Disaster Management, IDPs and Refugees, Peace and Conflict, Post-War, Vavuniya

Breaking News: IDPs in Zone 3 and 4 in Menik Camp affected by flooding

Reports received by Groundviews this evening indicate that torrential rains in Vavuniya throughout the day have severely affected IDPs interned in Menik Camp, particularly in Zone 3 and Zone 4. Other unconfirmed reports put the number of those affected by the rains at 15,000 at the time of writing.

As early as May this year, serious concerns of possible flooding due to poor drainage in Zone 4 of Menik Camp were clearly voiced by humanitarian agencies. There concerns were flagged again in the UN OCHA update on 31 July 2009, available here.

Vidura, who has written in to Groundviews previously, offers one perspective of the situation on the ground at the moment through Twitter. See www.twitter.com/apelankawe for updates.

Salient tweets until now from Vidura are reproduced below and flag the farcical and extremely dire circumstances on the ground in Menik Camp:

With more rain forecast, these horrific conditions of internment for IDPs will get worse.

Is this really the best we can do? Is this peace?

If you are on the ground in Vavuniya, or have access to new information on the flooding, please leave updates in the comments section.

Update, 15 August 2009, 8.22pm: For first images of the flooding in Menik Camp, click here.