COLOMBO, Dec 4: The Sri Lankan government has asked Norway, which plays the role of facilitator in the country’s troubled peace process, to stop all contacts with the LTTE, until further notice.
The government has requested Norwegian peace brokers to suspend links with the Tamil Tigers until next Wednesday as it was ‘reviewing’ the relationship with the LTTE, a top official of the government peace secretariat in Colombo said.
“We are reviewing the present situation in the wake of last Friday’s bomb blast in Colombo targeting Sri Lanka’s Defence Secretary Goyabaya Rajapakse.
“We do not want Norwegian facilitators to have contacts with the LTTE, until the cabinet meets on Wednesday to discuss the new measures taken to prevent terrorism,” government peace secretariat chief Palitha Kohona said, as analysts pointed out that a full scale war seemed imminent.
The international truce monitors, the Sri Lanka Monitoring Mission (SLMM), said no directive had been given to them to suspend their work. “So far, we are carrying out our duties as usual,” said a spokesperson for the SLMM which has been in the country since the Feb 22, 2002, ceasefire.
Meanwhile, President Mahinda Rajapakse is scheduled to meet opposition leader Ranil Wickremesinghe on Tuesday to discuss key developments in the country following the LTTE leader’s public speech last Monday, where he declared that the ceasefire was ‘defunct’ and four days later sent a suicide bomber to assassinate the defence secretary, who escaped unharmed.
SIX KILLED: At least six Tamil Tiger rebels and a member of the government special task force were killed following clashes between the LTTE guerrillas and the army in the eastern Ampara district, military sources said.
