Tuesday, February 27, 2007

LTTE fires 122MM mortars at VIP escort

Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) fired mortar shells hit an VIP escort today in Batticaloa. 11 people sustained injuries due to the attack. US ambassador Robert Blacke and Italian ambassador Prio Mariani were among the injured. Both of them suffered shrapnel wounds. Disaster management minister Mahinda Samarasinghe was also on board an SLAF helicopter when the attack took place. He received no injuries. The escort was hit when the helicopters landed in the Webber stadium of Batticaloa.

122MM mortars can cause widespread damage and has a range of 7-10 KM.

16 comments:

  1. Correction..The US ambassadors name is Robert Blake.

    ReplyDelete
  2. The German ambassador was also slightly injured, according to CNN.

    ReplyDelete
  3. Points to discuss with VIP
    1)Danger of Long Range arms by LTTE
    2)How easy civilians can get hurt by LTTE wepons. Until to date some of these VIP been accusing the Gov forces.
    3)Most of all India will have to pay a bigger penelty if they do not help to sort out the issue in Sri Lanka. Growing Economy in India can not affort to have conflicts in Sri Lanka . That would be a huge security risk for them.
    4) Most of all (hopeful) Oil wells in Sri Lanka could bring the end of the LTTE.

    Rich nations love the Oil :)

    ReplyDelete
  4. 122mm mortars?? or are the 120mm mortars? The tigers are known to use 120mm mortars with a effective range of 8~9km. Some of these 120mm were recovered from recent Op's in the east.

    Finally a defence blog for Sri Lanka...Thanks guys.

    ReplyDelete
  5. 122mm mortars?? or are the 120mm mortars? The tigers are known to use 120mm mortars with a effective range of 8~9km. Some of these 120mm were recovered from recent Op's in the east.

    Finally a defence blog for Sri Lanka...Thanks guys.

    ReplyDelete
  6. 122mm mortars?? or are the 120mm mortars? The tigers are known to use 120mm mortars with a effective range of 8~9km. Some of these 120mm were recovered from recent Op's in the east.

    Finally a defence blog for Sri Lanka...Thanks guys.

    ReplyDelete
  7. it should be corrected as 120MM mortars. Tigers dont have 122MM mortars but they do have 122MM artillery. but all artillery guns in eastern province has been captured by security forces. However eastern rebels still have some 5 120MM mortars with them/

    The post was written hastly when the news was 'hot'. Apologies for mistakes.

    ReplyDelete
  8. Yes they do have 122mm Artillery, which has a range of about 14~16km.
    Could'nt the firefinder radars find the tiger battery? Are they working?
    The LTTE might smuggle in to HEZ a few 60mm mortars and cause chaos, dont you think? Whith 1-2km range they could target fuel depos/storage, airports, power stations VVIP homes & a lot of other valuable targets.

    ReplyDelete
  9. smuggling in a 60MM mortar into urban areas may be impossible. They would have to bypass several checkpoints and some parts of the weapons cannot be dismantled so they wont be able to smuggle part by part too. But it would be shit if they did so.

    In fact the artillery detecting radar can easily identify the location but the problem is that LTTE moves the artillery soon after firing. Today Kfirs attacked identified mortar positions in Thoppigala and the results are yet to be determined.

    ReplyDelete
  10. Just in case you guys didn't see this this was posted by the LTTE

    ----- Original Message -----
    From: LTTE Peace Secretariat LTTE
    At: 2/27 12:37:03

    *Note: Please find the statement from LTTE Pease Secretariat on the incident
    in Batticaloa this morning. *
    **
    *Unannounced air craft landing in Batticaloa comes under LTTE fire*



    Two air crafts that landed in two military installations in Batticaloa came
    under LTTE fire this morning at 9.30am. One aircraft landed in the
    Batticaloa military air strip and the other landed inside the Batticaloa
    military Head Office premises.



    In recent times the Batticalo air space has only been used by the Sri Lankan
    military. The two landing sites, the Batticaloa air strip and the military
    head office complex are used for military purposes only. The air strip was
    also used to bring military supply. Sri Lankan military also uses these two
    locations as artillery positions. Even this morning there was provocative
    shelling by the Sri Lankan military in Batticaloa.



    LTTE military spokesman, S Ilanthirayan, expressed shock and sadness that
    Sri Lankan Government has exposed senior diplomats to danger by allowing air
    crafts carrying them into an area where they have declared military
    operations without informing LTTE in advance. He added that this is criminal
    negligence on the part of the Sri Lankan government. He said that simple
    diplomacy could have avoided the unfortunate incident and condemned the
    childish action of the Sri Lankan military.



    Ilanthirayan noted that a channel of communication exists between the LTTE
    and UN agencies and the ICRC for exchanging flight information when flying
    to the Palaly military airport in Jaffna. This well established and
    effective channel is operated through the LTTE Secretariat for Liaison with
    UN and International Agencies in Kilinochchi. No such channel of
    communication has been opened regarding Batticaloa airspace.



    Indeed, immediately after the event, Marian Din Kajdomcaj, Head of UN
    Security, contacted M Pavarasan of LTTE Liaison office and the shelling was
    stopped immediately and the air crafts with foreign diplomats were able to
    take off safely.



    Kajdomcaj thanked Pavarasan of LTTE for the prompt action and acknowledged
    their failure to warn LTTE about the flight in advance.




    --
    Peace Secretariat of the Liberation Tigers of Tamileelam.
    Kilinochchi.
    Tamileelam.

    ReplyDelete
  11. yankee,
    we saw it. It was quite entertaining to see how the tigers were trying to get away with it lol.

    ReplyDelete
  12. Maybe the Airforce should write out a message on a 500lb bomb and send it to the Peace Secretariat

    ReplyDelete
  13. "Maybe the Airforce should write out a message on a 500lb bomb and send it to the Peace Secretariat"

    and then they will whine about civilian casualties. pathetic assholes.

    ReplyDelete
  14. LOL- Yes,the LTTE Peace secretariat always has a different version of the story which is both amusing and entertaining- TamilNet, please continue you're daily parody LOL. World media channels have also exposed these hilarious denials over the past on year.

    ReplyDelete
  15. Send Gifts to Srilanka, Flowers to Srilanka, Cakes and Chocolates to Sri Lanka and Colombo.

    ReplyDelete

All DefenceNet members will communicate using the account DefenceNet bearing profile number 11553575476849786179. This number can be found at the end of Profile URL. Beware of impostors.

Comments with racist remarks, personal attacks and misinformation will be deleted. Replying to any such comment will only encourage the saboteurs to post more. We request all our readers to ignore such postings and continue the discussion without diverting from the theme of the blog.