COLOMBO, June 16 (AFP): A suspected Tamil Tiger rebel detonated explosives on his motorcycle outside a police office in northern Sri Lanka Monday, killing at least 12 police, officials said.
Forty people, including school children, were also wounded in the attack staged directly in front of the office in Vavuniya town, 258 kilometres (160 miles) north of Colombo, a police official said.
The most senior police official was not in the building at the time of the blast which occurred during the morning rush hour, a policeman in Vavuniya said when contacted by telephone.
He said nine policemen and three female constables were killed.
Officials at the Vavuniya hospital said they had received the bodies of 12 people killed in the blast, and a further 40 were rushed in for treatment, including school children.
Vavuniya borders Tamil rebel-held territory further north of the island.
The latest attack came as security forces stepped up pressure on the guerrillas inside their territory with air attacks and ground offensives.
The defence ministry reported that 19 rebels and five security personnel were killed in weekend battles in the north of the island.
The government insists it now has the upper hand in the 36-year-old conflict with the Tigers, who are fighting for a separate Tamil homeland in the majority Sinhalese island's north and east.
Sri Lanka has poured a record 1.5 billion dollars into the war effort this year, hoping for a quick end to the conflict that has left tens of thousands of people dead.
Air force fighter jets pounded a "logistics base and combat vehicle conversion plant" in Mullaitivu district, further north of Vavuniya, early on Sunday, the ministry said.
However, the rebel Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) said Sri Lankan jets had killed two civilians and wounded 11 more in the Sunday morning attack.
"Two civilians were killed by an aerial bombing of the Sri Lankan air force on Sunday in Puthukkuriruppu town centre (in Mullaitivu district)," the Tigers said in a statement on Saturday night.
