No sympathy for terrorists in Sri Lanka - Pranab

Kolkata, Apr 22 (PTI) India Wednesday made it clear that
it has no sympathy for the terrorists in Sri Lanka but was
concerned only over the plight of thousands of civilians who
are fleeing the conflilct zone.

"Over 58,600 civilians have come out of the conflict zone
till this morning," India's External Affairs Minister Pranab
Mukherjee said at a meet-the-press programme here.

"So it is not true that the Sri Lanklan authorities
were not responding to our appeal," the minister said.

Mukherjee said, "We have no sympathy for the
terrorists, but every sympathy for the civilians."

"There are conflicting signals about the exact number
of civilians who were still trapped in the conflict zone. The
Sri Lankan authorities were saying that the number was between
10,000 and 15,000. However, UN observers have put the figure
at between 30,000 and 40,000," he said.

The External Affairs Minister said that India had been
telling Colombo that what it was saying or doing 'should be
in the interest of the international community so that there
was no violation of human rights or liberties'.

With regard to the civilians' evacuation, he said the Sri
Lankan authorities should take the international community
into confidence.

Mukherjee said that India had already made an appeal to
the Sri Lanka government to extend the period of the
cessation of hostilities.

"We did not use the term ceasefire; what we said was that
there should be a pause to enable the civilians to go to safer
zones."

"I requested the Sri Lankan government to ensure that
relief materials sent by India specially be distributed
through the International Red Cross," he said.

The minister emphasised that relief materials sent by
other countries and especially the UN should be also allowed
to be distributed through the International Red Cross.