incident in the series has come at a time when visiting Norwegian special peace envoy Jon Hanssen Bauer is busy resolving the bitter battle between the government forces and Tamil Tiger rebels over the control of water in the north-eastern district of Trincomalee since July 26.

Meanwhile, fifteen local employees of a French charity have been found shot dead in the war-hit Muslim-dominated town of Muttur in the Trincomalee, aid workers said.

According to an official from the French-based group 'Action Against Hunger' (AAH) the decomposed bodies of the Tamil aid workers found inside the agency's office premises, had been brought to the Trincomalee base hospital yesterday.

The Consortium of Humanitarian Agencies said it was unclear who had committed the killings, while the government said that it would order an ''independent probe'' into the killings of the 11 men and four women who worked for AAH.

Former US President Bill Clinton, the UN Secretary-General's Special Envoy for Tsunami Recovery in a statement vehemently condemned the killing of Aid Workers in Sri Lanka.

''I was shocked and saddened to learn of the killings in Sri Lanka of 15 local staff members of the humanitarian organisation, who I understand, were providing assistance to tsunami survivors in the eastern part of the country. I hope that this wanton act will not deter the critical efforts of aid workers in Sri Lanka, who have operated with courage and determination under difficult circumstances'', Mr Clinton said in the statement.

UNI

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