Sri Lankan Navy Video Shows LTTE Aircraft Being Shot Down. 20th Feb09
Sri Lanka stepped up air defences on Saturday, a day after averting a major disaster in Colombo by knocking out two Tamil Tiger aircraft packed with explosives before they reached their targets.
Police and military officials said authorities expected the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) militants to try More.. more suicide attacks as they steadily lose territory to advancing government forces.
"They could try more desperate attacks like this," a military official here said. "But we have placed the air defence systems on full alert and we can meet the threat."
The Tigers are believed to have had five Czech-built Zlin-143 aircraft smuggled into the island in pieces and re-assembled. It is not known how many they have left after the government launched its all-out offensive.
Military officials said another 17 Tiger rebels were killed in ground battles in the island's north on Friday, before the group launched a kamikaze-style air raid over the capital.
Colombo activated its air defence system as the planes approached late on Friday, shooting down one near the city's main airport and apparently forcing the other off course and into the Inland Revenue building.
Air force spokesman Janaka Nanayakkara said each plane was packed with 215 kilos (473) pounds of C-4 type plastic explosives and the city's ground-based air defence units had prevented a big disaster.
However, the pro-rebel Tamilnet.com said the attacks, in which two people died and another 58 were wounded, were "successful."
"This is a desperate attack," said defence spokesman Keheliya Rambukwella. "They may be trying to divert attention from their defeats in the north."
Rambukwella said security forces hoped to crush the Tigers "in a matter of days," adding, "Very soon, this problem will be over."
Authorities said the wounded included tax department staff and bystanders hit by falling debris. The identity of the two dead has not been released, but one of them was believed to be a child.
Shortly after the attack, firemen and air force units recovered parts of the aircraft from the tax building.
A search of the wreckage of the downed plane found the pilot had no night vision equipment to fly in pitch darkness and used a pocket torch and a hand-held global positioning device.
The rebels said the targets were air force facilities in capital and that two men from their elite "Black Air Tiger" suicide squad piloted the two light aircraft in the attack. Both pilots died.
In neighbouring India, air defence systems were on alert for possible intrusion by rebel aircraft. A narrow strip of water separates Sri Lanka from the southern Indian state of Tamil Nadu, home to the 62 million Indian Tamils as well as to thousands of Sri Lankan Tamil refugees.
The guerrillas have now lost over 98 percent of the territory they once controlled and are confined to an area of less than 100 square kilometres (38 square miles) along a coastal jungle stretch in the island's northeast.
Fighting between the two sides has provoked international concern for the safety of tens of thousands of civilians trapped in the war zone.
United Nations special envoy on humanitarian affairs, John Holmes, appealed to the government and the Tamil Tigers to spare civilians as the warring factions appeared set for a final showdown.
Holmes said "tens of deaths and more injuries" of civilians are taking place daily inside the northern Wanni region, where security forces have hemmed the Tigers into a small stretch of jungle along the northeast coast.
"I urge both sides to do everything they can for a peaceful and orderly end to avoid a final bloody battle," he said at the end of a three-day visit to Sri Lanka.
Tens of thousands of people have died since the Tigers launched a campaign in 1972 to carve out a homeland for minority Tamils in the majority Sinhalese island's north and east.
© defence.ilkPolice and military officials said authorities expected the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) militants to try More.. more suicide attacks as they steadily lose territory to advancing government forces.
"They could try more desperate attacks like this," a military official here said. "But we have placed the air defence systems on full alert and we can meet the threat."
The Tigers are believed to have had five Czech-built Zlin-143 aircraft smuggled into the island in pieces and re-assembled. It is not known how many they have left after the government launched its all-out offensive.
Military officials said another 17 Tiger rebels were killed in ground battles in the island's north on Friday, before the group launched a kamikaze-style air raid over the capital.
Colombo activated its air defence system as the planes approached late on Friday, shooting down one near the city's main airport and apparently forcing the other off course and into the Inland Revenue building.
Air force spokesman Janaka Nanayakkara said each plane was packed with 215 kilos (473) pounds of C-4 type plastic explosives and the city's ground-based air defence units had prevented a big disaster.
However, the pro-rebel Tamilnet.com said the attacks, in which two people died and another 58 were wounded, were "successful."
"This is a desperate attack," said defence spokesman Keheliya Rambukwella. "They may be trying to divert attention from their defeats in the north."
Rambukwella said security forces hoped to crush the Tigers "in a matter of days," adding, "Very soon, this problem will be over."
Authorities said the wounded included tax department staff and bystanders hit by falling debris. The identity of the two dead has not been released, but one of them was believed to be a child.
Shortly after the attack, firemen and air force units recovered parts of the aircraft from the tax building.
A search of the wreckage of the downed plane found the pilot had no night vision equipment to fly in pitch darkness and used a pocket torch and a hand-held global positioning device.
The rebels said the targets were air force facilities in capital and that two men from their elite "Black Air Tiger" suicide squad piloted the two light aircraft in the attack. Both pilots died.
In neighbouring India, air defence systems were on alert for possible intrusion by rebel aircraft. A narrow strip of water separates Sri Lanka from the southern Indian state of Tamil Nadu, home to the 62 million Indian Tamils as well as to thousands of Sri Lankan Tamil refugees.
The guerrillas have now lost over 98 percent of the territory they once controlled and are confined to an area of less than 100 square kilometres (38 square miles) along a coastal jungle stretch in the island's northeast.
Fighting between the two sides has provoked international concern for the safety of tens of thousands of civilians trapped in the war zone.
United Nations special envoy on humanitarian affairs, John Holmes, appealed to the government and the Tamil Tigers to spare civilians as the warring factions appeared set for a final showdown.
Holmes said "tens of deaths and more injuries" of civilians are taking place daily inside the northern Wanni region, where security forces have hemmed the Tigers into a small stretch of jungle along the northeast coast.
"I urge both sides to do everything they can for a peaceful and orderly end to avoid a final bloody battle," he said at the end of a three-day visit to Sri Lanka.
Tens of thousands of people have died since the Tigers launched a campaign in 1972 to carve out a homeland for minority Tamils in the majority Sinhalese island's north and east.
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Sorry for the rant, I'm fed-up with all these caffeine junkies that think they own the world, while in reality we're still on one planet, so yield!