Tigers bomb Sri Lanka commuter bus, 21 killed
Pastor Dale Morgan
Tigers bomb Sri Lanka commuter bus, 21 killed*
COLOMBO (AFP) - - At least 21 commuters were killed and 47 others
wounded Friday in a suspected Tamil Tiger mine attack on a crowded bus
south of the Sri Lankan capital, officials said.
The state-run bus was peppered with shrapnel, an AFP photographer at the
scene said, suggesting a powerful fragmentation mine placed on the
roadside had been detonated as the bus was passing.
"Twenty-one people have been killed, eight of them are women," police
spokesman Ranjith Gunasekera told AFP, adding that around 47 others were
hurt.
The military's spokesman, Brigadier Udaya Nanayakkara, blamed the
Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE).
Survivors said the bus was knocked over by the force of the explosion.
"I was standing in the middle of the bus when there was a loud noise and
the whole bus toppled to the side," said 21-year-old office worker
Shanika Priyadharshani, while being bandaged up in hospital.
"I blacked out for a while. There was black smoke, people were dead
around me. Some were shouting for help. I shouted for help and someone
pulled me out and put me into a passing by vehicle and brought me to
hospital," she told AFP.
The bomb was the latest in a string of attacks against commuters in and
around Colombo.
On Wednesday, 18 people were hurt when suspected Tiger rebels set off a
bomb alongside a packed commuter train.
And on May 26, another attack on a commuter train -- also blamed on the
LTTE -- killed nine people and wounded 84 others.
Each attack came after the LTTE complained that government commandos,
who operate in small groups known as 'deep penetration units', have
killed civilians in roadside bombings inside Sri Lanka's rebel-held north.
Hostilities have escalated sharply since the start of the year when the
government pulled out of a truce with the Tamil Tigers, who are fighting
to carve out a separate Tamil state within the Sinhalese-majority island.
Since then, both sides have traded allegations that each others' forces
are deliberately targeting civilians.
The LTTE said two civilians were killed late Thursday in a roadside mine
in the north by an army deep penetration unit, and that six civilians
died in a similar attack on Monday night.
Last month, the rebels accused government commandos of killing 19 people
in mine attacks.
Sri Lanka's military refuses to comment on its covert operations in the
north.
Casualty figures in the north are impossible to verify as journalists
are barred from visiting front line areas or crossing into rebel-held
territory.
The Sri Lankan government says that it now has the upper hand in the
long-running conflict, with the defence ministry reporting that 4,081
Tamil Tigers have been killed so far this year.