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The LTTE promised to release 10 servicemen held by them as Prisoners of War as a gesture of goodwill, a spokesman for the Relatives of Servicemen Missing In Action said yesterday.

The group which visited the Vanni to meet LTTE leaders was told by Moorthi, an LTTE area leader, that the 10 servicemen would be released on Monday evening.

Unconfirmed reports reaching Colombo from Vavuniya said the 10 Armed Forces personnel had been freed last night. They said the decision to free the Prisoners of War has been taken by the LTTE leadership.

Meanwhile, the LTTE yesterday freed two policemen who inadvertently entered an area under its control in Batticaloa.

The two policemen, an SP and an ASP, were returning from Batticaloa. They had wanted to go via Kalmunai. They had passed a police checkpoint at Palugamam and strayed into Kallerengu, which is under LTTE control, police sources said.

They had been held for about two hours there, while the local LTTE cadres contacted their leaders. The police had also alerted local Tamil politicians about the missing policemen by this time.

The LTTE area leaders later instructed their cadres to release the two men as a gesture of goodwill to mark the on-going truce.

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