2,000 civilians killed in Sri Lanka war zone: Pro-LTTE website

Colombo/New Delhi, May 10 (IANS) Over 2,000 Tamil civilians were killed in a single night during 'indiscriminate barrage of shelling by the Sri Lanka Army on the safety zone' in the island's north, a website sympathetic to the Tamil Tigers said Sunday.

The shelling by the army, starting from Saturday night to Sunday morning, 'slaughtered more than 2,000 civilians including large number of women and children', the pro-LTTE website TamilNet reported quoting medical sources in Vanni.

There was no independent confirmation of the TamilNet report. Sri Lankan officials have in the past denounced as propaganda similar claims by TamilNet.

The so called safe zone is where reportedly the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) chief V. Prabhakaran is hiding alongwith senior rebel leaders.

Dead bodies were scattered everywhere and 814 wounded managed to reach the makeshift hospital up to 9.25 a.m., the report quoted doctors as saying.

The website report claimed that weapons such as the banned cluster bombs and Multi Barrel Rocket Launchers and cannons were used.

The family of a nursing officer, Gracian Tharmarasa, was wiped out in the shelling.

At least 257 bodies, including 67 children, have been brought to the hospital.

The Tamil Tigers have been fighting to carve out a separate Tamil state in Sri Lanka over the past quarter century.