Date and Location: Kantale, Trincomalee, eastern Sri Lanka, 21-24 August 2006
Duration: 3mins
Camera: Chaminda Janaka
Sound: Geethananda Serasinghe
Producer: Davide Vignati
Source: ICRC – Access all

Preview (RealMedia stream 56Kbs - 128kbs):
news-cut/sri_lanka_060906


For full details of the World feed, go to the EBU website and/or see below for timings and technical specification:

For broadcast tapes and information on footage: Virginie Miranda, International Committee of the Red Cross, Geneva,

SHOTLIST

00 00 Scenes in St Joseph School IDP Camp Trincomalee town, villagers escaping fighting in Mutur town have taken shelter here

00 05 Scenes in camp, adults and children sleeping on floor


00 12 ITW Mr. S. Patmanathan, Mudamavetti villager
“I was sleeping with my family when the shelling started. The entire Mudamavetti town was under attack, explosions everywhere. We started to run and run, and we reached Kiliveddi town that was also under attack. There was a big chaos and confusion, I look around and my family was not there anymore, just my brother. We walked away towards Seruvilla and we met the ICRC convoy which brought me and my brother to this camp in Trincomalee”.

00 20 In camp, women cooking, men playing cards


00 38 ITW Mr. S. Patmanathan
“Once arrived in Trincomalee, we came directly to this camp, since then I haven't stopped looking for my family for a moment and finally today I got the news that they are safe in Kantale. I hope to be able to meet them soon”.

00 52 CSA Refugee Camp, Kantale Trincomalee district, old lady , children

00 56 ITW Majna Oumar, Mutur villager
“We had to escape from Mutur, there were explosions everywhere. We had to abandon all our stuff, and during the march to the south we could not eat for six days. We have been warned to go back home. I am afraid, my husband has been stopped by a group of men when we were trying to escape from Mutur. I screamed against them but they beat me and my kids and other women that were with me. We arrived here without nothing, I lost my husband”.

01 26 ICRC volunteers load emergency supplies in ICRC warehouse in Trincomalee

01 39 ICRC convoy of lorries - departure

01 46 ICRC convoy reaches C.S.A refugee camp in Kantale

01 50 tents

01 55 people waiting in line

02 05 ICRC gives out relief goods in the camp

02 19 ICRC Head of Trincomalee Sub delegation Yvonne Dunton organizes the distribution

02 24 ITW Yvonne Dunton, ICRC Head of Sub-delegation, Trincomalee
“When the people left Mutur, basically almost all the entire town of Mutur walked away from the town and came to Kantale, Kinniya, Trincomale and Tampalakamam, over 6,500 families who took this walk upon themselves to Kantale area that was safer for them. ICRC immediately supported the people, we also transported people into the camps."

02 56 child with water bottle

03 00 ENDS


STORY


GENEVA - 1 September 2006

Following the fighting between Sri Lankan security forces and the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) in Trincomalee district earlier in August, thousands of civilians remain displaced from their homes and are living in temporary camps in Jaffna Peninsula, Batticaloa and Trincomalee.

People are in a desperate state, having left behind all personal belongings, and often separated from friends and family in the urgency of departure. "We had to escape from Mutur, there were explosions everywhere. We had to abandon all our stuff, and during the march to the south we could not eat for six days." said one villager.

When fighting broke out in Mutur town, near Trincomalee, almost the entire population had to flee, according to ICRC's Yvonne Dunton, "basically almost all the entire town of Mutur walked away from the town …. over 6,500 families who took this walk upon themselves to Kantale area that was safer for them."

The ICRC is stepping up its efforts to assist the displaced, bringing in additional staff and mobilizing relief supplies. Goods including food, hygiene kits, mats, bed sheets, cooking pots and fuel have been brought into the Jaffna peninsula by boat and are being distributed to people living in desperate conditions in temporary camps. No firm figures of internally displaced people are available at this stage. The ICRC is basing its operations as follows: around 50,000 people have been displaced in Trincomalee, 42,000 in Jaffna Peninsula and 35,000 in Batticaloa district.

At today's press conference at ICRC's Geneva headquarters, the ICRC's delegate general for Asia and the Pacific, Reto Meister, noted that the organization continues to remind both parties to the conflict that they must allow all civilians affected by the hostilities to have access to essential goods and services such as food, water and medical care. In its role as a neutral intermediary, the ICRC remains ready to facilitate the transport of people and relief goods to and from areas cut off by the fighting and is discussing the question with both sides.


Current ICRC operations on the ground:

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Relief activities:
In Trincomalee district, internally displaced persons are sheltering in 45 camps or being hosted by the resident community. The ICRC has been providing relief to the displaced population in the east (hygiene parcels, family kits, tarpaulins etc) and delivering drinking water supplies as well as rehabilitating existing water systems. Millions of litres of water were made available to the affected population.

The ICRC is worried about the nutritional situation of the population in the Jaffna peninsula and potential food shortages. The two most recent operations in Jaffna are the following:

Ship
Relief reached Jaffna for the first time on Thursday the 24th of August. A ship full of food and relief items provided by the Sri Lankan government, WFP and the ICRC departed from Colombo Wednesday and sailed under an ICRC flag. It reached Friday ''Point Pedro'' in Jaffna where unloading operations started.

Ferry
The ICRC has also evacuated on Sunday the 27th of August 161 persons from Jaffna with a ferry. Among those people medical patients, families with children and some foreigners.

Protection activities:
-ICRC visits to persons detained as a result of the recent hostilities in Trincomalee and Kantale police stations. Most of the families of the detained persons were informed of their detention.
-Persons searching for their relatives or trying to re-establish links with their families have approached ICRC offices in the field to fill either family Red Cross messages, '' I am alive'' messages or tracing requests.

Crossing the lines with wounded and sick:
Between 26 July and 20 August, the ICRC, acting as a neutral intermediary, has facilitated the transfer of to hospitals of 23 wounded and 22 sick civilians.