From: Aftenposten
Date: 22.4.2003
C O N F I D E N T I A L SECTION 01 OF 08 COLOMBO 000688
SIPDIS
DEPARTMENT FOR D, SA, SA/INS, SA/PD, S/CT NSC FOR E. MILLARD LONDON
FOR POL/RIEDEL E.O. 12958:
DECL: 04-22-13
TAGS: PGOV, PTER, KPAO, EAID, CE, NO, JA, LTTE - Peace Process
SUBJECT: Tigers announce they are suspending peace talks;
GSL, most observers see move as tactical
Refs: Colombo 685, and previous (Notal)
(U) Classified by Ambassador E. Ashley Wills. Reasons: 1.5 (b, d).
1. (C)
SUMMARY: In a press release dated April 21, the Tamil Tigers
suspended their participation in the peace talks and said they
will not attend the June donors conference. The GSL has not
yet reacted in public to the statement (short of a very brief
letter to the Tigers taking note of their statement). Minister
Moragoda told us that he thought the move was tactical, "shock
therapy" by the Tigers, as he put it. Other observers agree
with this perspective. While the Tigers are always hard to
read, we tend to agree that they still see the peace process
as a going concern. A suggested press statement for Washington´s
immediate review is contained in Para 10. END SUMMARY.
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Tiger Statement
---------------
2. (U)
In a long press release dated April 21, the Liberation Tigers
of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) suspended its participation in peace
talks with the Sri Lankan government and said the group will
not attend the June donors conference in Tokyo. (Note: Per the
statement, the seventh round of GSL-LTTE talks, which had been
set to take place in Thailand from April 29 - May 2, is now
off.) The press release came in the form of a letter from the
LTTE´s London-based spokesman and senior negotiator Anton
Balasingham to Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe. (Note: The
text of the statement, as carried by pro-LTTE websites, is
contained in Para 11.)
3. (U)
The statement begins by tipping its hat to the peace process,
noting that the prior rounds of talks and other interactions
among the LTTE, government, and Norwegian government
facilitators had "fostered trust and confidence." After this
brief introduction, the statement hits it stride when it makes
the following three major complaints about the peace process:
-- April 14 Seminar: The statement asserts that the GSL and
the Norwegian facilitators should have ensured the LTTE´s
participation in all meetings on international assistance
issues. Instead, the GSL and GoN allowed Washington to be the
venue of the April 14 seminar on Sri Lanka despite being
"fully aware of the fact that the United States has legal
constraints in inviting representatives of a proscribed
organization" to the U.S. The statement goes on to claim that
the LTTE´s "exclusion" from the conference "has seriously
eroded the confidence of our people in the peace process."
(Note: The LTTE could not attend the seminar because the group
is on our Foreign Terrorist Organization, "FTO," list. This
part of the statement is the only place where the U.S. is
mentioned.) -- Ceasefire Accord Implementation: In its second
key section, the statement asserts that the government has not
done enough to implement the February 2002 ceasefire accord
(a.k.a., "the Ceasefire Memorandum of Understanding"). The
LTTE asserts that "tens of thousands of government troops
continue to occupy our towns, cities and residential areas,
suffocating the freedom of mobility of our people." The
statement goes on to claim that the GSL´s "repeated assurances
that the resettlement of displaced people would be expedited
have proven futile." (Note: About 300,000 displaced persons
have, in fact, returned to their homes in the north and east
since the peace process began. About 500,000 people remain
displaced.) A specific reference is made to Jaffna District,
where the LTTE has long complained that the GSL has not done
enough to reduce the size of its "high security zones." --
Focus of Assistance: The third major section involves a long,
rambling, vague claim that the government should not be asking
for international assistance for all of Sri Lanka, but only
for the war- torn north and east. According to the LTTE,
"(T)he poverty that is prevailing in southern Sri Lanka is a
self-inflicted phenomenon, caused by the disastrous policies
of past governments in dealing with the Tamil national
conflict...This approach grossly understates the severity of
the problems faced by the people in the northeast."
