Sri Lankan security forces killed at least 65 Tamil Tigers in a week of intense fighting that further reduced the territory under rebel control, the military said yesterday.The Tigers have been driven back into just 73 square kilometres (28 square miles) of jungle, military spokesman Udaya Nanayakkara said, having controlled large swathes of the north and the east of the island less than two years ago.
Officials say the rebels are increasingly desperate and may launch more attacks such as the airstrike on the capital Colombo on Friday, when two light aircraft were used in suicide missions that killed two people.
The LTTE's air power has almost collapsed after two rebel aircraft, which entered the Colombo sky to carry out a suicide mission, were destroyed by the security forces, officials said on Sunday.
"I do not think the LTTE has any more aircraft left. The two planes took off from a restricted air strip in Pudukudirippu and came to Colombo through Mankulam and Mannar," the officials said. They also added that they were detected on time failing which the damage to Colombo could have been quite high.
When contacted Military Spokesman Udaya Nanayakkara said the defence authorities had estimated the LTTE to have three aircraft of which one was destroyed a few months ago and the other two on Friday.
The defence authorities had claimed that the Sri Lanka Air Force (SLAF) destroyed the first aircraft on September 9 when the LTTE carried out an air and ground attack on the air force base in Vavuniya.
In the Friday's attack, two light aircraft of the beleaguered LTTE had bombed Colombo, hitting the main Revenue Department building near Air Force Headquarters and killing at least two persons and injuring 55 others before being shot down.
Nanayakkara said that each plane carried 215 kilograms of C4 explosives.
Meanwhile, the number of people killed in a Tamil Tiger attack against a village in eastern Sri Lanka has risen to 21, the defence ministry said on Sunday.
Gunmen from the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) stormed the predominantly Sinhalese village of Kirimetiya late Saturday and opened fire on residents, the ministry said.
It had initially said 10 people were killed and five wounded, but the authorities found more bodies and raised the toll to 21 killed and 20 wounded.
The bodies of 14 people were brought to the main hospital in the district capital of Ampara on Sunday, a hospital official told AFP.
The UN's top humanitarian relief official, John Holmes, appealed to the government and the rebels to spare non-combatants as the warring factions appeared set for a final showdown.
Holmes said civilians were dying every day inside the war zone, where government troops are fighting to crush the Tigers' decades-long armed campaign for an independent Tamil homeland.
"I urge both sides to do everything they can for a peaceful and orderly end to avoid a final bloody battle," he said on Saturday at the end of his three-day visit to Sri Lanka.
The Tamil Tigers dominated about 18,000 square kilometres (7,000 square miles) of territory until the middle of 2007, when the government launched its military offensive.
The defence ministry on Sunday said the number of people killed in a guerrilla attack on a Sinhalese village in the east of the island on Saturday had risen to 15.
It was the worst attack against a village in the multi-ethnic region in recent years, officials said, adding that troop reinforcements had been rushed to the area.