Citizens gather to mourn the victims of the March 4 suicide attack in Lahore. Violence continues in the region as 14 more people were killed today in a suicide bombing in Sri Lanka. (Photo: Daniel Berehulak / Getty Images)

    Islamabad, Pakistan - A suicide bomber in Sri Lanka attacked a Muslim religious procession today, killing at least 14 people and injuring more than three dozen, including a government minister, officials said.

    The army blamed the embattled Tamil Tiger separatist group, which for a quarter of a century has been fighting for a Tamil homeland in the northern part of the South Asia island nation.

    Tiger militants, formally known as the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam, are on their heels since government forces have encircled them in recent months in a small pocket of territory in the north along with tens of thousands of civilians.

    The militants have been concentrated into an area of about 23 square miles, according to Brigadier Udaya Nanayakkara: "They're desperate."

    But the bombing showed that the group could still launch an attack far from its traditional base in an area populated largely by majority Sinhalese. By some accounts, the attacker was on a bicycle, then mixed in with the crowd before exploding what the army said was a vest.

    "The message they're trying to send is, 'Whatever you do, we're still there,'" said Jean-Charles Bisard, a Paris-based expert on international terrorism.

    In contrast to many attacks these days around the world carried out by Islamic militants, this one targeted a mostly Muslim crowd. The explosion occurred in the southern city of Mattawa during a celebration of Mawlid, marking the anniversary of the prophet Muhammad's birth.

    "With the LTTE, there's no love lost for Muslims," said R. Hariharan, a retired colonel who headed intelligence for the Indian Peace-Keeping Force in Sri Lanka between 1987 and 1990.

    Some 100,000 Muslims, many of whom had lived there for generations, were given 48 hours to leave Sri Lanka's northern Jafna peninsula area many years ago when the Tigers first occupied the area. Since they spoke Tamil, some then took jobs in army intelligence fighting against the separatists group.

    The Tigers, listed as a terror group by the United States and the European Union, have pioneered many tactics, some of which were later adopted by other militant groups around the world.

    The group has developed sophisticated financing methods during a quarter-century war with the government, which has killed an estimated 70,000 people. It owned a fleet of commercial vessels and even maintained a small air force, using two light aircraft to launch a modest attack on Colombo last month.

    They also pioneered the use of suicide vests, which they used to assassinate several senior Sri Lankan officials as well as Indian Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi in 1990. By some accounts, they have carried out more suicide bombings than Hamas, Islamic Jihad and Al Qaeda combined.

    And they refined their methods, experts said, by recruiting many female bombers and by adding a trigger mechanism that activated when the bomber's arms were raised - such as might happen if they came under police suspicion. This reportedly has resulted in their suicide bombers being captured alive less frequently than Palestinian counterparts, for example.

    Brigadier Nanayakkara said the military has expected more attacks of this nature and recently stepped up its use of road blocks, but this festival provided the group with a target of opportunity.

    He said 13 civilians had been killed, in addition to the bomber. More than 200 militants and an unspecified number of soldiers have been killed in heavy fighting in the north since Thursday, the army said. The pro-militant TamilNet website, quoting rebel radio, said at least 100 government soldiers were killed in fighting Sunday.

    Analysts said the Sri Lankan government has put the Tamil community in Colombo under extremely tight oversight - residents are registered, carefully monitored and any newcomers investigated - which has led the Tigers to look for softer targets elsewhere around the country.

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