Over 34 Tamil Tiger rebels and nine soldiers have been killed in a series of gun battles in Sri Lanka's [Images] embattled northern region, officials said in Colombo on Tuesday. In the Liberation Tiger of Tamil Eelam-dominated Wanni region, at least 30 rebels were killed in several clashes with security forces on Monday, Defence Ministry spokesman Udaya Nanayakkara said.

Reacting to the stepped-up battles between the security forces and Tiger rebels, Nanayakkara said, "Since the LTTE has been incurring heavy losses in the recent weeks; they wanted to make their presence felt and are resorting to attacks."

However, the LTTE said that it lost only 20 cadres while 15 rebels received injuries in the incidents. During the subsequent search operation, troops found seven bodies of rebels, including that of five young women. They also seized six T-56 machine guns and one multi-purpose machine gun, officials said.

In another incident, Sri Lankan troops killed four LTTE rebels when they attacked a group of rebels at Muhamalai in Jaffna on Monday evening, an Army spokesman said.

At least seven soldiers were killed in an LTTE attack inside the Yala National Park, Sri Lanka's main wildlife sanctuary on Monday, the Defence Ministry said.

In a separate attack, one soldier was killed and seven others injured as the rebels targeted them using artillery and heavy mortar fire in the island's north, a Defence Ministry official said. Sources from the field positions said the Army refrained from retaliating since the LTTE has positioned all of their artillery and heavy mortar batteries around a church in the region.

Another soldier died in a mine blast as the tractor carrying him and some other soldiers ran over it, the Defence Ministry said, adding five others were injured in the incident.