Ultimatum to Tamil tigers as women and children hurt in suicide attacks

Sri Lanka today gave the Tamil Tiger rebels a 24-hour ultimatum to surrender, as thousands of people escaped the war zone. The deadline came as the army said three suicide bombers had attacked thousands of Tamil people. "At least 17 civilians, including women and children, have been killed and 200 people injured from the cowardly suicide attacks," said the military spokesman, Brigadier Udaya Nanayakkara.

About 35,000 people were waiting to leave the Tamil-controlled no-fire zone, an area of coconut groves on the north-eastern coast. Government forces have boxed the remaining guerrillas, and thousands of civilians, into the zone after capturing other Tamil Tiger strongholds.

Rebel leader, Velupillai Prabhakaran, has been given a strong warning by defence spokesman Keheliya Rambukwella: "With the influx of people, we have given a final warning to Prabhakaran and his terrorist group to surrender to the government forces within 24 hours from 12 noon."Thereafter will be a military course of action. That is the best option," he told reporters at an army base in the capital, Colombo.

Film footage taken from a plane showed thousands of people thronging around temporary reception centres set up by the army within a kilometre of the no-fire zone. Reports put the number who fled at between 5,000 and 20,000. Those fleeing are likely to join the thousands of others who have been interned by the government in cramped, makeshift camps where they face overflowing drains, water shortages and the threat of disease in the sweltering, unsanitary conditions. The government allowed a small group of international journalists into Menik Farm camp, near the town of Vavuniya, which is regarded by aid agencies as by far the best-equipped of the camps, the Guardian newspaper reported. But even here, people complain bitterly about their treatment and the lack of freedom of movement.

As Sri Lanka's army pounds the zone where the last remnants of the Tamil Tigers are cornered, its government says it expects the tens of thousands of civilians still trapped alongside the rebels to start making their way to safety in the next few days.

Sasi Kumar fled to Menik Farm with his family from Kilinochchi, the former Tamil Tiger stronghold, as fighting intensified around the city. They were promised security and food, but were not expecting to sleep on mats on the bare concrete floor in a tin-walled hut that soaks up the heat of the sun. Kumar, 34, gestured at his two-month-old baby, Vigee, sleeping on the floor."It is very hot and the health problems are very bad. The children have coughs and diarrhoea," he told the newspaper. "We can't go out, we have to stay inside the fences.

By Hayley Jarvis for SOS Children