Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam supremo V Prabhakaran will find it difficult to survive beyond six months, Sri Lankan army chief Sarath Fonseka has warned, vowing to eliminate the 3,000-strong Tiger rebels from their stronghold of Wanni in the embattled north. "The three armed forces are confident of wiping out the LTTE, which is now smarting its wounds due to the present military operations," Fonseka, who survived an assassination attempt by LTTE in April 2006, said.
Over 26 Tamil Tiger rebels and one soldier were killed in fresh clashes between government troops and the guerrillas in the restive northern Sri Lanka, the military said on Monday.
The Sri Lankan security forces could not avert the LTTE attack on Anuradhapura air base in spite of the Indian installed radar system providing timely warning about the light rebel aircraft hovering over the area, officials said. The attack had claimed over 30 lives earlier this week. Defence Ministry officials said that the LTTE's light aircraft was spotted by the radar system, installed by India in Vavuniya. No aircraft was able to intercept the two LTTE planes.
Gotabaya Rajapaksa
Test skipper Anil Kumble has come out strongly in defence of the starry Indian middle-order batsmen who came a cropper against the Sri Lankan spin duo of Ajantha Mendis and Muthiah Muralitharan in the recently concluded three-match series in the Emerald Isle which the visitors lost 2-1.
The blast inside the private bus, heading to Anuradhapura from Kandy, occurred at 7.05 am local time at a bus stand in Dambulla town, located 148 km from the capital Colombo, the army said.
The Sri Lankan Navy on Wednesday claimed that it has killed at least 40 Tamil Tiger rebels when it confronted a flotilla of Sea Tiger boats in the seas off Vettilaikerni in the northern Jaffna peninsula.
The security forces captured and destroyed the four bases of the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam in the jungles of Thoppigala in Batticaloa district during an offensive late Friday night and early Saturday.
The government has slammed peace broker Norway for 'misleading' the international community.
Sanath Jayasuriya has been banned from all cricket for two years after admitting breaching two counts of the ICC Anti-Corruption Code.
AIADMK coordinator O Panneerselvam is said to be upset at his son Raveendranath Kumar, a Lok Sabha MP, being denied a ministerial chance for a second time in a row, beginning with the formation of Modi 2.0 in 2019, reveals N Sathiya Moorthy.
156 people have died in the week-long clashes.
Prime minister Ranil Wickremesinghe's office said President Kumaratunga's offer to share powers in the defence ministry was unworkable.
The claim came a day after the Tiger rebels blew up an army bus in Colombo, killing one soldier, and overran a naval base where they claimed 35 sailors died.
Over 4,000 people have died since December 2005 in a new wave of fighting despite a truce which is in place since February 2002.
Naval gunboats intercepted the Tiger boats leading to the battle, which lasted for six hours, it said.
The LTTE said at least 26 civilians were killed in attacks carried out by the military on Monday, but did not say if they suffered any losses.
The pre-dawn operation was concentrated in Colombo's Wellawatte region where minority Tamils live in larger numbers
While 10 persons from Karnataka have been confirmed dead, at least seven of them are said to be JD-S workers.
The pitched battles follow two days of air raids by government troops triggered by the killing of 64 bus passengers in a suspected rebel landmine attack on Thursday in Anuradhapura.
The United States has welcomed the passage of United Nations Human Rights Council resolution on Sri Lanka and said that it sends a "clear message" to the Rajapaksa government that the international community is committed to promote peace, stability, and prosperity in the Asian country.
President Kumaratunga has embroiled the nation in a crisis by sacking three ministers and suspending parliament.
``We have full faith in the prime minister,'' declared Labor Minister Mahinda Samarasinghe, quoting from a a letter signed by 124 of the nation's 225 MPs.
DRDO says it is working with the navy to fit the Rustom-1 with an Automatic Identification System that will identify Indian fishing vessels along the maritime boundary
The India Under-19 team's World Cup title defence was dealt another blow on Wednesday when it suffered its second straight defeat in a warm-up game against South Africa, losing by five wickets, at the ICC Academy ground n Dubai.
Hamstrung, running out of partners and his team's title defence at stake -- the stage was set for Angelo Mathews to emerge from the Saturday night drizzle and enter Twenty20 folklore but the Sri Lankan captain fell agonisingly short. At 15-4, after England had set them a 172-run victory target in the World Twenty20 match, Sri Lanka's title defence looked all but over inside three overs. Their skipper then engineered a stunning recovery in the tournament's most portentous contest that was key to the semi-final hopes of three teams, including South Africa. But the lion-hearted effort took its toll on his hamstring and Mathews was clearly struggling when he took guard for the final over from Ben Stokes -- 15 runs separating him from Twenty20 greatness and his team from a place in the last four. As a mild drizzle fell on the Feroz Shah Kotla Stadium, Stokes charged in with a ball in hand and ice in veins to thwart Mathews' audacious bid to pull off a heist.
New Union minister L Murugan's declaration of Kongu Nadu as his native place, instead of Tamil Nadu, may be part of a grand BJP strategy to create new states out of existing ones, particularly those that have anti-BJP governments, mulls N Sathiya Moorthy.
Cheteshwar Pujara, on Wednesday, sought to play down the ineffectiveness of Ravichandran Ashwin and Ravindra Jadeja in the third Test against Sri Lanka, saying the fifth day Feroz Shah Kotla strip did not even have the bare minimum assistance for spinners.
Sri Lanka compensated for their batting failure with a disciplined bowling performance to beat United Arab Emirates by 14 runs in a round robin league encounter of the Asia Cup Twenty20, in Mirpur on Thursday.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Wednesday arrived in Frankfurt en route to New Delhi after concluding his visit to the US where he met President Barack Obama and agreed to make joint efforts to dismantle terrorist safe havens besides stepping up cooperation in defence, energy, economy and space.
Pakistan said on Monday that its close ally Saudi Arabia has asked for ground troops, warships and fighter planes to oust the Shia rebels in war-torn Yemen as lawmakers debate whether the country should join the conflict which has sectarian and domestic implications.
This is the first time an Indian shipyard has been commissioned to design and build a warship to specifications formulated by a buyer country. This marks an important first landmark in the Bharatiya Janata Party-led government's drive to increase defence exports.
President Rajapaksa and Prime Minister Rajapaksa will transform Sri Lanka's political landscape after Thursday's electoral triumph, predicts N Sathiya Moorthy, veteran Colombo watcher.
A clinical India defeated Sri Lanka comprehensively by six wickets to continue their their winning run in the Nidahas Twenty20 Tri-Series, in Colombo, on Monday.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi's ambitions abroad may run the risk of foundering on constraints at home.
Zimbabwe set to become first team to tour Pak after terror fears in March 2009.
However the final decision to shift the tournament will be Asian Cricket Council's prerogative.
Murali Vijay celebrated his return to the India side with a hundred, while Cheteshwar Pujara continued his golden run with another century as India dominated the second day of the second Test against Sri Lanka in Nagpur on Saturday.
Less than three months ago, Aaron Finch, alarmingly down on form and confidence, actually feared he might not be chosen for the Australian squad that he was due to lead. Now, he's atop the scoring charts at the World Cup.
