Up to 1,000 dead in Sri Lanka attacks 'bloodbath'

Two days of shelling in Sri Lanka’s northern war zone killed at least 430 civilians – and probably as many as 1,000 – a government doctor said today.

The United Nations called the artillery barrages a “bloodbath” which killed more than 100 children, and a coalition of international human rights groups called for the UN Security Council to hold formal talks on the war.

The initial artillery attack – which lasted from Saturday evening into yesterday morning – killed at least 378 civilians and wounded more than 1,000 more, according to a health official inside rebel-controlled territory.

A rebel-linked website blamed the attack on the government, while the military accused the beleaguered Tamil Tigers of briefly shelling their own territory to gain international sympathy and force a ceasefire.

About 6pm yesterday, a new round of shelling – less intense than the first - pounded the area, according to Dr V Shanmugarajah, who works at a makeshift hospital in the war zone.

A total of 393 people were either taken to the hospital for burial or died at the facility yesterday, he said. Another 37 bodies were brought in this morning, and more than 1,300 wounded civilians came to the hospital as well, he added.

However, the death toll is likely to be far higher, he said.

Many of the dead are being buried in the bunkers where they had taken refuge and then were killed, and many of the wounded never made it to the hospital for treatment, he said.

“There were many who died without medical attention,” Dr Shanmugarajah said. “Seeing the number of wounded, and from what the people tell me, I estimate the death toll to be around 1,000.”

Reports of the fighting are difficult to verify because the government bars journalists and aid workers from the war zone, but the UN confirmed a heavy toll from the first attack over the weekend.

That attack marked the bloodiest assault on ethnic Tamil civilians since the civil war flared again more than three years ago. Health officials said a hospital in the war zone was overwhelmed by casualties, and the death toll was expected to rise sharply.

“The UN has consistently warned against the bloodbath scenario as we’ve watched the steady increase in civilian deaths over the last few months,” UN spokesman Gordon Weiss said today.

“The large-scale killing of civilians over the weekend, including the deaths of more than 100 children, shows that that bloodbath has become a reality.”

Meanwhile, Human Rights Watch, Amnesty International and other rights groups called on Japan, the largest international donor to Sri Lanka, to press the UN to urgently discuss the conflict there.

“Formal meetings of the Security Council must be held urgently so that the council can take the necessary measures to address the humanitarian and human rights crisis,” the groups said in a letter to Japan’s prime minister.