Sri Lanka bombs rebel naval base in new strike

Colombo, Jan 4: Sri Lankan jets bombed a Tamil Tiger naval base in the north of the island today in a third consecutive day of air strikes despite United Nations calls for an end to the fighting.

The military said the Tiger base in the rebel-controlled Mullaittivu area had been destroyed in the bombardment, which followed a similar raid in the east yesterday.

It has vowed to dislodge the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam from their eastern stronghold, accusing the rebels of firing on them despite a 2002 ceasefire that international monitors say now exists only on paper.

The aerial bombings have become the latest flashpoint in the fighting between military and Tiger rebels who want to carve a separate homeland for minority Tamils in the north and east.

On Tuesday, the UN urged both sides to stop fighting and to protect civilians after it said an air strike by government forces earlier in the day in northwestern Sri Lanka had killed 14 people.

Six of the dead were children, the rebels said.

But the military denied hitting civilian settlements in that raid in Mannar district, and accused the Tigers of spreading false information to win international sympathy.

More than 3,000 people were killed in ambushes, suicide bombings and clashes last year alone, a level of violence that stoked fears of full-scale renewal of a civil war that claimed more than 65,000 lives over two decades.

Today, the Tamil Tigers detonated a mine in the northern town of Vavuniya, killing a soldier and wounding two, a military spokesman said.

Brigadier Prasad Samarasinghe said troops were clearing a stretch of road in Vavuniya on foot when the blast occurred.

Fragmentation mine explosions have increased in recent weeks, as fighting intensifies in the east and north of the island.

Reuters

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