Sri Lanka says 20 killed in fresh violence

COLOMBO: At least 19 Sri Lankan guerrillas and one soldier were killed as government forces and Tamil Tiger rebels fought heavily across the embattled north, the defence ministry said on Saturday.   

The rebels died in clashes on Friday and early Saturday in the Vavuniya and Jaffna districts bordering the de facto mini-state run by the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE), the ministry said. A government trooper was killed in Vavuniya on Friday evening, it said.   

The latest ministry figures raised the death toll since the start of the year to 457 rebels and 21 soldiers. The figures cannot be independently checked as no journalists or rights groups have access to the embattled areas.   

The latest fighting came after the military accused the Tigers of killing at least 10 civilians late Thursday in the relatively calm south of the island.   

Both the LTTE and the largely ethnic-Sinhalese armed forces have been accused of killing civilians during the decades-old ethnic war that has left tens of thousands of people dead.   

Suspected rebels triggered a roadside bomb killing 27 villagers on a bus, as a truce signed by the LTTE and the government in 2002 officially ended on Wednesday.   

Sri Lanka's government pulled out of the Norwegian-brokered truce accusing the Tigers, who have been fighting for an independent homeland in the island's north and east since 1972, of only using the truce to re-arm.