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Mahinda meets foreign envoys to discuss peace process
By Our Diplomatic Editor
President Mahinda Rajapakse is scheduled to meet heads of diplomatic missions based in Colombo tomorrow to discuss, essentially, the peace process with the LTTE.

President Rajapakse's meeting follows his twin addresses to the nation, soon after taking his oaths, and then to Parliament where he outlined his approach to direct talks with the LTTE, but with the help of foreign countries.
The scheduled meeting also comes the day after LTTE leader Velupillai Prabhakaran's Maveerar speech is delivered to his cadres outlining the rebel organisation’s assessment of the situation and its plans for the future.

During his first address, President Rajapakse said he would welcome the "friendly countries who have worked with us in the past" to reach an honourable peace by getting the stalled peace process re-started, but an official English translation referred to "India and other Asian countries together with the international community" assisting in the task.

The Sunday Times learns that the original draft of the President's Sinhala language text contained flowery language to describe India, and explain why she should get involved in the peace process directly, a line adopted by the Janatha Vimukthi Peramuna (JVP), but senior officials of the Foreign Ministry had intervened and edited some of the references.

However, the officials forgot to delete the references from the English text that was released to the media. Hours after the delivery of the address, the Foreign Ministry released an extract of the President's reference to "all countries that had worked in the past", but was careful not to make an issue of the reference to India in the English text.

The reference to "all countries that had worked in the past", included the current Co-Chairs of the peace process, i.e. the US, the EU, Japan and especially Norway, the controversial peace facilitator since 2001.

A few days later, however, the JVP told a news conference that its position was that it was opposed to Norway as the peace broker. It quickly added that the ultimate decision rested with the new President.

Then, on Friday, in his address to Parliament, President Rajapakse came back to what he originally did not say, together with what he said, and in an all-embracing reference included "the United Nations and other such organisations that support peace in Sri Lanka, all friendly countries, the international community, India and other regional States" in strengthening the peace process.

What was arguably significant was that the only country specifically named was India, and that Norway was specifically not mentioned. The Norwegian embassy in Colombo remained unmoved. Asked for a quote, a spokesman said "We do not want to comment on the policy statements".

"From the Norwegian side what we have been saying that we will be ready to continue our role in the peace process, if both the LTTE and the government want us to continue and the Norwegian government thinks it could make a useful contribution." The Indian High Commission remained coy, refusing to make an official comment.

All they would say is that they were "supportive" of the peace process, and that they would need to understand and study the role the different countries are supposed to play in the policy statement enunciated by President Rajapakse read together with some of the other aspects in the statement.
The mission confirmed that new Foreign Minister Mangala Samaraweera was due in New Delhi next week on his first diplomatic visit abroad, and that President Rajapakse too might follow shortly thereafter.

India is currently without an External Affairs Minister following the removal of K. Natwar Singh, and Prime Minister Manmohan Singh is handling the Ministry.

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