As violence surges in Sri Lanka, so does the number of abductions and disappearance of mostly Tamil men. That is the assessment of human rights activists and international aid groups operating in the Indian Ocean nation.

Soli Chana, 23, is trying to find out what happened to her husband. Witnesses say three men in civilian clothes stopped him, not far from his house in Vanuniya in central Sri Lanka. They handcuffed him, shoved in a plain white van and sped away. That was a year and a half ago. He has not been heard from since.

"She is shocked and upset, [very] upset. She made complaint to the police, the Red Cross, the Human Rights Commission and ICRC [Red Cross/Crescent] also," Chana said. "All they can say is, 'We will search.'"

Thousands of other families across Sri Lanka are doing the same - making the rounds at human rights agencies to find family members who have disappeared.

The missing and the families left behind, most of them left struggling, impoverished without their breadwinners, are caught up in a growing list of atrocities being committed by both sides of this 25-year conflict between the Sinhala-dominated Sri Lankan government and Tamil militants, known as the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam.

The American government and others, around the world, say the LTTE is a terrorist organization.

The numbers of the disappeared are in dispute by the Sri Lankan government, but human rights groups and foreign observer say that thousands of mostly Tamil men have been abducted in the past decade and remain missing.

Palitha Kohona is Sri Lanka's foreign affairs minister. He says the government is sincere in trying to locate those who have disappeared. He says the numbers are being exaggerated by Tamil activists and international aid agencies to tarnish the government's human rights record. Kohona says he helped investigate the disappearance of 355 people from list that an American diplomat recently handed to him.

"To us, one person disappearing is one too many," Kohona said. "When you have 355 it is a matter of serious concern. But, in that list, when we went through the list, there were some repetitions in it. There were 23 in that list whom we have located, up to now, and they are well and kicking. And, there are others whose names are suspiciously similar to those recorded by our immigration authorities as people who have left the country."

He says nearly half of the 355 people on the list were accounted for and that authorities are continuing their investigation.

Father Henry Miller is a Jesuit priest who has a list of eight-thousand people - mostly young Tamil men - who have been abducted in the past decade. He says most of them are still missing.

He says the Sri Lankan government is touting a recent election here as a sign that democracy is flourishing in a part of the country once controlled by the LTTE. The winner of that election - the first here in 14 years - was an supposedly-less-militarized political split-off of the LTTE, known as the Tamil Makkal Vidutalaip Pullikal, led by a former LTTE commander.

For some, their victory could usher in a new era of trust between the Sri Lankan government and the Tamil community.

But Father Miller is skeptical. He says the TMVP is merely a proxy party of the government.

And, now the government can say we have restored self-government to the people of the Batticaloa District and it has not been done," Miller said. "This is the government's program. And, with this they proclaim to the world that they have liberated and restored democratic government to the people of Batticaloa. It is a falsity."

Father Miller says that, in the government's ongoing attempt to control Tamil militants, they treat all Tamils as potential terrorists. He says that, with Sri Lanka's civil war flaring up once again in the Tamil-dominated north, that is not likely to change anytime soon.

A March report issued by the U.S. State Department cited almost daily extrajudicial killings and attacks against civilians by the army, paramilitaries and pro-government militias in the government-controlled Jaffna Peninsula.

In the last one year Sri Lanka’s eastern Batticaloa district has seen two rounds of mass displacements as hundreds of thousands of people fled warfare between Tamil militants and the armed forces of the country.
In late 2006 and early 2007, frightened civilians, mostly ethnic Tamils, fled their homes in areas held by the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam as the Sri Lankan army fought its way in to dislodge the militants.

As the government forces gained more and more LTTE territory, they also began a massive resettlement plan to get the internally displaced persons (IDPs) to return to their villages.

So far, over 104,000 of the IDPs have been resettled in areas regained by government forces such Vavunathivu and Vakarai, according to the ministry of resettlement and disaster relief services. Of those displaced until mid-March, last year, a little over 18,000 remain to be resettled.

The government of President Mahinda Rajapakse emphasised the reestablishment of its writ in the entire district by holding local body elections on Mar. 10 - though this was marred by the fact that the main opposition parties boycotted it.

And now the resettled civilians are demanding action from the newly elected local bodies.

"All my life I have been running, either from bullets or from shells. I have never been able to talk of a future," Sellan Sundaralingam, 49, and a father of three grown up daughters, told IPS in Vavuniathivu where 27,000 persons have been resettled.

Despite the mass returns, the villagers say that they still suffer from a chronic lack of basic facilities like proper roads, regular electricity, housing, schools and medical facilities.

"I still live in an abandoned house," Sundaralingam said.

Battered by decades of conflict, these newly resettled areas, mostly west of the famous Batticaloa lagoon have dirt track roads pockmarked by craters created by shell fire. School buildings are defaced and roofs and walls have been blown away by stray shells.

Kumaradass Nesamalar had hoped to rebuild his house with the Rs 250,000 (2,318 US dollars) that he received as tsunami relief.

"I was hit by the tsunami, my house was destroyed, but I was unable to repair it," the 38-year-old father of five children said. "Now the money is gone… spent on surviving the fighting.’’

Despite relative calm since last July, most of the newly resettled people bear the effects of having lived most of their lives under the barrel of a gun.

"The last few months have been good, there has been no war, no fighting and we have lived better," Nesamalar said.

"The harvest has been good and so is the fishing, but who knows what will happen tomorrow."

Villagers living in locations like Vavunathivu, Vakarai and Karadiyanaru, strongholds of the Tigers less than a year back, say their lives have been dictated by conflict for as long as they can remember.

"We have fled our homes on so many occasions and come back that it was almost a part of routine life," Sundaralingam said.

In fact, the last harvest was one of the best in recent years due partly to high rice prices in the Sri Lankan market and rich fishing operators have begun to cast eyes on coastal fishing spots like Vakarai, untapped for more than a decade.

The Rajapakse government has publicly pledged that development projects in the district would be fast-tracked after the local government elections.

Each of the nine newly constituted councils were handed Rs 2.5 million (23,000 dollars) by the President at the swearing-in-ceremony in mid March as support for local projects.

But just two weeks after the elections, two police officers were killed and five others, including three civilians, injured in a claymore attack in an areas south of Vavunanthivu.

Civilians who fled their villagers were resettled after a special registration process and issued special identity cards.

Outsiders still cannot travel about freely in the region. The U.N. and other relief agencies working in the areas have controlled access.

Development projects are likely to be delayed, at least till after the conclusion of the May 10 elections for the eastern provincial council that the government is anxious to conduct.

Like, the local body elections, this could end in a walkover for the ruling coalition. Batticaloa is one of three districts that fall in the eastern province.

Whoever wins, the local population is only interested in a peaceful and settled existence, after what they have been through. Much hope is placed on children growing up in these troubled areas.

Mana Madanaraja, a 14-year-old in Vavunathivu, has just recovered from a bout of measles but says that he likes going to school now.

"I like it, we can play in the ground without any fear. I go to school every day."

Madanaraja’s ambition is to be an engineer, "I want to help the people," he said, looking around at the dirt track road and ruined houses. But his school lacks basics such as text books.

"The teachers said that we will soon be getting them, it is difficult to study without text books."

