Tamil Tigers blamed as mines kill 64 on bus

COLOMBO - Tamil Tiger rebels said Sri Lankan Government jets pounded their positions last night, an apparent retaliation for the bloody ambush of a civilian bus that left at least 64 people dead in the worst incident since a 2002 truce.

The explosion in Anuradhapura district, 200km north of the capital Colombo, injured a further 45 people, officials said. A Government spokesman said the Tigers placed two mines side by side to blast a hail of steel into the bus.

Sri Lankan Army spokesman Brigadier Prasad Samarasinghe said the dead and injured included "children, ladies and clergy".

The Tigers denied it had placed the landmine, saying that the group had "no involvement in this killing of innocent civilians".

At least 500 people have been killed since early April as talks between the Government and Tigers collapsed and monitors declared the country was sliding again towards civil war.

Officials said most of the dead were likely to be from the island's Sinhalese majority. The Tigers have been blamed for killing groups of Sinhalese in recent months, but this is by far the biggest attack on a civilian target.

"The message coming out is that they will not stop at anything," said Jehan Perera, national director of the National Peace Council.

"They are saying they will also target civilians if their demands are not met. Or they could be trying to push the Government into a war."

The Tigers accuse the military of killing innocent Tamil civilians and of backing renegade former rebels the Karuna group, who have been attacking the mainstream rebels.

The Government has retaliated for some previous attacks with air strikes on the rebels, but has said it is committed to the truce.

"Without doubt, this is intended to create a civilian backlash," said head of the Government peace secretariat Palitha Kohona. He said he hoped and believed it would not succeed.

Near the northeastern port of Trincomalee, the Army said rebels had used another mine to target a military patrol. The military returned fire and killed one rebel, they said.

- REUTERS