4. (U)
Briefly reciting these complaints, the statement wraps up by
saying: "Under these circumstances, the LTTE leadership has
decided to suspend its participation in the negotiations for
the time being. We will not be attending the donor conference
in Japan in June. While we regret that we are compelled to
make this painful decision, we wish to reiterate our
commitment to seek a negotiated political solution to the
ethnic question."
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GSL Reaction
------------
5. (C)
The government has not yet issued an official public reaction
to the LTTE statement. (Note: Late April 22, Prime Minister
Wickremesinghe sent a very brief letter to the LTTE´s
Balasingham stating that the GSL had taken note of the Tigers´
concerns and planned to respond to them in full. A copy of
this letter is being faxed to SA/INS.) In an April 22
conversation, Minister Milinda Moragoda, who had just returned
from Europe, told the Ambassador that he thought the LTTE´s
announcement was basically tactical in nature, "a way to
regain control of the agenda by the Tigers," as he put it. It
was positive that the Tigers had made clear they were not
pulling out of the talks on a permanent basis and had not
pulled out of the ceasefire accord, for example. On this
point, Moragoda related he had met J. Maheswaran, a pro-LTTE
Tamil of Australian nationality, on his plane trip back from
Europe. Moragoda said Maheswaran had told him he (Maheswaran)
still intended to participate (as a LTTE representative) in
ceasefire- related meetings. (Note: The Sri Lanka Monitoring
Mission has also told us that the LTTE has given no indication
that it intends to cancel its participation in
ceasefire-related meetings, including in the Sub- Committee on
Immediate Humanitarian and Rehabilitation Needs in the North
and the East, "SIHRN.")
6. (C)
In making the statement, Moragoda said the LTTE seemed to be
using "shock therapy" because it felt a bit cornered, as many
of the easy steps regarding the peace process had already been
taken, leaving only tough decisions. In addition to being
upset about the April 14 seminar, Moragoda remarked that he
thought the group was also disturbed by political happenings
in the south, including a possible linkup between the
Opposition People´s Alliance (PA) and the radical, anti- peace
process Janantha Vimukthi Peramuna (JVP). Noting that he had
met with Norwegian envoy Solheim while in Europe, Moragoda
said he and other GSL officials involved with peace process
issues planned to meet with the Prime Minister late April 22
to formulate next steps. Ambassador Wills commented that the
government would be wise to be restrained in what it says, but
it should be firm with the LTTE. Moragoda said he agreed with
that posture, and based on an earlier conversation, he thought
the PM was on board for that sort of approach. He confided
that he had spoken with G.L. Peiris, the GSL´s chief
negotiator, who seemed a bit "frazzled" by the LTTE´s
announcement, however. (Note: Peiris is also the government´s
chief spokesman.)
7. (U)
(((Note: Shortly after her return from an official visit to
Bangladesh, President Kumaratunga issued a statement critical
of the LTTE´s announcement. The president´s statement called
the LTTE´s rationale for pulling out of the talks "feeble" and
called for the group to reconsider its decision. In a rare
joint meeting of the two political adversaries, the president
and the Prime Minister are scheduled to discuss the situation
on April 22.)))
--------------
Other Reaction
--------------
8. (C)
Most observers we have spoken to agree with Moragoda that the
Tigers´ statement was tactical in nature and not an indication
that the group plans to end the peace process. Comments we
have picked up included the following: -- N. Raviraj, a Tamil
National Alliance (TNA) MP who has expressed concerns about
the LTTE in the past, commented that he had "full confidence"
that the current problems could be worked out. He said he
believed that the Tigers´ non-invitation to the April 14
seminar was the "spark" that led to the LTTE´s releasing the
statement, but he thought the group could be convinced to
re-enter the talks. -- Joseph Pararajasingham, a Tamil MP with
very close LTTE links, told us that Tiger officials had
recently assured him that the group would not scrap the
ceasefire accord. He was also confident that if the Norwegians
took part in "shuttle diplomacy" they could get the LTTE to
attend the June donors conference in Tokyo. He said he thought
the LTTE truly was angered over the Sri Lankan military´s
continuing large-scale presence in Jaffna, as well as its
"exclusion" from the April 14 conference in the U.S.