Humanitarian agencies say hundreds of children in the North are suffering from severe malnutrition, with essential supplies, including therapeutic food supplements given to severely malnourished children, yet to reach them.

According to the Kilinochchi District Hospital, more than 500 children below the age of five in the Kilinochchi District, suffer from severe malnutrition.

Nutrition screening in Jaffna has identified a further 407 children suffering from 3 SD or Severe Acute Malnutrition, a UN affiliated agency said.

The Inter Agency Standing Committee (IASC) quoted the Kilinochchi District Secretary as saying that the Ministry of Defence (MoD) had not given permission to transport food items for consumption by the general public, through the Omanthai crossing point into Kilinochchi, in the months of February and March.

“MPCSs report that food stocks in the district are running low. Wheat flour shortages have been reported from some villages in the north-east of Kilinochchi District. The Regional Divisional Health Services (RDHS) office-in Kilinochchi reports that no MoD permission had been given to bring in essential drugs from the stores in Vavuniya for the first quarter of the year. This is further exacerbating the lack of essential medicines in government run medical facilities,” IASC said.

The Kilinochchi District Secretary reports that 4,025 acres of paddy that was ready for harvesting had been destroyed by floods brought on by un-seasonal rains.

Meanwhile, the Jaffna RDHS had forwarded a supply request, through the Director General of Health Services in Colombo, for the supply of BP 100 (the therapeutic food supplement used for severely malnourished children), in order that the Nutrition Rehabilitation Programme may continue, as stocks were running low.

“Nutrition screening identified 407 children to have 3 SD,” IASC said.

Interestingly, in January this year, a UNICEF consignment of BP 100 destined for malnourished children in the north, was seized after the government claimed the high protein biscuits were used by combatants as rations.

The stocks were however subsequently released to UNICEF, but sources at the agency fear the delay to get the consignment to Kilinochchi may have contributed to the malnutrition experienced in the district. The Military was not available for comment on the issue.

I had a rare opportunity to come to know closely of the details of a Black Tiger Thurairathinam Kalairaj (Ilam Puli), who became a Martyr, when the Anuradhapura Air Base was attacked by the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE).

Ilama Puli was born on 13.10.1981 in a fishing village called Myliddy. His father was a prosperous fisherman, who owned a big motor boat. Ten people were employed by him and led a very comfortable life having his own stone built house, a motor cycle and all the other paraphernalia that go with prosperity. He had three children with Ilam Puli sandwiched between two sisters.

Ilam Puli was very much attached to both the sisters and particularly to the younger one Kaviarasi. He had his education at the Nadeswara College in Myliddy until the tragedy struck their family through the invasion of the Sri Lankan Army (SLA) in 1995. This family was among the several lacks of people, who left the Jaffna peninsula in an exodus. They left behind all their belongings except what they could carry in their bare hands. Since the motorbike was in a garage, they had to leave that also behind. Unfortunately they had no bank accounts and all their savings were only the jewels the ladies were wearing. They lost everything – the boat, the engine, the motorbike and all what were left behind in the house. Even the house was subsequently washed away by the tsunami. A one time rich family was made as refugees within a matter of hours.

They reached Nagarkovil by foot and lived in a temporary shed; what a contrast from a big stone built multi-roomed house. Ilam Puli and his sisters continued their education at the Nagarkovil Govt. Tamil Mixed School. Incidentally this is the school that was bombed by the SL Air force in 1995. Ilam Puli and his siblings escaped miraculously from that bomb attack.

His father being a good fisherman got hold of a few logs of wood and made a Catamaran to continue fishing in the coasts of Thalayadi. But their problems propped up again, when the SLA commenced shelling the Vadamaradchchi East, which constituted Nagarkovil as well. All those from the nearby villages had to be moved out further into Vanni. They finally reached Mallavi.

Again another shed housed all the five inmates of the family and with no fishing possibilities in the heartland of Mallavi they were left at the mercy of the handouts given to them by the International Non-Governmental Organisations (INGOs). But that was hardly sufficient to feed five mouths. The father was earlier shot and injured severely by the IPKF and one of his lungs and a kidney were affected. Hence he could not do any hard manual labour. Hence it was Ilam Puli’s mother who had to find work as a coolie in the neighbourhood.

Mallavi is not a very prosperous area either. There were days when none of the members of the family had anything to eat. Yet they managed somehow and Ilam Puli with his siblings joined the Mallavi Maha Vidhyalayam. He and his younger sisters did exceptionally well at school. He attained such good results at the Advanced Level that admission to the university was open for him. But his love for his family was eating into him. He just could not leave them behind. Besides he could not even dream of a University Education due to the high costs involved.

I was told that he kept telling his friends that the cause for their present plight was the Sri Lankan Government (GoSL). He felt sorry for the rest of the refugees. Their misery was hurting him. This antagonism made him decide to do what he thought was best and that was to join the LTTE and fight the enemy who was ruining the lives of several thousands of people. Without the knowledge of the parents he joined the LTTE in 1999.

His exemplary service and meritorious qualities were straight away spotted by the higher-ups in the LTTE. He was swiftly absorbed into the medical division and taught medicine. Within four years he qualified as a medical practitioner and everyone addressed him as Doctor. He exemplified himself in his duties and exhibited his devotion and dedication to that noble profession. I was told that he did several surgical operations under very primitive circumstances and saved so many lives and limbs. Very senior doctors and surgeons admired his skill in surgery. He was a committed doctor and cared for the patients with love and devotion. He saved so many people that he made several friends. One Cholan (fictitious name), whose life was saved by Ilam Puli, became his thickest chum. It is Cholan who now takes good care of the family after the demise of Ilam Puli.

Heart of hearts Ilam Puli’s intention was always to become a Black Tiger. So he made his application to the Leader Mr.V.Pirapakaran but got no response. He made another attempt after one year. He was called in by the Leader after a long wait of another six months and the Leader told him that he could not take him in simply because Ilam Puli was the only son in the family. It touched my heart when I heard of this from Kaviarasi. Mr.V.Pirapakaran who is characterised as a “Ruthless leader” in several quarters has such a soft and tender heart embedded in him.

But Ilam Puli returned with a broken heart. He got a day’s leave from work and visited his parents. I heard that he was unusually very moody on that day. They did not know why. Normally when he comes home he used to sit beside his mother holding her hand and putting it intermittently on to his eyes. He also does not fail to put Kavi (as Kaviarasi is called by him) on the other side. And before he leaves he always touched the feet of his parents (Patha Namaskaram).He was so attached and devoted to the family.

His mother told me that Ilam Puli once wrote to them to get him a small radio, which they did when they visited him next. But when they met him after three months he did not have the radio with him. His explanation was that he had given it away to another LTTE cadre from Batticaloa as he had no parents or any relations. This is a symbol for Richness in Poverty.

Ilam Puli never gives up until he attains his goal. He kept applying until one day when he was finally taken as a Black Tiger. He told no body about this, which is typical of the Black Tigers. Neither his best friend nor any of the members of his family including his mother, whom he loved so much, knew of this development.

Now looking back the motherly instinct tells her that it was several months before the attack that her son must have become so. This is because his usual visits that were once quite frequent gradually became rare and rare. Even when he visited them he kept a distance from his mother and his dear little sis Kavi. Apparently he was cutting himself off from the family in the interest of both the parties. Only he knew what was in store.

