Stranded Britons flying home

Tourists are waiting in hotels for flights to resume

British holidaymakers are flying home from Sri Lanka where they were caught up in a gun battle.

Forty seven Britons were trapped in a fire fight between rebel and government troops at the country's only international airport.

Eighteen people died in the strike by Tamil Tigers on Tuesday but none of the tourists, who fled and hid, were injured.

Tourists ran for their lives when the shelling started

Flights have now resumed from Bandaranaike International Airport.

The Foreign Office has advised visitors to postpone trips to Sri Lanka.

Military aircraft and 11 civilian planes, half the national fleet, were damaged or destroyed in the attack.

The tourists, who ran for their lives were among 600 holidaymakers waiting for flights to London.

Martina Bellieni was terrified of returning to the airport

Martina Bellieni, who had been on a double-wedding family holiday, said she was very scared about returning to the airport.

"It's not surprising when you've been through that sort of carnage."

Her brother-in law Jimmy Bellieni, said it was strange to return to the scene.

"The runway is cleared. It's really weird to be back where most of the fighting went on.

"You can see burnt out aircraft," he said.

He was also on his honeymoon, and was separated from his pregnant wife, Candace, and three children in the mayhem of the attack.

"At one point I poked my head up to see if I could get out and there was just silhouettes, flash fire, and a burning airport in the background," he told BBC Radio 5 Live.

The airport's duty manager Maxie Pearari told the BBC that it could take two days for flights to get back to normal.

Complacency attacked

The tourism industry's attitude to a country where some areas are gripped in civil war, has been criticised by Robert Evans, MEP for west London.

He told BBC Radio 4's Today programme: "I think that the tour industry and travel companies have perhaps been less than honest in not warning people that Sri Lanka, and holidays that go through Colombo Airport, have an element of risk".

He said the small country was spending 25 per cent of its budget on defence.

"We mustn't be complacent about this and neither should the tour companies," he said.

Keith Betton, of the Association of British Travel Agents, told the programme that tour operators were telling customers this week and next to cancel their holiday plans and offering refunds.

In the longer term, he said they would act on Foreign Office advice.

But he said Sri Lanka was a popular tourist destination attracting 100,000 people a year where for the past two-three years the Foreign Office had said it was not an unsafe destination.

"The sad thing is as a destination it is very peaceful, particularly the south," he said.

Attack condemned

Foreign Secretary Jack Straw condemned the suicide attack and called on the rebel Tamil Tigers and Sri Lankan government to cease hostilities.

He said Britain was ready to help in the peace process to work towards a solution to the conflict through peaceful negotiation.

Flights into Sri Lanka have been diverted to India and the Middle East.

Varada Kumar, executive secretary of London's Tamil Information Centre, told BBC News Online that civilian aircrafts were attacked because they had been used to transport military personnel.

Sri Lanka has launched air strikes on Tamil Tiger positions in retaliation.

Britons anxious about relatives can ring the Foreign and Commonwealth Office's consular protection unit on 0207 270 1500.