February 22, 2008	Friday	Safar 14, 1429

COLOMBO, Feb 21: Sri Lankan troops have killed 92 rebels in the latest offensive into their northern stronghold, the island’s defence ministry said on Thursday.

Fighting between the military and the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) has intensified since the government scrapped a six-year-old ceasefire pact in January.

The government says the rebels had used the truce to re-arm and were not sincere about talking peace. It has vowed to crush them militarily, and has captured large swathes of rebel-held territory in the east, but analysts say neither side is winning.“As per the military reports received from the northern battlefronts, at least 92 terrorists were killed and over 15 suffered injuries during yesterday’s confrontations,” the Ministry of Defence said in a statement on its website, referring to Wednesday’s fighting.

The ministry said three soldiers were killed and another 20 were wounded in the fighting focused in the northern districts of Mannar and Vavuniya.

The military had earlier reported 13 confirmed dead and 40 suspected killed during Wednesday’s offensive.

The Tigers were not immediately available for comment and analysts say both sides tend to inflate enemy casualty figures in the absence of independent accounts of the fighting.

The military is increasingly releasing details of battles with an overnight lag.

The latest fighting came as UN Assistant Secretary-General for Political Affairs Angela Kane visited Sri Lanka to begin a week-long mission described by the world body as a regular follow-up visit to assess its operations.

The International Committee of the Red Cross says it is deeply concerned about the growing number of civilian casualties in Sri Lanka, where the civil war has killed more than 70,000 people since 1983.

The ICRC said 180 civilians were reported killed and almost 270 wounded so far this year in bombings on buses, train stations and in the streets. The Sri Lanka government has blamed most of the attacks on the rebels.

The violence hit tourist arrivals last year, which fell 12 per cent from a year earlier, while the stock market slid nearly seven percent in 2007, with some businesses shelving investment plans.—Reuters