The humanitarian situation in northeastern Sri Lanka has become 'extremely grim' - UN Official

The humanitarian situation in northeastern Sri Lanka has become 'extremely grim' - UN Official
Mar 4, 2009, 19:39 Digg this story!
G. Patrick - TNS

Colombo: The UN official, Gordon Wiess, warned for the people trapped in the war zone in northern Sri Lanka, there is virtually no humanitarian access to the enclave. Nothing like what is needed to sustain the population inside there.

'There is virtually no humanitarian access to the enclave. Nothing like what is needed to sustain the population inside there,' Wiess said to a media.
The humanitarian situation in northeastern Sri Lanka has become 'extremely grim', a senior UN official in the Asian country said Wednesday.
He said it was 'unacceptable' that civilians were cut off from aid.

Conditions in the territory were 'extremely overcrowded, squalid, they are very short of water, apparently short of food, certainly short of medications'.
'We have not had any consistent food deliveries since December last year,' Weiss said, noting there were 'only sporadic deliveries of food supplies'.

The parties to the conflict were 'obliged to facilitate access, whether by evacuating civilians or opening the gates so humanitarian actors can have full, consistent, meaningful, substantive contact with the civilian population,' Weiss said.

Furthermore, 'there are big issues of humanitarian law at stake', owing to actions by both the Sri Lankan military as well as the Tamil Tiger rebels.
US Based rights group, Human Rights Watch (HRW) statement last week said, at least 2000 civilians were killed and over 7000 injured within past two months of shelling by the Sri Lankan Security Forces (SF) in the war zone in Vanni.
The humanitarian crisis situations in Vanni only worsening for these innocent civilians as they are facing annihilation as the indiscriminate land, sea, and air attacks on them are continuing by the Sri Lankan forces in small Mulaitivu area daily. These people facing severe shortages of food, medicines, drinking water and other basic necessities in this area as severe blockade was imposed upon by the state on them for past many months, an IDP representative said.