In Sri Lanka, a renewal of violence is leading to fears the country could see its worst fighting in four years. Earlier today, a leading Tamil politician was assassinated near his home in Colombo. Nadaraja Raviraj was a member of Parliament with the Tamil National Alliance. His death comes two days after government forces killed at least 23 people and wounded dozens more in the shelling of a camp for displaced refugees.

Dr. M. Deveraj, director of Batticaloa Hospital: “All these are due to blast injuries. According to patients’ stories, they say they were in refugee camp, in a school, and some were at home. So, they say they were injured due to artillery blast. More than 15 patients are critically ill.”

An estimated 40,000 people have been displaced by fighting between the military and Tamil Tiger rebels over the past several days.