The United Nations said on Tuesday it was withdrawing all its aid agency personnel from Sri Lanka’s embattled north, following a government order to quit ahead of a major military offensive.
Only a few aid agencies, including the UN outfits, were still operating inside the rebel-held Wanni district, where government forces are currently on a major push to dismantle the guerrillas’ mini-state.
”A precise timetable for the complete withdrawal of all staff is yet to be determined, but relocations will begin this week,” the UN said in a statement.
Sri Lanka Disaster Management Minister Mahinda Samarasinghe on Monday said Colombo could not guarantee the safety of aid workers ”given the present situation”.
”We asked them to leave the Wanni district immediately with all their resources,” the minister said. ”They wanted a week or two to comply.”
The UN statement said it had noted that ”the government recognises it holds primary responsibility for ensuring the safety of humanitarian workers”.
It said it would reassess how it could address the humanitarian needs of civilians.
Colombo wants to avoid troops being accused of killing aid workers in a repeat of the August 2006 massacre of 17 local employees of the French aid agency Action against Hunger in the east of the island.
However, the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) said on Tuesday that it had no immediate plans to pull out.
”As of now, we are staying in the Wanni,” ICRC spokesperson Aleksandra Matijevic said.
”We are, of course, in regular dialogue with the government and the LTTE [Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam] to ensure the safety of our own workers and the civilians being displaced,” she said.
Aid officials have reported that about 134 000 people have been displaced from their homes in Wanni as a result of the current wave of fighting, as troops move in to take control of the rebels’ political capital of Kilinochchi.
Tens of thousands of people have died on both sides since the LTTE launched a separatist campaign in 1972 for a homeland for minority Tamils in the island’s north and east. — AFP
