 Sri Lanka govt rejects Tamil truce
(China Daily)
Updated: 2009-04-27 07:44
COLOMBO: The Tamil Tigers declared a unilateral ceasefire yesterday, but Sri Lanka dismissed it as a "joke" and said only a surrender would stop troops from finishing the last battle in Asia's longest modern war. The Tigers' truce declaration came as the UN's top humanitarian chief was in the Indian Ocean island to press for the protection of tens of thousands of people trapped in the apparent final conventional battle of a war that started in 1983. And Sri Lanka's ruling party won a resounding victory in a provincial poll, seen as the latest referendum on President Mahinda Rajapaksa's war effort and another step to shoring up his power before possibly calling an early national election. The Tigers have offered a ceasefire repeatedly as the military juggernaut has pushed them to the brink of defeat, but have refused international calls to free stranded civilians, whom witnesses say are kept from leaving by deadly force. "In the face of an unprecedented humanitarian crisis and in response to the calls made by the UN, EU, the governments of India and others, the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) has announced a unilateral ceasefire," an LTTE statement said. Sri Lanka's defence secretary, the top civilian official in charge of the military and the president's brother, laughed at the truce declaration. "That is a joke. They were not fighting with us, they were running from us. There is no need of a ceasefire. They must surrender. That is it," said Defence Secretary Gotabaya Rajapaksa. The war success has driven President Rajapaksa's popularity high, and helped him sideline the main opposition United National Party (UNP). Election results from the Western province showed his party got more than double the seats of the UNP. But after the end of the conventional war, Sri Lanka will face challenges healing divisions between the Tamil minority and Sinhalese majority and boosting an ailing economy. It is seeking a $1.9 billion IMF loan to ease a balance of payments crisis. UN calls to open war zone A top UN official pressed Sri Lankan leaders yesterday to let aid into the northeastern war zone, as the ruling party won a sweeping victory in an election seen as a referendum on its fight against ethnic Tamil rebels. The government has pushed deep into the Tamil Tigers' strongholds in the north in recent months, surrounding the beleaguered rebels and vowing to end the quarter-century war. But reports have grown of starvation and casualties among the tens of thousands of civilians trapped by the fighting. UN Under-Secretary-General for Humanitarian Affairs John Holmes held meetings yesterday with senior officials in Colombo and was "underscoring the urgent need for humanitarian access by the UN to the combat zone," UN spokesman Gordon Weiss said. Aid workers have been barred from the region since fighting escalated in September. Holmes, who arrived late Saturday, had previously called on the government to suspend its offensive to allow the estimated 50,000 trapped civilians to escape. Reuters (China Daily 04/27/2009 page7) |
