A soldier stands guard outside an oil refinery where Iran's President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and Sri Lankan President Mahinda Rajapaksa are present to mark the modernization of the refinery, in Sapugaskanda, near Colombo, Sri Lanka, Tuesday, April 29, 2008. Ahmadinejad held a prayer ceremony with Sri Lanka's Muslim community Tuesday and toured the oil refinery his country is helping to expand as he concluded a brief overnight visit here.
(AP Photo/Gemunu Amarasinghe)
17 Tamil rebels, 3 soldiers die in latest Sri Lanka fighting
A soldier stands guard outside an oil refinery where Iran's President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and Sri Lankan President Mahinda Rajapaksa are present to mark the modernization of the refinery, in Sapugaskanda, near Colombo, Sri Lanka, Tuesday, April 29, 2008. Ahmadinejad held a prayer ceremony with Sri Lanka's Muslim community Tuesday and toured the oil refinery his country is helping to expand as he concluded a brief overnight visit here.
(AP Photo/Gemunu Amarasinghe)
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By
Bharatha Mallawarachi
Associated Press Writer
/
May 3, 2008
COLOMBO, Sri Lanka—Scattered gunbattles and a roadside bomb blast in Sri Lanka's embattled north killed 17 Tamil separatists and three soldiers in two days of violence, the military said Saturday.
Troops attacked Tamil Tiger rebels across the front lines in northern Mannar district Saturday morning, triggering a battle that killed six guerrillas, a defense ministry official said on condition of anonymity because of government regulations.
The army suffered no casualties, he said.
Sporadic fighting in the same district Friday left 10 rebels and two soldiers dead. Fifteen insurgents and four troops were also wounded, the official said.
Tamil guerrillas later triggered a roadside bomb targeting an army truck in northeastern Welioya region Friday night, killing one soldier. Separately, a gunbattle along the front lines in Welioya killed one Tamil rebel and wounded 13 others, four of them soldiers, he said.
Rebel spokesman Rasiah Ilanthirayan was not immediately available for comment Saturday.
It was not possible to independently verify the military's claims because the media are banned from the northern jungles where much of the fighting takes place. Both sides commonly exaggerate their enemy's casualties while underplaying their own.
The Tamil Tigers have been fighting since 1983 for an independent homeland for minority ethnic Tamils, who have been marginalized for decades by governments dominated by the Sinhalese majority. More than 70,000 people have been killed in the fighting.
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