Date:25/05/2007 URL: http://www.thehindu.com/2007/05/25/stories/2007052506701500.htm

International

Seaborne offensive repulsed: Sri Lanka

B. Muralidhar Reddy

Delft Island is a vital surveillance point

COLOMBO: In a day of bloody violence, in which suspected LTTE cadres detonated a powerful explosion targeting a military bus in the vicinity of the Colombo harbour and the Naval Headquarters and the Sea Tigers fought pitched battle with a unit of the navy in the north on Thursday, at least five soldiers, six cadres of the Tamil Tigers and two civilians were killed in the island nation.

The casualty figures of the Tigers as projected by the military and of the military by the LTTE together stand at 41. There is no way the figures could be independently verified after the Sri Lanka Monitoring Mission (SLMM) is reduced to the role of a distant and silent spectator.

The explosion in the crowded commercial market in the Colombo fort at 8.55 a.m. was initially declared by the military as a suicide mission. Later it said the blast was triggered by an Improvised Explosive Device (IED) targeting a bus transporting army personnel.

Meanwhile, the naval personnel defended the Delft islet, situated in the northern seas, "against a major seaborne terrorist offensive" in the early hours of Thursday by the Sea Tigers.

The army said 18 boats including six suicide boats were involved in the attack. The Media Center for National Security (MCNS) said 18 Sea Tigers were killed and four boats were destroyed.

Security point

It said 18 boats, including six suicide boats and 12 attack craft, attempted to breach a navy security point around 00.30 a.m. The Naval Fast Attack Craft and the ground troops engaged the flotilla "inflicting severe damages".

The MCNS said the air force engaged the withdrawing boats destroying two and disabling another. "The Navy reiterates that no naval craft were destroyed or damaged in the attack as claimed by pro-LTTE media. Four sailors were killed while four sustained injuries. The island is under the control of the navy. All the Islets in the Jaffna peninsula are under the control of the SLA."

The navy says the Delft Island was a vital surveillance point in the west coast to monitor LTTE arms smuggling from Tamil Nadu.

Tamil Tigers however gave a different account. "[The] commando marines of the LTTE naval wing, the Sea Tigers, launched a pre-dawn attack [on] Thursday on Delft islet off Jaffna coast inflicting heavy losses to the Sri Lanka Navy [SLN]," military spokesman Irasiah Ilanthirayan told TamilNet. He claimed that at least 30 sailors were killed, a Dvora Fast Attack Craft was destroyed and two naval vessels sustained damages in the operation that lasted for two hours.