16 February 2004	Monday	24 Zilhaj 1424

COLOMBO, Feb 15: Sri Lanka's faltering peace process was dealt a further blow on Sunday when the Marxist coalition partner of Sri Lanka's president vowed to scrap a truce with Tamil Tiger rebels if they win April elections.

The Marxist JVP, or People's Liberation Front, said it was working on an alternative to be presented to the Tigers to replace the February 2002 Norwegian-brokered ceasefire that has halted the three-decade rebellion for a Tamil homeland.

"The ceasefire agreement Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe secretly signed with the Tamil Tigers is clearly a threat to national security," JVP leader Wimal Weerawansa said. "We have always said we will totally reject it."

He told the pro-JVP weekly Lanka that his party was willing to negotiate with the Tigers based on "reasonable demands," but opposed devolution of power as demanded by minority Tamils.

Weerawansa said the JVP, which unsuccessfully led armed uprisings in 1971 and 1987, would have to come to an understanding over the ceasefire issue with President Chandrika Kumaratunga's Sri Lanka Freedom Party (SLFP).

Kumaratunga has opposed the truce, but has pledged to uphold it and agreed to cooperate with Scandinavian ceasefire monitors after she took over the ministries of defence, interior and information in November.

The president's move against the rival premier prompted Norway to suspend its mediation saying there was no clarity as to who was in charge in Colombo. Peace talks due to resume in December were put off indefinitely.

The latest JVP remarks over the truce were the party's strongest criticism of the ceasefire since the Marxists inked an agreement with Kumaratunga's SLFP on January 20 in hopes of ousting Wickremesinghe.

There was no immediate Tiger reaction to the JVP's promise to scrap the truce. "This anti-peace political pact articulating an incoherent, confused and mutually contradictory position on a serious national issue might create objective conditions for the resumption of ethnic war," LTTE ideologue Anton Balasingham had said. -AFP