Immediately after the incident, angry soldiers went on a shooting spree, firing their guns in the air as residents of the area ran into their homes and locked themselves in, eyewitnesses said.

The claymore mine went off at about noon, hitting a bus that was carrying soldiers on leave to Polonnaruwa in central Sri Lanka. The bus was one in a convoy of about 10 vehicles which had set out just minutes earlier. The explosive was fitted on the roof of a closed-down shop in the Batticaloa town area and was apparently triggered off by remote control.

A similar attack last month killed nine policemen and left 26 injured, and though the convoys took precautions since then like taking different routes and never leaving at a set time, these measures were apparently not effective enough.

The claymore attack came twodays after LTTE top-runger Tamilchelvam told a delegation of Catholic priests who visited the group's headquarters in Mullaithivu that they were keen on reopening negotiations and were only waiting for "peace signals" from the government.

Last week, 50 Sinhalese villagers were massacred in Ampara, south of Batticaloa, by suspected LTTE cadres. The brutal killings of innocent civilians has hardened positions amongst Sinhalese who have been arguing against peace talks with the LTTE.