Sri Lanka staged mass funerals for bomb blast victims on Tuesday after independence day festivities were marred by a string of attacks blamed on Tamil Tiger rebels.
   Schools in Colombo were shut as a Buddhist service was held for seven students and their baseball coach killed in a suicide bombing at a train terminal here on Sunday on the eve of independence day.
   After funeral rites, the coffins were taken to the victims’ homes for burial.
   In the northeastern Weli Oya region, a funeral was held for three people killed on ‘freedom day’ in a bomb attack on a civilian bus that left 14 people dead and 15 injured.
   Five people killed on Saturday in a bus bomb attack were buried in a mass grave in Kandy district on Monday.
   The president, Mahinda Rajapakse, insists security forces are winning the battle against the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam and that the guerrillas have been confined to the northern region of the palm-fringed tropical island.
   But there has been an explosion of violence blamed on the rebels in recent weeks with a series of bloody attacks and villagers have been hacked to death inside government-controlled territory.
   In further violence, another roadside bomb attack killed a soldier in the south on Monday.
   The government has also delayed by three days a military hardware and state enterprise exhibition after the blasts, which came as the nation staged festivities for Sri Lanka’s 60 years of independence from Britain.
   The funerals took place as Sri Lanka complained to neighbouring India that seven of its sailors were missing along with their speedboat after a confrontation with suspected rebels on Monday near the Indo-Lanka maritime border. It was not known whether the boat had sunk or the sailors had been taken prisoner.
   Colombo alleged that 400 to 500 Indian trawlers were poaching in Sri Lankan waters and the Tigers took cover among them to launch an attack on Sri Lankan naval patrols.
   The Sri Lankan patrols could not return fire for fear of injuring the Indian fishermen, Colombo said.
   The Tiger naval attack followed ground confrontations between troops and rebels in the same area, in which at least five guerrillas were killed and four wounded, the defence ministry said.
   War planes bombed a suspected Tamil Tiger administrative office on Tuesday but there were no immediate reports of casualties or damage, the ministry said.
   In an independence day address to the nation on Monday, Rajapakse declared that ‘terrorism is receiving an unprecedented defeat.’

Palestinian gunmen and Egyptian forces exchanged fire at the Gaza-Egypt border on Monday, killing one person and wounding 59 others a day after Cairo closed the breached frontier with the Hamas-run enclave.
   At least 45 Egyptian policemen and 14 Palestinians were wounded in the clash at the Rafah border crossing, which Hamas Islamists blasted open on January 23 to let Gazans stock up on supplies in defiance of an Israeli-led blockade.
   The dead person was identified by local medical officials as a Palestinian civilian. Two Egyptians suffered gunshot wounds and one senior security official sustained fractures from stone throwing, security sources and medical officials said.
   Hamas denied any role in the fighting, which began after Egyptian security men stopped the flow of people trying to go back home and the crowd responded with stone-throwing, drawing smoke grenades from the Egyptians, local residents said.
   ‘We have shut our doors and our windows. People here are terrified because tear gas can cause children to suffocate,’ one resident in the Egyptian side of the Rafah border town said by telephone.
   ‘We are also worried that if people cross from the other side, they might hurt us,’ he said, speaking on condition of anonymity, fearing police persecution.
   Egyptian security officials said Palestinians threw petrol bombs at the police and border guards and at the border wall separating Egypt and the Gaza Strip.
   The Egyptian government faces a difficult balancing act. It does not want to be seen as aiding the Israeli blockade, but is under US and Israeli pressure to take control. It also fears the spread of Islamist influence and the effects of becoming home to so many undocumented Palestinians.
   Hamas official Sami Abu Zuhri said the clash at Rafah was ‘unfortunate,’ adding: ‘Hamas renews its call for self restraint.’

