The Hindu : PA against fait accompli

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Saturday, Nov 16, 2002

International

International

PA against fait accompli

By Our Special Correspondent

COLOMBO NOV. 15. Sri Lanka's main Opposition party, the People's Alliance (PA), today warned the ruling United National Front against any attempt to present a "fait accompli" to solve the decades-long ethnic crisis.

The party also termed the proposed participation of the U.S. and the U.K in the donors' conference, to be held in Oslo later this month an "alarming development in the international scene" as it would send "wrong signals" on countering terrorism.

Calling for greater inclusiveness in the peace process, the former Foreign Affairs Minister, Lakshman Kadirgamar, wanted a "fuller and wider participation" in the future talks. "Those who have legitimate claims to voice the aspirations of the various communities" in the island, especially the "elected representatives of the people of the northern and eastern provinces" would have to be involved, he said.

Emphasising that the party and its leader, Chandrika Kumaratunga, were strongly of the view that the conflict cannot be solved through military means, the party cautioned that "it would be a grave mistake" to leave it out of the peace process. Pointing out that any resolution of the conflict required its support to get a two-thirds majority in Parliament, the party said "cooperation will not be given" if any "fait accompli" was presented to the nation.

Asked to comment on the position taken by Anton Balasingham that confederative and federal models would be looked at, Mr. Kadirgamar dismissed the former as "totally unacceptable".

The draft constitution prepared by the Kumaratunga administration in 1997, he said, was based on a quasi-federal model. However, though it was not necessary that that should form the "basis" of a political solution, the features of that draft should not be ignored in the search of an acceptable model, he said.

Explaining a detailed seven-page statement, Mr. Kadirgamar pointed out that the direction of the talks, was "right only for the LTTE" and that there was a "grave risk of a separate state".

Developments in the ground, he said, were "gradually slipping and sliding into a situation where the LTTE is taking various steps to set up a parallel government which is not responsible to the central government".

On the proposed donors' conference, the PA said there was the danger that the funds collected through this "will be controlled, or heavily influenced, by the LTTE" unless there was a "valid administrative structure", which was constitutional and "responsible to Parliament".

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