War fears mount in Lanka

A Tamil rebel office in the island's troubled eastern district was bombed while another office of a Tamil political party was targeted in a pre-dawn strike, defence officials said, adding that there were no casualties.

In the northern peninsula of Jaffna, a private television relay station was vandalised overnight disrupting broadcasts in the region, officials said.

The violence came shortly after Public Security Minister Ratnasiri Wickremanayake vowed in parliament to strengthen the armed forces and the police to meet any threat to national security.

Former air force chief Harry Gunatillake said he feared the rhetoric could push the country away from Norwegian-brokered peace talks and closer to war, a fear shared by Asian and Western diplomats.

Wickremanayake, who is also deputy minister of defence, stopped short of referring to a direct threat from Tiger rebels but repeated the government stance of rejecting rebel demands to resume peace negotiations.

"We will strengthen armed forces in terms of men, material, ideas and weapons," Wickremanayake said during a debate on the defence budget. "We are ready to meet any threat to this sovereign nation."

Parliament Monday approved defence spending of 56.29 billion rupees (541 million dollars) for 2005, up eight percent from 52.08 billion rupees this year. Analysts said the increase is negligible when measured against double-digit inflation and a nine percent weakening of the rupee against the dollar in the past year.

There was no immediate reaction from the Tigers to the speech. But the rebels' website carried a letter from public organisations in the rebel-held Wanni region, saying they feared the country was slipping back to war.

"We feel that we are being pushed again into the war era as the permanent peace eagerly expected by all the people has collapsed," said the letter posted on the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam peace secretariat website.