Colombo - Sri Lankan state television broadcast video footage on Tuesday of what it said was the body of Tamil Tiger leader Velupillai Prabhakaran, hours after the rebels claimed he was still alive.
The footage showed the upper part of a corpse dressed in camouflage uniform and with a head wound. The face was intact, with the eyes wide open, and bore a clear resemblance to the rebel leader.
Part of the forehead was covered by a blue cloth, and the head was resting on a bloodstained newspaper.
The images also showed Prabhakaran's dog tag with the marking '0.01' and his Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) identity card.
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'We categorically reject this' The broadcast came after the country's army chief, General Sarath Fonseka, announced he was "very pleased to confirm that we have killed Prabhakaran, the ruthless terrorist leader".
Fonseka said the body had been positively identified earlier Tuesday as of Prabhakaran, who was reported by the army to have been killed on Monday while trying to flee.
Hours earlier, a Tamil Tiger spokesman claimed the rebel leader was "alive and safe," and accused government troops of murdering his aides who tried to surrender.
In a statement carried by the pre-separatist website Tamilnet, the Tiger official accused the Sri Lankan government of fabricating news of his death in order "to gloat" over its rout of the rebel army.
"Our beloved leader is alive and safe. He will continue to lead the quest for dignity and freedom for the Tamil people," the Tigers' chief of international relations, Selvarasa Pathmanathan, said in a statement.
The Sri Lankan military said Monday that Prabhakaran, founder and leader of the LTTE, had been shot dead with two of his top commanders as they attempted to flee advancing troops in an ambulance.
"We categorically reject this," Pathmanathan said, without making any claim to Prabhakaran's current whereabouts.
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