November 30, 2003	Sunday	Shawwal 5, 1424

KILLINOCHI, (Sri Lanka) Nov 29: Vellupillai Prabhakaran, leader of the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) on Friday warned that “if the ruling Sinhala elite continue to deny the rights of our (Tamil) people” and oppose reconciliation and if the conditions of oppression continue we have no alternative other than to secede and form an independent state.

In his annual statement commemorating the LTTE Heroes’ Day, he rejected accusations made by Sri Lanka President Chandrika Kumaratunga that his organisation was preparing for war. He characterised the current power struggle in Colombo as a typical repetitive historical confrontation between the two major Sinhala political parties.

The LTTE leader observed that this phenomenon erupts whenever one party in power attempts to seek a solution to the Tamil ethnic conflict. “This tragic political drama has been continuing for the last 50 years aggravating the plight of the Tamil people,” he said.

“There is no coherent structure in in the Sinhala nation. The power of the state is torn between the heads of the two most powerful Sinhala political parties”, lamented Prabhakaran.