GENEVA (Reuters) - A major humanitarian crisis is unfolding in Sri Lanka, with hundreds of civilians killed in the past two weeks and 250,000 trapped by intense fighting, the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) said on Tuesday.
The neutral aid agency appealed to government forces and separatist Tamil Tigers to respect the laws of war and allow the "safe and voluntary movement" of civilians out of combat zones.
"We are in an all-out decisive stage of the conflict," Jacques de Maio, ICRC head of operations for South Asia, told a news briefing in Geneva. "There is definitely a major humanitarian situation unfolding right now."
The Sri Lankan army seized the last major town the rebels controlled, the northeastern port of Mullaittivu, on Sunday aiming to strike a death blow to the 25-year insurgency, one of the longest-running in Asia.
Intense fighting continues in the northern Vanni region, which de Maio called "the last LTTE (Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam) stronghold" where 250,000 civilians are trapped.
Hundreds of people have been killed in the past two weeks according to approximate figures the ICRC compiled from sources including hospitals and the Sri Lankan Red Cross.
Much of the fighting has been "intrinsically incompatible with full respect of the basic rules of the law of war," de Maio said. Embodied in the Geneva Conventions, they include the protection of civilians, precaution, distinction between civilian and military structures, and proportionality.
Virtually no humanitarian aid has been able to enter Vanni in recent weeks, he said. Hundreds of patients need evacuation to Vavuniya Hospital in the government-controlled area.
"What we clearly know is that the medical system is both under threat of fire, shelling and looting, and is objectively overwhelmed by an influx of war-wounded and sick people," he said, referring to Puthukkudiyiruppu Hospital in the Vanni.
(Reporting by Stephanie Nebehay; Editing by Richard Balmforth)
