The Sri Lankan military said yesterday its troops had killed at least 180 Tamil Tigers during a weekend of fierce fighting around the rebels' shrinking fiefdom in the northeast of the island.Army spokesman Udaya Nanayakkara said the Tigers, boxed into an area of less than 50 square kilometres (19 square miles), had launched a series of counter-attacks against advancing troops in the district of Mullaittivu.
Meanwhile, some 2,000 former Tamil Tiger guerrillas joined Sri Lanka's ruling party yesterday, formalising a political alliance, officials said.
The former rebels are followers of former war-lord Colonel Karuna who defected from the separatist Tamil Tigers in 2004 and formed his own political party which went onto win local elections in the island's east last year.
They enrolled with the Sri Lanka Freedom Party (SLFP) at a ceremony at President Mahinda Rajapakse's tightly-guarded residence, officials said.
Following his defection Vinayagamoorthy Muralitharan, better known as Colonel Karuna, helped the Sri Lankan army drive Tigers out of the eastern district of Batticaloa, in one of the biggest military successes of 2007.
The military said it had killed 100 rebels in clashes on Friday and Saturday. yesterday it said it found another 80 bodies from Sunday's fighting.
Army spokesman Nanayakkara called it the bloodiest day for the guerrillas in the latest military campaign aimed at completely defeating them. "We have killed over 150 Tigers on Sunday and that is the biggest loss for them in a single battle," Nanayakkara said adding that troops used special forces, artillery guns and aircraft to pound rebel strong points.
"Security forces also lost a few soldiers... and a few (were) wounded," he said, without giving precise figures for government casualties. He added that a large haul of guns and ammunition were found.
The Sri Lankan government bars most journalists and aid workers from the north of the island, meaning the claims cannot be verified.
On Sunday, the defence ministry announced that the fighting had reached the "final phase" of operations against Tiger rebels, who have been leading a campaign for a separate Tamil state since 1972.
UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon last week reiterated his call for a swift halt to the conflict to avoid further civilian casualties after the International Red Cross said in January hundreds had been killed.
Sri Lanka officially estimates that 70,000 civilians remain trapped in the war zone along with around 500 Tiger fighters, but the United Nations says the number of non-combatants could be about 200,000.
The government also insists it is trying to aid civilians and accuses the Tigers of using them as "human shields".
Another 200 civilians crossed the front lines and sought shelter with government forces on Sunday, the defence ministry said, adding that a 17-year-old girl was wounded while trying to escape.
Some 36,000 people have already sought shelter with security forces since January.