Sri Lankans were voting today for a new Parliament, with President Mahinda Rajapaksa looking to consolidate his political dominance after winning re-election in January and then detaining his chief rival.

Sri Lanka's former army chief and presidential candidate was hauled away by military police today from his office, political allies said, after weeks of complaining of government harassment.

Sri Lankans crowded voting stations throughout Colombo today in a hard-fought election to decide whether the incumbent president or his former army chief should lead the nation’s recovery from a brutal civil war.

A video purportedly showing troops shooting blindfolded, naked Tamils in the final months of Sri Lanka’s civil war has revived calls for a war crimes investigation and cast a shadow over the upcoming presidential election.

One of America's wealthiest men was arrested on the day he was due to fly to London over a £15.6m (€17.11m) insider trading case.

The Government has scrambled an aid expert to war-torn Sri Lanka to help distribute humanitarian supplies.

THE Tamil Tiger rebels admitted defeat in their 25-year-old war with the Sri Lankan government yesterday, offering to lay down their guns as government forces swept across their last strongholds in the northeast.

The Tamil Tiger rebels admitted defeat in their 25-year-old war with the Sri Lankan government today, offering to lay down their guns as government forces swept across their last strongholds in the northeast.

The United Nations condemned both sides in Sri Lanka’s war zone today after artillery shells tore through a hospital packed with civilians for a second day, killing at least 50, setting an ambulance ablaze and forcing medical staff to huddle in bunkers for safety.

AN overnight artillery barrage in Sri Lanka’s northern war zone killed at least 378 civilians and wounded more than 1,100, a government doctor said yesterday, calling it the bloodiest day he had seen in the army’s offensive against the Tamil Tiger rebels.

Sri Lanka’s separatist rebels have asked Britain and France to continue pushing for a ceasefire in the island’s civil war after the two European nations’ foreign ministers failed to secure a halt in the fighting to allow civilians to evacuate.

SRI LANKA’S government dropped leaflets across the northern war zone yesterday urging civilians to flee the fighting amid accusations the military pounded the area with artillery shells that killed at least 10 civilians.

THE Sri Lankan government, under intense pressure to prevent civilian deaths, said yesterday it would immediately stop air strikes and artillery attacks, but rejected calls for a ceasefire in its war against the Tamil Tiger rebels.

Facing imminent battlefield defeat, Sri Lanka’s Tamil Tiger rebels have declared a unilateral ceasefire and called on the government to halt its offensive to spare the tens of thousands of civilians trapped by the fighting.

Tens of thousands of civilians trapped in Sri Lanka’s northern war zone are facing starvation, the Tamil Tiger rebels warned today as the UN sent its top humanitarian official to assess the crisis.

HUNDREDS who fled intense fighting in Sri Lanka’s war zone were awaiting evacuation from this tiny coastal village yesterday as the UN reported that nearly 6,500 ethnic Tamil civilians were killed in the past three months.

Tens of thousands of civilians fled Sri Lanka's northern war zone ahead of the government's deadline today for separatist Tamil rebels to surrender.

SRI LANKA’S president ordered a two-day suspension of offensives against Tamil Tiger rebels to enable tens of thousands of trapped civilians to leave the war zone, his office said yesterday.

Sri Lanka today announced it will suspend offensives against Tamil Tiger rebels for two days to enable tens of thousands of trapped civilians to move out of the war zone.

A former rebel leader whose defection helped Sri Lanka push the Tamil Tigers to the brink of defeat has joined the ruling party and been named a government minister.

Hundreds of sick and wounded people are stranded in a makeshift hospital in war-wracked northern Sri Lanka, the Red Cross said today as it urged the government and Tamil Tiger rebels to let the patients out of the conflict zone.

SRI Lanka’s prime minister yesterday rejected calls for a ceasefire from donor countries concerned by reports of growing civilian casualties in the South Asian nation’s civil war and instead demanded the Tamil Tiger rebels’ unconditional surrender.

Sri Lanka’s president today urged the Tamil Tiger rebels to allow the estimated 250,000 civilians trapped in the northern war zone to flee to safety following reports of heavy casualties among non-combatants stuck in the shrinking territory.

Sri Lanka’s military declared a “safety zone” to enable 250,000 trapped civilians to cross into government-controlled territory from the diminishing area held by Tamil Tiger rebels in the war-torn north.

The Sri Lankan government officially outlawed the Tamil Tiger rebel group, ruling out the possibility of restarting peace talks to end a quarter of a century of civil war.

GOVERNMENT forces captured the Tamil Tigers’ de facto capital in northern Sri Lanka yesterday, dealing a devastating blow to the rebels’ quarter-century fight for an independent state, the president said.

À suicide bomber has hit a civil defence force post in Sri Lanka killing at least five people.

Sri Lanka’s navy sank a Tamil Tiger ship and four smaller attack boats in a battle that killed 20 rebels off the north-eastern coast early today, the army said.

A bomb blast blamed on separatist Tamil Tigers wounded 45 people in Sri Lanka’s capital today.

An explosion has rocked the Sri Lankan capital Colombo, the country’s military said today.

Police say a bomb explosion on a passenger bus near Sri Lanka's capital has killed at least 21 people and wounded 47 others.

A BOMB ripped through part of a packed passenger train during evening rush hour yesterday, killing eight people and wounding 70 others near the Sri Lankan capital.

A bomb blamed on Tamil Tiger separatists ripped through a packed passenger train today killing seven people and wounding 70 others near the Sri Lankan capital of Colombo.

Nine suspects have been arrested in a bus bombing that killed 26 passengers outside Sri Lanka's capital, Colombo, police said today as air force jets pounded positions of the Tamil rebels blamed for the attack.

A day of fighting between Sri Lankan troops and Tamil Tiger rebels killed 28 insurgents and a soldier while troops overran guerrilla bunkers in the island’s north, the military said today.

A series of battles between government forces and Tamil Tiger rebels across Sri Lanka’s embattled north killed 28 rebels and four soldiers, the military said today.

A bomb explosion on a bus wounded at least 14 people near the Sri Lankan capital today.

A bomb ripped through a packed bus in Sri Lanka today, killing 23 people as the government officially withdrew from a ceasefire with Tamil Tiger rebels.

At least 34 people across northern Sri Lanka have been killed in the latest spate of violence across the country.

TURNING 90 yesterday, British science fiction writer and visionary Sir Arthur C Clarke had three birthday wishes: For ET to call, for man to kick his oil habit and for peace in his adoptive Sri Lanka.

Navy and army troops clashed with Tamil Tiger rebels in Sri Lanka's volatile north-east, triggering battles that left at least seven insurgents dead in the latest fighting in the tropical island's deepening conflict.

Government forces and Tamil Tiger rebels clashed AGAIN in northern Sri Lanka today, as Britain suspended some aid payments to the country amid the intensified fighting.

Tamil rebel planes bombed government military positions in northern Sri Lanka today in their second airstrike.

A roadside bomb tore through a civilian bus in northern Sri Lanka today, killing seven people and wounding 26, the army said, blaming Tamil Tiger rebels for the attack.