Colombo, January 3
Sri Lankan jets and attack helicopters bombed Tamil Tiger positions in the north of the island on Saturday, the military said, a day after ground forces seized the rebels’ de facto capital Kilinochchi. The military is now targeting the port town of Mullaitivu and other rebel strongholds in the north, as it seeks to deliver a knockout blow to end the island's 25-year separatist war in which more than 70,000 people have been killed.

Meanwhile, at least three people were injured and several vehicles damaged in an explosion on Saturday in the commercial quarter of Colombo, the second in the capital in two days.

Military spokesman Brigadier Udaya Nanayakkara blamed rebels for the attack, which he said was an attempt to scare people or to show that Colombo was not secure.

“A small IED (improvised explosive device) fixed underneath a van exploded and three people were injured,” Nanayakkara said. There has been no direct comment from the LTTE (Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam) on the fall of Kilinochchi, for long the centre of the rebels’ fight for an independent homeland for the Tamil minority.

“Fighter Jets raided a Sea Tiger base in Mullaitivu while the MI-24 helicopters attacked rebel positions in and around Mullaitivu in support of ground troops,” Air Force spokesman Wing Commander Janaka Nanayakkara said.

Troops fought their way into Kilinochchi, deep in the north, on Friday in one of the biggest blows for the rebels in years. Details of casualties from the fighting have not yet emerged and a pro-rebel website said the Tigers had moved their headquarters further northeast before the town fell.

“The Sri Lanka Army (SLA) has entered a virtual ghost town,” the website said. “The Tigers, who had put up heavy resistance so far, had kept their casualties as low as possible in the defensive fighting.” Nanayakkara said troops were carrying out search and recovery operations in Kilinochchi town on Saturday.

Security was tightened across the island following a suicide bombing that killed three air force personnel in the capital Colombo shortly after President Mahinda Rajapaksa announced the fall of Kilinochchi. — PTI

London, January 3
There is no doubt about Pakistan’s complicity in the Mumbai attacks, internationally acclaimed India-born author Salman Rushdie has said and urged Britain to stop aid to Islamabad for failing to act against terrorists operating from its soil.

“There is no question that this was Pakistan. You could see it as an act of war,” the writer of “Satanic Verses”and “Midnight’s Children” said in an interview to The Times.

“The West should be tougher on Pakistan. It is trying to play both ends against the middle -- to look like the friend of the revolutionaries on one hand and a friend of the West in the fight against terrorism. It can’t be both things,” he said.

“This country should make clear that as long as Pakistan harbours terrorists, it’s not going to get any Western aid.” Mumbai saw a demonstration of “extraordinary barbarism” that people are prepared to unleash on the world, the controversial author said.

“How many of these attacks do we need before we understand what's going on?” Recalling his days in Mumbai, Rushdie said he watched with horror as flames tore through the Taj Mahal Palace hotel in Mumbai.

“Those are the streets I grew up on. Two of the characters in my novel ‘Midnight's Children’ consummate their love affair in the Palace, as so many of us did.” — PTI

Chief of the Awami League Sheikh Hasina will be the next Prime Minister of Bangladesh, after leading her party to a landslide victory last week, according to party officials.

“Sheikh Hasina will be the next Prime Minister of Bangladesh. The party does not have any other alternative,” senior league leader Abdul Jalil said, dismissing speculation that a new face would replace Hasina, who has led the party since 1981. Hasina served as the country’s premier between 1996 and 2001. Her father, Sheikh Mujibur Rahman, was the country’s founding president.

Newly Awami League-led grand alliance MPs were sworn in on Saturday, with Hasina expected to be declared as the leader of the House. Opposition MPs, largely from the Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP), which was reduced to a paltry 29 seats, will be sworn in on Sunday after accepting the election results on Friday, only a day after rejecting the results accusing the interim government of conspiring with the league.

The BNP maintained the election was rigged, but it now says the party and its leader, Khaleda Zia, is willing to work with its bitter rivals to improve governance. “Khaleda Zia will be ready to cooperate with the incoming Prime Minister and her government,” said BNP secretary-general Khandakaer Delwar Hossain, adding that “We hope Sheikh Hasina will invite Khaleda Zia and discuss cooperation.” Hasina said on Thursday she would offer senior parliamentary posts and even cabinet positions to the BNP if they work with her new government.

Washington, January 3
Michelle Obama, who will become America’s next first lady on January 20, opened up about how she first met her husband, a “no-frills guy”, in a television interview broadcast.

“He didn’t care about what other people thought and how he looked, and he was not into fashion but very much into issues. He cared more about the work that he was doing in the community than how he looked,” Michelle Obama told CNN.

“He always has and always will be a kind of no-frills guy.” When she first learned about her future husband, she “probably did what a lot of people do when they hear about Barack Obama. First, I thought, what kind of a name is Barack Obama?” Michelle Obama told CNN.

“My assumption was, this guy’s got to be a little weird. Probably a little nerdy. I’d already created an image of this very intellectual image of this nerd.” But when she got to know Obama better after he was hired at Chicago law firm Sidley Austin, where she worked, Michelle Obama said: “we clicked right away.”

“He told me more about his background, and he fleshed it out a bit more. I found out that his father was from Kenya, his mother was a white woman from Kansas and that he had spent part of his life in Indonesia,” she said. — AFP

London, January 3
The British army is learning the traditional Indian sport 'kabaddi' and hopes that the game will help it recruit men from the under-represented Asian community. A team of 'kabaddi' players meets often at a gymnasium in Larkhill, Wiltshire, to practise the sport.

The team recently defeated a 'kabaddi' team from Italy, and is likely to play against a team of India's Border Security Force (BSF) soon. The game was first introduced in Britain through a Channel 4 documentary in the early 1990s. It soon gained a small but devoted following, including among some police forces.

The army team's coach is Ashok Das, an Indian-origin Briton, who believes his players will form the nucleus of an English national team that will challenge India's dominance in the game. Colonel Paul Farrar, deputy head of army recruiting, saw "a really good game ... something the British army ought to look at seriously." Second Lieutenant Nick Burdick, of 14 Regiment, the Royal Artillery, in Larkhill, was tasked with putting a team together. — PTI

Washington, January 3
A Muslim family that was ordered off an AirTran Airways flight on New Year's Day received an apology and refund yesterday from the airlines, which said its decision to bar the passengers was necessary.

Atif Irfan said in an interview with CNN that federal authorities removed him, seven members of his family and a friend from the flight after passengers overheard members of the group talking about the safest place to sit on the plane. He said they were being careful to avoid any buzzwords like "bomb" that would trigger a security alert.

The group was flying out of the Reagan Washington National Airport and was headed for a religious retreat in Florida when other passengers apparently overheard the conversation and reported it to authorities.

AirTran, a subsidiary of AirTran Holdings Inc, issued a statement apologising to the nine and the other passengers who were inconvenienced by the incident. It said the airfare of the nine was refunded and other passengers would be reimbursed for expenses incurred by taking other flights.

"We apologise to all of the passengers - to the nine who had to undergo extensive interviews from the authorities, and to the 95 who ultimately made the flight," the discount airline said in a statement.

The Washington-based Council on American-Islamic Relations said it filed a complaint yesterday with the US department of transportation. The Islamic civil rights group said in a statement it was working with the Muslim passengers and the airline to address the civil liberties issues related to the incident.— Reuters