Attacks against the Sri Lankan security personnel in Jaffna peninsula and in the Eastern province are on the increase as the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) put pressure on the military outside Vanni also.
In the latest attack in the East, LTTE forces attacked a military post inside the high security area in Kanatalaay in Trincomalee district killing four Sri Lankan military personnel, including Sri Lanka Army soldiers and home guards.
The raid took place at Seranawa on Monday, September 29.
On the same day, a Sri Lankan Special Task Force (STF) trooper sustained serious injuries in a gunfire ambush at Arasadiththeevu in Paddippazhai, 15 km west of Batticaloa city, according to Sri Lankan police.
A day earlier, a commando unit of the LTTE stormed a joint paramilitary-Army mini-camp at Thikiliveddai, north of Batticaloa, killing six military and paramilitary personnel.
The LTTE unit attacked the base on Sunday September 28, bringing the camp under their control within 15 minutes, LTTE sources told TamilNet.
One PK-LMG, five T-56 type-2 assault rifles, a drum magazine for the PK-LMG, 100 rounds, seven AK-47 magazines, two-hundred-and-twenty 7.62 mm rounds and a holster were seized in the attack.
In the months August and September alone over 50 Sri Lankan soldiers have been killed in the Eastern province.
In August, 23
In September at least 26 Sri Lankan security personnel were killed and another 26 wounded in separate attacks carried out by LTTE forces in different locations.
Since the Sri Lankan Government announced the ‘Liberation of the East’ on July 11, 2007 there have been several attacks against security forces which have increased in frequency in the past few months.
The government recently tried to brush off the attacks by referring to them as isolated incidents.
The Sri Lankan defense establishment claimed these incidents were isolated attacks and that they are ‘natural’ in places that have been ‘newly liberated’.
These attacks would not go on for long, they claimed.
However, analysts feel that the escalating attacks on Sri Lankan security personnel outside theatre of war in Vanni is putting severe pressure on the Sri Lankan military, which is facing an acute shortage of personnel, to protect areas under its control whilst continuing the offensive in Vanni.
The personnel shortage is clearly evident in Jaffna peninsula, informed sources claim.
With relocation of large number of Sri Lanka Army troops to the Northern Front Defence Line (FDL) areas and outer districts, the Army is allegedly facing difficulties in carrying out prompt cordon and search operations in Jaffna peninsula.
On Monday September 29, a unit of SLA soldiers was attacked by a group in military fatigue near a Saiva temple in Maasiyappiddi area and the soldiers had called for assistance from their camp.
Although the
SLA had requested all camps located from Koozhaavadi to Chunnaakam, a distance of 8 km, to send five soldiers from each camp.
The soldiers assigned to the task from each of the above camps encountered difficulty in finding transport, and eventually used vehicles belonging to residents to reach Chunnaakam, residents said.
The LTTE has also stepped up its attacks on security personnel in the North, in
The night before the Maasiyappiddi attack, an
Separately, Sri Lanka Army soldiers posted at the electricity transformer area at Vannaaththi Paalam along Aadiyapaatham Veethi in Kokkuvil in Jaffna were fired at on Thursday October 2.
An explosion caused either by a hand grenade or claymore device was heard from the place of attack, and gunfire followed the blast for nearly ten minutes, residents of the area said. There was no information on casualty or injuries to the
An electricity transformer in the same area was set fire earlier.
Similar attacks had been made on electricity transformers in Thenmaraadchi and Vadamarraadchi areas in
The SLA soldiers, following these attacks, fenced in all transformers, and have deployed guards 24 hours a day.
