0
COLOMBO: Sri Lanka's peace process is at its lowest point since the government and Tamil Tigers signed a truce early in 2002, a Norwegian envoy said on Wednesday, adding that renewed violence in the east was eroding trust.
Norwegian Deputy Foreign Minister Vidar Helgesen made the comments following three days of talks with both sides, during which, he said, little progress was made toward restarting talks to end 21 years of civil war.
"The peace process is in its most serious situation for two-years and given that fact, I'm disturbed by this complacency and the fact that people tend to take peace for granted," Helgesen told a news conference.
He said trust between the two sides was also dissipating in the face of an upsurge in violence related to a split within the rebel movement and the emergence of a breakaway leader called Karuna, who the Tigers accuse the government of backing.
"The level of trust between the parties is pretty low and the ground situation is not helpful," Helgesen said. President Chandrika Kumaratunga told Helgesen on Tuesday she would hold talks on the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) proposals for interim self-rule - a longstanding rebel demand for renewing negotiations on hold for 16 months.
But both Helgesen and analysts said the agenda for talks is no longer the main stumbling block and the two sides will not be able to come to the table until the issue over the rebel split is resolved.
"What's really bugging the LTTE is the Karuna issue. That's the issue on which the government has to move," said Jehan Perera of the independent National Peace Council.
COMPLACENCY: The Tigers have rejected the government's denials it is involved with Karuna's group and have stepped up attacks on his supporters, most recently killing eight at the weekend as they slept in a Colombo suburb.
"The next step would be to try and find a non-violent resolution to the Karuna issue. That would mean the government ensuring Karuna's people don't use violence, because the LTTE is not going to stop its own violence," Perera said.
A Human Rights Watch report warned that the killings threatened the truce that stopped the fighting after the war that killed 64,000. "These targeted killings sadly show that the ceasefire has not meant an end to the violence that has plagued Sri Lanka.
The LTTE and pro-Karuna forces should immediately halt these killings," the group said in a statement. Helgesen also said that despite the worsening ground situation there was "incredible complacency" among Sri Lankans about the peace bid and added the truce was a long way from a permanent solution. -Reuters
