U.N. Says Scores Killed in Recent Sri Lanka Clashes

COLOMBO, Sri Lanka — An average of 70 civilians have been killed each day since late January in fighting between the Sri Lankan government and ethnic Tamil separatists, according to the latest tally by the United Nations.

Related
Times Topics: Sri Lanka

Despite international calls for a cease-fire, including a visit here Friday by senior Indian officials, the government is pushing ahead with its plans to destroy the remnants of the Tamil Tigers, who are now confined to a sandy narrow strip of land about seven kilometers long off Sri Lanka’s northeast coast.

More than 100,000 civilians fled from the combat zone earlier this week but the United Nations estimates that anywhere from 50,000 to 100,000 civilians remain trapped on the sandy spit of land. The assessment is based on satellite images and reports from United Nations workers in the conflict zone.

“The humanitarian conditions in the conflict area are very grim,” said Sarasi Wijueatne, a spokeswoman for the International Committee of the Red Cross, which has evacuated 11,000 sick and wounded by ferry over the past three months.

“There’s a lack of medical staff, supplies and drinking water. The people who remain are completely reliant on humanitarian aid and as far as we are aware no food has gone in there since the first week of April.”

Sri Lanka’s Defense Ministry said on Friday that 15,000 to 20,000 civilians were caught in the conflict zone. The government, which by its own admission underestimated the number of trapped civilians in the past, says that Tamil rebels are shelling the area and using the civilians as human shields.

Relief agencies and the United Nations blame both sides for the civilian deaths.

As the military cordon around the Tigers has tightened, the rebels appear to be forcing an increasing number of civilians to take up arms, said Gordon Weiss, a United Nations spokesman in Colombo.

“They’ve been recruiting civilians to fight, handing them AK-47s,” he said, referring to the widely used assault rifle. “Increasingly they’ve been recruiting children. We hear as young as 12.”

Some 6,432 civilians, many of them children, have been killed over the past three months and 13,946 were wounded, according to a United Nations document obtained by news agencies.

The toll was compiled by the United Nations from government doctors and United Nations workers and corroborated by the Red Cross. The tally may already by out of date. “Hundreds more civilians have been killed or wounded in recent days,” said Ms. Wijueatne, the spokeswoman.

The sharply rising death toll worsens prospects for an eventual political reconciliation between the ethnic Sinhalese majority and the Tamil minority that has long strived for greater autonomy. The casualties will also embitter the influential and wealthy Tamils living overseas who have been major backers of the insurgency, according to Alan Keenan, an analyst for the International Crisis Group.

“The levels of anger among Tamils and the sense of humiliation — as well as a desire for revenge — are unprecedented,” Mr. Keenan said.

The government, which faces a huge challenge in dealing with what it says are 200,000 people displaced by the conflict, is appealing for international assistance in helping manage and supply its internment camps. Mr. Weiss, the United Nations spokesman, described the current condition of makeshift camps as “overcrowded, lacking proper shelter and without enough resources to sustain humane conditions.” link...