EPDP threatens UNP candidates

[TamilNet, Saturday, 09 September 2000, 21:17 GMT]
Two more candidates contesting Parliamentary elections in Jaffna withdrew from the race due to threats by the pro-government armed Tamil group, the Eelam People's Democratic Party (EPDP) opposition sources said. The two, Sabaratnam Jeyaratnam and Sithamparapillai Rasathurai, are candidates of the United National Party (UNP).

The Tamil United Liberation Front and an independent group have charged that the EPDP is threatening their candidates too, coercing them to resign.

Tamil party sources in the north said that the EPDP is concerned that the opposition's presence in Jaffna would hinder rigging and that sections of the Sri Lankan security forces would be sympathetic to the UNP.

The EPDP won nine out of ten seats in the electoral district of Jaffna with the backing of the SLA in 1994 when the peninsula was controlled by the Liberation Tigers and the government's presence was confined to three camps there and the islands to Jaffna west and southwest.

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