Police posts attacked

[TamilNet, Monday, 04 October 1999, 08:17 GMT]
Two policemen were wounded when the Liberation Tigers attacked a police post at Pesaalai in Mannar yesterday evening around 8.30 p.m. said sources.

The Tigers threw grenade and fired with small arms at the police post at Sangiththan Vaadi, adjoining a Special Task Force (STF) camp, the sources said.

The police and the STF retaliated by firing mortars and small arms fire. Some shells fell on houses in the vicinity of the Murugan Temple. However, no civilian casualties have been reported.

Sources in Mannar said at least 50 youths have been arrested during a subsequent search operation by the STF and police.

Shops remained closed in Pesaalai this morning and no one, except government officers, were allowed to travel to Mannar from Pesaalai the sources added.

Elsewhere a police post at Mithirigiriya, a boarder village between Batticaloa and Polannaruwa districts, was destroyed when it was attacked by the Liberation Tigers around 8.30 p.m. last night.

The Tigers are reported to have ransacked the weapons from the police post.

Security sources said a jeep, which was taken away by the attackers, was later found abandoned and damaged in the jungle. Two civilians were killed and four policemen were wounded in the attack, they added.

The policemen had fled to the nearby jungle in the initial phase of the attack.

Sources said bodies of two civilians were found at the scene. Unconfirmed reports say they are of a detainee held at the police post and of a drunken man who was on the road when the attack took place.