Sri Lanka police, soldiers arrested over abductions

COLOMBO, Mar 6 (Reuters) Sri Lanka's police said today it has arrested policemen and soldiers as well as underworld figures in connection with a rash of killings and abductions in the latest chapter of the two-decade civil war.

The admission comes as the government faces mounting pressure from human rights groups and foreign governments to halt rights abuses blamed on elements of the military as well as Tamil Tiger rebels and renegades -- and after the discovery of five corpses in the island's north.

''The magnitude of the problem is yet to be assessed. But the fact remains there are a few groups like this operating,'' Asoka Wijetilleke, Deputy Inspector General of the police's foreign intelligence department, told a news conference.

''Some of them, which include ex-soldiers, serving soldiers, police officers and underworld gangs and other organised elements have been arrested,'' he added. ''That does not mean we have fully and completely investigated the whole thing.'' Sri Lanka's Human Rights Commission says nearly 100 abductions and disappearances have been reported to them so far this year in the capital Colombo, eastern district of Batticaloa and the besieged northern Jaffna peninsula.

That in turn comes on top of 1,000 cases reported during 2006 as the island's civil war, which has killed around 68,000 people since 1983, resumed.

REUTERS MS RAI1834