Deadly bus blast hits Sri Lanka

06/06/2008| IslamWeb

An explosion on a bus near the Sri Lankan capital Colombo has killed at least 20 people, police said.

 

The suspected bombing happened on a passenger bus in Moratuwa during rush hour on Friday.

 

Ranjith Gunasekara, a police spokesman, told the Associated Press news agency that at least 40 other people were injured.

 

Brigadier Udaya Nanayakkara, a military spokesman, blamed the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) rebel group for the attack.

 

The LTTE, or Tamil Tigers, have been fighting the Sri Lankan government for two decades in an attempt to secure a homeland for ethnic minority Tamils in the north and east of the island.

 

The incident on Friday is the latest in a series of attacks against commuters in and around Colombo.

 

At least 18 people were wounded when a bomb exploded as a packed commuter train passed between Colombo's Wellawatte and Dehiwela areas on Wednesday.

 

And on May 26, another attack on a commuter train blamed on the Tamil Tigers killed nine people and wounded 84 others.

 

The latest violence against civilians comes as the Sri Lankan military is pressing an offensive to retake the Tigers' northern stronghold.

 

Analysts say the government has been gaining ground recently in the decades-long civil war but see no clear winner on the horizon.

 

 

 

 

PHOTO CAPTION:

Sri Lankan police [Reuters]

 

 

Al-Jazeera