LTTE attacks army bunker line, 17 soldiers killed

The fighting came as the LTTE said in a statement from their London office that they were keeping up an offensive aimed at quot;liberatingquot; their former heartland of Jaffna located further North of Paranthan. The Tiger statement came as the Army said that it had repulsed several rebel attempts to dislodge troops from three locations that form the outer defences of the Elephant Pass military base at the entrance to Jaffna.

Army Major General Lionel Balagalle said the attack had backfired on the LTTE which had made spectacular gains elsewhere in the North last month by overrunning 10 military bases in just five days of fighting. However, Balagalle said the Tigers could still try to launch a fresh attempt on the Elephant Pass base. quot;Elephant Pass itself is untouched but the Tigers tried to break in at three other points but they failed,quot; Balagalle said on Wednesday while adding that the guerrillas had used a large force of their sea-going cadres.

Government forces captured Jaffna in December 1995 after a 50-day offensive to dismantle what had become a de facto state run by the Tigers. The Tamil Tigers are leading a campaign for independence from the Sinhalese dominated island in its northern and eastern regions. More than 55,000 people have been killed in fighting in the past 27 years.