A top Tamil leader has asked Sri Lankan President Mahinda Rajapaksa to review the conditions of the displaced Tamil civilians living in the government-run welfare camps in the north, saying some feel being kept in an "open prison".

"In utter despair I am writing this appeal to you to convince you that your intervention at this stage is indispensable, if the country is to maintain its dignity and honour," said Tamil United Liberation Front (TULF) President V Anandasangaree in a letter to Rajapaksa.

"The country's credibility lies in your decision to order the immediate release of certain categories of Internally Displaced Persons and to follow it up soon by re-viewing the problem of the remaining IDPs," he said.

"At present, they are virtually kept under compulsion without any justification, giving them the feeling that they are kept in an open prison with too many restrictions and not in a welfare centre," Anandasangaree wrote in the letter.

The TULF President, a strong critic of the LTTE, urged Rajapaksa to visit some of the camps to assess the situation.

"I am acting on the assumption that many happenings in the IDP Camps are not brought to your notice. Seeing is believing and a visit to some of the IDP Camps by you is long over due," he said.

"Your decision, which I am sure, will open the eyes of some who think that we can play with the lives of over 300,000 odd IDPs who are suffering for no faults of theirs," Anandasangaree said.

He said the authorities in an IDP camp in Pulmoddai in Mullaittivu had denied release of a one-your-old child along with the 61-year-old Grandmother with whom the child is now staying there.

The TULF leader said while the father of the child had his left leg amputated and was in Pulmoddai, the child's mother had her right leg amputated and was now in Vavuniya.

"This type of incidents are available in abundance in various camps," he said, adding thousands of people from his constituencies in Kilinochchi and Mullaittivu have come to the IDP camps in the North.

"I heard and continue to hear a number of stories, some of which moved me to tears. It is the injured and the pregnant women who suffer the worst, without proper and prompt attention," the Tamil leader said.

"Although there are thousands of cases, I give just one or two examples for you to consider the seriousness of the problems," he said, adding "as a patriotic Sri Lankan who loves not only his country but also its people, I have done my duty to my country."

"If you want to win over the Tamils do this first, resettle them soon and think of any development latter," he added.