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The International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) has halted their health programmes in the LTTE held parts of the Wanni region due to the lack of medical supplies, officials said,yesterday. According to ICRC, Information Officer, Harsha Gunawardena, drastic cuts in medical supplies have crippled their programmes in the war-torn region, where they conduct 40 mobile health clinics in addition to primary health centres. Meanwhile, Security Forces have been forced to impose certain restrictions, due to the ongoing fighting in the North between Tiger rebels and Government Forces, military sources said. The ICRC had Defence Ministry approval to take 45 medical items across the army's forward defence lines to the LTTE held region. However, even though the entire quota was approved, the Ministry reduced the quantities of every item, ICRC officials said. When the medical stocks were moved to Vavuniya and approval was sought to cross the front lines, the Security Forces headquarters in Wanni removed 31 items from the quota and asked the ICRC to take the remaining 14 items, only after the quantities were further reduced, Gunawardena said. The Medicine Sans Frontieres (MSF) urged the government, earlier, to permit adequate medical supplies to the region, because hospitals had been closed due to lack of medical supplies, sources said. However, Military sources claim that they have permitted a large number of seriously sick patients to cross the fronlines to enter government hospitals in the South.
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