Sri Lanka denies civilian crisis
[BBC]
Sri Lanka’s government has denied Red Cross and UN reports of a major humanitarian crisis in the north, where troops are fighting Tamil Tiger rebels. Defence Secretary Gotabhaya Rajapaksa told the BBC that he had a policy of “zero” civilian casualties. The Red Cross believes that hundreds of civilians have been killed and hundreds of thousands more are trapped. With aid supplies mostly blocked, the UN plans to make a new bid on Thursday to evacuate badly injured civilians.