COLOMBO, Nov 13: Sri Lanka’s president on Tuesday issued a fresh invitation to Tamil Tiger guerrillas to open peace talks, but ruled out compromise on issues that derailed a Norwegian-brokered peace bid.
The rebels, fighting for a separate state called “Eelam” for minority Tamils in Sri Lanka’s north and east, have dismissed all recent offers of talks saying they did not want to negotiate with an “unstable regime” facing a parliamentary election on Dec 5.
“We invite the terrorists, at least, now to give up their demand for Eelam and come for talks,” President Chandrika Kumaratunga said at a news conference.
But Kumaratunga, who is elected separately and will remain in power until 2005 regardless of the outcome of the polls, refused to move on a rebel demand that a ban on their organization be lifted before talks begin.
“No more conditions until talks begin,” Kumaratunga said. She swept to power on a promise of a negotiated peace but has been accused by the opposition and Tamil moderates of taking an increasingly hawkish approach to the war.
“If they don’t negotiate we will have no option but to continue the war against terrorism,” she said.
Kumaratunga accused the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) of plotting with the opposition to overthrow her coalition government, which collapsed amid a series of defections last month.
“It is known that the LTTE prefers to do business with weak leaders,” she said.
The main opposition United National Party, which has a softer stance on the peace process and promises to negotiate if its wins the December vote, has dismissed Kumaratunga’s allegations as a ruse to shore up support among nationalists in the country’s Sinhalese majority.
Kumaratunga blamed the rebels for the collapse earlier this year of the Norwegian peace bid which gave the country its best hope in years of a negotiated settlement to a conflict that has claimed more than 64,000 lives.
“The only reason the peace process is not working is because the LTTE told the Norwegians they were not interested in negotiations right now,” said Kumaratunga.
The rebels have blamed the deadlock on the government’s refusal to match a four-month ceasefire they declared in December last year and its failure to lift the ban on the LTTE.
It also said the ruling party’s coalition deal with a radical Marxist party, which has publicly opposed Norway’s role in the peace process, had made negotiations impossible.
The ruling Peoples’ Alliance has already promised to revive the coalition deal which enabled Kumaratunga to reopen parliament in September after a two-month suspension that followed an earlier wave of defections.
Kumaratunga said the deal with the Marxists was not an impediment to talks. —Reuters
