By Xinhua
Colombo : The Sri Lankan Army has launched a military offensive against Tamil Tigers insurgents in the island’s north, defence officials said Saturday.
Brigadier Prasad Samarasinghe, the military spokesman said that the troops moved ahead at Silavaturai in Mannar district in the early hours of Saturday.
“It is a humanitarian mission to free the civilians who are suffering at the hands of the LTTE (Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam),” Samarasinghe said.
Around 6,000 to 7,000 civilians are said to be in Silavaturai area and some of them have already fled for government-controlled areas, Samarasinghe said.
There was no immediate response from the LTTE about the government’s claim.
Also in the morning at Welioya in Northern Province the LTTE had fired mortars in the village of Ethavatunuwewa but no casualties were reported, officials said.
The clashes in the island’s separatist armed conflict have now shifted to the north, the main base of the LTTE.
Government troops in mid-July claimed that the entire Eastern Province had come under their control.
Nearly 70,000 people have died in the island country’s conflict since the mid-1980s.