http://www.news.com.au/dailytelegraph/story/0,22049,20128188-5001028,00.html

From correspondents in Colombo

August 14, 2006 12:00

TAMIL Tiger guerrillas said today that 61 schoolgirls at an orphanage and 15 civilians huddled in a church have been killed in air and artillery attacks by Sri Lanka's military.

Air force jets hit a "Senchcholai", an orphanage run by the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE), in the northeastern region of Mullaitivu, the Tigers said in a statement.

The government denied the attack and said the air force had only targeted an LTTE training facility in Mullaitivu.

The Tigers said the victims were students aged between 15 and 18 who were taking part in a two-day seminar on first aid. "The number of children killed in the Sri Lankan air force bombing on students participating in a first aid seminar has increased to 61, with many fearing that the number killed is higher," the LTTE said in a statement.

About 150 children were seriously wounded, it said, adding that the victims were being taken to hospitals in Kilinochchi and Mullaitivu, both in rebel-held territory in the north.

The LTTE's website showed pictures of some of the children killed in the attack.

"It is a lie to say that schoolchildren were targeted," government spokesman Chandrapala Liyanage said. "The air force had bombed a LTTE training centre. We don't know if they had moved child soldiers there."

Military officials confirmed that the air force was keeping up attacks in support of ground troops resisting a rebel advance on the Jaffna peninsula, further to the north of the island.

The Swedish-led Sri Lanka Monitoring Mission said they received a complaint from the LTTE and monitors were on the way to the area to investigate. "We have got a complaint from the LTTE that an orphanage has been bombed and that 50 children have been killed," spokesman Thorfinnur Omarsson said. "Our monitors are on the way. We can't comment any further."

The United Nations agency for children, UNICEF, said it was also told of the incident and had rushed officers from its base in Kilinochchi to investigate. Ambulances were rushing the wounded, many of whom were bleeding heavily, to hospitals, the pro-rebel website Tamilnet reported. The Tigers run orphanages to care for hundreds of war orphans in the rebel-held northeast.

Source: The Daily Telegraph - Australia
Date: 14 August 2006