Colombo: The Sri Lankan government has rejected a cease-fire offer from the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE), even as the Lankan Army has encircled Tamil Tiger's last stronghold - Puthukudiyirippu.
Security forces have already killed nine LTTE rebels and broken past the town's first line of defence.
Lankan troops are now just 400 metres away from the main part of the town. Once Puthukudiyirippu is captured, the LTTE will have little choice but to scatter into the forests and resort to guerrilla warfare.
A cornered LTTE had earlier on Monday offered a cease-fire to end human sufferings in Sri Lanka's Wanni region but refused to lay down arms.
"The LTTE is ready to accept the calls for a cease-fire issued by the international community with the good intention of ending the human suffering," PTI quoted Tigers political chief B Nadesan in a letter sent to the UN.
"The world should take note that calls for the LTTE to lay down its arms and surrender is not helpful for resolving the conflict," he said.
Reacting to the LTTE's latest offer for a cease-fire in the Wanni region, where thousands of civilians are trapped in the crossfire, the Sri Lankan Government said it would accept nothing short of a unconditional cease-fire.
"Sri Lankan government has no intention to enter into the cease-fire with LTTE without their laying down arms," Government spokesman Keheliya Rambukwella said
In the letter, Nadesan said, whose organisation is confined to a small territory in Wanni, "arms of the LTTE are the protective shield of the Tamil people and their tool for political liberation".
"The LTTE has taken part in numerous peace efforts. No one insisted then that the LTTE should lay down its arms," Nadesan said in the letter.
The LTTE also appealed to the international community to take actions to stop the "genocidal" attacks on the Tamil people.
"International community should apply pressure of the Sri Lankan Government to seek not a military but a political solution to the ethnic conflict," he said in the letter.
"We also wish to inform the international community that we are ready to discuss, co-operate, and work together in all their efforts to bring an immediate cease-fire and work towards a political settlement," Nadesan said.
"The protection of the Tamil people is dependent on the arms of the LTTE," he said.
Meanwhile, reports say LTTE supremo Velupillai Prabhakaran's wife and two younger children have reportedly fled Sri Lanka.
But Prabhakaran, along with his eldest son Charles Anthony, is still believed to be hiding in the Wanni region.
(With inputs from PTI)
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