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| Sri Lanka |
| Tigers protest to UN over bombing |
| 2008-01-31 |
| Sri Lankan air force fighter jets pounded northern rebel positions on Wednesday as ground troops attacked 35 rebel bunkers, killing at least 10 Tamil Tigers, the military said. The clashes in the Jaffna peninsula came as the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) blamed the army for a roadside bomb that killed 17 people, most of them children, on a school bus on Tuesday. The army denied the report. Sea, land and air battles between government soldiers and the rebels have escalated since a six-year truce was scrapped on Jan 16. “The troops attacked about 35 of the LTTE terrorist bunkers in Killali and Nagerkovil in Jaffna today in the early hours, destroying about 20,” said military spokesman Brigadier Udaya Nanayakkara. 10 rebels killed: “Monitoring confirmed 10 terrorists were killed,” he said, adding seven soldiers were wounded. The Tigers said they beat back a military attempt to attack their forward defence line in Jaffna. “Fighting units of the Sri Lankan Armed Forces (SLAF) backed by heavy artillery and mortar fire advanced towards LTTE position,” said Tamil Tiger spokesman Rasiah Ilanthiraiyan in an e-mailed statement. “In the end of the clashes that lasted about an hour, the SLAF fighting units that participated in the attempt fell back to their own fortified localities with casualties.” The fighting came a day after the Tigers blamed the military for a blast in the northwestern district of Mannar that killed 17 people, including 11 children and two teachers. In a statement on their official website, the rebels said 17 others were wounded in the blast. Military spokesman Nanayakkara denied the allegations, saying they were “fabricated stories”. There were no independent accounts of the clashes. UN protest: The Tigers also lodged a formal protest with the United Nations against the alleged bombing of the school bus by Sri Lankan security forces. Among those dead on the bus were 11 children between the ages of eight and 16, the head of the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) political wing, B Nadesan said in a letter to UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon. The Tigers also accused the Sri Lankan air force of dropping bombs on villages in the rebel-held areas in the north, killing and wounding scores of civilians. “Since the present president of Sri Lanka took office in November 2005, 2,056 Tamil civilians, including 132 Tamil children, have been massacred by Sri Lankan state forces,” Nadesan said. “The deliberate targeting of Tamil civilians by the Sri Lankan state has continued even through the nearly six-year period of the ceasefire agreement signed in February 2002,” he said. “We urge you to consider recognising Tamil sovereignty as a constructive approach to end the unending decades-long, large-scale, and serious rights violations against the Tamil people,” Nadesan said. |
| Posted by:Fred |
| #3 That's a bitch getting hit by craven, chickenshit, roadside bombs isn't it boys? |
| Posted by: Chuck the Wide9663 2008-01-31 14:59 |
| #2 Heh, heh. The terrorists must really be getting desperate if they're appealing to the UN for help. |
| Posted by: gromky 2008-01-31 03:11 |
| #1 The Tigers also lodged a formal protest with the United Nations against the alleged bombing of the school bus by Sri Lankan security forces. Don't like buses getting bombed, eh? Anyway, what mechanism allows a terrorist entity to squat on Sri Lankan soil and lodge protests with the UN against the rightful government? Do I have my facts wrong? |
| Posted by: gorb 2008-01-31 01:49 |