Afghanistan risks becoming a failed state if NATO troops do not defeat the Taliban, boosting Islamist extremism worldwide, a study said Tuesday, warning the West is struggling with a lack of resources.
   The International Institute for Strategic Studies also lamented growing signs that the insurgency is expanding from the south of the country into northern provinces, with rebels learning lessons from Iraq.
   Elsewhere the London-based think tank noted progress by the so-called surge in Iraq, but warned that US and other troops face being in the country for a generation.
   On Afghanistan, the IISS annual study said there was a general acceptance that defeating the militants was of international importance and would require long-term, joined-up commitments from all countries involved.
   But the NATO operation was most at risk where its technical advantage was reduced, particularly in eastern Afghanistan where troops have been engaged in intense fighting with militia, IISS said in ‘The Military Balance 2008’.
   ‘Failure in these actions would risk boosting Islamic extremism (not just in Afghanistan), would produce a failed state in an area of strategic importance, and would offer safe haven to terrorist organisations and the narcotics trade.
   ‘It would also undermine the credibility of NATO in its first major out-of-area combat operation,’ the study said.
   The IISS said that although NATO’s 41,000-strong force was bolstering president Hamid Karzai’s fledgling government, the administration ‘still lacks authority in much of the country’.
   The report echoed warnings last week from two US think-tanks – the Atlantic Council of the United States and the Afghanistan Study Group – who said troop levels had to be ramped up and major changes had to be implemented urgently.
   Publication of the IISS report comes a day before the US secretary of state, Condoleezza Rice, arrives in Britain for talks on NATO and Afghanistan after calls from both countries for all members of the alliance to pull their weight.
   Germany and France are among nations particularly criticised for failing to send forces to areas where fighting is the most intense. Military commanders in Afghanistan have estimated that an extra 7,500 troops are necessary.
   On Iraq, where the US president, George W Bush, announced a ‘surge’ of about 30,000 American troops to the 132,000 already in the country a year ago, the IISS said the security situation remains ‘highly volatile’.
   But although violence towards military and civilians was ‘dramatically’ down, ‘criminality, intra-communal military violence and sectarian strife remain commonplace, and still undermine political and economic initiatives’.
   And it warned that ‘even if (troop) reductions can happen in 2008, it is estimated that president Bush’s successor will inherit a situation whereby at least 100,000 troops are still stationed in Iraq’.
   According to IISS, the Iraqi Army is ‘a generation away’ from being able to operate free of US logistical support.
   But the study’s most pressing warning was on Afghanistan, where it said there was a ‘gradual proliferation of insurgency and terrorism into Afghanistan’s northern provinces.’

Combining violence with rhetoric that appeals to the hundreds of millions living in poverty, India’s Maoist rebels have left the government looking for an effective counter-insurgency strategy.
   The dilemma boils down to two options: strike the militants hard in their strongholds or address the abject poverty that has created fertile ground for the Naxals, as the Maoists are known.
   India says it is fighting on both fronts against what the prime minister, Manmohan Singh, has called the greatest threat to domestic security. But observers say it is making little headway on either.
   ‘The effective force actually engaging Naxals is not more than 1,800 to 2,000,’ said Ajai Sahni, executive director of the New Delhi-based Institute for Conflict Management.
   The numbers are quickly diluted in the epicentre of the Maoist conflict – a 40,000-square-kilometre heavily forested region in central Chhattisgarh state.
   The police officials in the largely tribal region that includes Dantewada and four other districts, put the figures slightly higher – but not by much.
   According to Dantewada police chief Rahul Sharma, the area can count on about 15,000 paramilitary and state police personnel, although he admitted about half are engaged at any time in fighting a Maoist army of 5,000.
   Estimates of the rebel army size nationwide range between 10,000 and 20,000.
   Sharma said authorities in Chhattisgarh state have asked for at least 70,000 more police to knock out the guerrillas, but reinforcements are slow to arrive.
   ‘This is their main belt,’ said Sharma. ‘If they are beaten here they have nowhere else to go.’
   Many, however, question whether simply dispatching more troops is the answer.
   ‘If you have to put out a fire you have to remove the fuel first,’ said Dantewada social worker Himanshu Kumar. ‘Naxals get their fuel from government policies that are increasing the problems of the poor.’
   Their pro-poor platform is why Delhi is so worried about the Naxals, even though the 834 people killed in the 13 states that reported Maoist-related violence last year looks small when compared with the toll in Indian-ruled Kashmir.
   But while the pool for converts to the Kashmir insurgency is limited, the Maoists could potentially attract millions of poor.
   Rural tribal villagers in mineral-rich Chhattisgarh have no more than 35 cents a day to spend, the lowest level of any state in the country, according to official data released in January.
   Their bare-bones existence largely involves gathering and selling leaves for Indian ‘beedi’ cigarettes 12 hours a day – a far cry from the boom being experienced in other parts of the country.

