- The UN is sending a humanitarian team to northern Sri Lanka, where it says 50,000 people are trapped by fighting.
- The organisation has called on the rebels and the Sri Lankan government to allow pauses in conflict so aid can be sent in and people evacuated.
- Sri Lanka's government has rejected a UN appeal to allow more aid agencies into the war zone, where the army is closing in on Tamil Tiger rebels.
- The government says 100,000 people have fled since Monday's military push.
- An estimated 60,000 people had already fled in recent months.
'Not sensible'
On Thursday, Sri Lankan Defence Secretary Gotabhaya Rajapaksa rejected a UN appeal to allow aid agencies in.
View satellite images showing area in northern Sri Lanka where refugees have gathered on the beach.
In pictures
"It's not a sensible thing at the moment," he told the BBC.
"There is a civilian rescue operation going on in the area and allowing aid agencies inside the conflict zone is not matching with ground realities."
While the government has allowed aid agencies to help those fleeing the conflict, Sri Lanka's UN ambassador says only the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) and the Catholic charity, Caritas, have been let into the war zone itself.
The ICRC said they had evacuated 530 people on Thursday and 350 the day before, including families as well as sick and wounded people.
On Wednesday the UN Security Council, which had been accused of inaction, called on the Tamil Tigers to lay down their arms and urged the Sri Lankan government to allow international aid agencies into areas of need.
The UN and other Western nations - including the US and the UK - have been pressing for an immediate halt to the fighting to allow time for civilians to leave the war zone safely.
The government categorically denies rebel charges that hundreds of civilians have been killed by the army, saying soldiers are only lightly armed and are trying to rescue trapped people.
The Tamil Tigers, meanwhile, deny accusations that they are holding civilians as human shields.