A notification from the Ministry of Defence late on Friday afternoon said ``regulations have been made by Her Excellency the President prohibiting the publication and transmission of sensitive military information.'' Under powers vested in the President by the emergency prevailing in the country, Chandrika Kumaratunga appointed the deputy army chief of staff as the ``competent authority'' for implementing the new regulations.

However, confusion prevailed about the details of the regulations, with the Information department unable to say to whom journalists should submit their reports for examination. More bafflement was created by the use of the word ``prohibition'' in the regulation, which could imply a total ban onall reports on the fighting.

Under the regulations, no newspaper, broadcasting station or a television station in or outside Sri Lanka can publish or broadcast ``any matter which pertains to any operations carried out or proposed to be carried'' by the security forces or the ``deployment of troops or personnel equipment or any statement pertaining to the official conduct or the performance'' of any member of the security forces.

Though the punishment for contravention of these regulations is not specified, the notice says any violator will be ``guilty of an offence'' and the competent authority will take ``steps as appear to be necessary'' against such a person.

Sri Lanka has imposed censorship from time to time since the ethnic conflict flared up in 1983. The most recent was a six-month censorship on the local media which was lifted in October 1996. Censorship was also imposed for a period from September 1995, but lifted only for the foreign media after four days.

Meanwhile, Sri Lanka's military hasunofficially blacked out all information about the battle at Killinochchi in the northern Vanni region but the Tamil Tigers claimed on Friday that they killed over 100 soldiers and injured hundreds more in its latest confrontation with the Army.

The LTTE said on the clandestine Voice of Tigers (VoT) radio that it had lost 20 of its fighters and had killed ``more than 100 soldiers''.

It has announced that it will hand over 47 bodies of soldiers to the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) to be given to the Army. A search was on for more bodies, VoT said.

While the government continued to appeal to the public to donate blood at blood banks all over the country, there was officially no word about Thursday's confrontation or the number of those killed or wounded in it. However, official sources said 35 soldiers were killed and over 300 injured.