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| Sunday, 23 February 2003 |
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Ceasefire violations parley on Friday by S. Selvakumar The year-long dispute between the armed forces and the LTTE over ceasefire violations which threatens to deviate the ongoing peace process from brass tacks will be subjected to a lengthy discussion between the government and the LTTE at a meeting to be held in Kilinochchi on Friday February 28. The meeting has been sponsored by the Sri Lanka Monitoring Mission (SLMM). The government team for the talks will be headed by Defence Secretary Austin Fernando. LTTE Eastern Province military wing leader Muralitharan alias Karuna will lead the Tiger delegation. SLMM chief Trond Furuhovde will preside at the discussions and his incoming new replacement Major General (Rtd) T. Tellessen will also be associated at the talks. The SLMM burdened with ceasefire violation complaints from either side feels that it could effectively find a solution to this problem and concentrate more on the implementation of the Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) signed last February by the government and the LTTE, SLMM deputy leader Hagrup Haukland told the Sunday Observer. Karuna has been specially handpicked by LTTE leader V. Prabhakaran since a majority of complaints on ceasefire violations pertaining to alleged LTTE abduction, conscription and extortions are reported from the Eastern Province. "The talks should be fruitful and help us to discuss about other core issues at future peace talks" an authoritative governmental source beamed with confidence while diplomatic sources described the scheduled Kilinochchi meeting as a correct move by the SLMM. "These things should be nipped in the bud to enable the peace moves to proceed forward" the same diplomatic source pointed out. The next round of peace talks are scheduled to be held in Japan from March 18 to 21 and the same delegates from both sides are expected to participate. |
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