Category: Politics

TRINCOMALEE, Sri Lanka, Aug 8, 2006 (AFP) – Police have recovered the bodies of 17 aid workers employed by the Paris-based Charity Action Against Hunger (ACF) and autopsies were underway Tuesday, officials said.The aid agency and authorities had initially thought that 15 ACF staff were shot dead at work in the nearby coastal town of […]

TRINCOMALEE, Sri Lanka, Aug 8, 2006 (AFP) – Slumped on the ground outside the hospital in this strife-torn Sri Lankan port town, Khanthasami Sivapaka cries for justice for his favourite daughter — one of 17 aid workers mown down by gunmen.Beside him are freshly painted maroon coffins, delivered to the Trincomalee General Hospital’s gloomy mortuary […]

TRINCOMALEE, Sri Lanka, Aug 8, 2006 (AFP) – Sri Lanka troops launched fresh artillery attacks against Tamil Tigers from bases in this port city Tuesday, as grieving relatives prepared to bury aid workers killed in the conflict.An estimated 60,000 people have been killed since the Tamil insurgency began in 1972. The bodies of 17 employees […]

Aug 8, 2006 (AFP) – Three people were killed Tuesday in a bomb attack aimed at a Sri Lanka politician opposed to Tamil Tiger rebels who have been fighting a separatist insurgency here for decades, police said.The blast, which exploded in front of a girls’ school in a crowded area of the island nation’s capital […]

GENEVA, Aug 8, 2006 (AFP) – The International Committee of the Red Cross is trying to negotiate urgent access to the area around the northeastern Sri Lankan town of Muttur, where at least 4,000 people are thought to be stranded by fighting, a spokeswoman said Tuesday.Shelter equipment and clothing for the displaced were being distributed […]

PARIS, Aug 8, 2006 (AFP) – Seventeen employees of a French charity found dead in northeastern Sri Lanka at the weekend were all executed by gunfire, the group confirmed Tuesday, demanding that those responsible be severely punished. Following the massacre, the charity suspended its local mission to Sri Lanka, whose 15 expatriate and 224 local […]

TRINCOMALEE, Sri Lanka, Aug 8, 2006 (AFP) – Relatives Tuesday sprinkled perfumed water and buried aid workers gunned down inside their office in strife-torn northeastern Sri Lanka, while police maintained tight security.“I just want to get his remains now and give him a decent burial. There is nothing more I can do.He is already dead.” […]

Aug 8, 2006 (AFP) – Tamil Tiger rebels lifted a water blockade Tuesday at the root of Sri Lanka’s latest bloodshed, which has officially claimed over 440 lives, as a car bomb killed three people in the capital.The fighting in the past fortnight has been the worst since the 2002 truce, which has been repeatedly […]

Aug 7, 2006 (AFP) – A French aid agency said Monday it would review its presence in Sri Lanka after 15 of its workers were found shot dead in the worst attack since its inception 25 years ago.Paris-based Action Against Hunger, or ACF, said 11 men and four women, all Sri Lankans, had been killed […]

Aug 7, 2006 (AFP) – Sri Lanka will order a “clean and independent” investigation into the reported killing of 15 workers of a French charity during fighting in the northeast, the human rights minister told AFP Monday.The government will grant “very high priority” to probe charges that 11 men and four women, all locals employed […]

GENEVA, Aug 7, 2006 (AFP) – Evacuations of thousands of Asian and Ethiopian migrant workers trapped in war-torn Lebanon have resumed, the International Organisation for Migration said Monday. About 750 people a day are expected to travel to Syria in coach convoys over the next five days, unless the security situation deteriorates further, the IOM […]

Aug 7, 2006 (AFP) – The bodies of 16 slain aid workers were found in Sri Lanka on Monday as new fighting between security forces and Tamil Tiger rebels dashed hope of an immediate end to the violence in the troubled nation.The Tigers said meanwhile that at least 15 more civilians were killed in new […]