Jaffna Bishop calls for urgent help to avert humanitarian disaster

[TamilNet, Friday, 03 November 2006, 00:30 GMT]
Jaffna Bishop, Rt. Rev. Thomas Savundara- nayagam, has sent an urgent telegram Thursday to Sri Lanka's President Mahinda Rajapakse requesting him to immediately open a landroute to Jaffna peninsula to allow the flow of desperately needed food and other essential materials to Jaffna residents, civil society sources in Jaffna said Thursday.

The Bishop criticised the Sri Lanka government (GoSL) refusal to open the A9 landroute at the last Geneva Talks and faulted Non-governmental organisations in the Jaffna peninsula, both foreign and local, for having failed to anticipate and be prepared for grave ground situation now facing Jaffna residents.

The 3 months old economic embargo on the Jaffna peninsula has forced long lines in front of shops and near Sri Lanka Army (SLA) camps, and called this a planned and deliberate scheme of the GoSL against the Tamils, said the Bishop in his message to Mr Rajapakse, sources added.

The Rt. Rev. Bishop has been insisting on both the GoSL and the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) to open A9 route because the supply by sea alone is hardly sufficient to meet the much needed food, medicine and other essential commodities for the people of Jaffna, said community leaders in the peninsula.

Rt. Rev. Bishop is now taking the matter directly to the President of the country, they added.

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