Colombo, December 30:

Sri Lankan Defence Secretary Gotabhaya Rajapaksa has hinted that LTTE chief Velupillai Prabhakaran might have been killed in the air raid on his bunker on November 26.

“Our intelligence sources believe he (Prabhakaran) was seriously hurt or killed,” Rajapaksa told the government-run Sunday Observer.

He discounted the validity of pictures put out by the LTTE of Prabhakaran delivering his annual Heroes’ Day address over TV and radio on November 27. In another interview in the same paper, Sri Lanka’s army chief Lt Gen Sarath Fonseka said the Sri Lankan Air Force had plans to attack all LTTE bases in the north.

Meanwhile, troops moved into a LTTE-controlled area in the Parappakandal area of Mannar over the weekend. Both sides claimed to have inflicted heavy casualties.