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Once upon a time Sri Lanka was marketed as a paradise island to wealthy tourists

who flocked to swim from its sandy beaches and stroll in its lush tea plantations.

But for the last 20 years the country has been torn apart by civil war.

In the second of a new series of tales from the Commonwealth

Robin White travels to the Sri Lankan capital Colombo

to find out how people there are coping with the violence.

Colombo, city of a host of motorbike taxes known as Tuk Tuk's and thousands of security checkpoints.

On every street corner there's an army post or a police post or a navy post.

There are a multitude of barricades, barriers and sandbags.

Everyone is stopped and searched many times every day.

The men in uniform are armed, well armed.

If you are ordered to stop, you stop. If you don't, they shoot.

Sri Lanka is at war with itself.

For most of the past 20 years the central government has been fighting a bitter civil war

with Tamil tiger rebels in the north and the east.

It's a war which has pitted the majority buddhist singhalis against tamels who are largely Hindu.

In 2002 a ceasefire was broken by the Norwegians, but it started and finally collapsed in January this year.

The government of President Mahinda Rajapakse has embarked on a military solution.

Government forces have had some success in the east, in the north, the war continues.

...