COLOMBO, August 2: Over 200 Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) fighters were killed when the Sri Lankan armed forces thwarted an attack last night near Omanthai in northern Sri Lanka, the Ministry of Defence said.``More than 200 bodies of terrorists have been recovered by troops,'' said a communique from the Ministry, adding that 10 policemen and four soldiers were killed and 30 security personnel wounded in the fighting which began around 10.30 pm last night and lasted till early Saturday morning. Unofficial estimates said that 45 security personnel, mainly from the police, were killed.Sources said a large squad of Tigers came in waves at the defence lines, five km north of Omanthai on the Vavuniya-Killinochchi road, with mortars, artillery and other arms. ``Terrorists launched seven assaults using large numbers. All these assaults were effectively repulsed by the troops,'' the official release stated.It is the objective of Operation Jaya Sekuru to free the road from the control of the LTTE, but so far, the offensive, which began on May 13, has been able to gain control of less than 20 km on the 90 km-stretch while suffering major losses of men and material.In yesterday night's attack, the LTTE once again targeted an area that, after being taken over by the Army soon after the start of Operation Jaya Sekuru, was being defended mainly by the police and navy personnel recently trained in land operations.The attack came soon after the forces of Operation Jaya Sekuru attempted to push through Puliyankulam and resume their advance on the Vavuniya-Killinochchi road. But unlike on previous occasions, the policemen and the sailors stayed put and fought back, the main reason for this being that this time, the armed forces were expecting the attack and were not taken by surprise.On Thursday, 50 LTTE cadres were killed north-west of Omanthai near Nedunkerni in a confrontation with the Army. One LTTE cadre was shot dead near Puliyankulam. These incidents seemed to have put the army on high alert.Minutes after the first wave of Tigers tried to breach the defences, the Sri Lankan air force began bombing the area aided by Roman candles. Reports said the army fired more than a 1,000 rounds of artillery from the camp in Vavuniya town towards Omanthai.With the sustained bombing and shelling, the Tigers withdrew in the early hours of Saturday. It is reasonable to assume that if they left behind more than 100 of their dead fighters, they would have also taken away with them a large number. According to the defence ministry, troops saw the Tigers pile over 200 dead and wounded into vehicles in which they fled. However, it will take a few days for the real casualty figures to emerge.
