Sri Lanka says rebels' torture chambers found

Sri Lankan officials today said commandoes had found torture chambers at a captured rebel base, but the separatists said the cement cells were for holding prisoners and denied any torture had taken place.

Separately, five soldiers and two policemen were killed in two separate bomb blasts blamed on rebels in the volatile north.

The government provided no details to back its assertion that the insurgents used the cells to punish informers and people who tried escape their ranks.

The Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam said the cells were used to hold captives from a breakaway rebel faction, Karuna, and that the facility was abandoned a year ago.

Both the government and Tigers have been accused of torturing - and killing - dissenters and opponents, and each side routinely accuses the other of committing heinous acts, allegations that are regularly denied and often nearly impossible to verify.

The latest report came late Monday when the ministry posted a statement on its Web site saying, "Torture chambers and lockups were established to torture escapees and informers, including women cadres" at a captured camp in the eastern district of Ampara.

The website had a photograph taken from outside the four cells, showing a cement structure with four small doorways covered by rusty gates.

Chief military spokesman Brig Prasad Samarasinghe said Tuesday that "five escapees who have surrendered have told (government) officers that the facility was being used by the rebels to punish dissidents."

But neither he nor the website report provided details.

The rebels said the report was part of a government propaganda campaign to discredit them.

"The Sri Lankan state is now in the process of tarnishing the image of our liberation organisation," a rebel spokesman, Rasiah Ilanthirayan, said from the insurgents' headquarters in the northern town of Kilinochchi.

Separately, fighting broke out in eastern Sri Lanka today, killing a government soldier and wounding 15 others, the Defence Ministry said. The rebels said seven fighters were wounded in the ground battle in eastern Batticaloa province.

The chief military spokesman said government forces were advancing to capture rebel bases in the area to prevent the insurgents from attacking military camps.

As the Sri Lankan infantry advanced, the air force bombed a rebel camp in Verugal village, causing damage to the facility, the spokesman said. Verugal is under rebel control, but the military has smaller camps south of Verugal, which is in Batticaloa district.

Tamil Tiger spokesman Ilanthirayan confirmed the ground fighting and said seven rebels were wounded.

Also on Tuesday, two policemen were killed when suspected Tamil rebels triggered a roadside bomb in the government-held northern district of Vavuniya, Samarasinghe said.

About six hours later, also in Vavuniya, five soldiers were killed in a similar bomb blast.

Tamil Tigers set off the bomb targeting a group of army troops who were on a foot patrol, said acting military spokesman, Maj. Upali Rajapakse. The blast also wounded two soldiers.

The rebels have been fighting for more than 20 years for a separate homeland for the country's 3.1 million minority Tamils, who have suffered decades of discrimination by the majority Sinhalese.

Although both sides claim to be adhering to a Norwegian-brokered 2002 ceasefire, violence has escalated since late 2005, with more than 3,600 people killed last year alone.