ABOUT 70 TAMIL TIGERS SUSPECTED OF BEING KILLED IN A MAJOR AIR FORCE BOMBING ON A LTTE MILITARY TRAIING BASE

By Walter Jayawardhana

Sri Lanka Air Force sources said a major strike by their supersonic jets on a well selected Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam military training base may have killed about 70 Tamil Tiger cadres in the rebel stronghold of Mulathivu , in the troubled Northern Sri Lanka.

Citing aerial photographs taken by the attack jets Lieutenant Colonel Upali Rajapaksa of the Media Center of the Defense Ministry said, " The LTTE suffered major damage due to our bombing."

He further commented, “"Generally 60 to 70 (guerrillas) live in such bases and we believe that they have died or (been) wounded due to the bombing and resulting explosions." According to him the the training base pounded on by the Sri Lanka Air Force was in Wattapalai in the Multivu District , which is considered the most fortified military area by the Tamil Tigers.

A day before Group Captin Ajantha de Silva told reporters that the jet aircraft had struck the Iranamadu air strip used by the LTTE. The long known Iranamadu air strip is in the other LTTE military stronghold of Kilinochchi and is being believed to be used by the LTTE propeller driven air craft.

He said a communication base of the Tamil Tigers was also targeted in the bombing in Mulathivu.
During the strike on Kilinochchi a LTTE gathering of its spies were meeting , he said.
Rasiah Ilantheriyan, the LTTE military spokesman has denied any air raid on their military training facility has ever taken place.

It is customary for Ilantheriyan to contradict any air strike on their military facilities.
Meanwhile the the pro-LTTE news website, The Tamil Net published a report about an unnamed phantom aircraft flying over the troubled Jaffna peninsula controlled by Sri Lanka government security forces.

Observers said the LTTE website was referring to some LTTE propeller driven light aircraft that dropped a bomb at the Katunayaka military air base, days ago. The website said the aircraft flew on April 16. But it did not report of any bombs being dropped.