Sri Lankan rebels keep up attacks as peace bid looms

By Raju Gopalakrishnan

COLOMBO (Reuters) – Suspected Tamil Tiger rebels ambushed
an army truck with a fragmentation mine in eastern Sri Lanka on
Thursday, killing four people and injuring more than 20 in a
fresh threat to a last-ditch peace effort.

Norwegian peace envoy Erik Solheim is to hold talks next
week with the government and, separately, with the Liberation
Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) in what is seen as the last chance
to prevent the resumption of a fratricidal war that has killed
more than 64,000 people since 1983.

A string of attacks on the military since early December
has killed more than 100 people and brought a four-year truce
to the verge of breakdown. Analysts say unless the talks
produce a new initiative, war seems inevitable.

Residents in the Tamil-dominated north and east, which the
Tigers claim, were pessimistic.

“After the Solheim visit, I think war will restart,” said
Hewavitharana Senapala, a fish vendor on the beach in the
eastern port city of Trincomalee.

“We have no problem with Tamil people, but the LTTE wants a
war. I think there will be war.”

In the latest attack, a claymore fragmentation mine hit a
truck carrying soldiers and police in the center of the town of
Batticaloa. Three policemen and a civilian were killed while 23
people were injured, a military spokesman said.

There were several other attacks in the Batticaloa and
Trincomalee areas. At least 15 people were injured.

The Tigers routinely deny they are responsible for any
attacks on the military but few believe them.

Naval troops, some with faces covered by black bandannas,
searched houses on the outskirts of Trincomalee after they were
ambushed.

On the road into the port city, government troops were
erecting new bunkers with railway sleepers and tree trunks,
covering them with branches and leaves.

Armored personnel carriers ferried sailors wearing body
armor along a main supply route as soldiers, their faces
covered, sped past on motorbikes, rifles at the ready.

ENVOY’S VISIT

Solheim said he hoped his February 23-26 visit would
provide some stability to the ragged ceasefire, but warned
against expecting any breakthrough.

“I think it’s very important to play down the
expectations,” he told reporters in Oslo. “What could hopefully
be achieved through this visit is some kind of understanding
between the parties on how they would stabilize the ceasefire.”

Sri Lanka’s stock market, which has been steadily falling
since reaching a record high in November last year, rose a
provisional 1.38 percent on Thursday as investors bet on
progress during Solheim’s visit.

“There have been so many negatives that people have faced
in the past few days, they are living in hope that (Solheim)
could do something to make a breakthrough,” said Auburn Senn, a
trader at NDB Stockbrokers in Colombo. “The investors and
public … feel something could materialize.”

The Tigers run a de facto state covering most of the north
and east and have threatened to resume their armed struggle
this year unless new President Mahinda Rajapakse gives them a
separate Tamil homeland and wide autonomy.

The two sides are poles apart, and cannot even agree on a
venue for peace talks.

Parliament on Thursday extended a state of emergency, which
has been in force since the August assassination of the
island’s foreign minister and which gives police and the
military wide powers. The Tigers are the prime suspects for
that killing too, but they have denied involvement.

Tamils make up around a fifth of Sri Lanka’s 19 million
people and many in the community say they are discriminated
against by the majority Sinhalese, who control the government
and the military.

(Additional reporting by Joe Ariyaratnam in Jaffna, Peter
Apps in Trincomalee and Alister Doyle in Oslo)