US turns to Lankan tactics to fight in Iraq and Afghanistan

The United States can learn from the Sri Lankan military's bloody war with Tamil Tiger rebels as it fights insurgents in Iraq and Afghanistan, a top US army commander said Thursday.
Lieutenant General James L. Campbell, commander of the US Army in the Pacific, said he was looking into the possibilities of military co-operation between the two countries to help the United States learn tactics.
"Sri Lankan security forces have experience in facing the kind of situation that our men and women are facing today in Iraq and Afghanistan," Campbell told reporters during a visit to the Sri Lankan military headquarters.
"We can benefit from the tactics and on dealing with improvised explosive devices. ... We can learn from them how best to deal with such things," he said.
Sri Lankan army chief Lionel Balagalle said: "Our troops have learnt the hard way and we are prepared to share our knowledge with each other."
The Sri Lankan military has suffered heavy casualties in the three-decade ethnic war, losing 18,000 troops until a Norwegian-brokered truce went into effect in February 2002.
The Tigers, who have been fighting for a separate Tamil homeland, have incurred similar casualties while more than 20,000 civilians are estimated to have died.
Both Sri Lankan forces and the rebels have been accused of gross human rights violations, although the two sides later began lessons conducted by the International Committee of the Red Cross on how to treat civilians under the Geneva Conventions.
Campbell is due on Saturday to open Sri Lanka's first peacekeeping exercise, hosted jointly by the United States, that will also train troops from Bangladesh, Nepal and Mongolia.
Campbell said Sri Lanka sending 750 troopers to Haiti next month as part of a UN force was a sign of Sri Lanka emerging as a key nation in international peacekeeping.
Sri Lanka has sought UN peacekeeping slots for soldiers who are likely to be demobilised once a final settlement is reached in the Tamil separatist conflict.
But Balagalle said there was no decision to send Sri Lankan troops to Iraq or Afghanistan.
"That is a foreign policy decision for the government and there is no such decision at the moment," Balagalle said.