Word: sri
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...Sri Lankan government has denied that government forces were responsible for the attack and called the doctor's report a fabrication. "There is absolutely no way that this doctor could have used a telephone, dialed BBC, or CNN or al-Jazeera, and said that the shelling was coming from the government side and so many people have been killed," says Mahinda Samarasinghe, Sri Lankan Minister for Human Rights and Disaster Management. No one within areas held by the Tigers can act independently and are under pressure from the Tigers, Samarasinghe says. "There may have been a gun pointed...
...shrinking combat zones have proved reliable in the past - a statement that drew sharp condemnation from Colombo. "Mr. Gordon Weiss should be a lot more discreet about what he says in public, given the sensitivities involved, especially at a time when emotions are running high, not only in Sri Lanka, but elsewhere as well," Foreign Secretary Palitha Kohona said. Weiss has overstepped his mandate, Kohona says, effectively giving a stamp of authenticity to unverified claims about the war. The Sri Lankan government has made it all but impossible to verify any claims about events inside the war zone by refusing...
...Secretary General Ban Ki-moon also reminded both parties soon after the weekend battles that "the world is watching Sri Lanka and would not accept further violations of international law." The five-member Security Council already held an informal session about Sri Lanka on April 11, and some members have lobbied for wider UN action. But moves to initiate a formal Security Council session on Sri Lanka have been thwarted by China and Russia. The government sees this effort to apply diplomatic pressure - through UN action or a debate at the Geneva-based UN Human Rights Council - as, in effect...
...trapped in a very small area with their lives at tremendous and increasing risk. The United Nations estimates that 50,000 people remain trapped in the six-square-kilometer area still controlled by the Tamil Tigers, which have been fighting for a separate ethnic Tamil homeland since 1983. The Sri Lankan government says there are no more than 15,000 to 20,000. The LTTE holds only this small strip of territory on Sri Lanka's northeastern coast within an area designated by the Army as a so-called safe zone. Over the weekend, the Army announced that...
...perimeter of the war zone, where they could escape as soon as the Army advanced, into the area's middle where the Mullivaikal hospital is located. On April 20, an estimated 100,000 civilians fled the zone within 72 hours when the Army breached a major Tiger fortification. Sri Lankan troops advanced a further 300 meters into Tiger territory on Tuesday. "We still believe that thousands of people, men, women and those vulnerable remain trapped inside the combat area," says Sarasi Wijeratne ICRC spokesperson. "There is hardly any safe area left for these people to move in, and their lives...