Fear and death on Sri Lanka's rebel battlefield

BATTICALOA, Sri Lanka, Aug 12 (Reuters) The first survivors to escape Tamil Tiger territory in northeast Sri Lanka tell of days walking through government shelling without food or water after the rebels tried to stop them leaving.

The first ground action since a 2002 ceasefire led to almost the entire civilian population fleeing the area south of the port of Trincomalee. About 50,000 people, most of them Muslims, have made it out to camps, but aid workers fear about 30,000 are trapped behind rebel lines.

''I was walking by the road when there was a huge explosion,'' said Jeevaratnum Parvinthiran, 15, taken to hospital with shrapnel wounds to the chest, throat, arms and legs.

''I don't know what happened. I felt pain in my chest. Since then, I have had no contact with my parents but I expect I will see them again.'' Civilian witnesses and the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) rebels, who have fought for two decades for an ethnic Tamil homeland, said about 50 people were killed by the government shelling on Thursday that wounded Jeevaratnum.

Aid workers say the Tigers want to keep as many civilians as possible in their areas of the northeast to act as human shields.

But the presence of civilians does not seem to be deterring the army.

''It seems that they're happy to just play with the lives of tens of thousands of people,'' said one aid worker on condition of anonymity, blaming both sides. The Red Cross said 15,000 people had been registered but there were certainly many more.

TRAPPED Some of the few hundred now accommodated in churches in the eastern town of Batticaloa said they had to dive for cover every few hundred metres as they walked out of rebel areas. They say they saw people die, and had access to little food or water.

Sixteen-year-old A. Suhitharan said he and his family fled their village in an army-held area after a policeman shot a local man last Tuesday. They fled into Tiger territory but soon returned to government-held areas.

Some people say they told the rebels they were only going to get food, but then fled across the front line.

One motorcycle-riding priest said he got about 200 people out of rebel-held areas.

While the army allowed people into government territory when they escaped, survivors say they generally tried to stop them moving further south. Some diplomats said the military feared more Tiger infiltration of their areas.

Heading back in to try to get more people out, the young priest, who did not want to be identifed, said he made the sign of the cross every time he got on his motorbike, not knowing when a shell from either side might land.

''This war will not have stopped even when I have been in the priesthood 25 years,'' he said. ''If it did, the government would have to start talking about education and services. And the LTTE -- what would they do if there was peace?'' Reuters BDP GC1244