Sri Lanka's Air Force, faced with the problem of countering Tamil Tiger rebels' air capability, has called for the public to remain calm when the city of Colombo's air defense system gets activated.

Air Marshal Roshan Gunetilake, the commander of the Sri Lanka Air Force, told a radio station here Tuesday that the Air Force would be greatly helped if the public remained calm.

Confusion and panic reined in the city of Colombo in the early hours of Sunday when the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) carried out an air raid in the city suburbs.

The rebels dropped four bombs off two light aircraft which they said were aimed at destroying the government oil installations.

The immediate activating of the air defense system left people in a state of fear with the Colombo sky being lit up by continuous barrage of anti-aircraft gunfire.

Some six people were injured by the anti-aircraft gunfire but no deaths were caused during the LTTE air raid.

This was the fourth such air raid by the Tiger rebels since the end of March.

The government has vowed to destroy the LTTE air capability which has added a new dimension to the island's long drawn-out separatist armed conflict which has cost over 67,000 lives since the mid 1980s.

Source: Xinhua