Sri Lanka air force bombs kill 2 civilians: Tigers

By Staff
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Google Oneindia News

Colombo, Feb 20: Sri Lanka's Tamil Tigers said today that airforce jets bombed a village under their control in the island's north,killing at least two civilians, but the military said it was targetinga training camp and mortar post.

The air raids in the northern district of Vavuniya came amid abrief lull in Sri Lanka's two-decade civil war, though many analystsand civilians fear the conflict will flare again soon.

''Four or more (Israeli-made) Kfir bombers bombed a civiliansettlement close to Omanthai in Vavuniya. Rescuers have recovered twodead persons and one injured,'' Tiger military spokesman RasiahIlanthiraiyan said by telephone from the rebels' northern stronghold.

''It's feared there may be more casualties,'' he added. ''Oursuspicion is that they are punishing the Tamil people. It's not new.''Omanthai is near defence lines that separate Tiger-controlled territoryin the north from the rest of the island, which is under governmentcontrol.

Military spokesman Brigadier Prasad Samarasinghe said jets had bombed locations west and northeast of Vavuniya.

''Air Force jets took two targets. One was a mortar position. Theother was a training camp,'' he said, adding that two dozen civilianshad fled from Vavuniya to government territory today saying the Tigerswanted to recruit their children as fighters.

Emboldened by the capture of a key eastern Tiger stronghold, thegovernment has vowed to wipe out the rebels, reigniting a civil warthat has killed 4,000 people in the past year.

The Tigers resumed their fight for an independent state afterPresident Mahinda Rajapakse flatly rejected their demands for aseparate homeland for minority Tamils in the north and east.

Suspected Tigers have mounted a series of ambushes and bombattacks against the security forces in recent months, including aroadside bomb attack on Saturday that killed four people in thebesieged, army-held Jaffna peninsula in the far north.

Clashes have eased in the last few days but the Sri Lankangovernment and Tamil Tiger rebels have ignored repeated pleas from theinternational community to halt a new chapter of a war that has killedmore than 67,000 people since 1983, and analysts fear it will escalate.


Reuters

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