Kavi told me last week that Ilam Puli once came with her photo where her picture was decorated with Red Roses. When she asked him for the reason he seems to have said “It is because you are a Rose to me.” She couldn’t control her emotions and was sobbing when she narrated this. I wouldn’t disagree with his statement as she is as pretty as a rose.

It was more than six months since he visited his family last. It was only when the “News” was brought to them by Karikalan that they came to know the whole story. During his visits Ilam Puli seems to have asked his parents for a few things. One was that in case of his death they should treat those who bring the message of his death, lovingly and give them tea. The other was to decorate his coffin with Red Roses, which I trust, symbolized his sister Kavi. Another day Kavi told me that Ilam Puli use to call her as Kavi and not Kaviarasi. When she asked him as why he calls her so, he seems to have said “because you are a poem to me” and of course she broke down after that too.

But I give credit to his mother. I did not see her cry even on the day of the funeral or on the 41st day ceremony. When I met her ten days back to prepare this article I asked her the reason for it. She said that she did cry a lot when the “News” was broken to her but within a matter of hours she pulled herself together, because she remembered what Ilam Puli had told her once. It was that none of them should cry over his demise.

Kaviarasi despite the very trying circumstances she was in, yet she got a B and two Cs in the Advance Level exam. But poverty, the atrocities by the army and the fact that she is a sister to a Black Tiger prevented her from joining the University in Jaffna. What a pity.

Both at the funeral and on the 41st day there were present several from the LTTE cadre who had been treated by Ilam Puli. They were full of praise for the care and dedication he devoted in treating the injured. Their words filled with emotions spoke of the great respect they have for him.

Even though Ilam Puli was a qualified doctor yet the photo of the hut where his parents live, will portray the poverty of the parents. Their faces are intentionally not shown for obvious reasons. It is in this small hut that his parents live with their daughters. The elder daughter is married and has a child as well. In spite of his being a doctor he was not paid any remuneration, which is the practice with the LTTE, whose cadres are unpaid volunteers sacrificing their lives for the betterment of our community.

When our brothers, sisters, sons and daughters are sacrificing their lives for us, the question that props in my mind is “what am I doing for them?”

More than security concerns, the sentiments of Tamil Christians and their mistrust of Sri Lankan State seem to be the impelling force behind the decision of taking away Our Lady of Madu from her abode. Those who could look at how Kathirkaamam was confiscated from the predominance of Tamils and how the ancient temples behind the Tamil Saiva myth are inside ‘High Security Zones’, could understand the fear of Tamil Christians. The question is whether the International Community and India, which contribute to the military option, don’t understand or don’t want to understand the fact that if there is anything to be defeated militarily in Sri Lanka, it is the chauvinism of the Sri Lankan State.

Our Lady of Madu has become a refugee in her own land, the Bishop of Mannaar said on Thursday.

To a Tamil mind it reminds of the plight of the two chief deities of Tamil Saivism and Vaishnavism, who had to be carried away to escape vandalism at the hands of the Muslim rulers of medieval times.

Arangkan (Sri Rangkanaathar of Sri Rangkam) had to flee to Thiruppathi, Saligramam and Chegnchi and Ampalavan (Nadaraja of Chithamparam) had to find sanctuary in Thiruvaaroor.

It took a pan south Indian resistance movement to reinstate Arangkan and there rooted the birth of Vijayanagara Empire.

The Tamil identity is secular. It doesn’t have any particular religion. Tamil served the medium for all the major religions of the world since very old times, which is a unique attribute to a language and the identity associated with it.

To a Tamil mind, the self-respect of one’s freedom to follow any faith in his or her language and cultural context is what that matters.

Tamil Christianity in Sri Lanka today is an integral part of Eezham Tamil identity.

Contrary to the impression of many, Christianity hasn’t come into Tamil heritage with the advent of the Portuguese. It had come long before, almost at the time of the birth of Christianity in West Asia. It made an impact and survived in the old Tamil society, the descendents of which are the Syrian Christians of Malabar.

When the Roman Catholic faith came along with the Portuguese to Asia, Mannaar, associated with the activities of St. Francis Xavier, was one of the first centres – a Tamil Christian centre, established through martyrdom.

For centuries, the Tamil Christian heritage of Mannaar has evolved its own culture, literature, art forms etc.

The origin of the icon of Our Lady of Madu, go back to the times of the advent of Catholic Christianity in Mannaar.

In the 16th century, the image, which was then known as Our Lady of Good Health, was in a church at Maanthai.

The persecution of Catholics by the Dutch in the 17th century made her worshippers to carry her deep into Vanni in the year 1670.

She was kept at a place Marutha-madu (meaning, the deep tank in the locality of Maruthu / Terminalia arjuna trees), which at that time was in the border of the territories of the king of Kandy. The settlement soon received further Catholic refugees from Jaffna, fleeing Dutch persecutions.

A lady among the latter group called Santa Lena (St Helena) built a humble church for the statue, which then became Our Lady of Madu.

Over the centuries Madu became the most important pilgrim centre for Catholics, both Tamils and Sinhalese, throughout Sri Lanka.

Many, who have not grasped the undercurrents, may wonder at the necessity to carry the image when the church is a pan Sri Lankan pilgrim centre. They may ask whether the Sri Lankan state is incapable of protecting it.

Of course there is insecurity in wartime, especially when having a State with credentials of committing destruction to Christian and Hindu places of worship.

But, more than the fear of destruction, the pricking question now it seems, is the attempt of Sinhala nation to confiscate pilgrim sites, and Sinhalicise them, to deal with myths counter to it.

Most of the Sinhala Catholics, who make pilgrimage to Madu, were Tamils three or four generations ago. They come from the coastal areas of Northwestern and Western Provinces. All along the western coast, up to Colombo, there were traditional villages of Tamil Christians.

Their Sinhalicisation was systematic, abetted by an ingenious scheme of disruption of communication. The closing down of the traditional coastal highway between Colombo and Mannaar / Jaffna, in the guise of the Wilpattu sanctuary, cut down the contiguity.

What happened in the western coast is actually the forerunner to what happened and what is happening to the geographical contiguity of Tamils in the East.

Through a state orchestrated process, involving competition for fishing grounds, the third generation not only became Sinhalese but also anti Tamil. The churches, which until recent times conducted masses in Tamil, switched over entirely to Sinhala, signifying a wedge between Tamil and Sinhala Christianity.

The matter didn’t stop there. The Sinhala Buddhists have not accepted them fully, just because they speak Sinhala. Frictions are not uncommon in this part of the Island.

More than security concerns, the sentiments of Tamil Christians and their mistrust of Sri Lankan State seem to be the impelling force behind the decision of taking away Our Lady of Madu from her abode. They trust the secularism of the LTTE better.

Those who could look at how Kathirkaamam (Kataragama), once the most favoured pilgrim place for Tamil Saivites, has been confiscated from their predominance and how all the ancient temples behind the Tamil Saiva myth, such as Thiruketheesvaram (Maanthai), Thirukkoa’nesvaram (Trincomalee), Nakuleasvaram (Keerimalai) and Maaviddapuram are denied to devotees, being inside of ‘High Security Zones’, could understand the fear of Tamil Christians about Madu.

The question is whether the International Community and India, which contribute to the military option of Sri Lanka, don’t understand or don’t want to understand the fact that if there is anything to be defeated militarily in Sri Lanka, it is the chauvinism of the Sri Lankan State.

