A soldier on guard in Colombo on Wednesday. (AP)

Colombo, June 20 (Reuters): Sri Lankan troops gunned down around 30 Tamil Tigers in a jungle in the island’s restive east, the military said today, hours after the navy said it had killed around 40 insurgents in a sea battle.

The military said soldiers had captured a rebel bunker line during the fight in a swathe of landlocked eastern jungle called Thoppigala, where Tiger fighters are still entrenched after the fall of their eastern stronghold.

The clash came hours after the navy said late yesterday it had destroyed five Tiger vessels after being attacked by two dozen rebel boats off Sri Lanka's far northern tip.

There has been a series of land and sea battles in recent months as Sri Lanka’s long-running civil war flared into heavy action again.

“We have destroyed three satellite camps (in Thoppigala) and are clearing the area. There are a lot of minefields,” said military spokesman Brigadier Prasad Samarasinghe.

“One Tamil civilian in the area said there are 73 prisoners being held by the Tigers there, including one army corporal,” he added. “They cannot hold on to that area now because they don’t have any food.” Samarasinghe estimated that around 150 Tiger fighters remained in the Thoppigala area.

The LTTE accused the navy of starting the sea battle. They said just two of their own fighters died in the confrontation. “According to our people, they managed to damage one of the Sri Lankan Navy Dvora (attack boats),” a Tiger source said.

“The Sea Tigers lost two of their men and there is no damage to any of their boats reported. There is no information from the east yet.”

There was no independent confirmation of what happened or of casualty tolls. Analysts say both sides tend to talk up enemy losses and play down their own.

The government is forging ahead with a plan to resettle tens of thousands of internally displaced from dusty camps in the east to areas southeast of Thoppigala, from where the distant sound of artillery and mortar bomb explosions can be heard.

Aid groups and displaced families alike have voiced concern about the safety of those being resettled, given that fighting is still going on in Thoppigala.

The land battle and clash at sea off Point Pedro in the northern army-held Jaffna peninsula, cut off from the rest of the island by rebel lines, come amid a rash of battles on land and at sea as well as ambushes and air strikes.

Fighting is now focused on the north after the military captured the Tigers’ eastern stronghold earlier this year. Around 4,500 people have been killed since last year alone.

Pro-rebel website www.tamilnet.com has accused the Sri Lankan government of blocking access to local readers. The site cannot be viewed through state carrier Sri Lanka Telecom’s Internet services, but both the company and government denied they were interfering.