Geneva, May 15, SPA --A United Nations official today described thecoastal strip housing thousands of civilians in northern Sri Lanka asa "killing field", with unattributed UN sources putting the deathtoll there at up to 8,000 since January, dpa reported. Officials in Geneva said pleas to the Sri Lankan government andthe Tamil Tiger rebels for access to the conflict zone forhumanitarian and to allow refugees to flee have gone unheeded, whilethousands have been killed in recent months. Rupert Colville, a spokesman for the High Commissioner for HumanRights, called for an independent committee to investigate possiblewar crimes, and said the supposed safe zone on a northern beach"could turn into a killing field, if it is not already one." Calls for the two sides to the conflict to respect the laws of warhave also been "consistently ignored," the UN Office for theCoordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) said in Geneva. UN officials, speaking with the German Press Agency dpa oncondition of anonymity, have given "conservative" estimates that7,000 and even possibly 8,000 people have been killed since the endof January Speaking in the British parliament this week, Bill Rammell, ajunior Foreign Office minister, said 6,500 civilians had been killed,and if accurate, the reports were "appalling." He was apparently basing his statistics on an internal note thatwas at least several days old. Journalists and aid workers are prevented by the government fromgaining access to the conflict zone. Somewhwere between 20,000 civilians, according to the government,and 50,000, according to UN agencies, are trapped in a tiny rebel-held enclave in the north. The scenes in the small coastal enclave in north-east Sri Lankahas been described by the International Committee of the Red Cross asan "unimaginable humanitarian catastrophe." Other UN senior officials, including John Holmes, the tophumanitarian affairs coordinator, have warned of a "bloodbath." --SPA www.spa.gov.sa/664591