Saturday, April 26, 2008, Rabi-ul-Sani 19, 1429    

Sri Lanka lost 185 soldiers in Jaffna battle

Colombo — At least 165 Sri Lankan soldiers were killed and 20 more went missing in a major battle with Tamil separatists this week, military sources told AFP Friday as journalists attacked widening censorship. The toll makes Wednesday’s clash the bloodiest in recent years and saw the authorities extend “unofficial” press censorship to hospitals and funeral parlours, a media rights group said.

The death toll from the sources were far higher than official defence ministry casualty figures, who have long been accused of massaging the statistics.

The ministry said 43 soldiers died and 38 were missing from Wednesday’s fighting in the northern peninsula of Jaffna.

“Some of the senior officers have been told that the army lost 185, including 20 who are still listed as missing,” said a military source who declined to be named. “We are trying to establish the fate of the missing. The Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) on Thursday returned via the international Red Cross the bodies of 28 soldiers they had captured.

The government also reported killing more than 100 rebels and wounding 100 more in the pre-dawn offensive along the Muhamalai front lines on the peninsula.The Tigers said only 25 of its fighters were killed.

Official defence ministry casualties reports and LTTE figures can seldom be verified because the government prevents journalists from visiting war zones and territory held by the rebels.

The ministry claims 3,105 rebels have been killed already this year — more than intelligence estimates of the number of LTTE fighters, which was put at 3,000 Wednesday’s confrontation was by far the biggest battle since Colombo withdrew from a Norwegian-arranged truce in Januar.—AFP