Sri Lanka offensive intensifies

Troops have moved forward to capture the land

At least nine soldiers and 35 Tamil Tiger rebels have been killed in heavy fighting in north-eastern Sri Lanka, defence officials say.

Sri Lankan forces and Tamil Tiger rebels exchanged artillery and mortar fire in Trincomalee district.

The army launched a ground offensive last week to reach a waterway blocked by the rebels in the area.

Rebel officials reportedly said a 2002 ceasefire was now "null and void" and Sri Lanka faced a renewed civil war.

The clashes are the bloodiest encounters between government troops and rebels since the 2002 truce ended a lengthy conflict.

War warning

The government has described its action as a humanitarian intervention to open the canal's sluice gates and allow water to flow to nearby villages.

But senior Tamil Tiger figures told news agencies they believed the ceasefire was effectively over.

The country is entering a deeper state of conflict Jehan Perera Analyst

"The war has begun," S Elilan, a Tamil Tiger official in Trincomalee, eastern Sri Lanka, told Reuters news agency.

"It is the government which has started the war. Militarily, we have decided to fight back if the Sri Lankan army enters our area."

Analysts have warned the violence risked returning the country to all-out war.

"The country is entering a deeper state of conflict with ground troops on both sides fighting over territory in a sustained manner," analyst Jehan Perera told the Associated Press.

But the head of the UN monitoring mission in Sri Lanka, Ulf Henricsson, said a return to full-scale war would benefit neither side, and he expected a continuation of low-intensity conflict in the coming months.

Low profile

The government accuses the Tamil Tiger rebels of closing the canal, affecting the livelihoods of thousands of farmers around the Mavilaru waterway in Trincomalee.

The area stands along the ill-defined border between rebel-held and government-controlled territory.

The government launched the ground assault on Sunday after four days of air raids.

The BBC's Dumeetha Luthra in Colombo says the government has been trying to maintain a low profile on the advance.

This latest skirmish comes as the international ceasefire monitoring mission faces severe problems.

Denmark and Finland are pulling out because the Tigers refuse to provide safety guarantees for individual monitors from EU countries.

The rebels say those observers can no longer be neutral because the EU has listed the Tigers as a terrorist organisation.

The withdrawal will reduce an already over-stretched mission by a third.