Tigers destroy Jaffna building with time bomb
Tigers destroy Jaffna building with time bomb
COLOMBO (Reuter): A time bomb planted by Sri Lankan Tamil Tiger guerrillas demolished the main administration building in Jaffna yesterday as troops mopped up resistance in the former rebel northern stronghold, defense officials said.
"Terrorists had set up an explosive device inside the kachcheri (administration) building in Jaffna town," a military spokesman said. "Around 11.45 a.m. one side of the building collapsed as a result of an explosion."
He said there were no casualties in the blast, which came as the government prepared to restore basic services to the battle- scarred town.
Troops worked to flush out remaining Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) rebels from newly captured areas of the town center and to defuse a maze of mines and boobytraps planted to delay their advance and inflict maximum casualties, officials said.
On Sunday troops raised the national flag over the Jaffna Fort, an ancient Dutch citadel which was the army's headquarters before it pulled out of the town five years ago.
The military said any rebels caught in their net would have to surrender or commit suicide.
The guerrillas' Voice of Tigers radio, monitored by Reuters in the frontline town of Vavuniya, said yesterday that rebel resistance and boobytraps had slowed the army's advance.
"While the government is engaged in false propaganda that the LTTE have bolted from the Jaffna peninsula to escape the oncoming army, it is very silent about the current fierce resistance of the LTTE," the radio said.
The rebels have withdrawn to Killinochchi, on the northern mainland, and to the jungles of Mullaitivu and Batticaloa in the east.
Tiger radio reported firefights between rebel defenders and government troops at the weekend after two army columns linked up in the Jaffna fort area on Saturday, ringing the town center.
Troops were searching for hidden arms dumps which the rebels were suspected to have left behind in Jaffna town for use later by infiltrators, defense officials said.
They said the military was bracing for a massive Tiger counterattack to avenge the loss of Jaffna, the rebels' spiritual capital in their war for an independent homeland for minority Tamils in the island's north and east. More than 50,000 people have died in the 12-year war.
Officials said they want to restore power, water and other basic supplies to the town to try to woo back its population, forced by the rebels to evacuate before the army took control.
The government says at least 180,000 people have fled the fighting in the Jaffna peninsula and crossed the Jaffna lagoon to the northern mainland. Aid agencies put the number of people displaced by the fighting at as high as 800,000.
Analysts say it will not be easy to get Tamil civilians to resettle in Jaffna as they fear reprisals from the LTTE.
But they say the army must win the hearts and minds of the refugees if President Chandrika Kumaratunga's "peace package" offering devolution to minority Tamils is to succeed.
The government plans to rehabilitate Jaffna after liberating it from the rebels, Housing, Construction and Public Utilities Minister Nimal Siripala de Silva was quoted as saying in yesterday's state-run Daily News.
De Silva urged southern Sinhalese youths to show goodwill and help the government to rebuild the north. Youths who wished to help would get free transport and other facilities, he said.