Thousands of refugees stranded in Sri Lanka's northeast

Thousands of civilians have been trapped by fighting in Sri Lanka’s northeast, and the most desperate among them have started walking through the forests to escape the battles, a Red Cross official said today.

Some 6,000 to 7,000 families were trying to get out of Muttur, the seaside town that has been the focus of the worst fighting, said Yvonne Dunton, Trincomalee head of the International Committee of the Red Cross.

“We know that they have left their homes and are trying to come out,” Dunton said.

The ICRC was trying to get access to them, but shelling by both the Tamil Tiger rebels and the military in Muttur, about five miles across a small bay from Trincomalee, was making the task difficult, according to district administration officials.

A convoy had been dispatched to try to get to the refugees, said ICRC’s Colombo-based head, Toon Vandenhove.

The area is particularly dangerous. Muttur, a government-controlled town edged by rebel-held villages and jungle, is located on a small peninsula, and travellers must cross several ferries or take land routes that are often shelled.

But the rebels said they were arranging for safe passage for the refugees.

“We are making necessary arrangements to move civilians from Muttur to safer locations,” the pro-rebel website TamilNet quoted Irasiah Ilanthirayan, the rebels’ military spokesman, as saying. It was not clear what arrangements they were making.

Sri Lanka already has an estimated 800,000 internally displaced refugees as a result of the two-decade civil war between the rebels and the government.

The war killed about 65,000 people before the Norwegian-brokered a ceasefire in 2002, which left parts of the north and east under rebel control.

While the agreement officially remains in effect, escalating violence since December has killed at least 900 people, half of them civilians. Over the past few weeks, the violence has spiked even further.