Pro-Tamil Tiger rebel Parliament member fatally shot in eastern Sri Lanka amid escalating violence

Unidentified gunmen shot and killed Tamil legislator Joseph Pararajasingham during midnight Christmas mass at a church, the Defense Ministry said Sunday - as escalating violence threatened to shatter the country's cease-fire.

The attackers fired at Pararajasingham, 71, while he was at the St. Michael's church after midnight in Batticaloa, eastern Sri Lanka's main town, military spokesman Brig. Prasad Samarasinghe said.

His wife, Sugunam Pararajasingha , and eight others with him, escaped with injuries. Pararajasingham's bodyguards had opened fire, but it was not known if any of the assailants were wounded.

Pararajasingham represented the Tamil National Alliance, a proxy party of the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam, which wants to create a Tamil homeland for Sri Lanka's 3.2 million ethnic Tamil minority. A breakaway faction of the rebels is opposed to the alliance.

On Saturday, envoys from Asia and Europe met with the Tamil Tiger rebels' top political leader, expressing concern that growing violence was threatening to shatter the country's cease-fire, officials and the rebels said.

But violence continued, with one soldier and five rebels dead in a battle in the rebel's heartland, the Jaffna Peninsula on Saturday, the military said.

``The terrorists attacked our troops and we had to open fire in self defense,'' said Defense Ministry spokesman Samarasinghe.

``We have found weapons and evidence that the deceased were terrorists,'' he said.

The day before on Friday, 13 members of Sri Lanka's navy traveling in a bus were killed in an ambush.

In response to the violence, envoys from Japan, Britain, Norway and European Union, representing key backers of Sri Lanka's peace process, met with S. P. Thamilselvan Saturday in the northern guerrilla stronghold of Kilinochchi.

``The delegation briefed Mr. Thamilselvan on the ... concern over the escalating violence and the necessity to start talks on effective implementation of the cease-fire agreement since it is felt that the (truce) is running into grave risk,'' the rebels said on their Web site.

Thamilselvan assured the envoys of the rebels' ``commitment to the peace process and the cease-fire,'' said the statement.

Violence has escalated in Sri Lanka's ethnic Tamil-majority northeast since rebel leader Velupillai Prabhakaran threatened to resume his struggle for an independent Tamil homeland if the government fails to address Tamils' grievances.

This month alone, at least 34 government security personnel were killed and many more injured in attacks blamed on the rebels.