Rebels attack Navy base as Lanka fighting rages

Colombo, Aug 12: Tamil Tiger rebels attacked a Navy base in Sri Lanka's east and fought artillery duels with troops in the north before dawn today, the military said, as the worst fighting since a 2002 truce deepened.

The Tigers rained artillery on the strategic eastern port of Trincomalee, a vital maritime supply line to the army-held northern Jaffna peninsula -- which is cut off from the rest of the island by rebel territory and where a new battlefront opened up yesterday.

The Tigers said troops were trying to breach a ''border'' that divides government territory from their own in the north, and said hundreds of civilians were fleeing army shelling as fighting that has raged in the east for 17 days spread.

''Trincomalee harbour is under artillery attack,'' said Navy spokesman Commander D K P Dassanayake. There were no immediate details.

Truce monitors confirmed artillery exchanges at three points along the Jaffna border, including the main entry point at Muhamalai. Goods travelling by land must pass through there to reach the Jaffna peninsula, where 40,000 troops are stationed.

''It is definitely very dangerous, opening up on several fronts,'' said Robban Nilsson of the unarmed Nordic truce monitoring mission.

''Guerrilla tactics have always been able to fight the enemy on several fronts, so it is definitely a very worrying development.'' A Reuters witness in Jaffna heard fierce shelling in the distance and said the military announced an indefinite curfew over an emergency radio channel yesterday. Shops must now stay closed and people must stay off the streets.

The Tigers used their own radio station, the Voice of Tigers, to warn civilians to immediately leave the army-held town of Chavakachcheri which lies 10 miles (16 km) east of Jaffna and suffered years of shelling in the past.

''They are firing artillery and trying to breach our borders,'' Tiger military spokesman Rasiah Ilanthiraiyan said by telephone from the northern rebel stronghold of Kilinochchi.

''They are trying to thrust towards Kilinochchi, so our soldiers are retaliating.'' The military accused the Tigers of provoking the northern confrontation and said there was no ground offensive.

The government says it will not halt operations until it controls a disputed sluice and an irrigation reservoir that feeds it. The Tigers insist the land is theirs and say continued army attacks are an effective declaration of war.

North of the town of Batticaloa towards the sluice gate, the Red Cross say at least 15,000 Tamils are displaced behind rebel lines having spent days under shellfire. That it is on top of over 30,000 newly displaced in government territory.

The Tigers have long demanded a separate homeland for ethnic Tamils in the north and east of Sri Lanka but President Mahinda Rajapakse has ruled this out. The rebels say any return to stalled peace talks is a distant prospect.

Reuters

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