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Human rights groups welcome the announcement that Shavendra Silva—a former military general in the Sri Lankan army who stands accused of extrajudicial killing and torture—has been removed from U.N. Secretary-General Ban Kimoon’s Special Advisory Group on Peacekeeping Operations. In a press statement released on February 22, Louise Fréchette, the Chair of the Special Advisory Group, stated that Silva’s participation in the group is “not appropriate or helpful.”

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[Human Rights Watch]

The Sri Lankan army’s announcement that it had appointed a five-member court of inquiry to investigate allegations that its forces committed serious violations of the laws of war appears to be another government delaying tactic in the face of mounting international pressure, Human Rights Watch said today.

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[Washington Times]

Sri Lanka will hold accountable every person accused of war crimes during its decades-long civil conflict, the island nation’s ambassador to the U.S. says.

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[Independent UK]

His name was Abi, he was six, and the last his family glimpsed of him was in the frenzied moments after deadly shells struck close to the bunker where they had been sheltering. His sisters were gravely injured, his mother too, and the young boy put his arm around her. “Mother,” he sobbed three times.

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[The Sunday Times]

MORE than 250,000 terrified Tamil men, women and children were trapped between rebel Tamil forces and the army in no man’s land in northern Sri Lanka last night as the 25-year civil war appeared to be nearing a violent conclusion. A 48-hour ceasefire was due to end after the government promised to eliminate terrorism once and for all. Mahinda Rajapaksa, the Sri Lankan president, vowed that there would be no let-up in the army’s offensive. The International Committee of the Red Cross said a humanitarian crisis was unfolding and described horrific conditions in the conflict zone… Although the government has issued statements saying that it will not injure civilians, I know how hollow they sound to those caught up in the fighting because I have encountered the Sri Lankan army.

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[HRW]
The Sri Lankan government and the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) should take immediate steps to allow thousands of civilians trapped in a shrinking conflict zone safe passage and to ensure that they receive desperately needed humanitarian aid, Human Rights Watch said today. Intense fighting between the Sri Lankan army and the separatist LTTE has caught an estimated 250,000 civilians in deadly crossfire, and in the past week civilian casualties have risen dramatically.

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[Guardian]

International concern is intensifying over the fate of around 350,000 civilians trapped in a rapidly shrinking rebel-controlled pocket of land in Sri Lanka’s north east, as the military steps up its campaign to end the civil war by crushing the Tamil Tiger forces.

The Sri Lankan army this week announced that it had seized new swathes of territory from the separatist Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE), forcing the dwindling guerrilla forces to retreat to their last remaining stronghold, the small coastal town of Mullaitivu.

Aid agencies believe that hundreds of thousands of people made homeless by the latest offensive have been pushed back, along with the guerrilla fighters, and are now crowded into a densely forested patch of land around 30km wide. Most of these civilians are thought to be sheltering with locals, or beneath shelters roughly thrown together from palm leaves, and food supplies are very restricted.

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[ IPS ]

Incessant rains and flooding in the Vanni, the Tamil rebel stronghold in northern Sri Lanka, are adding to the woes of at least 200,000 people stranded in intensified fighting between the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) and the Sri Lankan army since mid-September. On Tuesday, the pro-LTTE website, TamilNet.com, reported that floods were “flowing over most of the roads and civilians who had sought refuge in open lands and in temporary huts in low-lying areas were forced to seek shelter in schools, temples, churches and public buildings in Vanni.”

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[ IPS ]

The only good thing about tropical storm “Nisha”, that lashed northern Sri Lanka in the last week of November, was that it brought a lull to the fierce fighting between Tamil separatist rebels and the Sri Lankan army. During the week that followed little fighting was reported and Nisha seemed to have achieved what the international community failed to do — bring about a break in the bloody hostilities. But the respite in the fighting was all too brief. As Nisha waned the bullets and the artillery shells resumed and the ministry indicated that troops were gathering around Kilinochchi.

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