A church has been attacked in the ongoing violence engulfing northern Sri Lanka, between governmental forces and rebel groups.

|TOP|According to reports more than 40 people were injured and 1 killed, when a grenade was thrown into the Roman Catholic Church of Our Lady of Victory, in the village of Pesalai, in the north-western coastal district of Mannar last week, tell The Church Times.

Fighting had forced approximately 200 people to seek shelter inside the church when the attack took place, and since the incident thousands more have gone to the church complex for shelter.

The RC Bishop of Mannar, the Rt Revd Rayappu Joseph, who had visited the church only hours before the incident, said everyone was “shocked”.

According to local reports, people in the village are blaming government security forces for the attack. However, the government has denied all accusations that it attacked the church, and instead pushed the blame onto the rebels, who are known to have attacked a naval base in the same village on the same day.

Bishop Joseph, however, told that Tamil civilians had seen government security forces approaching, and so had rushed into the church for shelter. The bishop also reported that he saw forces firing at the doors and windows of the church, and it was then that several grenades were launched into the crowds.

|AD|The bishop went on to report that outside the church six men were shot through the mouth by security forces after being questioned as to their identity. Five of them died - two Roman Catholics, two Hindus, and one Muslim.

Bishop Joseph concluded, “The people are now afraid of going back home or going fishing. Seven thousand people are camping in the church compound now,” according to The Church Times.

The Bishop of Colombo, the Rt Revd Duleep de Chickera, issued a statement after the incident, condemning the “deliberate and brutal attack on innocent civilians at Kebittigollawa.”

He urged calm and caution, but also condemned the government policy of retaliatory attacks, which “invariably harmed innocent civilians”, despite being intended for selected targets.

Bishop de Chickera encouraged all warring sides to find back the spirit of the peace agreement that was signed in 2002, after two decades of civil war.

Currently more than 500 people have been killed since the renewed fighting began in April, and Bishop de Chickera also said that he had heard reports that an armed Tamil group was engaged “in the vigorous conscription campaign of adolescents”.

The National Christian Council of Sri Lanka (NCC) issued a statement after last week’s bus attack, with Santha Fernando, executive secretary of the NCC commission, saying, “This has brought the ongoing violence to a new high.”