Wounded Sri Lankans describe chaos

Wounded Sri Lankans describe chaosStarving civilians fired on by rebels as they tried to flee village

updated 7:44 p.m. ET Feb. 11, 2009

TRINCOMALEE, Sri Lanka - Starving and trapped by fighting between Sri Lankan troops and Tamil Tiger rebels, scores of civilians tried to flee villages in the northeastern war zone. But as they ran, the rebels opened fire, according to survivors' accounts.

Manoharan Mahendran said residents of Vishwamadu village begged to be allowed to cross into government territory last week, but the separatist Tigers blocked their path and fired indiscriminately.

"People were helpless," 53-year-old Mahendran told The Associated Press on Wednesday in a rare firsthand account, recalling the panicked exodus.

Survivors at the hospital described dodging rebel gunfire and surviving the shelling of the last functioning hospital in the northeast.

'My wife and child got killed'
"My wife and child got killed in the shooting by the rebels," said 23-year-old Selvadorai Thavakumar from Kilinochchi, the former de facto rebel capital which the government captured in January.

"At dawn we started toward the army post waving a white flag," said 20-year-old Kesava Sarvananda Dharshika.

Just then, the rebels fired from behind, killing her husband, a Hindu priest. She said she ran to the army post with their infant son in her arms.

Selvarani Sasikumar, a 31-year-old mother of four, said she feared her missing husband was dead.