Tamils

In the government's first military success since a major rebel offensive last month, Sri Lankan troops repulsed a land-and-sea attack Saturday by hundreds of Tamil rebels. Defense Ministry spokesman Brig. Sunil Tannekoon said 230 rebels and eight soldiers were killed in the fighting near a strategic northern military base. Afterward, the military reinforced its positions there, Tannekoon said. "We are fully prepared to face any new threat," he said.

Despite opposition from Tamil rebel leaders, India will proceed with plans to sign, as "guarantor," an agreement to end the five-year-old ethnic war in Sri Lanka, Indian officials said Monday. At the same time, according to Indian news agency reports, the police in Sri Lanka used tear gas and rubber bullets to disperse several thousand demonstrators protesting the agreement.

The leader of the Tamil Tigers returned to his rebel stronghold on the northern tip of this island nation Sunday amid reports that he has agreed to surrender his guerrilla group's weapons in exchange for a political position in a newly created majority Tamil province.

A Tamil Tiger rebel leader appealed Sunday to Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi of India to halt Indian army attacks against rebel positions as casualties mounted in the second day of intense fighting in the northern tip of this island nation.

Civilians fleeing the besieged Tamil community of Jaffna on Thursday described a terrified city without electricity and food, where most residents have abandoned their homes for school campuses that serve as refugee camps. "People are suffering. Most people are trying to get to refugee camps. Many people have not eaten or slept for four days," said a 25-year-old business student at Jaffna University who escaped Thursday morning.

The government said Thursday that it was willing to resume peace talks if Tamil rebels came up with a "substantial proposal" to end Sri Lanka's 17-year-old civil war. The offer came as the government continued a major offensive to retake Elephant Pass, which links Jaffna peninsula in the north with the rest of the island nation. The military said it captured a rebel armory after killing six guards Thursday.

Tamil guerrillas killed 14 Sinhalese--beheading four of them--after ambushing their vehicles on a country road, Sri Lankan police and military officials said Saturday. Assistant Police Superintendent Ebert De Alwis said by telephone that 25 to 30 rebels dressed in army fatigues emerged Friday from the jungles in in Meegaswewa, 135 miles to the east of Colombo, and fired at two trucks, a tractor and four bicycles on a gravel road.

After a week of fierce fighting against outnumbered Tamil Tiger rebels, Indian troops were on the verge Sunday of encircling the northern city of Jaffna and cutting off Tiger supply lines on the Indian Ocean, officials said here and in New Delhi. Indian forces captured the headquarters of the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam at Kapay North, just outside of Jaffna, Reuters news agency reported from New Delhi, quoting state-owned All India Radio.

A cyanide capsule found on a suicide bomber's body and other clues point toward Tamil rebels in the assassination of President Ranasinghe Premadasa, police said Sunday as huge crowds gathered to pay last respects. Tamil rebels have waged a 10-year secessionist war that has claimed thousands of lives, including several prominent figures killed in suicide bombings.

Indian military forces dropped leaflets from aircraft and used loudspeakers Wednesday to offer full amnesty to rank-and-file Tamil Tiger guerrillas entrenched inside the northern Sri Lankan city of Jaffna, Indian diplomats reported here. Meanwhile, a spokesman said the commander of the estimated 20,000 Indian troops on this island has been called back to New Delhi for "consultations."