SL hospital attack kills 49

COLOMBO – A mortar shell struck the only functioning medical facility in Sri Lanka’s northern war zone yesterday, throwing bloody bodies into the dirt outside and killing 49 people, a government health official said. It was the second time this month the hospital was hit.

The attack on the makeshift hospital – little more than a corrugated tin roof with blue tarp walls – also wounded 50 people. It came after a weekend of heavy shelling that killed hundreds of civilians trapped in the tiny war zone. The military denied shelling the coastal strip under rebel control, which is packed with an estimated 50 000 civilians.
Dr Thurairaja Varatharajah, the top government health official in the war zone, said a single mortar shell hit the admissions ward yesterday morning. The death toll was expected to rise, he said.
Shells were still hitting the area hours later, including one that landed about 150 metres from the hospital, Varatharajah said.
Just outside the admissions ward, bodies were strewn about in the dirt while health workers hooked up the wounded to IV lines, according to photographs taken after the attack. Later, nearly two dozen dead bodies were lined up in rows in a sandy courtyard.
Other photographs showed civilians fleeing the area. One man running away was carrying a child with a bandaged head.
Two other hospital officials, who spoke separately on condition of anonymity because they were not authorised to speak to the media, confirmed the attack and said a hospital administrator was among those killed.
Varatharajah and the hospital workers declined to say who had fired the shells.
It was the second time this month the facility has come under heavy fire. On May 2, 64 civilians died when the hospital was hit by artillery.
– Nampa-AP