Suspected Tamil Tiger rebels set off a powerful bomb aboard a packed bus outside the Sri Lankan capital yesterday, killing at least five people and wounding 50 others, the defence ministry said. The blast ripped through the passenger bus carrying up to 80 people near the town of Nittambuwa as it travelled on the Colombo-Kandy highway during the evening rush hour. “The bus was full of passengers at the time of the blast,” military spokesman Brig-adier Prasad Samarsinghe said. “It was a time bomb weighing about 2kg and fixed onto a seat. This is the work of the LTTE,” he added, referring to the rebel Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam. Keheliya Rambukwella, the government’s defence affairs spokesman and the Minister of Policy Planning, added: “The historical evidence points the finger towards the Tigers for the blast. “These are signs of desperation in view of the defeats they have faced recently in the battlefield”.
The bus immediately burst into flames following the explosion, witnesses said, forcing the temporary closure of the A1 highway, the main road linking Colombo and the central provincial town of Kandy. “We have sent three ambulances to the explosion site,” a spokesman at a local hospital said.
There was no immediate claim of responsibility or denial from the Tigers, who are fighting for a separate homeland for minority Tamils in the northern and eastern regions of the Sinhalese-majority country.