COLOMBO, May 18 The three-decade long quest by the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam to carve out a separate state for Tamils in north-eastern Sri Lanka ended on Monday with the announcement that LTTE leader Vellupillai Prabhakaran had been killed along with the few remaining members of the group's hierarchy.

The announcement of Prabhakaran's death was greeted by an unprecedented eruption of jubilation throughout the country. Places of worship tolled their bells and firecrackers were lit in every town and village after the official announcement. In some places people burnt effigies of Prabhakaran.

The government's information department sent text messages to mobile phones across the country announcing that Prabhakaran was killed along with several of his deputies.

The Tigers' supremo tried to drive out of the battle zone, but his convoy was attacked by Sri Lankan troops, killing the guerilla chieftain, the defence ministry said.

“We can announce very responsibly that we have liberated the whole country from terrorism,” army chief Lt-Gen Sarath Fonseka, who survived an LTTE suicide blast in 2006, told state television.

According to military officials, President Mahinda Rajapaksa will open a session of parliament on Tuesday with an address that will officially mark the ending of the war and the killing of the LTTE leader.

At a special ceremony in the evening, the three service chiefs formally informed the president about the defeat of the LTTE and liberation of 'every inch' of Sri Lanka from the clutches of Tiger terrorists.

According to the military, among other top leaders killed with Prabhakaran were intelligence chief Puttu Amman, Charles Anthony (Prabhakaran's eldest son), head of the political section B. Nadesan, peace secretariat chief S. Puleedevan, military leaders, Soosai, Bhanu, Jeyam, Ramesh, Ilango, Sudharman, Thomas, Luxman, Sri Ram, Iseiravi, Jenardhanan, Varadha, Pudhiyavan, and the deputy intelligence chief Kapil Amman.

The LTTE, however, maintained total silence on the killing of Prabhakaran and top aides.

Pro-LTTE website Tamilnet, the media arm of the rebel outfit, said the guerilla organisation had not confirmed their deaths. However, the website noted the defence ministry's announcement of the killing of political wing chief B. Nadesan, peace secretariat director S. Puleedevan, police chief Ilango and Prabhakaran's son Charles Anthony.

On Sunday, in a dramatic move the guerillas acknowledged that their decades-old battle for an independent ethnic homeland had reached its “bitter end”.

“We have decided to silence our guns. Our only regrets are for the lives lost and that we could not hold out for longer,” Selvarasa Pathmanathan, the Tigers' chief of international relations, said in a communiqué published on Tamil Net. President Rajapaksa promoted three service chiefs to their next higher rank after the declaration of victory.