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JHU accuses President of taking U-turn on peace talks
By Santhush Fernando
The JHU has come out strongly against President Mahinda Rajapakse’s present position on the peace process, charging that the Mahinda Chinthana proposals had been violated.

JHU spokesman Kamal Deshapriya told The Sunday Times that the President has taken a U-turn from his earlier stance. When asked whether the JHU had not raised objections at the All Party Conference, where all political parties represented in parliament had consented to allow President Rajapakse to take decisions regarding the peace process, the JHU spokesman said his party proposed three steps before resuming negotiations.

“Firstly the LTTE must stop all killings and acts of violence. Secondly the present ceasefire agreement must to be amended making it balanced and fair. Thirdly a political consensus to be reached through the APC for maximum devolution of power within a unitary setup and that draft to be the foundation for any future talks. However the President does not appear to have given heed to our proposals”, an angry Mr. Deshapriya said.

He said the President in his manifesto pledged to seek a national consensus but he had broken this pledge by not informing the stakeholders of the President’s victory --. the JHU and the JVP or those who voted for him.
The JHU spokesman said by holding talks in a European country – Geneva, the already internationalised national issue which in the first place should have been confined to Sri Lanka would now become further “globalised”.
He said the President had turned away from his original stance of holding negotiations at an Asian venue.

“When compared to Geneva, Oslo in Norway might have been a better option”, Mr. Deshapriya said. He said it was hara kiri to allow UNP dissidents to join the government without a firm pledge to accept the mandate given by the people at November’s presidential elections, as the UNP campaigned for a federal solution. Mr. Deshapriya said it was highly detrimental to accept a person such as Prof. G. L. Pieris -- architect of the 2000 Draft Constitution which proposed devolution within a united Sri Lanka. He said the LTTE’s road map was to achieve its own agenda and not to achieve peace and the Geneva talks won’t be any different.

Mr. Deshapriya said the JHU had learnt from highly placed government sources that the LTTE was pressurising the government to set up a joint mechanism for tsunami rebuilding, to remove HSZs and to disarm paramilitary groups including the Karuna faction.

He said the JHU would defeat such moves. Mr. Deshapriya said with the emergence of the Karuna faction the LTTE supremacy in the East was being questioned and at such a time the Government should not take upon itself to disarm the dissidents.

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