Sri Lankan forces defused a package bomb hidden in the garden of a heavily guarded Colombo apartment building filled with legislators' homes yesterday, preventing another attack just days after two bombings killed 20 people, the military said.
The 1.2kg explosive device -- discovered by a resident -- was presumed to be an assassination attempt by Tamil Tiger rebels on the air force chief, Air Marshall Roshan Goonetilleke, whose house is located in the area, military spokesman Brigadier Udaya Nanayakkara said.
"There are so many senior officers living there -- including parliamentarians, military officers -- it is not possible to say who [the target] is," he said. "But we suspect they targeted the air force commander."
PHOTO: AFP
ONE IN A SERIES
The bomb attempt appeared part of a new wave of attacks by the rebels in the capital.
On Wednesday last week, a bomber killed one person in a government office in a failed attempt to kill a Cabinet minister. Hours later, a package bomb exploded at a suburban department store, killing 19. Authorities blamed the separatist Tamil Tigers for the attacks.
European monitors said they feared civilian casualties were approaching the levels seen before a truce between the government and the rebels was signed five years ago. The 2002 ceasefire has largely fallen apart amid fighting between the two sides over the past two years.
The war killed 49 civilians and wounded 60 more from Nov. 25 to 28, the Sri Lankan Monitoring Mission said in a statement, referring to the bombing and government attacks in northern areas controlled by rebels.
More than 70,000 people have been killed in 24 years of conflict. The rebels call for a separate homeland for ethnic minority Tamils in Sri Lanka's north and east, following historic discrimination under governments dominated by the majority Sinhalese.
NEW FIGHTING
In new fighting early yesterday, troops killed two rebel fighters in the Vavuniya district just south of rebel-held territory in northern Sri Lanka, the military said. Troops also discovered more than 400 anti-personnel mines in three separate caches in the area.
Earlier attacks across the north -- where the separatist rebels control a de facto state -- killed a total of 56 rebels and six soldiers over the weekend, the military said.
Independent confirmation of the casualties was not available because access to the conflict zone is restricted, and rebel spokesman Rasiah Ilanthirayan could not be reached for comment.
Both the military and the rebels routinely exaggerate the other's casualty numbers and plays down its own.
The fighting came as the government tightened security in Colombo following the bombings. Troops and police searched most vehicles entering the capital.
Police have been accused of detaining hundreds of Tamils in the crackdown.
"Around 1,000 Tamil people have been arrested without credible evidence within two days," said Mano Ganeshan, a lawmaker.
The Philippines yesterday said its coast guard would acquire 40 fast patrol craft from France, with plans to deploy some of them in disputed areas of the South China Sea. The deal is the “largest so far single purchase” in Manila’s ongoing effort to modernize its coast guard, with deliveries set to start in four years, Philippine Coast Guard Commandant Admiral Ronnie Gil Gavan told a news conference. He declined to provide specifications for the vessels, which Manila said would cost 25.8 billion pesos (US$440 million), to be funded by development aid from the French government. He said some of the vessels would
Hundreds of thousands of Guyana citizens living at home and abroad would receive a payout of about US$478 each after the country announced it was distributing its “mind-boggling” oil wealth. The grant of 100,000 Guyanese dollars would be available to any citizen of the South American country aged 18 and older with a valid passport or identification card. Guyanese citizens who normally live abroad would be eligible, but must be in Guyana to collect the payment. The payout was originally planned as a 200,000 Guyanese dollar grant for each household in the country, but was reframed after concerns that some citizens, including
A plane bringing Israeli soccer supporters home from Amsterdam landed at Israel’s Ben Gurion airport on Friday after a night of violence that Israeli and Dutch officials condemned as “anti-Semitic.” Dutch police said 62 arrests were made in connection with the violence, which erupted after a UEFA Europa League soccer tie between Amsterdam club Ajax and Maccabi Tel Aviv. Israeli flag carrier El Al said it was sending six planes to the Netherlands to bring the fans home, after the first flight carrying evacuees landed on Friday afternoon, the Israeli Airports Authority said. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu also ordered
Former US House of Representatives speaker Nancy Pelosi said if US President Joe Biden had ended his re-election bid sooner, the Democratic Party could have held a competitive nominating process to choose his replacement. “Had the president gotten out sooner, there may have been other candidates in the race,” Pelosi said in an interview on Thursday published by the New York Times the next day. “The anticipation was that, if the president were to step aside, that there would be an open primary,” she said. Pelosi said she thought the Democratic candidate, US Vice President Kamala Harris, “would have done
RSS