SALAWA, Sri Lanka: Destruction caused by a mortar bomb which hit a home on the edge of the Sri Lankan capital Colombo is seen yesterday, hours after an explosion of an ammunition depot at the neighboring military complex. — AFP

COLOMBO: Sri Lankan police were yesterday racing to defuse unexploded bombs that rained down on villages near the capital overnight, destroying homes and killing a soldier, after a fire at an ammunition depot. At least one soldier burnt to death and thousands of villagers fled their homes after fire broke out at the Salawa military complex late Sunday, triggering a series of explosions that sent shrapnel flying into the air. Local businessman Neville Nishantha fled with his wife and three children as the explosions began and returned yesterday morning to see his house in ruins. "A mortar bomb had gone through my roof and hit the living room," Nishantha told AFP. "A wall collapsed in the bedroom where my three children would have slept."

 Yesterday, the police Special Task Force commandos were deployed to defuse multi-barrel rockets, artillery rounds, rocket propelled grenades and mortar bombs from residential areas. An AFP photographer saw commandos collecting at least four unexploded rockets, one of which was lodged in the ground outside an abandoned home. "Forensic experts have examined the site and we have just begun clearing the main roads of all unexploded ordnance," a senior police official told AFP. Nearly 50 people were treated for injuries or smoke inhalation after the fire, which forced the evacuation of the local government hospital. Police said the facility had been badly damaged.

'Military Matter'

Authorities are yet to identify the cause of the fire, which began at sundown Sunday and continued until yesterday morning. Government spokesman Rajitha Senaratne said the national security council would meet yesterday to review the blast. "This is a military matter and they must investigate if this was an accident or sabotage," said Senaratne. One of the affected villages housed widows and wounded veterans from Sri Lanka's long civil war, who had to cross a river to safety. "We took a boat and went across the Kelani river and took shelter at a temple," said 53-year-old widow Mahilagodage Rohini. "Most of the houses at our (Swarna Jayanthi) village have been destroyed."

Wasantha Fernando, 45, said he abandoned his home and ran as thick black smoke filled the area. "When I got back this morning the entire place was covered in ash," he said, adding that his walls had cracked and the house was unstable. It was the second time in three weeks that residents of Colombo were forced to leave their homes. Last month, around 200,000 residents in the capital were driven out of their homes by floods caused by the Kelani river bursting its banks.

The Salawa military complex, just by the Kelani river, is located at a former plywood factory about 36 km east of Colombo.  It is used by the army to store heavy weaponry and ammunition, including rockets. Law and Order Minister Sagala Ratnayake said the fire had spread quickly to two ammunition depots within the military complex. The explosion was the worst at a military installation since the end of Sri Lanka's decades-long Tamil separatist war in May 2009.

In June 2009, a much less intense explosion at an army ammunition storage facility in the northern district of Vavuniya, 250 km north of Colombo, injured several soldiers. The separatist conflict ended when government forces crushed Tamil Tiger rebels in a no-holds-barred military campaign that triggered allegations up to 40,000 ethnic Tamil civilians were killed in government bombardments. - AFP