Red Cross: staff member killed during Sri Lanka shelling

Geneva: The International Committee of the Red Cross says one of its staff in Sri Lanka has been killed by shelling in the area where government forces are battling Tamil rebels.

ICRC spokesman Marcal Izard says the Sri Lankan national is the third Red Cross worker to die in the conflict since March.

Izard says the neutral aid group doesn't know who fired the shell that killed the staff member and his mother around midday Wednesday.

Izard says the man was a water technician who also helped evacuate wounded civilians from the battle zone in northern Sri Lanka where 50,000 people are thought to be trapped.