Three Sri Lankan doctors who treated hundreds of badly wounded civilians in understaffed, makeshift hospitals in the country’s war zone were detained on accusations they gave false information about the casualties to the media, a health official said on Monday.
With journalists and nearly all aid workers barred from the war zone, Thurairaja Varatharajah, Thangamuttu Sathyamurthi and V. Shanmugarajah became some of the few sources of information on the toll the war took on the tens of thousands of civilians trapped in the area.
The doctors fled the conflict last week as the government’s fight against the Tamil Tiger rebels neared its conclusion.
A health ministry official said the doctors were detained by the military when they fled and were later turned over to police. The official spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to speak to the media.
The ministry was conducting an inquiry into their conduct, including allegations they disseminated false information, the official said.
Police spokesman Ranjith Gunasekara said he had no information about the doctors, whose fate has generated international concern.
UN humanitarian chief John Holmes said the UN had not been able to confirm the reports that the doctors were detained.
Earlier, a UN spokesman said he believed they had been detained.
“I would certainly urge the government to treat them properly,” Holmes said. “These are people who performed absolutely heroically in the last few weeks and months and deserve every praise and care — not anything else.”
As the fighting in the north escalated, the doctors told harrowing stories of the fighting and the conditions they were forced to work under. They repeatedly relocated their makeshift hospital to schools and other buildings amid heavy shelling as government forces swept the area.
They described how the vast number of wounded civilians overwhelmed their facilities as they ran low on medicine, supplies and staff.
They said the war zone, packed with tens of thousands of civilians, was under almost constant artillery attack.
As the doctors told of the dire conditions for civilians, government officials denied the men existed. They later acknowledged that Varatharajah and Sathyamurthi were working in the war zone, but said they were pressured to lie about the fighting.
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