Aung San Suu Kyi’s pro-democracy party on Tuesday invited ethnic minority groups that support Myanmar’s ruling junta to meet at its headquarters for talks on resolving their differences.
   The rare gesture by the National League for Democracy came less than a week after party leaders were allowed to meet with Aung San Suu Kyi, who has been under house arrest for 12 of the last 18 years.
   Aung San Suu Kyi in November had released a statement through visiting UN envoy Ibrahim Gambari, calling for national unity and saying she had a particular duty to consider the opinions of Myanmar’s dozens of ethnic minority groups.
   Many of the country’s ethnic groups have waged armed struggles for decades against the junta, seeking autonomy for their peoples. Some of the groups that have signed ceasefires and aligned themselves with the military government issued statements in state media saying that Aung San Suu Kyi had no right to speak on their behalf.
   In a statement Tuesday, the NLD invited those groups to gather at the party’s headquarters to work on resolving their differences.
   ‘The NLD invites those ethnic national parties and organisations who had different views on the statement (by Aung San Suu Kyi) to come and discuss their opinions at the NLD headquarters in Yangon,’ it said.

Railways and highways were returning to normal across China on Tuesday, but millions are likely to spend the biggest holiday of the year without power and water in what for some is the coldest winter in a century.
   The freezing weather in the run-up to the Lunar New Year break, which begins on Wednesday and offers the only chance for poor migrant workers to visit loved ones, has killed scores of people and left millions stranded.
   Whole cities have had their power and water cut off for more than a week and so far 11 electricians have been killed trying to reconnect lines or break ice encasing poles and cables.

Democrats Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton slugged out a neck-and-neck tussle and John McCain aimed to close out the Republican race, as voting began on ‘Super Tuesday,’ a historic 24-state White House nominating showdown.
   New Yorkers kicked off the unique nationwide primary contest before dawn, with a huge turnout expected, especially among energised Democrats, before last polls close in California Tuesday night (0400 GMT Wednesday).
   After a clutch of single-state contests, ‘Super Tuesday’ embraces millions of voters from across racial, religious, social and income barriers, in states as diverse as liberal Massachusetts and parched Arizona in the southwest.
   It is the toughest test yet in the most expensive, intense, prolonged and unpredictable White House race, which will see Democrats eventually break a deadlock and pick the first black or woman presidential nominee.
   But barring a major surprise, even ‘Super Tuesday,’ the biggest one-day nominating bonanza ever, is unlikely to install Hillary or Obama just yet: their state-by-state race could drag on until March or even longer.
   The two rivals duelled with campaign rallies and television advertising blitzes across the political map on Monday, with the race narrowing in Hillary’s stronghold, California, tight in heartland Missouri and Tennessee, and up for grabs in states like northeastern New Jersey, Connecticut and Massachusetts.
   ‘I don’t believe that you can rest until the last vote is counted, and so I’m going to keep working, reaching out to the voters,’ Hillary told CBS News late Monday.
   The former first lady was to vote early Tuesday in her home state of New York, while Obama was returning to his patch in Chicago to watch results roll in.
   ‘I think we’re bringing a lot of new voters into the process and we’ll see a split decision, basically, coming out of tomorrow, with both of us having won sizable numbers of delegates,’ Obama said on the same CBS programme.
   ‘I think we’ll have to continue on,’ he said.
   Monday, her voice raw and fatigue creasing her face, the former first lady brushed away a tear as she visited Yale University, where her political odyssey started as an earnest 1970s student in bell-bottom pants.
   Hillary, 60, held an online town hall meeting also broadcast on a cable television channel, taking questions from across ‘Super Tuesday’ states.
   ‘It’s going to take someone with experience in running and winning campaigns to take the White House in November,’ Hillary said.
   On talk show host David Letterman’s couch, she said she, not former president Bill Clinton, would be the boss if she wins November’s election.
   ‘In my White House we will know who wears the pant suits,’ she quipped.
   To wild chants of ‘O-ba-ma’ and ‘We can’t wait,’ the 46-year-old Illinois senator rocked an indoor arena packed with 16,000 supporters in the closely-fought state of Connecticut, then repeated the trick in Boston.
   Musing on his presidential odyssey, Obama said Americans ‘don’t want spin, they don’t want PR, they want straight talk.’

