The Sri Lankan Navy said Saturday it had destroyed a Tamil Tiger rebel arms-carrying vessel off the island's coast.

Mahesh Karunaratne, the Navy spokesman, said that the Navy spotted a Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) ship after 1 a.m. local time Saturday (1930 GMT Friday), 70 nautical miles northeast off Mullaithivu coast in the north.

"This was a medium sized vessel, about 300-400 meters in length. Our off-shore craft attacked and destroyed the vessel and the four accompanying boats", Karunaratne said.

Mullaithivu coast is being used for arms supplies for the LTTE, defense officials said. The government troops are now poised to reach Mullaithivu in the current military advance towards destroying the LTTE challenge.

The LTTE, since mid 2006, have lost large areas of territory which they had controlled in the north and east during their over three-decade-old separatist campaign to set up a separate homeland for the minority Tamils.