Sri Lanka orders ICRC to scale down operations

The Sri Lanka has asked aid agencies, including the International Committee of Red Cross (ICRC), to scale down operations on the Indian Ocean raising concerns among aid groups about the care of some 300,000 Tamils, who were uprooted during the last phase of the fighting that ended in May and are now being held in government-run camps.

The ICRC on Thursday, July 9, said it had been ordered by Sri Lanka to scale down relief operations. As a result, the ICRC said it was withdrawing expatriate staff from the battle-scarred northeast, where it has been helping civilian war victims, AFP reported.

The BBC’s correspondents say that the announcement is significant because if the ICRC cuts back staff considerably, it could mean that eventually there is no independent monitoring of barbed-wire ringed camps in which over three hundred thousand people are interned.

The ICRC has had a strained relationship with the Sri Lankan government which accused the Geneva-based charity of inciting panic over civilian deaths.

As fighting escalated in the final days of the conflict with the Tamil Tigers, the ICRC had spoken of an unfolding "humanitarian catastrophe" in the war zone amid a surge in civilian casualties.

The ICRC was the only outside agency with access to the area of combat, taking in aid and evacuating wounded people by ship, the BBC pointed out.

Sarasi Wijeratne, ICRC spokesperson in Colombo, this week confirmed that they were shutting down four offices in the eastern region. These offices had 148 local staff and up to 10 expatriates, out of its total strength of 649.

"The ICRC is in the process of reviewing its setup and operational priorities in Sri Lanka," said Jacques de Maio, the organization's the head of operations for South Asia, said in a statement last week.

Meanwhile, the United Kingdom appealed to Sri Lanka not to cut down the presence of the ICRC as that organisation’s continued presence was necessary to deal with problems relating to 280,000 Tamil refugees housed in government-run camps in north Sri Lanka.

A statement posted on the website of the British foreign office said that Minister Lord Malloch- Brown had urged the government of Sri Lanka to continue its dialogue with the ICRC in relation to the civilians in camps for the Internally IDPs.

“Although the conventional conflict in Lanka has now ended, this does not mean that the presence of the ICRC ceases to be necessary as significant challenges still remain, particularly in relation to the civilians in camps for the IDPs,” Brown said.

“We urge the government of Sri Lanka to continue its dialogue with the ICRC on issues of humanitarian concern, and to provide every opportunity for the ICRC to implement its mandate as Sri Lanka takes its first steps towards recovery,” he added.

In recent times, the government has imposed about one percent tax on foreign donations received by NGOs. Visas to expatriate workers, including the head of agencies, are also restricted and in some cases reduced to six months with provisions to renew, which becomes a cumbersome process mired in bureaucracy. Expatriates normally serve a 3-year period.