Sri Lankan Prez urges LTTE to surrender
IRNA - Islamic Republic News Agency
New Delhi, Nov 15, IRNA
Sri Lanka-Prez-LTTE
Sri Lankan President Mahinda Rajapaksa on Saturday urged the Tamil Tiger rebels to lay down weapons and come for talks, hours after his troops declared they had captured the rebels' last major naval bastion in the island's north.
The advancing troops backed by artillery bombardment had entered the Tamil Tiger rebels' naval bastion of Pooneryn in the north, and the defence ministry said that pitched battles between the two sides were on and the rebels were withdrawing.
President Rajapaksa, who is also Commander-in-Chief of the armed forces, in a televised address to the nation on Saturday morning announced the capture of Pooneryn and said that the troops were now in a position to open a land route to Jaffna (A-32) along the coastal belt nearly after two decades.
"I clearly tell the LTTE and its leader Velupillai Prabhakaran at this moment to lay down all their weapons and come for talks with us immediately. Laying down of weapons and surrendering will be a great service he could do for the people in the north", Rajapaksa said in his address, minutes after heading a National Security Council meeting at his official residence in Colombo, IANS reported.
Pooneryn is known to be the last major LTTE naval point on the western coastal belt, from where the rebels in the past have used their long-range artillery and mortar guns to fire at military targets.
The defence ministry said Saturday "Troops of Army Task Force 1 have entered the LTTE bastion of Pooneryn this morning. The troops had advanced along the northwestern coastal belt of the island and successfully negotiated the great marshlands south of Pooneryn last (Friday) night and cut off the Pooneryn-Paranthan road (B-69) close to Nallur before dawn of Saturday".
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