Liberation Tigers Political Head B. Nadesan on April 7 sent an urgent letter to Norwegian International Development Minister Erik Solheim, placing a request to the Royal Norwegian Government to take steps to immediately end the military assault of the holy Madu shrine in Mannar district.

"The international community together with the international institutions that are concerned about protecting the historical treasures of the world must be brought together and we hope the Royal Norwegian Government together with them will take the necessary actions to end the attacks on the church," Mr. Nadesan urged Norway.

“We write to share with you our view about the zeal exhibited by the Sri Lankan State to destroy the Madhu church, a historically significant shrine revered by the entire Tamil nation,” the letter said.

“You are, of course, aware of the Sri Lankan State's year long, large scale military onslaught against us with the view to occupy Vanni. The world is also aware that the Sri Lankan State's military onslaughts are targeting the historical Madhu church in the Mannar district, the western region of Vanni.

“The Madhu church is a centuries old shrine revered by the Tamil people of all religions. That is why the Madhu church complex has been a place of refuge for people of all religions. This church has become a symbol of inter religious amity and goodwill among the Tamils,” the letter pointed out.

“The Sri Lankan State armed forces have directed their artillery fire incessantly towards this church over the last few weeks. Such a revered church that symbolizes inter religious tolerance was identified as a military target by the Sri Lankan State and it is being subjected to military onslaught. Yet, the international community has failed to stop or even condemn this atrocity. Tamil people are shocked by this silence of the international community,” Mr. Nadesan noted.

“The Sri Lankan military is using Multi-Barrel-Rocket-Launchers, artillery, mortar, and tanks to assault this holy shrine. Tragically, due to this indiscriminate military assaults, thousands of people who took refuge in the holy shrine complex and the church priests were forced displace from the complex together with the statue of Mother Mary of the Madhu church.

“Part of the shrine is already damaged by the Sri Lankan military attacks. There is continued danger that the church will sustain further damage because the Sri Lankan military is persisting with its onslaught.

“We would like to place a request through you, who is looked upon by the Tamil people as a peace envoy, to the Royal Norwegian Government to take steps to immediately end the military assault of the holy Madhu shrine,” the letter said.

“The international community together with the international institutions that are concerned about protecting the historical treasures of the world must be brought together and we hope the Royal Norwegian Government together with them will take the necessary actions to end the attacks on the church.

“The Sinhala State, which shows great keenness to protect Buddhist symbols and Buddhist temples, which shows great keenness to build new Buddhist temples in the Tamil areas that they occupy, is also vehement on destroying the religious symbols of other religions, thus hurting the feelings of people who follow other religions.

“As far as our movement and our people are concerned we continue to accept the facilitation role of the Royal Norwegian Government. As such we believe that we have a right to place such a request to them.

“We, therefore, ask you to urge the Royal Norwegian Government, with the help of the international community to stop the Sri Lankan State's military assault on a revered shrine of the people of Tamil Eelam,” Mr. Nadesan’s letter said.

Earlier Mr. Nadesan had issued a statement strongly condemning the indiscriminate shelling on the Madu Church and urging the International Community and Human Rights organizations to condemn the Government of Sri Lanka for 'barbarically' transforming a sacred shrine that offered refuge to displaced people into a battlefield.

He criticized the government for unleashing its army on an area that was ought to be free of war according to war ethics and UN conventions.

"Sinhalese armed forces are indiscriminately shelling the vicinity of the Madu Shrine and thus turning a shrine sacred to the Catholics into a battlefield. The Liberation Tigers vehemently condemn the Sri Lankan Government for giving a free reign to its army and unleashing it in an area that should be free of hostilities according to warfare ethics and UN conventions."

The Tiger Political Head termed as "barbaric" the Sinhalese government's act of making a war zone out of the Madu Shrine that provided refuge to thousands of internally displaced people. He recalled that in 1998, "invading Sinhalese troops had fired from armoured tanks laying siege to the Madu Shrine and killed more than 30 people, including children, women and the aged, who had sought refuge there."

Likewise, on February 29, 2008, Sri Lanka Army's claymore attack on schoolchildren travelling across the premises of the sacred Madu Shrine left 18 people, schoolchildren and civilians, dead.

"The Sinhalese armed forces that cause danger to the people has imposed yet another atrocity on them. Once again, the Sri Lankan government is striving to transform the sacred area of the Madu Shrine into a war zone."

The leader of Sri Lanka's Buddhist monk political party is calling for a resolution to the country's 25-year war between government forces and Tamil militants. The monk, who heads a party in Sri Lanka's parliament, supports using the military to do it.

Athurliye Rathana, a Buddhist monk who heads the Jathika Hela Urumaya party in Sri Lanka's parliament, wants to end the suffering by putting a quick end to the war. Speaking with VOA at a seaside hotel in this former tourist haven, Rathana says he supports the government's latest military offensive to quash the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam.

"Anytime a militant group is harmful to peaceful people, then government should have the right to exercise constitutional law and order," Rathana said.

"And, LTTE is unlawful and so, under our constitutional law, anyone cannot exercise militancy. But [with] the LTTE separatist movement, the government has some duty to control their military activities. I say only one thing, 'Please do your duty.'"

For comments like that, the Sri Lankan media has branded Rathana the "war monk," an anomaly in a country where most monks are committed to nonviolence. But his sentiments are common in Sri Lanka's majority ethnic Sinhala community.

Rathana is a celebrated figure in this predominantly Buddhist nation, where monks are cherished for their spiritual guidance. The pro-war activism of Rathana and others has spurred as many as 30,000 Sinhalese young men to join the army in the past few months.

But Rathana has many critics. Among those is Mano Ganesan, a Tamil member of Sri Lanka's parliament.

"I'm surprised. Buddhism teaches non-violence and love for another," Ganesan said.

"Whereas, in this country, in the name of Buddhism, they propose killings, they propose murders, they propose abductions, even these extra-judicial killings and disappearances have been justified by these very monks in this country. Can you believe it?"

Rathana's activism was energized after the 1998 bombing of the Temple of the Sacred Tooth Relic in Sri Lanka's spiritual capital, Kandy - allegedly by Tamil militants. He says the temple is sacred to Buddhists because it houses a tooth allegedly snatched from Buddha's funeral pyre.

He says the barrages of attacks and suicide bombings aimed at civilians by alleged Tamil militants have spurred many Sri Lankans - Buddhist and otherwise - to call for military action.

"As the Buddhist way of life, under the Buddhist philosophy, we cannot invade any country and we cannot disturb others," Rathana explained. "Under the Buddhist way of life, it is wrong. Why [are we] involved in conflict as a Buddhist country? Any occasion we did not react against Tamil people, if such incidents happened in India, in Pakistan and in America -[where] Muslim people attack churches or any sacred place - I think common people are roused and confused. We are also confused. But we never attack normal Tamil civilians. That is the truth. That is the heart of Buddhism."

Violence has flared up again in this former tourist haven, as government troops regained territory in the island's eastern fringes. Fighting still rages in the north, where aid groups operating in the region have reported that hundreds of Tamil militants and civilians have died over the past few months. Their claims cannot be independently verified because the government has barred journalists from travel near the front lines of the conflict.

