A bomb tore through a packed bus carrying mostly elderly Buddhist pilgrims yesterday in central Sri Lanka, killing 18 people and wounding 51 others, the military said.
The blast inside the bus occurred at 7am in Dambulla, a town about 150km northeast of the capital, Colombo, said military spokesman Brigadier Udaya Nanayakkara, blaming separatist Tamil Tiger rebels.
Bus driver Rohana Wijesiri said he was taking about 100 passengers, mainly elderly women, to the holy city of Anuradhapura.
"When we were passing Dambulla there was a huge blast and the door near my seat got blown away," Wijesiri said.
The top and sides of the bus were ripped apart by the force of the blast. A severed hand could be seen among the blood-stained bags, glass and other debris strewn several meters from the vehicle.
"I do not remember what happened next, but I was running on the road. I saw my conductor fallen on the ground. He too got up and started running with me" Wijesiri said.
"As it [the bus] came near me, I heard thunder. I got thrown away," said Kankeaarachige Michael, a 52-year-old businessman, who was standing by the road when the blast occurred.
"When I saw blood gushing out of my body, I realized its a bomb," Michael said at Dambulla Base Hospital where he was being treated. Michael lost an eye in the blast.
Nanayakkara initially said 20 people had died in the blast, but he later changed the official toll to 18 after gathering more information.
Violence has intensified on this Indian Ocean island, with more than 700 people killed since the government withdrew from a cease fire with Tamil rebels last month.
A spokesman for the rebels could not immediately be reached for comment. The group, listed as a terror organization by the US and EU, routinely denies responsibility for such attacks.
Sri Lankan President Mahinda Rajapaksa's spokesman condemned yesterday's attack.
"They [the rebels] are targeting innocent civilians as they face defeats in the battle front," Chandrapala Liyanage said.
Before dawn on Friday, the army attacked rebel bunkers in the northern Jaffna peninsula, triggering a battle that killed 10 guerrillas and two soldiers, Nanayakkara said. Six more soldiers were wounded, he said.
Civilians have borne the brunt of the violence over the past month with three attacks on passenger buses killing dozens, including many schoolchildren.
INCURSION: After 13 PLA aircraft flew into Taiwan’s ADIZ, the US Department of State said that China should rather ‘engage in meaningful dialogue’ with Taiwan US President Joe Biden’s administration on Saturday urged China to stop placing military pressure on Taiwan, while calling on both sides of the Taiwan Strait to engage in peaceful dialogue. The statement by the US Department of State was issued after 13 Chinese military aircraft flew into Taiwan’s southwest air defense identification zone (ADIZ) on Saturday, the highest number observed in a single day this year, the Ministry of National Defense said. The air force scrambled fighter jets to monitor the Chinese aircraft, issuing radio warnings and mobilizing air defense assets until the planes left the ADIZ. The US “notes
‘INCREASED VIGILANCE’: A source of infection has not yet been found for the latest two cases in a hospital cluster, which should serve as a warning, Chen Shih-chung said A total of 2,991 people associated with a COVID-19 cluster infection at Taoyuan General Hospital have been put under home isolation, after an emergency expanded isolation order was issued on Sunday evening, the Central Epidemic Command Center (CECC) said yesterday. Fifteen people have so far tested positive in the cluster infection. The first case in the cluster (case No. 838) was reported on Jan. 12 — a doctor who treated an infected patient who had returned from the US. Contact tracing for the first 13 cases found connections to case No. 838, said Minister of Health and Welfare Chen Shih-chung (陳時中), who
FAMILY UNIT: The CECC warned that the eldest sister of the latest case, who also has COVID-19, visited Taoyuan’s Chungping evening market on Tuesday and Wednesday The Central Epidemic Command Center (CECC) yesterday reported a domestic case of COVID-19, associated with a recent cluster infection at Taoyuan General Hospital, and two imported cases. Minister of Health and Welfare Chen Shih-chung (陳時中), who heads the center, said that the latest case (No. 885) is a woman in her 50s, who is the third daughter of case No. 881, a man in his 90s. The woman is the main caregiver of her elderly father, who had been hospitalized earlier this month and was treated by a nurse (case No. 852) from Monday to Thursday last week, he said, adding that
DUBIOUS HONOR? A man in his 90s, who tested positive yesterday and is part of the Taoyuan hospital cluster, is the oldest person in Taiwan to have contracted COVID-19 Taiwan yesterday recorded six new imported cases of COVID-19 and two new domestic cases, the Central Epidemic Command Center (CECC) said, adding that the local infections are linked to the cluster at Taoyuan General Hospital, which now totals 12 cases. One of the domestic cases is a man in his 90s, who was treated earlier this month at Taoyuan General Hospital and tested negative for COVID-19 on Monday last week, four days before he was discharged, the center said in a statement. After one of the nurses on the ward was confirmed on Saturday last week to have contracted COVID-19, the
RSS