Concern for Sri Lankans Trapped in War Zone Increases
(24 Apr 09 - RV) Two top Indian officials met with Sri Lanka's president to demand
an immediate cease fire in the bloody civil war as a U.N. report estimates that nearly
6,500 ethnic Tamil civilians have been killed and 14,000 wounded in the last three
months of fighting. Concern for the safety of the civilians trapped in the war zone
has increased in recent weeks as the government pushed ahead with its offensive to
crush the Tamil Tiger rebels and to end the nation's twenty-five year civil war. On
Monday, the military broke through rebel fortifications on the edge of a previously
declared «no fire» zone along the northeastern coast, sparking an exodus of more than
100,000 civilians. Meanwhile, the local director of Caritas in Sri Lanka's war-torn
Vanni region, Fr. Vasanthaseelan was injured in an attack yesterday. We spoke to Patrick
Nicholson from Caritas Internationalis about Fr. Vasanthaseelan...