|TOP|The Reverend Dr Samuel Kobia, General Secretary of the World Council of Churches (WCC), has written a letter to the Sri Lankan president the Honourable Mr Mahinda Rajapaksa.

In the letter Rev Kobia expressed that he was “dismayed and concerned” about the “recent lethal escalation of armed violence” that has been occurring in the Northern and Eastern parts of Sri Lanka.

The letter, written on the 20th January confirms the WCC’s support for the Sri Lankan churches, who have called upon the president, political party leaders, as well as the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Ealam (LTTE) to “take immediate steps to stop this spiral of violence... and sit at the peace talks without delay.”

|AD|A cease-fire agreement followed by peace talks between the Sri Lankan government and the LTTE came in 2002. The cease fire marked the end of over twenty years of conflict, in which over 64,000 people were killed.

Reverend Kobia expressed his concern that another long, drawn-out war could break out “if the rapidly deteriorating situation is not brought under immediate control.”

The letter comes at a time when conflict in Sri Lanka has increasingly becoming out of hand, although there has been no formal end to the cease-fire. The BBC reports that the LTTE has continued to attack government checkpoints.

While the Sri Lankan military is on trial for the extra-judicial killing of five young Tamil students, who appear to have been executed according to ceasefire monitors.