With the Tamil Tigers on the verge of total defeat, Sri Lanka today said it would keep up its military offensive until the leaders of the LTTE, mainly its chief Velupillai Prabhakaran was captured "dead or alive".
Terming the international calls for a ceasefire as "pre-mature", the Lankan defence secretary Gotabhaya Rajapaksa said: "after 30 years, the time has come finally for Prabhakaran and other Tiger leaders to be captured dead or alive". "The government would not stop until that end was achieved," he told the visiting British Foreign Secretary David Miliband and other delegation members, the Island Newspaper reported today.
The top Lankan official, who is also the brother of President Mahinda Rajapaksa, told the British delegation that a truce would only help the Tiger supremo Prabhakaran, who is believed to be holed up with his remnants fighters on a tiny patch of four sq km on the island's northeast coast.
His remarks come as Prabhakaran's close comrade-in-arms and now a government minister Karuna Amman today said the LTTE chief and his top aides have been unable to flee due to heightened vigil. The defence secretary did not mince his words, when he said it was Sri Lankan troops and civilians who had perished in the conflict and therefore the government was determined to finish off the LTTE, the paper said.