Notwithstanding the hard feelings, he predicted that these
issues could be "overcome," allowing the peace process to move
forward. -- M.L.A.M. Hizbullah, a National Unity Alliance MP
and a Muslim, said he was convinced that the suspension of
talks would have little long-term impact on the peace
process. He said the GSL should respond to the LTTE in good
faith with proposals re the security zones in Jaffna and in
other areas to assuage LTTE concerns. He also expressed doubts
that the LTTE would not, in the end, attend the donors
conference in Tokyo, as "it was in their interest to be
there." -- Taking a somewhat different tack, V. Thevaraj, the
editor of a Tamil-language daily newspaper, expressed some
concern over what he described as "deep anger" within the
LTTE. He stated that some in the LTTE remained furious over
the deaths of 11 of its sea cadre in a confrontation with the
Sri Lankan navy off the northeast coast in March (see
Reftels). The LTTE´s statement, he averred, was an effort by
its leadership to appease Tiger hard-liners, who remained
bitter over this incident.
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COMMENT
-------
9. (C)
While the Tigers are always hard to read, we tend to agree
that that their statement seems basically tactical in nature
and that they still see the peace process as a going
concern. It was positive, for example, that the group did not
permanently pull out of the peace talks; nor, based on what we
are hearing, is it ending cooperation on ceasefire-related
matters. Our guess is that Moragoda is right and that the
group is trying to regain control of the agenda via some
"shock therapy." The LTTE´s decision, as it happens, also
appears to fit into its seeming long-term desire to slow down
the pace of the peace process. (Note: Some observers say, for
example, that the LTTE wants to wait until arch-foe President
Kumaratunga´s term ends in late 2005 before it agrees to a
negotiated settlement.) In issuing the statement, however, the
LTTE is exposing itself to a lot of flak that it is
undermining the peace track. We think that pressure on the
group to remain a part of the process will not only come from
the south, but also from many Tamils, who know that a return
to war would be devastating for their community. END COMMENT.
---------------------
Draft Press Statement
---------------------
10. (C)
Attached below is a draft press statement for Washington´s
immediate review. We would like Washington´s clearance by
April 23 morning (local), so that the statement can be issued
that day. We have received many press inquiries and would like
to get a U.S. statement out right away. As an alternative to
the attached statement, Washington may wish to consider
issuance of a "minimalist" statement that simply regrets the
LTTE´s decision, and urges it to reconsider, so as not to
endanger the gains made by the peace process. We think it is
important to be up-front and direct with the LTTE about its
action, which is why we recommend the attached
statement. Either way, we would appreciate Washington´s
guidance ASAP.
Begin text: We regret the decisions by the LTTE to suspend its
participation in the Sri Lankan peace talks and not to attend
the Tokyo donor´s conference scheduled for June. We reviewed
carefully the ostensible reasons for these decisions cited in
Mr. Balasingham´s letter to the Prime Minister dated April
21. We do not find them convincing. A well-intentioned party
that truly wants a peaceful, political settlement to Sri
Lanka´s conflict could deal with such grievances at the
negotiating table. We call on the Tigers to reconsider and to
return to the negotiating track. We also call on the LTTE and
the Government of Sri Lanka to honor the terms of the
ceasefire even while the talks are suspended. In the meantime,
this interregnum in the talks could prove useful by giving
both parties the opportunity to recommit themselves to
negotiations. We have long supported the MOU even though we
have also acknowledged it has not been implemented perfectly.
Blame for this does not fall exclusively on the side of the
Government of Sri Lanka, however, as the LTTE´s statement
suggests. The Tigers, too, bear heavy responsibility for
numerous breaches of the MOU. While the talks are suspended,
we urge the LTTE to reflect carefully on its own
transgressions. Assassinations of opponents, intimidation of
Muslims, taxation without representation, aggressive Sea Tiger
behavior and continued child recruitment do not build trust in
the LTTE´s intentions. We continue to believe that the way out
of Sri Lanka´s ethnic conflict is through negotiations
facilitated by the Government of Norway. In this regard, we
remain willing to do whatever we can to assist Sri Lanka as it
tries to bring an end to this ugly war. End text.
