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Govt.
says talks only with LTTE The UPFA's official position that excludes any role for a separate Muslim delegation at the talks was spelt out in an official statement. This drew angry reactions from SLMC Rauff Hakeem. "Talks will not be a success, if they go ahead without a separate Muslim delegation. They will also not have the support of the SLMC," he said. Mr. Hakeem said if the government goes ahead without including a Muslim delegation, it would be breaking its promises to the Muslims. He said President Chandrika Kumaratunga and Foreign Minister Lakshman Kadirgamar had regularly emphasized the need for Muslim participation in the talks. Only the UPFA General Secretary Susil Premajayantha placed his signature on the official statement issued yesterday and it was not clear whether the statement reflected the position of UPFA's main partner, the JVP. The statement says: "Taking into account political and ground realities concerning the conduct of negotiations, it is clear that the two principal parties at the negotiation table can only be the Government and the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE)." It was on this basis, the statement said that Foreign Minister Kadirgamar, "was quite correctly quoted by the Island newspaper on April 30 as saying that the Government recognizes the LTTE by implication as the sole representative of the Tamils." A constituent partner, the Tamil minority Eelam People's Democratic Party (EPDP), has already contested this UPFA assertion. It was only last week its leader and Cabinet Minister Douglas Devananda declared that his party did not agree to this viewpoint. The statement said that negotiations concerning the resolution of the ethnic problem had always been conducted between the government and the LTTE, except the Thimpu talks. The statement said that no other Tamil party had objected to talks being conducted by the government with the LTTE. |
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