Sri Lanka's Tamil Tiger rebels Sunday opened a new front in their offensive to remove a renegade commander in a further blow to the island's faltering peace process, officials said.
The main Tamil Tiger force mounted the initial onslaught from the north-eastern port district of Trincomalee, but another drive was launched from the opposite direction, military sources and aid officials said.
As the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) stepped up pressure on the renegade commander, V. Muralitharan, better known as Karuna, 18 fighters loyal to him surrendered to government forces here.
Military officials said the 18 Karuna loyalists travelled by boat to the navy-held Norway island just off the main sea port here Sunday to give themselves up to naval authorities.
Further south, Tigers had taken control over the town of Vakarai Saturday and from the second advance took several key coastal bases of Karuna, the sources said.
Diplomats say the fighting, the first since the rebels and government entered an uneasy truce in 2002, have dimmed prospects for reviving a Norway backed effort to end ethnic bloodshed that has killed 60,000 since 1972.
Karuna's positions in Akkaraipattu and Tirrukkovil fell to the advancing second column on Saturday, local military sources said when contacted by telephone. They said the Tigers were now moving westwards towards a key renegade jungle base.
They said there was little resistance as Karuna's breakaway faction had withdrawn to a point where security forces had unwittingly been placed right between the two warring factions.
"Advance commando teams of the LTTE moved into the south-western sector of the Batticaloa district and began consolidating strategic positions there since Saturday morning," the pro-rebel Tamilnet.com website reported.
Karuna's faction said nine of its fighters were killed and 10 wounded while another 300 surrendered or were captured by the main Tiger group.
Military sources, however, placed the number of fatalities on both sides at about 20. At least two civilians - an ambulance driver and a paramedic - were also killed in the crossfire.
The LTTE leadership, known for its ruthlessness in putting down dissent, said it had started "co-ordinated operations to expel Karuna," who led an unprecedented breakaway from the Tigers on March 3.
Karuna had accused the leadership based in northern Sri Lanka of ignoring the interests of Tamils in the east, who put up much of the fighting force in the Tigers' three-decade campaign for a separate Tamil homeland.
"We are taking all efforts to bring a closure to Karuna's actions and the resulting disturbances and anxiety caused in the east," the LTTE said in its first statement since mounting the attack against Karuna on Friday.
"We will take every effort to avoid bloodshed and loss of lives."
However, UN's Children's Fund on Sunday expressed concern for the safety of children and asked the warring factions to free child soldiers amid reports that young boys and girls had been killed and wounded in the fighting.