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President, PM hold separate crisis talks
By Our Political Editor
As the Government and peace monitors were locked in a row with Tiger guerrillas over the High Security Zone, President Chandrika Kumaratunga last night summoned the Army Chief and his Jaffna Commander to obtain a first hand account of the developing situation.

During an hour-long meeting, Lt. Gen. Lionel Balagalla and Maj. Gen. Sarath Fonseka, The Sunday Times learns, briefed President Kumaratunge on the prevailing security situation and on matters relating to the High Security Zone.

President Kumaratunga is learnt to have congratulated Maj. Gen. Fonseka for the firm stand he had taken on the HSZ issue. She had urged him to keep her briefed on developments through the Army Commander.

Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe now on a private visit to Singapore to exchange ideas with its father-figure Lee Kuan Yew was also yesterday in consultation with his ministers and defence officials as the LTTE upped its stake in the on-going peace process by slamming the Norwegian ceasefire monitors and calling the re-location of the army in Jaffna as "non-negotiable".

Next month's peace talks in Thailand were now faced with a serious problem with the LTTE demanding the withdrawal of the army from what is called the High Security Zone (HSZ) in Jaffna, the army's refusal to budge from certain areas, and the Norwegian monitors (SLMM) agreeing with the army saying that the LTTE demand would be a shift in the 'balance of power'.

Defence Minister Tilak Marapana yesterday was huddled in conference with senior military officers, including Jaffna commander Maj. Gen. Sarath Fonseka as they analysed the political fallout from the LTTE rejection of the army conditions for a phased withdrawal from Jaffna.

LTTE's chief negotiator Anton Balasingham - who said a year ago that the LTTE will regain Jaffna either militarily or politically - on Friday in a letter to the Norwegian monitors written on the orders of the organisation's leader Velupillai Prabhakaran rejected what the army has called a one-sided de-escalation if the army was to be re-located according to an LTTE time-table.

He also criticised the SLMM for giving unsolicited "comments and value-judgements" on the vexed issue of army re-location in and around Palaly, the main military garrison in Jaffna.

Sri Lanka's peace negotiator Milinda Moragoda, meanwhile, returned to the country yesterday after discussions with Prime Minister Wickremesinghe in Singapore and went straight for an urgent meeting with former foreign minister Lakshman Kadirgamar to brief him on developments.

Mr. Kadirgamar had spent Friday with President Chandrika Kumaratunga at Dickwella where she was holidaying with her children, and urged her to cut short her vacation and return to Colombo to be prepared for "any eventualities".

The Sri Lanka Army report on the HSZ (High Security Zone) referred to the dangers the government's security forces would face if LTTE backed 'civilians' were permitted too close to their camps.

They have indicated that the LTTE was preparing to settle 'Mahaveerar' families - the kith and kin of those LTTE cadres who have died, as the civilians, closest to these camps.

"Security can be relaxed only in stages in relation to de-escalation of the LTTE, i.e. disarming of cadres and decommissioning of the LTTE long-range weapons," the army report handed over to the SLMM and the LTTE states.

The Army has, however, indicated its willingness to withdraw and relocate by March-2003 from the Gnanam Hotel and its environs, by mid-2003 from Subash Hotel and by end 2003 from certain areas of Jaffna town and Chavakachcheri, saying de-mining and processing ownership claims will need to be done before Jaffna's civilians are handed over the vacated premises.

Anton Balasingham has hinted in his letter that the "gains of the historic peace process" were now at stake unless the Ranil Wickremesinghe government gave in to their "non-negotiable" demands on the withdrawl of the Sri Lanka Army from the Jaffna High Security Zone.

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