The Sri Lankan military claimed it destroyed a Tamil Tiger suicide boat yesterday, hours after the government ruled out a ceasefire in the northern war zone where hundreds of thousands of civilians are reportedly trapped.
The explosives-laden boat was intercepted by a naval ship and destroyed with heavy gunfire in the early hours yesterday, said a statement on the Ministry of Defense Web site.
It said the boat was apparently launched from Mullaittivu and was headed for a naval blockade along the northeastern coast.
It gave no other details, and the Tamil Tiger rebels did not immediately respond to the claim.
The naval blockade is aimed at preventing the Tamil Tigers, cornered into a small 300km² coastal territory north of Mullaittivu town, from escaping by the sea.
Their land escape routes are also sealed off by the Sri Lankan military, which has achieved a string of victories in recent months, ousting the Tigers from towns and villages.
The military believes it is now close to destroying the Tigers, who have been fighting since 1983 for a separate homeland for the minority Tamils in the north and the east.
But the fighting has also left many civilians trapped in the area controlled by the Tigers — some 250,000 the Red Cross said.
But Human Rights and Disaster Management Minister Mahinda Samarasinghe disputed the figure, saying less than 120,000 civilians were in the war zone.
Sri Lankan President Mahinda Rajapaksa had urged the rebels to let the civilians leave the conflict zone by yesterday and guaranteed safe passage to all noncombatants. But the government insisted there would be no let up in its war.
He denied reports that more than 300 civilians were killed in recent fighting and accused the rebels of forcibly recruiting civilians, giving them two or three days of training and putting them on the front line as cannon fodder.
Tamil Tiger spokesman Balasingham Nadesan said the government has stepped up artillery attacks on civilian areas, leaving at least 28 people dead on Friday.
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