Suspected Tamil rebels attack Sri Lankan air force checkpoint
(AP)
Updated: 2006-01-16 13:36

Suspected Tamil Tiger rebels hurled a grenade at an air force checkpoint, wounding an airman, military officials said Monday as rising violence threatened to plunge Sri Lanka back into civil war.

The assailants fled after throwing the grenade in northeastern Sri Lanka Sunday night, and the wounded airman was hospitalized, said military spokesman Brig. Athula Jayawardane.

No motive was not immediately known, but Jayawardane said it was part of the Tamil Tiger rebels' plan to expand their terror attack.

At least 74 Sri Lankan security forces have died since December 4 in a mounting spate of attacks that the government has blamed on the Tigers, who deny responsibility.

The Tigers fought since 1983 for a separate homeland in the northeast for ethnic minority Tamils, claiming discrimination by the majority Sinhalese.

A Norway-brokered cease-fire halted the war in 2002, but subsequent peace talks broke down because of disagreements over rebel demands for autonomy in the Tamil-majority northeast.

The attacks in recent weeks have sparked fears that the truce could collapse and the island nation may return to full-blown war.

Separately, troops on Monday found two anti-personnel Claymore mines in the northern area of Jaffna along a route used by government military forces based there, the Defense Ministry's Media Unit said.

Jaffna Peninsula is the traditional homeland of the country's Tamils.

The military has said that Claymores _ remotely detonated, above-ground anti-personnel mines designed to fire hundreds of steel balls _ appear to be the most favored weapons of the rebels.