Last week, as shells fired by Sri Lanka Army guns only a few miles away exploded within the Madhu Church’s complex, the resident priests followed the Bishop of Mannar’s instructions and removed the revered statue to a safer location deeper within Vanni.

For the first time in over 300 years the presiding icon of Sri Lanka’s oldest Catholic site of pilgrimage has fled before an invading army, along with her serving priests and nuns. The last time was in 1670 when the Catholic Church fled persecution by the Protestant Dutch into the Vanni jungles.

As Bishop Raiyappu Joseph lamented, “Our lady of Madhu becomes refugee in her own land”.

In that way, the statue has become iconic of the entire Tamil people. Repeated Sri Lankan offensives and incessant human rights abuses over a quarter century of conflict, over a million people, almost one in three Tamils have been either internally displaced or made refugees.

Last week’s relocation of ‘Our lady of Madhu’ is emblematic of the conflict itself.

The targeting of the revered Madhu site is just the latest act in the Sinhala-Buddhist state’s persecution and marginalisation of the island’s other religions. Tamil-speaking Hindus, Christians, both Catholic and Protestant, and more recently, the Muslim people have been the targets of the state’s hegemonic project.

Of course, even Sinhala Christians also face persecution, with church burnings, violence against Christian NGOs and even the repeated tabling of so-called ‘anti-conversion’ legislation in Parliament (last time the United States reportedly intervened to stop such laws being passed).

However, Sinhala Christians have not been caught up in the state’s ethno-majoritarian onslaught in the Northeast and have not suffered the deprivations of bombardment, starvation and mass killings that the people of that region have.

This is not the first time the Madhu church has been bombarded by the military: in 1999, as the Army fled before a Tamil Tiger offensive, retreating Sri Lankan tanks fired into the church complex, killing over thirty Tamil refugees.

The international rules of war decree that warring parties have an obligation to protect religious sites.

However, in the context of the state’s drive to establish an ethnocracy, non-Buddhist religious sites have in fact been the targets and objectives of military campaigns.

The Sri Lankan state has, for example, militarised most of the major Hindu temples of the Northeast, constructing “High Security Zones” around them and separating worshippers, except on tightly regimented occasions by razor wire and machine guns.

Even, the present fighting in Madhu stems to a great extent from the present ultra-nationalist administration’s desire to raise the Lion flag over the venerated shrine, so as to sustain its standing amongst the majority Sinhala-Buddhists who swept President Mahinda Rajapakse to power two years ago.

The Rajapakse administration has made no effort to conceal its contempt for non-Buddhists. Consider the assassination of Tamil Parliamentarian Joseph Pararajasingham by government-backed paramilitaries, literally at the Batticaloa church’s alter in the middle of Christmas Mass in 2005. Then there was the ‘disappearance’ in 2006 of Father Brown in Jaffna and the shooting dead by soldiers of another Jaffna priest that year (even he, like so many innocent Tamils, had a grenade planted on him by his killers).

From the beginning of the armed conflict, Tamil churches and temples have been readily targeted by the Sinhala military (as US military academic Brian Blodgett puts it, the production of Sri Lanka’s “ethnically pure” military began in 1962).

Even during the ‘liberal’ President Chandrika Kumaratunga’s ‘War for Peace’ the Navaly church had several bombs dropped on it: almost a hundred people were killed in the airstrike in July 1995.

The Catholic Church has been rooted for centuries in the coastal areas of the Tamil north; particularly with the arrival in Mannar of St Francis Xavier of Portugal, circa 1645.

While militant Buddhism (as currently formulated in Sri Lanka unlike the pacifist Buddhisms practiced in the rest of Asia) - must necessarily clash with the Christian Church on ideological lines, there is another reason why the Church of the Northeast must come into confrontation with the Sinhala state.

The Church of Our Lady of Madhu, like many other places of worship across the Northeast have given shelter to waves of refugees throughout the conflict. The Mannar site has been one of the longest-functioning sanctuaries during the war.

In a war characterised by the state engaged in collective punishment through mass displacement, starvation by embargo and ‘scorched earth’ offensives (as conducted once again in the Eastern province during 2006-7), the Northeastern Church has sought to alleviate the very suffering and deprivation the state seeks to inflict.

And in terms of a majoritarian state trying to crush the Tamils and their struggle for liberation, the Church’s ideological stances on key issues, including social justice and collective rights, brings it inevitably into confrontation with the Sinhala state.

The Social mandate of the Catholic Church is enunciated quite clearly in the Vatican publication, “Compendium of the Social Doctrine of the Church” which was summarised by Pope John Paul II in his apostolic letter, Tertio Millennio Adveniente (the Third Millenium).

The Social Doctrine deals comprehensively with the social issues of our time, with chapters entitled, “The Right to work”, “The Rights of Workers”, “Private Initiative and Business Initiative”, “Foundation and Purpose of the Political Community”, “The International Community” among others.

Perhaps the most illuminating in the context of the Tamil struggle are the chapters entitled “Political Authority” and “Human Rights”.

Para 157 notes that “The Magisterium points out that international law “rests upon the principle of equal respect for States, for each people's right to self-determination and for their free cooperation in view of the higher common good of humanity”.[327] Peace is founded not only on respect for human rights but also on respect for the rights of peoples, in particular the right to independence.[328]”

A nation has a “fundamental right to existence”, to “its own language and culture, through which a people expresses and promotes ... its fundamental spiritual ‘sovereignty”', to “shape its life according to its own traditions, excluding, of course, every abuse of basic human rights and in particular the oppression of minorities”,

Para 504 of the Social Doctrine says: “The right to use force for purposes of legitimate defence is associated with the duty to protect and help innocent victims who are not able to defend themselves from acts of aggression.”

Consequently, the persecution of the Church by an authoritarian, ethno-majoritarian state, engaged in a systematic and broad-fronted onslaught against non-Sinhala-Buddhist communities should come as no surprise.

Of course, while the Catholic tradition, rooted in the Vatican and the living presence of the Pope, is itself under no threat due to the war in Sri Lanka, the Saivite Siddhanta tradition of Jaffna’s Hindus is unique, rooted in the ancient Tamil city and, under the onslaught of the majoritarian state, very much at risk of extinction.

And, as it turns, out the tradition migrated, to be preserved independently of the political fortunes of the Tamil state of Eelam, its home for millennia.

In contrast to Catholicism, there is no single organised Hindu authority: there are only an independent set of historic temples which follow the Saivite tradition.

The acknowledged religious leader of the Northeastern Hindus is Jaffna’s Yoga Swami, whose Saiva Siddhanta sect claims its spiritual lineage from an unbroken 2000-year old line of preceptors originating in the Himalayas.

Even as the Tamil refugees fled to the West in the eighties and nineties, the leading preceptor of Jaffna’s Hindu tradition had already laid the foundation to move the spiritual centre of the Saivite tradition to the West, their new home: in 1970 Yoga Swami, presciently as it turns out, ordained as his successor, a 22 year old American (known as Subramuniya Swami), instructing him explicitly to take his faith abroad and found a Saiva Siddhanta. It was established in Hawaii soon after.

This decision arose out of the Saivite Hindus’ very different approach to temples, spirituality and death. The Hindus believe that the temple is the connector between the material world and the spiritual world of their gods, a connection being maintained through meditation and the rituals of Puja.

