By Xinhua
Colombo : At least 66 Tamil Tiger rebels have been killed in Sri Lanka’s northern districts as heavy fighting between the government troops and rebels continued, the military has said.
The defence ministry said in a statement Saturday that one soldier was killed and 28 injured during the clashes in Vavuniya, Mannar and Jaffna regions Friday.
The statement came one day after Sri Lankan Army Commander Sarath Fonseka told reporters that the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) would be defeated before he retires from service at the end of this year.
“I do not want to hand over this issue to the next army commander,” Fonseka said Friday night.
The commander, who survived an assassination attempt carried out by the LTTE in 2006, said the strength of the LTTE has been reduced to around 4,500 cadres after it lost 2,300 cadres in the east and 1,500 in the north from mid-2006.
Fonseka said around 600 government soldiers were killed and around 4,000 were injured during the period.
The government troops are not in a hurry and what happened in the last two years will continue in the future, the commander said Friday.
“The troops are doing very well. And at the rate we are going, there will be major changes in the coming six to seven months,” said Fonseka.
Fonseka said he did not believe in a military solution to the country’s long drawn-out ethnic issue, but by defeating the LTTE by the armed forces would pave the way for a political solution.
Claiming discrimination at the hands of the Sinhala majority, the LTTE has been fighting the government since the mid-1980s to establish a separate homeland for the minority Tamils in the north and east.
The Norwegian brokered cease-fire agreement between the two sides will expire Jan 16. The Sri Lankan government has announced its withdrawal from the ceasefire agreement signed in 2002.