Sri Lanka repulses major Tamil attack

The Sri Lankan military said today that its forces thwarted a major Tamil Tiger rebel attack on a strategic jetty in Muttur, killing 35 insurgents, as a Norwegian peace envoy travelled to the northern rebel heartland in an effort to prevent the country from sliding back into full-blown civil war.

“Our forces have repulsed a major terrorist attack, and based on our ground information we have learned that 35 bodies of terrorists are lying there,” military spokesman Maj. Upali Rajapakse said in Colombo. The rebels had tried to capture a jetty that is a major sea supply link for the military, he said.