For the faith to stay alive, the connection must be maintained unbroken at some location in the world, it matters not where. And in the temple of Siva in Hawaii founded by Subramuniya Swami, the priests have chanted prayers in Tamil and Sanskrit in an unbroken timeline since 1973, for 365 days a year, 24 hours a day.

Subramuniya Swami’s choice of America as a refuge for the Saivite tradition is no accident for as he points out: “Our constitution guarantees religious freedom.”

Meanwhile, the Sri Lankan ethno-majoritarian state sees its war against non-Sinhala-Buddhists challengers as a campaign ‘In defence of the Dharma’ as Tessa Bartholomeuz’s detailed study of the state’s military practices is titled.

However, Sri Lanka’s conflict is not a strictly a ‘religious war’.

The LTTE, which spearheads the Tamils’ struggle for self-determination, is a secular organisation. It is not fighting to protect Hinduism or any other religion per se. Rather it is fighting to establish the secular state of Tamil Eelam in which all religions will be treated equally – unlike in Sri Lanka where Buddhism has ‘a first and foremost place’ as the Constitution itself makes clear.

Indeed, the Tamils have long separated state and religion, from at least the Sangam era, as is clear from the copious literature of the era, including the Thirukkural.

The Tamils of the Sangam age (ca. 200 BCE to 200 CE) practiced three main religions - Hinduism, Buddhism and Jainism. Scholars find the society tolerant towards all religions, with the monarchs themselves openly encouraged religious discussions, protecting the temples and monasteries of all sects and religions, irrespective of the doctrines they themselves believed in.

Today, as the international community continues to insist on a political solution to Sri Lanka’s conflict, they do so with a misunderstanding of the logic inherent in the state’s efforts to militarily crush the Tamil struggle for liberation.

The international analysis of Sri Lanka as a flawed democracy trying to defeat terrorism while attempting to build a liberal state stems from the international actors’ own hopes for this goal.

However the evidence to challenge this analysis is copious and ubiquitous, should international actors choose to look.

For example, why did Buddhism, despite very few of the minorities practicing it, come to be enshrined in the Constitution as having a ‘first and foremost’ place?

How did an interpretation of history which sees the Tamils as interlopers crushed and disciplined by Sinhala kings who were both valiant and devout Buddhists, come to become standard text in schools?

Why are temples and churches attacked with abandon by the military whilst Buddhist temples and statues are rapidly erected in areas conquered by the military?

Why are the Sri Lanka Army’s regiments (remember Sri Lanka is supposed to be a multi-ethnic state and polity) named after Sinhala kings said to have conquered the Tamils in the past?

Why, amid the supposedly secular nature of the state, are Buddhist rituals daily practices of the military and, for that matter, the official functions of state?

All the island’s inhabitants know precisely why. The answer lies at the heart of the Sri Lankan state and nation building project as conceived by the Sinhala-Buddhists.

Thus, terrorism for the Sri Lankan state is essentially resistance to Sinhala-Buddhist hegemony.

That is why journalists, academics, civil society activists and, yes, priests who challenge the state’s majoritarian practices are condemned as supporters of terrorism and become targets for murderous violence. (It is also why even the senior UN official Sir John Holmes could be denounced by the Sri Lankan government as a terrorist, without much consternation or embarrassment amongst the Sinhalese).

Until the international community takes a close look at the logic informing the practices of the Sri Lankan state and Sinhala politics, the conflict will remain inexplicable at best and ‘senseless violence’ at worst.

More importantly, until the international community is prepared to confront and smash the Sinhala-Buddhist project, there will be no peace in Sri Lanka.

The Tamils are not going to accept a subordinate place in a Sinhala chauvinist order that has accorded itself a privileged position as overlords of the island.

Not even if every non-Buddhist place of worship in the Northeast is razed to the ground.

Frustrated by determined Tamil Tiger resistance on the three northern battlefronts, the Sri Lankan military has intensified its efforts to break into the Vanni. The confident boasts of the military leadership and President Mahinda Rajapakse's right wing administration have given way to expectation management. As some Southern commentators have begun daring to point out, for all the tough talk, there are few tangible gains to show. Meanwhile, the absurd LTTE casualty figures dispensed daily by the military have begun raising laughable arithmetical contradictions for the government. In short, having hitched its political survival firmly to a warhorse, the Colombo administration is now under serious pressure. As in the past, this inevitably heralds intensified suffering for the Tamil people.

Contrary to the government’s claims, the military has been making determined, if fruitless, efforts for many months to capture the Mannar region amongst others. There have been gains, but compared to what had been expected (and promised), these have been negligible; indeed, one military operation in Mannar in the late nineties took much greater territory in just a week that the present offensive has in eight months - but then, the LTTE, preparing for more strategically important moves, withdrew without resistance that time. Reports suggest that the fighting across the northern fronts is collectively many times more intense than during the ill-fated Operation Jaya Sikirui of the 'War for Peace' era. Of course, the Sri Lankan military has been significantly strengthened by the international community during the Norwegian peace process. The LTTE has also not been idle.

The indiscriminate bombardments being directed for several months towards LTTE-held parts of Mannar have intensified in recent weeks to the extent one of the major prizes of the onslaught, the Madhu church complex, is gradually being turned to rubble. The decision last week by the Mannar Diocese to relocate the revered statue of 'Our Lady of Madhu' came as it become clear that the Rajapa-kse administration, now desperate for territorial gains, has decided the destruction of the Church was a price worth paying. The only reason there haven't been heavy casualties amongst the thousands who had sought shelter around the long-functioning sanctuary is because they had moved out over the past two months.

However, just like previous Sri Lankan governments faced with Tamil defiance, the Rajapakse administration will intensify its punitive attacks and measures against the Vanni population. The embargo on food and medicine will be tightened further and civilian centers will be targeted more heavily. Last week health workers in Kilinochchi reported growing malnourishment amongst young children. For almost two years, Tamil villages, schools and refugee camps have been targeted by Sri Lankan airstrikes and artillery. Buses and, especially, ambulances, have been targeted by Sri Lankan commandos. These murderous tactics will also intensify. In the meantime, despite the plethora of d harsh reports by international human rights groups and some Western governments, human rights abuses will worsen.

The point here is that, despite the rhetoric of human rights and so on, there will be no concrete international action to restrain the state. And all the 'Security Sector Reform' that donors fund will not change the majoritarian ethos of the Sinhala state. Nor will there be any serious international effort to alleviate the suffering of the Tamil population. International NGOs will of course continue to operate, but their actions are already woefully inadequate for the needs of the hour. As the recent history of the Eastern province demonstrated, as the conflict intensifies we can expect a scaling down, rather than an increase, in international relief. This is partly self-interest, partly subordination to strategic imperatives of donors and partly disruption by the Sri Lankan state. The systematic harassment of aid agencies by the Rajapakse administration is an integral part of the military campaign which seeks to induce war weariness amongst the Tamil people as much as destroying the LTTE's fighting capacity. So are the crackdowns on Tamil NGOs by some foreign governments.

Amid shrinking international commitment to humanitarian norms when it comes to the Tamils, the Tamil people must tend to their own needs. The Diaspora has long been the mainstay of relief efforts for the people of the Northern warzones and - more than the international community - was central to the rebuilding of the Tamil areas during the peace process. The Diaspora has been selflessly generous at times of crisis, out of proportion to its economic base. It needs to step forward yet again.