----------------------
Text of LTTE Statement
----------------------
11. (U)
The following is the text of the LTTE statement made by LTTE
spokesman Anton Balasingham and issued late April 21:
Begin text. Dear Prime Minister, In accordance with the
decision of our leadership I am advised to bring to your
urgent attention the deep displeasure and dismay felt by our
organization on some critical issues relating to the on-going
peace process. You are well aware that the Ceasefire Agreement
that has been in force for more than one year and the six
rounds of peace negotiations between the principal parties has
been successful, irrespective of the occurrence of some
violent incidents that endangered the peace process. The
stability of the ceasefire and the progress of the peace
talks, you will certainly appreciate, are the positive outcome
of the sincere and firm determination of the parties to seek a
permanent resolution to the ethnic conflict through peaceful
means. The cordial inter-relationship, frank and open
discussions and the able and wise guidance of the facilitators
fostered trust and confidence between the negotiators and
helped to advance the talks on substantial levels. The
negotiating teams were able to form important sub-committees
on the basis of equal and joint partnership. During the early
negotiating sessions it was agreed that the Government of Sri
Lanka and the LTTE should work together and approach the
international community in partnership. The Oslo Donor
Conference held on 25 November 2002 turned out to be an ideal
forum for such joint endeavor. The LTTE has acted sincerely
and in good faith extending its full cooperation to the
government of Sri Lanka to seek international assistance to
restore normalcy and to rehabilitate the war affected people
of the northeast. The LTTE to date has joined hands with the
government and participated in the preparation of joint
appeals and programs. In spite of our goodwill and trust, your
government has opted to marginalize our organization in
approaching the international community for economic
assistance. We refer to the exclusion of the LTTE from the
crucial international donor conference held in Washington on
14 April 2003 in preparation for the major donor conference to
be held in Japan in June. We view the exclusion of the LTTE,
the principle partner to peace and the authentic
representatives of the Tamil people from discussions on
critical matters affecting the economic and social welfare of
the Tamil nation, as a grave breach of good faith. Your
government, as well as our facilitator Norway, are fully aware
of the fact that the United States has legal constraints to
invite representatives of a proscribed organization to their
country. In these circumstances an appropriate venue could
have been selected to facilitate the LTTE to participate in
this important preparatory aid conference. But the failure on
the part of your government to do so gives cause for suspicion
that this omission was deliberate. The exclusion of the LTTE
from this conference has severely eroded the confidence of our
people. As you are aware, considerable optimism and hopes were
raised among the people when your government, shortly after
assuming power, entered into a ceasefire agreement with our
organization, bringing to an end twenty years of savage and
bloody conflict. Expectations were further raised when both
sides began direct negotiations with Norwegian
facilitation. In particular, there was a justifiable
expectation that the peace process would address the urgent
and immediate existential problems facing the people of the
north and east, particularly the million people who are
internally displaced by the conflict and are languishing in
welfare centers and refugee camps. As such, the Ceasefire
Agreement included crucial conditions of restoring normalcy
which required the vacation, by occupying Sri Lankan troops,
of Tamil homes, schools, places of worship and public
buildings. Despite the agreed timeframe for this evacuation of
troops, which has since passed, there has been no change in
the ground situation. We have repeatedly raised the issue of
continuing suffering of our people at every round of talks
with your government. Your negotiators´ repeated assurances
that the resettlement of the displaced people would be
expedited have proven futile. The negotiations have been
successful in so far as significant progress has been made in
key areas, such as the agreement to explore federalism on the
basis of the right to self-determination of our people. But
this progress has not been matched by any improvement in the
continuing hardships being faced by our people as a result of
your government´s refusal to implement the normalization
aspects of the Ceasefire Agreement and subsequent agreements
reached at the talks. As a result, considerable
disillusionment has set in amongst the Tamil people, and in
particular the displaced, who have lost all hope the peace
process will alleviate their immense suffering. Through there
is peace due to the silencing of the guns, normalcy has not
returned to Tamil areas. Tens of thousands of government
troops continue to occupy our towns, cities and residential
areas suffocating the freedom of mobility or our people. Such
a massive military occupation of Tamil lands, particularly in
Jaffna - a densely populated district - during peace times
denying the right of our displaced people to return to their
homes, is unfair and unjust. Your government, in international
forums, continues to place poverty as the common phenomenon
affecting the entire country. The Poverty Reduction Strategy
forms the essence of the document Regaining Sri Lanka´ which
defines the macro-economic policy of your government. Though
poverty and poverty alleviation constitute the centrality of
the new economic vision of your government as exemplified in
`Regaining Sri Lanka´ the document fails to examine the
causality of the phenomenon of poverty, the effects of ethnic
war and the unique conditions of devastation prevailing in the
northeast. In our view, the conditions of reality prevailing
in Tamil areas are qualitatively different from southern Sri
Lanka. The Tamils faced the brunt of the brutal war. Twenty
years of intense and incessant war has caused irreparable
destruction to the infrastructure in the northeast. This
colossal destruction augmented by continued displacement of
the people and their inability to pursue their livelihoods due
to military restrictions and activities have caused untold
misery and extreme poverty among the people of the northeast.
