S Lanka rebels say army offensive kills 50 civilians

KANTALE, Sri Lanka, Aug 10 (Reuters) Sri Lanka's Tamil Tiger rebels said today more than 50 civilians were killed and 200 wounded in their territory in the island's east during a major army offensive to capture a disputed water supply.

Army artillery and air force fighter jets pounded rebel positions in the east as ambulances ferried dozens of wounded troops to hospital and the military moved tanks, munitions and fresh soldiers to the battlefront through green paddy fields.

Doctors said six troops were killed and over 50 injured.

''There are over 50 dead (civilians) because of artillery and mortar shells fired by the Sri Lankan military as well as fire from Kfir fighters,'' S Puleedevan, head of the Tigers' peace secretariat, told Reuters by telephone from the northern rebel stronghold of Kilinochchi.

Fifteen of the dead were taken to a hospital in the rebel-held town of Vakarai, to the south of the site of the fiercest fighting since a 2002 truce, he said. Another 35 bodies were still to be moved.

As night fell, an ammunition dump exploded at an army camp east of the government-held town of Kantale -- one of the main eastern artillery sites -- and army sources said they feared that many troops had died or been wounded.

The military had no details on casualties, and said the blast was an accident. Reuters correspondents in the eastern town of Trincomalee heard sustained explosions coming from the camp about 30 km away, which lit up the night sky.

Troops said they made a push early today to wrest control of a disputed rebel-held water supply, which the Tigers unblocked on Tuesday and which triggered the fighting in the first place.

Nordic truce monitors said the Tigers had earlier given them a figure of 30-40 dead civilians, and said they believed it.

The military had no confirmation of civilian deaths, but accused the Tigers of moving heavy guns to populated areas, and said any deaths were the rebels' fault.

''Maybe they were subjected to our retaliatory fire. But they should be responsible for not employing their guns close by a location where there are civilians,'' said Maj. Upali Rajapakse of the government's National Security Centre.

Aid groups said both sides had ignored their appeals for a time window to pull wounded civilians out of the battle zone, and accused the government of an informal aid embargo.

''The military and government are blocking the flow of aid into Tiger areas which is a violation of the ceasefire,'' said Jeevan Thiagarajah of aid umbrella body the Consortium for Humanitarian Agencies. ''We can't reach people in need.'' GOVERNMENT OFFENSIVE The government says it will not halt operations until it controls the sluice and a reservoir that feeds it. The Tigers say the land is theirs, and say army attacks amount to a declaration of war.

Doctors treating dozens of cases of skin infections and diarrhoea in makeshift camps in Kantale, struggling to cope with 30,000 newly displaced, turned to focus on new army casualties.

Thousands more are displaced in Tiger areas.

The local hospital was so overstretched, some injured had to share beds. Others lay on trolleys. Many troops had blast wounds, and arrived wearing bandages and crude wooden splints.

Aid workers say the human cost has already been high, although it will become much worse if the two-decade civil war that has already killed more than 65,000 people escalates to cover more of the north and east, where the Tigers want a separate homeland for minority Tamils.

''We are just ordinary people,'' said 55-year-old fisherman MA Mohamed, one of many who has fled the conflict area and is now living under a bullock cart with four other families in Kantale. ''We just want to get on with our lives.'' REUTERS MQA KP2247