An international panel invited by Sri Lanka to observe the government's probe into human rights abuses shut down operations on March 31, three weeks after accusing Colombo of failing to tackle the issue.

The International Independent Group of Eminent Persons (IIGEP) was formed to observe an inquiry into 16 cases of serious rights violations, including the August 2006 massacre of 17 local employees of the French charity, Action Contra la Faim (ACF).

The panel said in a statement that they were halting their efforts to determine whether the inquiries were being conducted "in accordance with internationally accepted norms and standards."

Earlier last month, the panel had accused the government of lacking the political will to investigate the incidents and said Sri Lankan authorities did not meet the basic minimum standards in investigating serious rights abuses.

The IIGEPs final report is expected to be presented to Sri Lankan President Mahinda Rajapakse before the panel's office formally closes on April 30, the group said.

Key international personalities, who were earlier invited by Rajapakse to observe the inquiry proceedings, have since left the island.

Colombo has come under fire for its rights record, with Human Rights Watch saying recently that at least 1,500 people – mostly ethnic Tamils living in the island's restive north and east – had “disappeared” between 2006 and 2007.

The New York-based rights group said Sri Lanka was one of the world's worst perpetrators of “disappearances” and abductions, and described the situation as a “national crisis”.

Sri Lanka's cabinet last week approved a plan to enact laws to protect witnesses to crimes and to encourage them to testify in cases of abductions and disappearances.

International concern over the human rights situation in Sri Lanka has been mounting amid the government's escalating war against the Tamil Tigers.

Fighting has stepped up since January, when Colombo formally pulled out of a six-year-old truce with the Tigers.

Relatives of seventeen aid workers massacred in Sri Lanka said they did not expect justice, as a heated human rights inquiry began on March 24 into their execution-style murders more than a year ago.

Ravi Shantha, the aunt of one of the Action Contre la Faim (ACF) aid workers killed in August 2006 in the northeastern town of Muttur, told a panel of judges appointed to investigate rights abuses in Sri Lanka that too much time had passed.

The 17 Tamil workers were shot in the head and were lying face down in the ACF compound.

"I don't trust that I will be given justice in this case," Shantha said to Reuters after giving evidence about the last known movements of her nephew Ambigavathy Jayaseelan.

"It's almost two years. Nobody has talked about justice and I do not think I will able to get it, even after this," she said at the end of an emotional four hours in the witness box.

Nordic truce monitors have blamed the massacre, at the time the worst attack on aid workers since a 2003 bomb attack on the United Nations office in Baghdad, on state security forces.

The government has accused ACF of being responsible for the massacre of their own local staff through "negligence" and "irresponsibility" in the midst of a 25-year civil war between government forces and Tamil Tigers.

After initially denying fault, and then blaming the Tigers, the military said they were trapped in fighting between troops and the Tigers.

Shantha told the hearing that her nephew, also her adopted son, joined the NGO because he could not get a government job, going to work by bicycle and "leaving again in a coffin".

She also told of threats after Jayaseelan's death from a group of unidentified men dressed in civilian clothes.

"They warned us not to speak about this incident to anyone," she said, wiping away tears.

Shantha, an ethnic Tamil, said she had not even been allowed to see Jayaseelan's body before burial or file a police report.

Lawyer for the army, Gomin Dayasiri, pressed Shantha on foreign negligence and leapt on an admission by rights lawyer Desmond Fernando that he had secretly been told who carried out the massacre by Human Rights Minister Mahinda Samarasinghe.

Mr. Fernando said he no longer wished to participate in the Presidential Commission of Inquiry because he was privy to such information, reported the Daily Mirror.

However, when the State Counsel objected to this statement, some Commissioners requested Mr. Fernando to repeat his original statement as they had not heard it properly. “I only said I had a confidential discussion with the Minister,” Mr. Fernando said by way of an explanation.

“He said the minister had told him who the killer was,” the State Counsel claimed.

“No, I did not say that at all,” Mr. Fernando responded. The inquiry was then disrupted by a heated argument on the impact of this revelation.

“Unfortunately the statement may not have been recorded as only four microphones can be used at the same time. We will have to check the official recording later,” Chairman N.K. Udalagama said.

International monitors recently told the government they were withdrawing from the inquiry because of official interference and lack of internationally acceptable standards.

Separately, a rights group charged that a local Muslim home guard - a police auxiliary - and two constables are the killers of most of the group.

It said witnesses described an "air of celebration" at Mutur police station after the massacre and that senior figures in the nearby northeastern town of Trincomalee apparently also backed the killings. The report said the execution-style murder of five Tamil students in Trincomalee earlier in 2006 had also been covered up and one of the responsible officers promoted, fostering a culture of impunity as a 2002 ceasefire collapsed into open war.

"It shows the government investigations into the massacre were little more than a bad joke played out on the victims' families and the international community," said Human Rights Watch senior legal adviser James Ross.

The U.S. State Department, in its recent annual rights report, said the Sri Lankan state's respect for human rights continued to decline in 2007, citing reports of killings by government agents and collaboration between the state and paramilitaries accused of major abuses.

Sri Lanka's Minister of Highways and Road Development, Jeyaraj Fernandopulle, was killed in a bomb blast at the public playground in Weliweraya, located in the Gampaha district of Western Province, around 8:00 a.m. April 6.

Fourteen others were killed and 60 wounded in the attack that took place while the minister was waving a flag to start off a marathon race in connection with the Tamil and Sinhala New Year celebrations.

The minister had walked up to the starting line where more than 100 athletes had lined up and at the countdown a huge blast shattered the occasion.

"Ready, on your marks, steady...," the official had said over the public address system, moments before the huge explosion.

An athletic coach attached to the sports ministry, Luxman de Alvis, and an Olympic marathon runner, K. A. Karunaratne, who was formerly attached to Sri Lanka Army, were killed in the blast, according to initial reports. A police SSP was among the seriously wounded.

Police claimed that the blast was caused by a suicide attacker, charging that the LTTE was behind the attack. However, eyewitnesses saw a parcel being thrown just before the blast.

Fourteen-year-old Kavindu Nadishan, a participant at the marathon said he wanted to relieve himself and went to the cemetery close by when he saw a man throwing a parcel towards the road, reported the Daily Mirror.

He said the blast occurred just then. One of Nadishan’s hands was fractured from the impact of the blast, the paper reported.

The 55-year-old minister, who is also the chief government whip of the Sri Lankan parliament, has been elected to Sri Lankan parliament for five consecutive terms.

He was a close associate of the Sri Lankan president Mahinda Rajapaksa and played a key role in strengthening Sri Lanka's relationship with Iran since 2006, when he was the minister of trade, commerce, consumer affairs and marketing development.

He was fluent in Sinhala, English and Tamil languages and functioned as a propaganda spokesman for Sri Lankan’s ruling United Peoples Freedom Alliance (UPFA) government.

Mr. Karunatne participated in the Olympic marathon in 1992 and in the 1993 World Championship. He has a gold medal in the marathon and 10,000 metres in the South Asian Games held in 1991.

