Sri Lanka - war crimes charges

Hospitals shelled repeatedly in anti-LTTE drive, HRW claims

Article published on the 2009-05-09 Latest update 2009-05-09 14:54 TU

A Tamil woman who lost part of her leg in a hospital ward in the government-held town of Vavuniya in northern Sri Lanka
(Photo: Reuters)

The US-based NGO Human Rights Watch has accused Sri Lanka's military of war crimes, claiming that government forces have repeatedly shelled hospitals in their offensive against the separatist Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE). The army claims to have killed 49 rebels in the latest fighting.

The Sri Lankan navy said on Saturday that it has sunk two Tiger boats, carrying at least 14 guerrillas, in a sea battle. Earlier troops killed 35 LTTE fighters outside a newly declared "safety zone", the Defence Ministry said.

The government has reduced the size of the safe zone, on which its forces will not fire, after claiming recent advances in its offensive.

"The new civilian safe zone is an area which is two kilometres long and 1.5 kilometres wide," said military spokesperson brigadier Udaya Nanayakkara, repeating claims that the rebels are restricted to a five-kilometer area. 

The government claims that the LTTE is holding 20,000 civilians as "human shields". The UN says that as many as 50,000 may be trapped by the fighting.

Government forces have repeatedly shelled hospitals in the conflict-hit north, according to a Human Rights Watch report, which says its findings are "evidence of war crimes".

"We have received repeated reports in the last couple of months, of hospitals being hit by Sri Lankan government artillery fire, rocket propelled grenades, or other kinds of weaponry," says Brad Adams, from Human Rights Watch.

The US-based group says that there have been "at least 30 attacks on permanent and makeshift hospitals" in the Vanni region, describing the artillery and aerial bombardments as "indiscriminate".

"One of the deadliest took place on 2 May, when artillery shells struck Mullaivaikal hospital in the government-declared 'no-fire zone', killing 68 persons and wounding 87," the group says.

Alleged evidence of attacks on a hospital, which was posted on the pro-LTTE Tamilnet website last weekend, was denounced as forgery by the government, which denies having knowingly shelled medical facilities.

Adams says Human Rights Watch's sources are reliable.

"We have built up relationships with credible sources over time. One thing I can be certain of is that this information is not LTTE propaganda, he told RFI.

"We would like there to a humanitarian pause, so that civilians can leave through a humanitarian corridor. We want the government and the Tigers to let humanitarian aid in. We don’t want hospitals to be targeted. We want the detention camps, to be just transit camps," says Adams and he calls on the UN to act.

"If the Security Council is meant to protect civilians, and they’ve got a series of resolutions to that effect, this is a textbook case."

Meanwhile, rights campaigners have issued an appeal to save former child protection worker Strephen Suntharaj. He is reported to have been abducted by men in uniform in Colombo after being released from two months in police custody. 

Suntharaj, who works for the Centre for Human Rights and Development, previously worked for the Child Protection Authority in Jaffna.

"Stephen had taken up many cases of child abuse in Jaffna as a result was threatened by different groups and ultimately had to flee Jaffna," says a statement by the Asian Human Rights Commission.

"There is no reason to believe that those who abducted Stephen are acting on any other instructions other than those from the people who authorised his detention in the first place," the statement says. "It is the duty of the Ministry of Defence and the Sri Lankan government to immediately take steps to find and release Stephen."