September 24, 2008	Wednesday	Ramazan 23, 1429

LONDON, Sept 23: Pointing out a number of parallels between the terrorist tactics of LTTE and those of the Al Qaeda-Taliban combine, Sri Lankan Defence spokesman and cabinet minister Keheliya Rambukwella has claimed that the latter has been drawing extensively from Tamil Tigers’ book of terrorist tricks.

Referring to Saturday’s truck bombing of Marriott hotel in Islamabad, Mr Rambukwella said a similar truck bomb of almost similar intensity had been rammed through the gates of Colombo’s Central Bank by LTTE terrorists in 1996, killing 91 people.

Mr Rambukwella was speaking to the media at the Sri Lankan High Commission where Pakistan’s media representatives and correspondents of Pakistan-based media organisations were specially invited.

He claimed that the current technology of a suicide jacket used by Al Qaeda was actually developed by the Tamil Tigers.

He said the Sri Lankan government had now stopped all peace negotiations with the LTTE.

“You see after every truce agreement the LTTE would regroup, rearm and refund itself more vigorously and come back fighting with redoubled force. Exactly the way the Taliban have been doing in Pakistan over the last three years. This tactic also they seem to have learnt from LTTE’s book,” he said answering a question.