SLA will capture more and more ground, vows SL Premier

[TamilNet, Saturday, 09 September 2006, 11:38 GMT]
Sri Lanka’s Prime Minister vowed Friday to capture “more and more” territory from the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) and said the international community was coming forward to help his government "root out terrorism from the island." Ridiculing the LTTE’s assertion that there can be no moves towards peace as long as the Sri Lankan military occupied the Sampoor region which it captured last week in a ground offensive, SL Premier Ratnasiri Wickramanayake said “not an inch of Sampoor will be relinquished now or in the future.”

"We will capture more and more territory from the LTTE but not give an inch, even from Sampoor," he told officials in Kohana district from his party, the ruling Sri Lanka Freedom Party (SLFP), in an address to them at his official residence, the Alari Palace.

"We are not in the habit of giving away territory we have captured from the enemy" he said.

Mr. Wickramanayake said the Sri Lanka Army (SLA) has more such plans to systematically capture more territory from the Tigers.

"More countries are coming forward to help us with getting rid of terrorism in Sri Lanka by pledging modern weapons to seek them out from any jungle in Sri Lanka,” he said.

“There are modern weapons to seek out terrorists from any jungle in Sri Lanka but we do not have them now,” he explained.

“However friendly countries who have the same interest as us to rid the world of terrorists are coming forward to help us precisely with that kind of weapons.”

Within 5 years of this government in office, it will make that a reality, he said, of ending terrorism. "Nobody can stand against our will.”

Mr Wickramanayake dismissed protests by Tamil parliamentarians over the occupation of Sampoor.

“The TNA MPs who stated we would eat humble pie should we try to capture any part of Sampur are themselves rather quiet today,” he said of the Tamil National Alliance (TNA).

“He asked why the TNA MPs were rather quiet at last Tuesday’s Parliamentary sitting to extend the emergency state by a further month.

"There could have been protests from the world against the capture of Sampoor. But, those who stand by Sri Lanka and support our cause chose not to do so,” he said.

“The capture of Sampoor is to punish those who did stand against us," the Premier said.

60,000 Tamil civilians in areas of Trincomalee and Batticaloa district controlled by the Tigers have been displaced by repeated Sri Lankan bombardments and ground offensives.