A Sri Lankan policeman frisks a voter outside a polling booth in northern Jaffna town during the local government elections January 29. Voters started trickling out to polling booths in Sri Lanka's former northern Tamil Tiger rebel stronghold of Jaffna on Thursday after staying home earlier in the day for fear of rebel attacks. But most shops were closed and there was little trafic in Jaffna, which has been put under tight security for the local government elections, the first such poll in the north for 17 years.

SRILANKA ELECTIONS