Lanka blames LTTE for bus blasts despite rebels' denial

Colombo, Jan 6 (UNI) The Sri Lanka Government today condemned the blasts that left around 21 bus passengers killed and over 100 wounded in the country's southern region and blamed the Tamil Tiger rebels of carrying out such 'brutal attacks' on innocent civilians.

''The government condemns the brutal LTTE attacks on two passenger buses in Mitiyagoda on the Colombo-Galle highway today and in Nittambuwa yesterday,'' the Defence Ministry said in a statement barely few hours after the second blast.

''The government believes that the LTTE is attempting to divert attention from the continuous defeats they have been suffering at the hands of the security forces in the recent past,'' the statement said.

It said the LTTE has resorted to engage in terror attacks in the South in a bid to disrupt normalcy at a time when the government forces were 'successfully carrying out counter terrorist measures to restore civil administration in the North and East'.

'The government reiterates that terror attacks will not deter its efforts to find a peaceful solution to the national problem or its counter terrorism measures. LTTE's terror attacks will only strengthen the government's resolve to defeat terrorism and restore normalcy in the North and East,'' the statement added.

Meanwhile, the LTTE's spokesman on military matters, R Ilanthirayan in a statement has described the government charges as 'baseless allegation made without any evidence to support it'.

''GoSL attempt at blaming the LTTE is aimed at discrediting the LTTE. This is a feeble attempt by the GoSL which stands accused of horrendous and repeated crimes against humanity carried out against the Tamil people in the Tamil homeland,'' LTTE Peace Secretariat has quoted its spokesman as saying.

At least 15 passengers were killed and over 40 wounded when a powerful bomb exploded inside the passenger bus they were travelling at Mitiyagoda at Hikkaduwa in the southern Ambalangoda district in Sri Lanka this afternoon.

''It is now beyond doubt that LTTE was involved in it and they are desperately targeting the innocent civilians,'' military spokesman Brig Prasad Samarasinghe told UNI over the phone.

Reports from the South say that two people had been questioned by the police after the bus blast today.

It was only last evening that six passengers were killed and 60 wounded when a bomb exploded inside a passenger bus travelling from Nittambuwa to Kiriulla on the Colombo-Kandy highway in the Gampaha district.

Security measures have been further stepped up in and around Colombo following the bus blasts.

UNI