COLOMBO: Eleven Sri Lankan sailors and a bus driver were killed and 14 injured on Tuesday in a suspected Claymore mine attack by the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) on a naval convoy in Sri Lanka's eastern Trincomalee district.

The injured included 10 sailors and four civilians. The injured civilians, including two Britons, were travelling in a vehicle that crashed into the convoy after the blast, police said.

The Sri Lankan military said the sailors were returning from Trincomalee on leave for the Sinhala and Tamil New Year season.

"Neither of the British nationals has suffered life-threatening injuries," a British High Commission official told The Hindu.

Tuesday was the second consecutive day of violence in the northeast. On Monday five soldiers and two Sri Lankan NGO workers were killed in a Claymore explosion in the northern Jaffna peninsula.

The second round of talks between the LTTE and the Government is scheduled in Geneva later this month.

The attacks come amid the rebel demand for a sea passage along Sri Lanka's eastern waters and a Canadian ban on the LTTE. While the ceasefire agreement demarcates land territory between the Government and rebel-held, there is no such distinction for the sea, with the Sri Lanka Navy having control over the entire sea.

The LTTE recently has indirectly linked the sea passage demand to its participation in the April 19-21 Geneva talks. It said consultation with its eastern leaders was critical to develop its position at the talks. It has rejected the Government's offer of sea passage for its eastern leaders on a Sri Lanka naval vessel, accompanied by monitors from the Sri Lanka Monitoring Mission. It wanted the Sea Tiger boats used. The Sri Lanka Monitoring Mission (SLMM) condemned the attacks in Jaffna and Trincomalee as those that are "seriously jeopardising" the scheduled Geneva talks and having a "detrimental effect" on the ceasefire agreement (CFA).

In its reaction to the twin attacks on Monday and Tuesday, the SLMM commended the Sri Lankan Government for "not taking any retaliatory actions and thereby adhering to the CFA." The SLMM urged "both parties to do everything in their power to maintain the ceasefire and not to engage in violence or provocative acts that can lead to any further escalations."

Sri Lanka's peace facilitator, Norway, strongly condemned the "latest acts of violence" and urged the two parties to meet in Geneva as scheduled. Reflecting the sense of uncertainty over the holding of the second round of talks, the Norwegian Minister for International Development, Erik Solheim, said the Geneva meeting "will provide an opportunity for finding ways to implement the CFA and the promises the parties gave in their previous meeting."

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