Thusitha Neranjan, 22, said he was among the crowd watching the marathon organised by one of his tuition masters in collaboration with the Adishta Sports Club of Weliweriya, the Daily Mirror reported. “The marathon was to take the route of Weliweriya to Siyambalape junction, Sapugaskanda to Makola across Maturawa and back to Weliweriya. I was several metres away from where Minister Fernandopulle was. Just before the Minister flagged the race there was a huge explosion and we all fell,” he said.

Ten-year-old Sashishan, a grade five student of the Christ King College, Weliweriya was two metres away from the explosion but in the midst of the crowd, the paper said. “I felt I was hit with something on my chest and ran away for my dear life,” he said. A doctor at the emergency ward, CNH told Daily

The highly venerated statue of the Blessed Virgin Mary, also known as ‘Our Lady of Madhu’, was removed from one of Sri Lanka's most revered catholic shrines for the first time in more than four centuries because of intensifying fighting.

Meanwhile the Sacred Heart Church in the Madhu Shrine complex was completely destroyed by Sri Lankan Army shelling.

Bishop of Mannar, Rev. Dr. Rayappu Joseph, told TamilNet Thursday that he had instructed the remaining four reverend priests, four reverend sisters and five civilian assistants to flee the premises of the Madhu Church with the statue of Our Lady.

"This is the first time Our Lady of Madhu becomes refugee in her own land," the Mannar Bishop said. "She has been giving shelter to IDPs. In 1990, she gave shelter to 36,000 IDPs."

Bishop Rayappu Joesph has instructed the priests to relocate the statue to a safer area together with them. The statue was taken from the Madhu shrine by three priests to Thevayanpiddy in Vellankumam for its protection, Bishop Joseph said.

Thevayanpiddy is situated along the coastal Road to Jaffna from Mannar.

The bishop of Mannar said people who were sheltering at the shrine had also fled and referring to the statue he said "our lady had to go with them"

“We are going to take it to a safer location, we cannot allow it to remain there as it is our treasure,” he said.

"We asked the government to declare Madhu as a war free zone. The president agreed but it was not given in writing. If the government has agreed to have a peace zone then I think the LTTE would have honoured it. This is what TamilSelvan told me and Archbishop Malcolm Ranjith", said the Bishop.

The Sacred Heart Church was destroyed in Sri Lanka Army shelling after the priests had taken away the statue of Our Lady of Madhu last Thursday, reveal photographs taken by K. Baskaran, a photographer who visited the church on Sunday.

"Any desecration of Madhu is likely to be understood as an effort of the Sinhala Buddhist chauvinism to erase out the symbols of other religions and thus serving a spiritual blow which is the most dreaded stage in the process of ethnic cleansing," Vanni District Parliamentarian Selvam Adaikkalanathan told TamilNet Tuesday.

"The social and cultural formation of Tamil Christianity, especially the Tamil Catholicism, is about 500-years old. Madu Church is the foremost symbol of this phenomenon. It is also looked upon with the same feeling by the Sinhala Catholicism of the western coast which was once part of the Tamil Catholic identity," the MP, who is a Catholic hailing from Vidaththaltheevu in Mannar, told TamilNet.

This is the second time the Sacred Heart Chapel comes under SLA attack, the MP said.

None years ago, on 20th November, 1999, Sri Lanka Army troops, numbering around 300, who had taken up positions in the environs of Madhu church allegedly fired shells from their tanks, killing 33 Tamil refugees on the spot inside the Sacred Heart Chapel. Four victims died later at the hospital, among the more than 60 wounded. Twelve of the killed were children below 18. More than 3000 IDPs had taken refuge in the precincts of Madhu shrine at that time.

Two months ago, on 29 January 2008, 20 civilians including 11 school children were killed when Sri Lanka Army Deep Penetration Unit triggered off a claymore mine target a civilian bus close to the Madhu shrine.

The shrine at Madhu is a pilgrimage site for over six percent of Sri Lanka's Catholics. But now the statue of the Virgin Mary they travel there to venerate has been taken away for the first time in more than four hundred years.

Bishop Joseph said there had been intense shelling in the area and the priests had spent the day in bunkers.

Rev. Fr. Administrator Emilianus Pillai, Rev. Fr. Assistant Administrator E. Sebamalai, Parish Priest of Vangkaalai Rev. Fr. Antony Gnanapragasam, Vavuniya Komarasangkulam Parish Priest Rev. Fr. Antony Sagayam and four Reverend Sisters left the Shrine's premises according to Bishop's House.

Speaking to the BBC correspondent in Colombo, the Military spokesman confirmed that the troops are positioned about two kilometres from Madhu church.

The military spokesman Brigadier Udaya Nanayakkara insisted the army was not shelling the shrine and the Tamil Tigers must be responsible for the firing.

"We don't know whether we can come back and even if we come back Madhu shrine may be turned to rubble. That is the way both sides are fighting. If the Sri Lanka army does not decide to take a different route from Pandivirichchan instead of going through Madhu there will be total destruction". The Bishop says.

According to estimated statistics, about 30,000 internally displaced people were living in Mannar District last year, reported the Daily Mirror. Of that number 10,000 to 15,000 were reportedly living in the No-War Zone reserved for the historic Madhu Church.

By March 2008 only 700 IDPs were believed to be living in Madhu area. It is believed that they, too, have now left the area, the paper said.

According to military sources, many IDPs had moved to Maanthai West, about 30 kilometers from Madhu, the Daily Mirror siad. An estimated 14,000 IDPs are believed to have settled in Maanthai after the mass exodus.

In the aftermath of Sunday’s attack which killed Minister Jeyaraj Fernandopulle and 14 others and injured more than 83, the International Community Monday reiterated the urgent need for a negotiated political solution to end the longstanding ethnic conflict in Sri Lanka.

The European Union, the United States and Australia in separate statements called for an end to hostilities and the resumption of peace talks as the only way forward if peace was to return to Sri Lanka.

"I am deeply shocked by the heinous attack on Highways Minister Jeyaraj Fernandopulle. I strongly condemn this suicide attack, which killed Minister Fernandopoulle, 14 civilians and injured many innocent bystanders,” EU External Relations Chief Benita Ferrero-Waldner said.

She said the EU condemned all forms of terrorism and violence against civilians and continued to believe that there could be no military solution to the conflict but only a negotiated political settlement that could pave the way for lasting peace in Sri Lanka.

The United States insisted that it was not continued violence but a political solution that offered the way forward to end the ethnic conflict.

A US embassy statement said the United States strongly condemned the attack that claimed the life of Minister Jeyaraj Fernandopulle.

“The United States denounces this vicious and reprehensible terrorist attack on civilians in the strongest possible terms. Its perpetrators have achieved nothing other than to cause further suffering among the people of Sri Lanka. Not continued violence but only a political solution was the way forward to end the country’s longstanding conflict,” it said.

The Australian government said a political settlement developed in dialogue with all affected communities was urgently needed to bring lasting peace to the country.

It said “the use of terrorist methods by the LTTE is completely unacceptable.”

The Australian government sent its “most sincere condolences to Mr. Fernandopulle’s family and the families of others killed and injured in this terrible attack.”

It said it was concerned about the escalation of violence in Sri Lanka and condemned terrorism in all its forms.

“Sri Lanka’s conflict cannot be resolved militarily. Australia encourages the Sri Lankan government and all parties involved to redouble their efforts to develop realistic proposals to support a political solution to the conflict,” it added.