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| Sri Lanka |
| Bombing attempt thwarted, plane crash kills 2 in Sri Lanka |
| 2007-03-02 |
| A military guard nabbed a separatist rebel trying to plant a bomb beside a military camp in northern Sri Lanka, a senior military official said Thursday, as the Sri Lankan air force bombed a purported rebel training camp further north. Brig Prasad Samarasinghe, the militaryÂ’s spokesman, said the air raid was aimed at destroying a training camp run by the rebels in Mankulam. Damage or casualty estimates were not immediately available. Separately, at a military camp near Vavuniya, the man was overpowered and handed over to the police late Wednesday, said Lt Col Upali Rajapakse, a senior officer at the Defence MinistryÂ’s Information Centre. Rajapakse said the man was a member of the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam. The man was carrying a remote control device, a stand to set up a Claymore roadside bomb, a detonator, a roll of wires and a hand grenade. The Claymore fragmentation mine fires steel balls and nails across a wide area, and is normally set up on a stand or other surface for greater effect. There was no immediate comment from the rebels on the incident. Plane crash: A Sri Lankan air force trainee pilot and his instructor were killed Thursday when their plane crashed, an official said Thursday. The Chinese-built training aircraft crashed at Anuradhapura, 200 kilometres north of the capital during a routine exercise, an airforce official said, adding that investigations were underway. The instructor was Chinese, the airforce said. |
| Posted by:Fred |