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COLOMBO - Suspected Tamil Tiger rebels attacked an air force base at Sri Lanka's international airport before dawn on Monday, officials said.
Airline officials said the airport, 37 km north of the capital Colombo, had been closed and Sri Lankan airlines said all arrivals and departures were on hold.
Military sources said the incident appeared to be a mortar bomb attack.
"There has been a loud explosion from the air force camp in Katunayake not far from the airport runway where all our attack aircraft are parked," said police spokesman Deputy Inspector General of Police Jayantha Wickramaratne.
Witnesses who live near the airport told Reuters they could hear gunfire. Nordic truce monitors were checking reports of an air attack by the rebels who have smuggled light aircraft into the country in pieces and claim to have an air force.
The attack comes after weeks of air force raids on Tamil Tiger targets in the north and east.
The Tigers last attacked the airport in 2001, the year before a ceasefire deal which has since collapsed on the ground. In that attack half of Sri Lankan Airlines' fleet of planes was destroyed.
The Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE), who say they are fighting for an independent state for minority Tamils in Sri Lanka's north and east, were not immediately available for comment.
"I can hear gunfire from near the airport," said R.M. Gunasekera, an accountant who lives near the town of Katunayake where the airport is situated.
"We've put on hold all incoming flights," Sri Lankan Airlines Chief Executive Officer Peter Hill told Reuters.
"We understand it was a mortar attack on the other side, the military side, of the airport."
President Mahinda Rajapakse's government aims to defeat the Tigers militarily within 2-3 years and is pushing on with military offensives in the east and north despite pleas from the international community to stop.
The rebels have warned of a bloodbath and analysts say a new chapter in a two-decade war that has killed around 4,000 troops, civilians and Tigers in the past 15 months alone is spreading.
The civil war has killed around 68,000 people since 1983.
- REUTERS
