By Prensa Latina
Colombo, Jan 23 (Prensa Latina) Sri Lankan soldiers attacked northern positions of the insurgent Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam, which battles resulted in the death of 41 rebels and a soldier, military sources reported on Wednesday.
According to a spokesman of the national security center, who asked not to be identified, the troops attacked Tamil bunkers south of Adampan Tank, in the Mannar District, completely destroying six of the eight existing.
Other clashes took place on Saturday on the Jaffna peninsula and in Vavuniya, Pollonnaruwa and Mannar.
Those confrontations took place two days after 27 people died in an ambush of a bus in Buttala, for which Sri Lankan security forces held Tamil Tigers responsible.
A six-year truce between Sri Lanka and the Tigers ended last Wednesday, and the government then launched a new campaign to remove the Tamils from their northern bastion, in what is seen as the bloodiest escalation in the 25-year civil war.
The armed conflict began in 1983 when Tamil Tigers began its fight for an independent state for the Tamil minority in the north and east of the country.