COLOMBO, Sri Lanka, Feb. 4 -- Sri Lankan President Mahinda Rajapaksa proclaimed Wednesday that the rebel Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam would be "completely defeated in a few days," potentially signaling an end to a 25-year insurgency that is one of the world's longest ongoing conflicts.

The rebels' last holdouts are penned in a small zone in the north of the island nation, and government forces say they are confident that they are close to crushing the insurgency. Analysts, however, say guerrilla fighting might persist for months.

Civilian casualties have been significant: U.N. officials said that 52 civilians were killed in the past day in one sector and that cluster bombs had struck a hospital.

Wearing a flowing white robe, Rajapaksa used Sri Lanka's Independence Day to emphasize that an end to the fighting might be near. Diplomats have begun urging the government to turn its focus from conflict to crafting a truce agreement with the rebels, increasing humanitarian help for those caught in the war zone and negotiating a long-term agreement with the country's Tamil minority.

"For nearly three decades, we were forced to celebrate independence with an illegal armed group operating in our country," said Rajapaksa, who spoke from a heavily secured beachfront stage, guarded by tanks and navy ships, as 4,200 decorated service members marched in a military parade. "We have now been able, within a short period of 2 1/2 years, to completely defeat the cowardly forces of terror."

Rajapaksa's address came alongside U.N. reports that cluster bombs had hit the north's last functioning hospital. Fifteen U.N. staffers and 81 family members are trapped in the Puthukkudiyiruppu area, where the hospital was hit, U.N. spokesman Gordon Weiss said.

"We hold the gravest fears for the safety of our staff and their families," Weiss told reporters. The International Committee of the Red Cross reported that the hospital had been hit five times in the past few days, including a strike on the pediatric ward, leaving at least 12 civilians dead and 30 injured.

It was not clear who launched the cluster bombs, which spray dozens of "bomblets" and are banned under the international Convention on Cluster Munitions. Sri Lanka's military spokesman, Brig. Udaya Nanayakkara, said the government wasn't to blame and, by the evening, the United Nations said it had accepted the government's assurances.

Representatives of the rebel group have not been available for comment.

An estimated 70,000 people have died in the 25-year civil war between the Tamil rebels and the largely Sinhalese government. Aid agencies and the United Nations say about 250,000 civilians are trapped along with the Tamil rebels, who have been fighting to create a separate Tamil homeland in the country's northern and eastern provinces. The government disputes the figure, saying the number of civilians is far lower.

Aid workers' reports of casualties are impossible to verify independently because the government has banned journalists from the region, except on several recent, carefully guided tours.

In the seaside capital, more than 10,000 police officers were on guard to mark the country's independence from colonial power. Throughout the morning, roads were closed and families stayed home watching the parade and patriotic television footage, which showed Sri Lankan troops giving out water to suffering civilians and carrying injured people out of monsoon-drenched rural fields.

Many in the capital were eager to show they were backing the war efforts, in a conflict where criticism is frowned upon and Tamils living in Colombo say they are subject to suspicion.

Bright yellow national flags, showing a roaring lion clutching a sword, were perched atop Buddhist and Hindu temples and schools, on rattling rickshaw taxis and above shacks selling bananas and mangoes. Amid a stage festooned with balloons and a buffet dinner, an updated national theme song was released Tuesday with lyrics stressing a united country.

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