Rebels in Chad announced Tuesday an immediate ceasefire as France –emboldened by UN condemnation of the insurgents – declared it was poised to intervene militarily.
   With refugees pouring into neighbouring Cameroon by the thousands, fearing renewed fighting in the capital Ndjamena, rebel spokesman Abderaman Koulamallah said the insurgents were bowing to diplomatic pressure to halt their offensive against president, Idriss Deby Itno’s regime.
   ‘Aware of the suffering of the Chadian people ... the forces of national resistance have given their agreement to an immediate ceasefire,’ Koulamallah said by satellite telephone.
   The rebels – who stormed Ndjamena over the weekend, pinning Deby inside his presidential palace – were doing so, he said, ‘in line with the peace initiatives of fraternal countries Libya and Burkina Faso’.
   Reacting to the announcement, Deby’s government said a ceasefire was pointless because the rebels – who last week surged across the width of Chad from bases inside Sudan – had been ‘decimated’.
   ‘Why a ceasefire? They don’t exist any more. With whom would we sign a ceasefire? ... We’ve got them under control,’ the prime minister, Nourredine Delwa Kassire Coumakoye, told the French global TV channel France 24.
   In the wake of Monday’s unanimous Security Council statement, French President Nicolas Sarkozy said France – with 1,450 troops and Mirage fighter jets stationed in Chad – was ready to ‘do its duty’ and intervene if need be.
   ‘Now there is a legal decision taken unanimously by the Security Council, and if Chad was the victim of an aggression, France could in theory have the means to oppose such action,’ he said in the French coastal town of Aytre.
   ‘Everyone needs to think carefully about this.’
   In its statement Monday, drafted by French diplomats, the UN Security Council said it ‘strongly condemns’ the rebel offensive, and called on UN nations to ‘provide support ... as requested by the government of Chad’.
   Deby’s government has said its forces pushed the rebels from Ndjamena on Sunday after a weekend of heavy fighting that left dead bodies littering the dusty streets, shops and homes looted, the national radio station ransacked, and hospitals filled with wounded civilians.
   But rebel leaders insisted they had made a strategic withdrawal, and on Monday ordered civilians to flee in anticipation of a fresh assault.
   In Geneva, the UN High Commissioner for Refugees said Tuesday that 15,000 to 20,000 Chadians have taken refuge in Cameroon via the border town of Kousseri, 15 kilometres from Ndjamena.

Kenya’s feuding factions on Tuesday began talks on key political issues, in a bid to find a negotiated agreement to the deadly conflict that erupted after disputed December elections.
   ‘The talks have opened and they are discussing about power-sharing,’ a foreign ministry official said, describing the talks as ‘tough’.
   ‘Today we are tackling the political issues and the controversial elections, I hope we move as expeditiously as possible because we have no time,’ said former UN secretary general Kofi Annan, who is leading the mediation efforts.
   Negotiations began last week between the president, Mwai Kibaki, and the opposition leader, Raila Odinga, whose dispute over the December polls has ignited deadly violence across the country and rattled the region’s largest economy.

More than two million Colombians demonstrated worldwide Monday against the FARC Marxist rebels, according to official figures, demanding the freeing of hostages and an end to decades of violence.
   Wearing white shirts saying ‘No more FARC’ and ‘No more kidnapping,’ demonstrators brought normal business in Colombia to a virtual standstill as they flooded the streets of its main cities and 125 capitals around the world.
   ‘I feel the pain of the families of the hostages rotting in the jungle ... and I want all the nations of the world to realise that the FARC is not Colombia,’ one demonstrator, Myriam Forero, said in Bogota.
   They were the largest rallies ever organised against the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, coming a day after the armed group pledged to release three former lawmakers held hostage for seven years in the jungle.
   The Colombian government has sought to link the demonstrations to its own tough policies on the FARC and in recent days made repeated appeals for a massive public turnout.
   ‘Today the citizens have more faith in the state, they have more faith in the army,’ conservative president Alvaro Uribe declared on private television station Caracol.
   His government has used television coverage over the past week to try and mobilise the crowds with images of hostages behind barbed wire in FARC camps.
   Bogota’s Mayor Samuel Rojas said that more than 1.2 million people converged on Bolivar square in the heart of the city and hundreds in other parts, citing police figures.
   Half a million marched in each of two other major cities, Medellin and Cali, according to local authorities.