Suspected Tamil Tiger rebels kill 13 workers

Suspected Tamil Tiger rebels raided a village in eastern Sri Lanka, abducted 14 Sinhalese labourers and shot 13 dead.

The reason for the attack late yesterday at a state-run immigration project in Mhasenpura village, Batticaloa district, was not immediately clear. But a government spokesman called it a “sinister plot” by the rebels to provoke a Sinhalese backlash.

One of the victims managed to escape, said Deputy Inspector General of Police Nihal Karunaratne.

“A group of about 25 came to the village, spotted the house where these people were staying and took them away,” Karunaratne said.

The village is close to areas controlled by the rebels, who are fighting for a separate state for minority Tamils, saying they are discriminated against by the majority Sinhalese.

The killings top a series of violent incidents in which more than 300 people have been killed since April amid escalating attacks that each side has blamed on the other, raising fears the island country is heading back to the all-out war that was halted in 2002.