Pak claims key role in Sri Lanka's victory over Tamil Tigers

Pakistan's supply of high-tech military equipment and positioning of some of its highly trained Army officers in Sri Lanka played a key role in the ultimate defeat of Tamil Tigers, Pakistani media has claimed.

"It was the Pakistani defence cooperation with Sri Lanka as the largest suppliers of high-tech military equipment that played a major role in the ultimate defeat of the LTTE at the hands of the Sri Lankan army," The News quoted well placed sources in the Pakistani establishment as saying.

The newspaper said the defence cooperation between Sri Lanka and Pakistan had grown significantly in recent years as Islamabad, unlike New Delhi, had no problems supplying the state-of-the-art weaponry to Lankan army to accelerate its counter-insurgency operations against the LTTE which finally ended with the killing of Tamil chief Vellupillai Prabhakaran.

It was exactly a year ago, in the first week of May 2008, that Sri Lankan Army Chief Lt Gen Fonseka visited Pakistan and held detailed talks with his Pakistani counterpart Chief of Army Staff General Asfaq Parvez Kayani to finalise the purchase of high-tech arms for the Lankan armed forces, which were embroiled in an intense battle with the LTTE forces even at that time.