Continued displacement has also depleted all forms of savings
of these people disabling them from regaining their lives on
their own. The war-affected people need immediate help to
regain their dignity. They need restoration of essential
services to re-establish their lives. Reconstruction of
infrastructures such as roads, hospitals, schools and houses
are essential for them to return to normal life. The poverty
that is prevailing in southern Sri Lanka is a self-inflicted
phenomenon, caused by the disastrous policies of the past
governments (both the UNP and the SLFP) in dealing with the
Tamil national conflict. In its fanatical drive to prosecute
an unjust war against the Tamil people, the Sinhala state
wasted all national wealth to a futile cause. The massive
borrowings to sustain an absurd policy of `war for peace´ by
the former government caused huge international
indebtedness. The economic situation of the south has been
further worsened by the mismanagement of state funds, bad
governance and institutional corruption. Therefore, the
conditions prevailing in the south are distinctly different
from the northeast where the scale and magnitude of the
infra-structural destruction is monumental and the poverty is
acute. Ignoring this distinctive reality, your government
posits poverty as a common phenomenon across the country and
attempts to seek a solution with a common approach. This
approach grossly under states the severity of the problems
faced by the people in the northeast. The government´s
`Regaining Sri Lanka´ document completely lacks any form of
identified goals for the northeast. Statistics presented for
substantiating the policy totally ignore the northeast and
solely concentrate on southern Sri Lanka. However, this has
been promoted as the national strategy to the international
community to seek aid. It is evident from this that the
government lacks any comprehensive strategy for serious
development of the northeast. The poverty reduction strategy
fails to address the poverty of the northeast as distinct from
the rest. In seeking international assistance your government
disingenuously speaks of reconstruction being needed in all
areas, thereby masking the total destruction of the
infrastructure of the northeast which has resulted from the
militarist policies of the past three decades. As we pointed
out above, the exclusion of the LTTE from critical aid
conference in Washington, the non- implementation of the terms
and conditions enunciated in the truce document, the
continuous suffering and hardship experienced by hundreds of
thousands of internally displaced Tamils, the aggressive
Sinhala military occupation of Tamil cities and civilian
settlements, the distortion and marginalization of the extreme
conditions of poverty and deprivation of the Tamils of the
northeast in the macro-economic policies and strategies of the
government have seriously undermined the confidence of the
Tamil people and the LTTE leadership in the negotiating
process. Under these circumstances the LTTE leadership has
decided to suspend its participation in the negotiations for
the time being. We will not be attending the donor conference
in Japan in June. While we regret that we were compelled to
make this painful decision, we wish to reiterate our
commitment to seek a negotiated political solution to the
ethnic question. We also urge the government of Sri Lanka to
restore confidence in the peace process amongst the Tamil
people by fully implementing, without further delay, the
normalization aspects of the ceasefire agreement and permit
the immediate resettlement of the internally displaced people
of the northeast. We also request the government to
re-evaluate its economic development strategy to reconstruct
the Tamil nation destroyed by war. End text.
12. (U) Minimize considered.
WILLS