COLOMBO, 8 May 2003 — Sri Lanka President Chandrika Kumaratunga yesterday blamed the “international community” for the impasse in the island’s peace bid even as Norwegian and Japanese diplomats tried to revive the process.
The president’s spokesman Harim Peiris said Kumaratunga believed her government was misguided in counting on an “international safety net”.
“The international community has singularly failed to keep the Tigers at the table or get them to respect human rights and the democratic rights of others,” Peiris said.
“We would not be in the present stage if the government had heeded the president’s advice and taken up core issues, including human rights and democratic rights at the start of talks,” he added.
The Tigers suspended participation in the Norwegian-brokered peace talks last month triggering intense diplomatic activity to get the process back on track.
The president’s reaction came a day after Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe told Parliament that he was hopeful of seeing the rebel Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) back at the table.
“The safety net of the international community, which we have brought about, is being of great help to us at this time,” the prime minister said Tuesday.
Norwegian peace brokers are on the island trying to jumpstart the peace talks, while Japan’s special peace envoy to Sri Lanka, Yasushi Akashi, yesterday held talks with LTTE supremo Velupillai Prabhakaran in the island’s rebel-held north, rebel radio said. The two men had two hours of talks in the island’s war-torn northern Wanni region, the Voice of Tigers radio said without giving details. Prabhakaran, the elusive leader of the LTTE, is rarely seen in public.
Kumaratunga has long been critical of the prime minister’s handling of the peace process, accusing him of making too many concessions to the guerrillas.
Peiris said the president was also concerned that the Tigers had used the ongoing truce to target political rivals and blamed the government for not taking adequate measures to protect informants of the military.
More than a dozen military informants are reported to have been killed by gunmen suspected to be LTTE hitmen, while the Tigers have also been blamed for the slayings of rival politicians.
“The LTTE intelligence operatives are operating openly and this is a ridiculous state of affairs,” Peiris said.
Japan, which is Sri Lanka’s largest single aid donor, is organizing a major aid-pledging conference in June. But the Tigers have said they will not attend the June 9-10 aid conference in Tokyo in protest at what they consider slow progress in the talks.
