It has been clear that Sri Lankan crisis was escalating dangerously, where according to all indications a humanitarian tragedy of horrendous proportion was exploding, given the ‘massive mobilisation for massacre’ by the Sri Lankan Armed Forces on the small number of militants and quarter million civilians holed up in the jungles of Wanni.True to the foreboding of Jacques de Maio, in the last 100 days alone 4,800 Sri Lankan Tamils have been massacred and over 10,000 grievously injured. According to reports, not denied by Sri Lanka Government, thermobaric bomb - a bomb that uses a fuel-air explosive capable of creating overpressures equal to an atomic bomb – has been used in this mass killing. In one such attack over 520 men died and the Sri Lanka Defence website displayed the photos as if these were trophies won!

This is the latest from UNICEF's Executive Director Ann M. Veneman: “Hundreds of children have been killed and many more injured as a result of the conflict in Sri Lanka . Thousands are now at risk because of a critical lack of food, water and medicines.”Sri Lanka Government’s response to the civilians trapped in the ’killer zone’ is demarcation of some ‘safety zones’.

From all reports it appears that safety zones themselves have become killer zones. UN secretary-general Ban Ki moon has expressed deep distress at the persistent reports of shelling, mortar fire and aerial attacks in the no-fire zone. A UNICEF news report on their web says, "This (the govt declared no fire zone) is a 14sq km strip of coastline, home to an estimated 150,000 people, of which around one third are children. Despite the Government’s declaration of a no fire zone, shells continue to fall inside the densely-packed area, exacerbating the high casualty rate.”

New Indian Express said it all in an investigative report when it touchingly quoted a Sri Lankan Tamil refugee describing ‘life’ in no fire zones: “It was like dying each day again and again.” Nothing further needs to be said. The paper’s editorial on 18 April sums up succinctly: “There seems little doubt now that the so-called safe zone is anything but safe. Safety is a delusion for people outside the place to comfort themselves with. Both the West’s finger-wagging over the situation as well as India ’s statements of concern seem patently unreal in this context.”

In this context ‘Super-power’ India ’s stance appear to be the most pathetic. In spite of all the harrowing happenings in the neighbouring island, India ’s External Affairs Minister has made this policy declaration while appealing to the Government of Sri Lanka to extend the pause in cessation of hostilities: "No question of mediation. We were not offered to mediate. Our policy is quite clear. The current concern is to ensure security and safety of civilians trapped in the 'no-fire' zone."

Whose policy is this? Is it the one laid down by the Union Cabinet or the whim of certain parochial bureaucrats in New Delhi ? How is the honourable External Affairs Minister going to ‘ensure’ the safety of the civilians trapped in the 'no fire' zone where life there was “like dying each day again and again.” What is worse, when there have been serious allegations of support by Government of India to the genocidal and racist war waged by the Sri Lankan Army and Government on the hapless Tamils of the island, the Minister was eerily silent on this.

In a ‘response telegram’ Chief Minister Karunanidhi says: “We welcome with gratitude, the appeal made by the External Affairs Minister for ceasefire in Sri Lanka . If the appeal is not honoured and implemented by the Lankan government, we request the Indian government to snap all diplomatic relations with Sri Lanka .” One wonders what this ‘gratitude’ is for and will ‘snapping all diplomatic relations’ save thousands if not lakhs from the jaws of ‘thermobaric death?’

Most unfortunately the rest of the world remains silent, unconcerned and uninvolved except for odd statements and pious intentions. UN Security Council, the only International Institution that is capable of making a difference, do not even have Sri Lanka on their ‘agenda for discussions’ despite their senior officials making heart-rending statements. It is alleged that India has a hand in the conspiracy for blocking this agenda!

The world cannot stand apart and abandon tens of thousands of helpless innocents to their uncertain fate. It must heed to the appeal issued by a group of experts and human rights champions: “It is the UN Security Council, according to the terms of the 2005 agreement, which must authorize ‘timely and decisive measures’ to prevent or halt mass atrocities. The Council must be prepared to bluntly characterize the violence in Sri Lanka as mass atrocity crimes; to demand that the government of Sri Lanka grant access to the conflict zone to humanitarian groups and to the media, both of whom it has barred until now and to consider the imposition of sanctions.”

“Tragedy of mankind is not the brutality of the few, but the silence of the many” said Martin Luther King years ago. Let not this silence – most of all by India and UN Security Council – persist. Lest, the Sri Lankan tragedy befalls and we are judged by history as its co-perpetrators!

(The writer is a former Indian Administrative Service (IAS) officer, who had held many important positions nationally and been in a very high position in the TN State administration, before retirement. Presently chairs the Chennai Intellectuals' Forum and was a member of the Chennai team that met with President Rajapaksa to discuss possible power sharing mechanisms as a solution to the present conflict. )