S Lanka ships attacked by Tigers

By Roland Buerk
BBC News, Colombo

The Tamil Tigers have attacked two merchant ships carrying supplies to Jaffna in northern Sri Lanka, badly damaging one, defence officials say.

Navy sailors on board the ships fired and destroyed two of the rebel boats and captured a third.

The Tigers have not commented. The Jaffna peninsula is held by the government but cut off by territory controlled by the rebels.

The attack happened in the seas off northern Sri Lanka before dawn.

Three Tamil Tiger boats attacked two merchant ships heading for the Jaffna peninsular which were carrying what the Navy said were humanitarian supplies for civilians, officials say.

Northern offensive

A Navy spokesman, Cdr DKP Dassanayake, said sailors on board the ships fired at the attackers with machine guns.

Two of the rebel boats were destroyed, he said, one exploding close enough to cause considerable damage to one on the ships.

Cdr Dassanayake said the third boat was captured.

The Jaffna Peninsula, in the far north of Sri Lanka, is controlled by the government, but land routes to it are cut off by territory held by the Tamil Tigers, so troops and supplies have to be brought in by sea and air.

The attack on the ships comes as government forces push ahead with an offensive in the north, aiming to crush the rebels and end their fight for a separate state for the ethnic Tamil minority.