Lanka launches air strikes on LTTE

Colombo: Sri Lanka's military launched air strikes on Tuesday against LTTE-held areas in response to a suicide bomb attack targeting the country's top military general.

The female LTTE suicide bomber killed eight people and injured 27 others, including Lt Gen Sarath Fonseka, military spokesman Brig Prasad Samarasinghe said.

A militant official and witnesses said the military responded hours later with air strikes and mortars in the guerrilla-held region of Trincomalee, 215 kilometers northeast of Colombo.

''There are at least two aircraft dropping bombs into our areas and there is shelling from army camps nearby,'' militant official S Elilan said by telephone from Trincomalee.

The Defense Ministry in Colombo declined to comment, but witnesses who live in nearby areas confirmed the air strikes and shelling. No reports of casualties or damage were immediately available.

Earlier, a lone LTTE female suicide pretending to be pregnant to conceal the explosives triggered a blast near a car carrying Fonseka, the commander of the army, at military headquarters in Colombo.

Fonseka suffered serious abdominal injuries, a hospital official said. He was operated on by 10 surgeons and his condition was stable, said Dr. Hector Weerasinghe of Colombo's National Hospital.

The bomber died instantly. It was not clear whether she was included in the figure of eight dead given by Samarasinghe.

The attack and apparent military retaliation were certain to put further pressure on the country's four-year-old cease-fire, which has been threatened by rising violence that has killed at least 89 people this month, including at least 43 soldiers or police.

European cease-fire monitors said the suicide attack ''could jeopardize any possibility for future talks'' between the government and the militants.

''This attack is yet another blow to the cease-fire agreement and the peace process,'' the monitors said in a statement.

Fonseka, a battle-hardened soldier with 35 years in the infantry, was appointed to the top post after President Mahinda Rajapakse took office in November.

The woman was able to enter the area by presenting fake identification and saying she had an appointment for a pregnancy examination at the army hospital located inside the complex, said other officials, speaking on condition of anonymity citing military regulations.

''I saw a fireball as I came out of my saloon,'' said S A Weerasinghe, who works in the military saloon, which is also inside the sprawling complex.

There was no claim of responsibility.

The Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam rarely take credit for such attacks.

The militants are known for their deadly suicide bombers, called Black Tigers.

The first suicide attack by the guerrillas was in July 1987, when a militant known as Captain Miller drove a truckload of explosives into a military camp, killing 40 soldiers.

Since then, 240 other militants have blown themselves up in attacks that have killed Sri Lankan President Ranasinghe Premadasa, former Indian Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi and dozens of others.

In earlier violence late Monday, suspected militants in a hijacked bus opened fire on soldiers when their vehicle was blocked at a checkpoint in northern SriLanka, drawing return fire that killed the driver, the military said.