COLOMBO, Aug. 3 (Xinhua) -- An artillery shell hit a
school in an eastern Sri Lanka town Thursday, killing 10 civilians, who were
hiding there to escape fighting, Sri Lankan military said.
The military said the shell was fired by the
Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) rebels, adding there are about 20 others
injured in the incident.
The rebels and army fought with artillery, mortar
bombs and small arms fire on Thursday in and around the town of Mutur in the
eastern district of Trincomalee.
Witnesses said the fighting has been close and heavy.
Civilians are hiding in schools, colleges and churches to escape the fighting.
The fighting in the Trincomalee district was sparked
off by the current spat between the rebels and the government over the shutdown
of a sluice gate.
The government forces began an advance into the rebel
area at Verugal in the Trincomalee district on Sunday and are still trying to
reach there in the face of heavy resistance form the rebels.
The fighting has overshadowed the fragile
Norwegian-backed ceasefire, and the two sides, however, keep on denying claims
that a full-scale war had returned to the island's north and eastern provinces
for the first time since the truce accord of February 2002. Enditem
