Tamil Tigers' Last Retreat Cut Off As Sri Lankan Army Takes Coastline

Sri Lankan forces said today they had taken control of the island's entire coastline, cutting off any sea escape for the Tamil Tigers amid growing international anger over attacks that have killed thousands.

The latest military advance appears to give the government full control of the coast for the first time in nearly a quarter of a century, leaving the rebels trapped along with tens of thousands of Tamil civilians in a tiny pocket of territory in the north-east.

The Sri Lankan president, Mahinda Rajapaksa, has vowed to defeat the remaining rebel fighters and end the 25-year-old civil war by the end of today.

The scale of the fighting forced doctors to abandon the last hospital in the so-called no-fire zone. One medic described how they were sheltering in a bunker, unable to reach the dead and injured lying inside the hospital.

The International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) said civilians trapped inside the war zone were finding it even more difficult to get water and food.

"Our staff are witnessing an unimaginable humanitarian catastrophe," said the ICRC operations director, Pierre Krahenbuhl. "No humanitarian organization can help them in the current circumstances. People are left to their own devices."

Douglas Alexander, Britain's international development secretary, issued an angry statement expressing his outrage that the scale of the fighting had prevented the Red Cross from evacuating the wounded.

"I am utterly appalled that the ICRC is no longer able to continue its operations in northern Sri Lanka," he said. "This deplorable situation rightly brings international condemnation of both parties to the conflict. There is simply no justification for allowing such needless suffering."

One unconfirmed report suggested that some of the latest injuries were caused by the use of white phosphorus. The Sri Lankan military released pictures on Thursday claiming to show that the Tamil tigers had rigged phosphorus bombs around areas where tens of thousands of civilians are trapped.

There is no way of confirming the reports because independent media are prevented from entering the war zone.

Dr Thurairaja Varatharajah, the most senior government medical officer still inside the war zone, said doctors had been forced to abandon the last hospital still functioning. "There is a big fight going on. We heard a lot of firing sounds and some shell sounds," he said. "There are shells falling in the civilian area."

Varatharajah said there were more than 2,000 casualties in the area around the hospital. Hospital medical staff were staying in a bunker and were unable to treat the injured.

"We can't do anything," he said. "There are people staying in the hospital without any medical facility. They are dying without proper treatment. There are dead bodies lying on the floor, we are unable to bury the dead bodies."

The Sri Lankan military said its forces were advancing along the beach from two directions, attempting to cut off the Tamil Tigers' last escape route by sea. Many thousands of civilians have sought shelter along the shoreline from the fighting.

Last night the military spokesman, Brigadier Udaya Nanayakkara, said the two prongs of the assault were 1.5km apart and continued to advance. He said 5,500 civilians had escaped from the area in the previous 48 hours.

Rajapaksa said the Tamil Tigers would be defeated by the end of today, adding that the government was determined to complete the operation despite attempts by some nations to "bully" the country.

"We have already taken steps to settle over 200,000 displaced persons in the north under state security and we are much faster in such methods, when compared to other countries which experience war situations," he said.

"The next step would be to offer a political solution to the problems of Tamil people to prevent fragmentation of the country. My aim is to provide a free nation for all people to live in dignity and honor."

The UN secretary general, Ban Ki-moon, sent his chief of staff, Vijay Nambiar, to Sri Lanka for a second time to try to bring the conflict to a peaceful conclusion.

A UN spokesman, Gordon Weiss, said Nambiar planned to meet senior government officials after he arrived today and would push for ways "to secure the safety of the 50,000 to 100,000 civilians remaining inside the combat zone".

The US applied pressure on Colombo by questioning Sri Lanka's application for a $1.9bn loan from the International Monetary Fund.

Hillary Clinton, the US secretary of state, said: "We think that it is not an appropriate time to consider that until there is a resolution."