Colombo, (Sri Lanka): A fierce battle between Sri Lanka's military and Tamil rebels killed at least 26 combatants, the two sides said, as an Indian envoy on Friday wrapped up a trip to the island nation in hopes of shoring up peace efforts.
The Sri Lankan military sent tanks and warplanes into eastern Batticaloa district on Thursday after the rebels attacked government troops, the Defense Department said on its Web site Friday.
Fifteen rebels were killed in artillery and airstrikes, while another four rebels died, and about 25 were wounded, in a separate encounter with security forces in the district, the military said.
The separatist Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam, however, said only one of its fighters died, and claimed to have killed seven government commandoes.
The rebels also accused the government of launching an offensive to seize control of their Batticaloa territory.
There was no way to reconcile the conflicting claims.
Batticaloa has been home to a breakaway faction of the mainstream rebels since a powerful eastern commander split in 2004 with 6,000 fighters. The uprising was suppressed by the northern-based rebels, though the renegades enjoy influence, and alleged military backing, in the area.
Meanwhile, India's Foreign Secretary Shiv Shankar Menon on Friday ended a brief visit to Sri Lanka, where he discussed the four-year-old peace process between the government and separatists that has all but collapsed amid renewed fighting in recent months.
Menon, during his three-day visit met Sri Lankan President Mahinda Rajapakse and Prime Minister Ratnasiri Wickramanayake and discussed the
"Current developments relating to the peace process" and economic affairs, a government statement said.
"I had fruitful talks with Sri Lankan leaders," Menon told reporters on his arrival in India, but he did not give further details.
Menon was dispatched to Sri Lanka by Prime Minister Manmohan Singh at the behest of the chief minister of India's Tamil Nadu state, M Karunanidhi.
There are strong ties between India's 56 million ethnic Tamils and those living in Sri Lanka.
Maj Upali Rajapakse, a military spokesman, said the rebels "launched a classic, conventional attack on our troops" at dawn Thursday in Batticaloa district. He said the military responded with tanks and air support to bomb the rebels' artillery positions.
The rebels said they killed seven government commandos in the fighting, though Rajapakse said only seven soldiers had been wounded. However, he said seven security personnel were killed in separate incidents, away from the main battle field, that he blamed on the rebels.
The military Friday said it had recovered the bodies of five rebels, believed killed in a confrontation with security forces late Thursday in northern Vavuniya, the defense department Web site said. There was no independent confirmation of the incident.
The Tigers have been fighting for over two decades for a separate homeland for the country's ethnic Tamil minority, citing discrimination by the Sinhalese majority.
A 2002 cease-fire temporarily took the steam out of the bloody civil war, but since last December, airstrikes, mine attacks, assassinations and heavy arms fire have killed more than 3,200 fighters and civilians.
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