Parcel bomb explodes in Lankan post office; 10 killed, 40 hurt

Soldiers and constables were at the post office to send money to their homes in the south of the country, officials said adding that the identity of those killed was yet to be established. The bombing came despite tight security throughout the country amid fears of attacks by the separatist Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam guerrillas.

It was not immediately clear how the bomb left at the post office was activated, but police said they suspected that a timing device may have been used to set off the explosives. The attack came nine days after a similar bomb packed with over 1,500 ball bearings was found near a police housing complex in the capital Colombo. The device was defused harmlessly.

That discovery was made a day after a suspected letter bomb was addressed to President Chandrika Kumaratunga, who is recovering from injuries suffered in a suicide bomb attack on December 18. A few minutes before the assassination attempt on Kumaratunga, a suicide bomber staged an attack against an Opposition United National Party (UNP) rally near here, killing 12 people.

The quantity of explosives discovered in the January 18 bomb here was similar to that found on the suicide bomber who killed herself and 14 others outside Prime Minister Sirima Bandaranaike’s office on January 5. The authorities imposed tight restrictions on people travelling to the capital from the northern town of Vavuniya as part of measures to minimise bomb attacks here.

Vavuniya is the northernmost population centre in the mainland under government control and the LTTE made an abortive push for the town in November after successfully taking 10 key bases further north from the military. Security has been tight in Vavuniya and the authorities have also clamped snap curfews in the capital to hunt for suspected Tamil Tiger rebels.

Thousands have been screened. Local police believe at least 10 members of the LTTE’s elite suicide squad, known as the Black Tigers, are already in Colombo on attack missions. In July, Tiger rebels sprayed bullets at a road block in Vavuniya killing six people near the main airbase.

The LTTE is leading a drawn out campaign for independence in the island’s northern and eastern regions. More than 55,000 people have been killed in fighting in the past 27 years.