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President approves promotions to navy officers amidst remarkable run of success

by Shamindra Ferdinando
Navy headquarters Friday received presidential approval for a series of promotions to officers as Navy’s Eastern Command scored another significant victory over Sea Tigers off Pulmoddai earlier in the day.

The victory continued a remarkable run of success both in the eastern and the northern theatres over the past two years.

Fast Attack Craft [FAC], some of them built at the Colombo Dockyards destroyed at least two enemy craft and damaged another off Pulmoddai while they were moving southwards from Mullaithivu in the early hours of Friday.

Quoting monitored enemy transmissions, intelligence services said that at least 20 terrorists were killed in the confrontation, the latest in a series of engagements this month which had claimed the lives of at least 70 terrorists, naval sources said yesterday. Among the dead terrorists were several senior self-styled officers including Lieutenant Colonel Niroshan.

A senior navy officer said that one Colombo Dockyard built FAC was slightly damaged during the engagement and two sailors suffered shrapnel wounds.

Commodores Mohan Wijewickrema and Wasantha Karannagoda have been promoted to the rank of Rear Admiral with effect from September 15. Wijewickrema, who topped the batch of the second intake has been attached to India’s National Defence College [NDC] while Karannagoda has been at Pakistan’s NDC.

Captains M. R. U. Siriwardene, T. S. G. Samarasinghe, S. R. Samaratunga, B. A. J. G. Peiris and D. Samarawickrema have been promoted to the rank of Commodore. Commodore Samarasinghe topped batch of the fourth intake.

Commanders M. Premathilake, Amal Wijetunga, Saman Molligoda, Lakshman Illangakoon, Susith Weerasekara, Jayanth Colomage, Ruwan Dias, Damayantha Dharmasiriwardene, Jayantha Perera, Kithsiri Weerakoon, Samantha Rajapaksha, Athula de Costa, Navan Tennakoon, Shermal Fernando, Kanishka Kularatne and Mahinda Navaratne have been promoted to ranks of Captain. Captain Shermal Fernando topped the batch of the eighth intake.

The sources said that with the new appointments there would be some changes in some command and control posts.

Meanwhile, the Chinese vessel MV Yujia damaged on September 25 in an LTTE attack about 40 nautical miles north east of Mullaithivu and moved to Trincomalee for temporary repairs left the port escorted by Sri Lankan patrol vessels last Tuesday [12]. A senior navy officer in Trincomalee yesterday said that the vessel carrying a consignment of chemical fertilizer reached Madras port two days later. Sri Lankan navy vessels fought a fierce battle to save the Chinese vessel after terrorists launched an attack.

ICRC takes bodies of 32 LTTE cadres killed in Ampakamam battle to uncleared area

While the navy continued its string of success against Sea Tigers, army late last week repulsed a major terrorist attack on its positions at Ampakamam in the Kilinochchi district. At least 27 troops were killed and almost 100 wounded but forces managed to inflict heavy losses on the attackers.

By the time, terrorists broke off the attack and withdrew troops had beaten back wave after wave of attacks on their positions. Later on Friday troops collected 55 bodies of terrorists and requested the ICRC delegates based in Vavuniya to make arrangements to transfer them to the LTTE held area.

However, as some of the bodies were in an advance state of decomposition, the ICRC yesterday agreed to transfer bodies of 32 terrorists killed in the attack. These bodies were moved to terrorist controlled area through Mankulam Civilian Safety Zone [CSZ].

Senior army officers said that troops remain in the area where last week’s clashes occurred. "Operations are continuing in the general area east of Ampakamam," Major General Wasantha Perera said yesterday. Perera, the army’s security forces commander in the Wanni region said that troops repulsed the attack causing heavy losses among the attackers.

On the same day in the general area Vavunikulam also in the Wanni, troops assaulted nine enemy bunkers killing at least 12 terrorists.

Last week’s attack was the first serious clash in the North East Sri Lanka after last month’s abortive army attempt to destroy LTTE positions at Periyamadu in the western part of the Wanni region. Over 100 soldiers were killed and several hundred wounded, of them just over 100 seriously when terrorists repulsed the two pronged offensive on their positions by troops engaged in the last conducted phase of operation Ranagosa.

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