During his journey last month to Vavuniya, a 10-hour drive north across the lush landscape of Sri Lanka, Doug Kennedy wondered what he would find once he entered the world of the "welfare centers."

Once on the front line during the island nation's lengthy civil war, the area was now Ground Zero for the painful aftermath. An estimated 260,000 civilians remain trapped there, held in government-run camps of up to 45,000 people each. They had fled Sri Lanka's war with the Tamil Tiger guerrillas, but two months after victory was declared, the Sri Lankan military had not let them go home.

In their midst for four days, the missions director for New Hope Christian Fellowship on O'ahu found people emotionally drained by war and vowed to help make their lives better.

They had tents and clean water, but they were living on the ground. They had a community with schools and banks, but they were living behind barbed wire. They clung to a desire to go home, even though their villages were strewn with landmines.

"I felt like I wanted to do anything I possibly could to help these people have a better life," Kennedy said. "I wanted to pour my everything into helping them."

Kennedy's goal, and that of his church, is to return to Sri Lanka next month with $50,000 in relief aid. The hope is to improve living conditions before the northeast monsoons begin in December.

RETURN VISIT

Kennedy, a 41-year-old Manoa resident, is no stranger to Sri Lanka. He has been going there regularly to help build a warning system after a tsunami swept across the Indian Ocean in December 2004, killing 230,000 people in a dozen countries.

New Hope was a partner in the project, and Kennedy has led teams of volunteers who helped create the Community Tsunami Early-warning Center.

He was in Sri Lanka in July when the center's director, Dr. Novil Wijesekara, invited him to visit Vavuniya.

Dr. Wijesekara, the country's chief health coordinator for the region and a friend, had recently been sent to the camps by the Sri Lankan government to help with day-to-day needs.

"My first day I got there, I think I was subconsciously comparing everything I saw to what I saw after the tsunami," Kennedy said. "I had seen bodies everywhere, and we were collecting bodies, and we were helping people who lost everything."

The situation in Vavuniya was very different.

Whereas there was no order after the tsunami, and the country was swarming with relief organizations that had arrived to help, this camp setting was run by the military, which in May had declared victory in its 25-year fight with the Tamil Tigers.

"I was impressed with that initially," Kennedy said. "But over time, I began to realize the heartache that the people had experienced and had to go through."

As the war came to an end, thousands of civilians were trapped in the region where the Tamil guerrillas fought their last battles. In March, the United Nations estimated that 2,800 civilians had been killed.

The International Red Cross described the displaced Sri Lankans' living conditions as a humanitarian crisis.

Camps for the displaced were established by the military, dubbed "welfare centers," and placed under its strict control. Access by human rights workers and journalists was limited.

Kennedy said he was lucky to be allowed inside, but he was ordered not to use his camera or video recorder. Nevertheless, he returned from the region with photos from outside the camp, showing guard posts and scenes from the Sri Lankan medical offices where health officials planned to fend off disease.

STILL LOCKED UP

Dr. Wijesekara and his fellow medics have done a lot to improve conditions in Vavuniya, Kennedy said, organizing 75 doctors and 40 nurses, hospitals and an ambulance service to help within the camp. The prevalence of diseases — hepatitis, typhoid fever and dengue fever — has dropped.

But Kennedy doesn't know why those in the camps remain locked up — or for how long.

Observers outside Sri Lanka have wondered the same thing.

At the East-West Center, G. Shabbir Cheema, a senior fellow and coordinator for the Asia-Pacific Governance and Democracy Initiatives, said international humanitarian groups have urged the Sri Lankan government to release the people.

"Those people still feel they are being held as prisoners," Cheema said. "There is alienation."

The problem is that the Sri Lankan government believes that Tamil Tigers are hiding in the camps, and it's trying to weed them out, Cheema said: "They think that if everybody is released, then the former militants will be able to start their violence once again."

Management of internal security after a conflict is a complex job, said Cheema, who worked for many years at the United Nations.

"You want to take steps that will reduce the alienation of the people, but you also have to ensure a minimal level of security," he said. "The Sri Lankan government has taken a very hard-line stance on security issues. They are not making any political compromises."

SHIFTING NEEDS

Outside support is finding its way to the 40 camps. The United Nations said in June that it supports the government's effort to restore normalcy, but until that happens, would work to provide "urgently needed aid."

In the camps, the needs change all the time.

Kennedy said his relief fund could go toward building platforms for the tents — which would help when the rainy season starts — or clothing. But it has a long way to go: New Hope has only raised about $4,000.

Kennedy met people who had lost everything inside the camps, he said.

"I think like anyone else, they want to move forward and get out of living in a tent and into a home in a community," he said.

"On the faces of the adults you see tiredness. You can read on their faces that they had experiences that have been dire. They are in this place of transition, but they want to go to the next step."