Calls for ceasefire rejected

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 Lankan forces captured the insurgents’ biggest sea base yesterday — cutting off their main supply point in the latest in a string of military victories that has squeezed the Tamil Tigers into a 85sq km sliver of coastal land.

Even before the base was taken, Prime Minister Ratnasiri Wickremanayake told parliament that the “last moment” of the rebels’ 25-year-old fight for a separate Tamil homeland was near.