SATTAHIP (Thailand), Sept 18: Sri Lanka’s Tamil Tigers made a dramatic conciliatory gesture towards Muslims on Wednesday, a move that further boosts Norway’s bid to broker peace in the war-torn island.

The chief negotiator of the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE), Anton Balasingham, publicly acknowledged that Muslims were an integral part of the island’s north-east, earlier claimed by the rebels as their exclusive homeland.

“The north and the east is the traditional homeland of the Tamils and the Muslims,” he told reporters here at the conclusion of the first of a series of peace talks to be held in Thailand. Analysts said Balasingham’s remarks would go a long way to easing tensions between the Muslims, the second largest minority, and the ethnic Tamils, who are the main minority group in the Sinhalese-majority nation.

During the talks, which started on Monday, the LTTE and a Muslim delegate on the government side, Rauf Hakeem, clinched an agreement on resolving their differences in the island’s multi-ethnic eastern region — giving an early boost to the peace process.

It received an unexpected push on Wednesday when the rebels announced they were giving up their demand for a separate state and instead agreed to consider “regional autonomy and self-government”.

Rapprochement between the Tamils and Muslims is essential for the success of the peace process because the Muslims, led by the Sri Lanka Muslim Congress (SLMC) party, could make or break the government.

Any collapse of the Colombo administration could have a serious impact on the peace process, revived by Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe, who came to power in December promising peace.

However, he is in an uneasy cohabitation government with President Chandrika Kumaratunga, who is openly opposed to his handling of the peace process.

Kumaratunga has slammed the Tigers over the harassment of Muslims and sought to use the issue as a stick to beat the government with. Clashes between Muslims and the Tiger rebels in Sri Lanka’s multi-ethnic eastern province threatened a Norwegian-arranged truce, but Oslo’s diplomacy managed to prevent a complete collapse of the process in April.

“Muslims must be on board for the talks to succeed and give it credibility,” Hakeem said before he sat down as a member of the government team to talk peace with the Tigers.

Hakeem is also the only government delegate to have had a face-to-face meeting with LTTE supremo Velupillai Prabhakaran, who is seen as the most important figure in the Sri Lankan conflict with the power to call the shots.—AFP