US Senate Panel Discusses Sri Lanka

[Voice of America] A U.S. Senate committee Tuesday focused its attention on the situation in Sri Lanka, where the military is engaged in an intense battle with Tamil Tigers as the two sides struggle for control of what is believed to be the last of the rebel strongholds. Witnesses at the Senate hearing decried the…

Read More

Concerns raised over civilian deaths in Sri Lanka violence

[Los Angeles Times] The number of civilian deaths in Sri Lanka has risen sharply in the last month, Human Rights Watch said Friday, calling on both sides in the protracted civil war to stop firing at civilians or shelling areas where they are concentrated. The government has been battling the Tamil Tiger rebel group, which…

Read More

Civilian ‘slaughter’ in Sri Lanka

[BBC] The campaign group, Human Rights Watch, has accused the Sri Lankan army of “slaughter” and rebels of “brutality” towards civilians in the north-east. It called on the government to end its “indiscriminate artillery attacks” on civilians and its policy of “detaining displaced persons in internment camps”. Human Rights Watch also condemned the Tamil Tigers…

Read More

Sri Lanka: End ‘War’ on Civilians

[Human Rights Watch] The Sri Lankan government should immediately cease its indiscriminate artillery attacks on civilians in the northern Vanni region and its policy of detaining displaced persons in internment camps, Human Rights Watch said in a report released today. Since early January 2009, civilian casualties have skyrocketed in the fighting between the Sri Lankan…

Read More

Sri Lankans in ‘Safe Zone’ Still Under Fire

[OneWorld.net] In a designated safe zone in northern Sri Lanka, weekend fighting has put civilians back in the war zone. A new “safe zone” has provided some respite for tens of thousands of local residents, reports the United Nations, but that area also experienced some fighting in the past several days. “The Sri Lankan government…

Read More