Tens of thousands of IDPs hit by monsoon rains
Report by IRIN News
The onset of the north-eastern monsoon in Sri Lanka is accelerating the need to provide adequate shelter to more than 220,000 internally displaced people (IDPs) in areas controlled by the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam in the north, UN and government officials said.
Many IDPs have relocated to flood-prone areas and thousands of families still have no shelter against the monsoon downpours
The IDPs remain in the Vanni, a north-central area under Tamil Tiger control and, according to the latest situation report by the Inter-Agency Standing Committee (IASC), insufficient temporary shelters had been erected by mid-September.
"The first of the monsoon rains have started in Mulaithivu District [in the Vanni], increasing concerns for vulnerable displaced families," the situation report, released on 13 October, stated.
"Humanitarian agencies are increasingly worried about the large gap in shelter provision for IDPs currently with inadequate shelters," stated the report. "Although some IDPs have managed to take shelter material and roofing with them as they have had to displace, only 2,100 temporary shelters had been built at the time humanitarian organisations relocated from the Vanni on 16 September."
UN and other international agencies working in the Vanni left the area in September following a government directive amid deteriorating security.
Shelter needs
Imalda Sukumar, the government agent for Mulaithivu District, which has the largest concentration of IDPs at 155,000 persons (about 39,000 families), said up to half needed proper shelter.
"We feel that at least 14,000 families are in need of shelter material and we are working to get them that," she told IRIN.
Heavy rains in eastern Sri Lanka led to heavy flooding in late December 2007 and the temporary displacement of some 250,000 people-pic: Amantha Perera/IRIN
"The monsoon is something that we all were expecting and now as we keep food supplies moving to the displaced [in the Vanni], we will have to look at transporting shelter material as well," Gordon Weiss, the UN spokesman in Sri Lanka, told IRIN.
Another 66,000 IDPs remain in Kilinochchi District west of Mulaithivu. Recent fighting in Kilinochchi has forced IDPs to move to Mulaithivu District in large numbers.
The situation report stated that many of the displaced families had relocated to low-lying areas. "Many IDPs have congregated in areas along the A35 highway which were once paddy land and therefore prone to flooding. Shelter agencies had previously assessed some of this land as potential IDP sites and found them unsuitable."
The Meteorological Department has warned that the annual north-eastern monsoon was likely to remain active until at least November.
Food convoys
Since the relocation, some 71 trucks with food supplies, including 30 with supplies from the World Food Programme (WFP), have crossed into the Vanni.
The government pledged it would keep supplies moving into the Vanni and officials said that at least one convoy would travel there every week.
"In order to ensure effective, adequate and safe delivery of humanitarian supplies, the government has been working closely with UN agencies, the International Committee of the Red Cross [ICRC], as well as a number of local and international NGOs," Foreign Minister Rohitha Bogollagama said on 14 October during an official visit to Australia.
The UN said it planned to move its second convoy of supplies since the relocation this week. "The plan is to send 50 vehicles with about 45 carrying food stuff from WFP," Weiss told IRIN.
Sukumar, however, warned that the rains could hamper future convoys. "The road from Puliyankulam to Nedunkerni [the route taken by the food convoys] is in a very bad condition," she said.
Due to fighting in Kilinochchi District, the food convoys did not travel far on the A9 highway, the best road in the Vanni, but took a safer route to the east.
"The situation in the Vanni is evolving daily," Anthony Dalziel, ICRC deputy head of delegation in Sri Lanka, stated in the agency's September bulletin, released on 13 October.
The ICRC is the only international humanitarian agency with a permanent presence in the Vanni. "While security remains a concern, we are in daily contact with the Sri Lankan security forces and LTTE, which allows us to obtain the necessary security guarantees to be present and carry out our work in the field," Dalziel said.
Reported by UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs [IRIN News]
1 Comments
The difference between liberty and slavery is that in slavery a master would decide for a slave, instead of allowing the slave to decide freely for himself as to what he should do. Because of such dehumanisation there is always a longing by the slave to have liberty and human dignity. But a master enjoys his status at the expense of another human being.
Under the prevailing ethnic "master-slave" culture in Sri Lanka(SL), maniacal selfishness has motivated oppressive Sinhalese political decisions against Tamils. The Sinhalese have been ruthlessly deciding as to what political rights and freedoms the Tamils should have, instead of granting them their rights that are legitimate and democratic.
Last week, Gothabaya Rajapakse, the appendage of the president, reflected his ethnic master arrogance when he defiantly said that no other food help whatsoever would be permitted to reach the Tamil civilians in Kilinochchi. He said this with sweet added to it that the Tamils in SL are "their citizens" and the government of Sri Lanka(GOSL) would take "care" of them.
In the recently concluded UN Human Rights Council sessions the GOSL used the same phraseology to escape UN action. Rights violations have tremendously increased since then.
A few days after Gothabaya spoke of the "care" for Tamils, a convoy of food sent by the UN from Vavuniya to meet the needs of the Tamil civilians in Kilinochchi was forced to return due to deliberate shelling by Sinhalese soldiers; a drama enacted by the state not to supply food to Kilinochchi where there is a humanitarian crisis.
Past assurances to the world community of "caring" for Tamils has produced a history of 60 years of discrimination, dehumanisation and destruction of Tamil lives, causing collective punishment and Tamil genocide.
Genocide is ugly to the utmost and those who commit this crime are demonised to deceive their victims. They become dangerous liars. During genocide, Jews were sweetly told that they were going to be clean after their shower and all were gassed to death in gas chambers.
The present monstrous, careless and catastrophical destruction of Tamil civilian lives and material values built up laboriously over centuries is undoubtedly and unequivocally genocide. But such collective Sinhalese action is called "liberating the North East(NE)" and "war on terrorism" by the state for deceptive consumption by the International Community.
For a long time, the UN and the world leaders have been duped by such distortion of realities.
Consequent to ethnic "master-slave" criminal acts committed by Serbians, Kosovo declared unilateral independence a few months ago. And during the second week of this month, the UN General Assembly asked the International Court Of Justice(ICJ) to rule on whether Kosovo's unilateral secession from Serbia is in accordance with International law.
The people of NE asked for an amicable divorce from the south of the island, democratically, in the year 1977. Since then, the desire was repeated again and again with no results.
The UN General Assembly should also justifiably ask the ICJ to rule on whether the unilateral declaration of republic by SL in 1972 was in accordance with international law and on the legitimacy of Tamil Eelam from the year 1977.
The ruling by the ICJ could pave way to the dawn of freedom for all the inhabitants of the island under an "equality culture" that would stop the present Tamil genocide in the NE and bring peace to the island.