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Key LTTE base bombed: Colombo

COLOMBO: Sri Lanka’s Air Force has claimed to have successfully bombed a “key logistic complex and engineering yard” of the LTTE in Mullaithivu district. However, the Tigers disputed the military version and asserted that a 15-year girl student was killed in the bombing.

Separately, the military claimed that 22 more LTTE cadres and three soldiers were killed in fighting in the north.

An air force statement said the targeted base was a hub for heavy engineering and construction work by LTTE.

On its website, the LTTE alleged that the air force’s F-7 bombers killed one child in Mullaithivu district.

“Around 6.30 a.m. on Thursday morning, four of Sri Lanka’s F-7 bombers bombed a civilian settlement in Punnainiraviyaddi in Visuvamadhu in Mullaithivu district. One child was instantly killed and several civilian huts houses destroyed.”

In a letter to President Mahinda Rajapaksa, Tamil United Liberation Front leader V. Anandasangree has expressed concern over the recent “midnight strike” on Oddusuddan by the air force.

The letter appealed to the President to instruct all parties concerned to avoid night operations and also ask them to give sufficient warning of their day-time operations.

In a report on its website, the Defence Ministry alleged that the opposition United National Party had included “two hardcore LTTE sympathisers” in its list of candidates for the coming Provincial Council election in the Eastern Province.

Quoting “reliable sources,” the Ministry said the two candidates had earlier contested the last local government poll in March 2006.

They did so on the symbol of the LTTE proxy Ilangai Tamil Arasu Kachchi (ITAK) or Tamil National Alliance (TNA).

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