Sri Lanka’s Tamil Tiger leaders remained at large today after the president declared victory in his nation’s quarter-century civil war with the rebels.

Sri Lankan President Mahinda Rajapaksa said today his country has militarily defeated the Tamil Tiger rebels.

Sri Lanka’s military said today it had taken control of the island’s entire coastline and cut off any sea escape for Tamil Tiger leaders trapped in a tiny slice of remaining rebel territory.

SRI LANKAN troops advanced on the Tamil Tigers yesterday and 5,000 civilians fled the shrinking war zone, signalling an end to Asia’s longest modern war.

Sri Lankan today forces battled to take complete control of the country’s coastline and surround the reeling Tamil Tigers in a final push to destroy the rebel group and end the country’s civil war, the military said.

Thousands of civilians braved rebel fire today to break out of Sri Lanka’s war zone, the military said, as health workers abandoned the only hospital in the area – leaving hundreds of wounded behind – because of unrelenting shelling.

Sri Lankan troops closed in on separatist rebels in an ever-shrinking coastal war zone, as two prominent guerrillas surrendered and tens of thousands of refugees clutching their belongings fled the fighting in boats.

The Sri Lankan military said soldiers have killed 35 Tamil rebels in the latest fighting inside the ever-shrinking sliver of rebel territory in the war-torn north.

The Sri Lankan military said government troops have killed 93 Tamil Tiger rebels in fierce fighting in the war-ravaged northern region.

A suspected rebel suicide blast near a mosque in southern Sri Lanka killed 10 people and wounded three government ministers.

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.

Three artillery barrages struck a hospital in Sri Lanka’s chaotic war zone, slamming into its paediatrics ward and its women’s wing and killing nine patients, the Red Cross said today.

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.

THE United Nations said yesterday that “many” civilians have been killed in recent fighting in Sri Lanka’s civil war and called the situation for thousands of displaced people trapped in the northern conflict zone a crisis.

Sri Lanka’s military said its forces have entered the Tamil Tiger rebels’ last stronghold of Mullaittivu in the country’s north-east.

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.

A rebel-affiliated website said today a pre-emptive strike against Sri Lankan troops killed 60 soldiers close to the Tamil Tigers northern headquarters.

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

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 bomb hidden on the baggage rack of a packed bus exploded today, killing 24 people at a bus station outside Sri Lanka’s capital, authorities said.

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.

Clashes between government forces and Tamil Tiger separatists killed at least 40 combatants across northern Sri Lanka, the military said today, as air force jets bombed a rebel commanders' camp.

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

A bomb tore through a packed bus carrying mostly elderly Buddhist pilgrims today in central Sri Lanka, killing at least 18 people and wounding 51 others, the military said.

The death toll from massive tidal waves that struck Sri Lanka’s coastline leapt to more than 11,500 today as thousands of soldiers and families searched for bodies a day after the disaster.