Lankan military kills 38 rebels in pitched battles
Scattered fighting in northern Sri Lanka killed 38 rebels and three soldiers as the government pressed ahead with its offensive against the Tamil Tigers, the military said yesterday.
The defence ministry said its troops fought pitched battles and beat back rebel assaults along several fronts in the north on Monday. It said three government soldiers died in the fighting.
There was no comment from the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE), who are battling a government push to dismantle their northern mini-state.
Having wrestled the east from the Tigers in July 2007, Sri Lanka now says it is just two kilometres (1.2 miles) from Kilinochchi, the LTTE's administrative hub.
The fiercest of Monday's battles took place in the Kilinochchi region, where 11 rebel fighters and two soldiers were killed in a wave of confrontations, military spokesman Brig. Udaya Nanayakkara said. Fighting in Jaffna, Vavuniya and Mullaittivu killed nine other rebels, he said.
With nearly all communications to the north severed, rebel spokesmen could not be contacted for comment.
Independent verification of the military's claims is nearly impossible because most journalists are banned from the war zone. Both sides routinely exaggerate enemy losses and underreport their own.
Since pulling out of a Norwegian-backed truce in January, the defence ministry has reported it has killed 7,516 rebels against the loss of 742 soldiers. The figures cannot be independently verified.
Fighting has escalated in recent months in the 25-year-old civil war, with the military capturing a series of rebel bases and large chunks of territory.
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