US Ambassador visits Jaffna, meets civil group leaders

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 11 March 2003, 17:02 GMT]
The Ambassador for United States of America in Colombo, Mr.Ashely Wills, paid a one-day visit to Jaffna Tuesday and held discussions with representatives of Jaffna civil groups and Tamil National Alliance (TNA) parliamentarians, sources said.

The president of the Jaffna NGOs Consortium, Mr. S.Paramanathan, Ms Saroja Sivachchandran of Women Development Centre, Rev. Fr.J.Bernard of Goodwill Committee for Justice and Peace, and the Jaffna regional co-ordinator of the Human Rights Commission of Sri Lanka, Mr.Ruwan Chandrasekara participated at the discussion held at Jaffna Beach Hotel Tuesday morning.

Representatives of Jaffna civil groups brought to the notice of the US Ambassador Mr.Ashely Wills that although one year has passed since the signing of the ceasefire agreement by the government and the LTTE, normalcy has not yet returned to the lives of the Jaffna people.

The US envoy said he would discuss the high security zone issue with the Jaffna area Sri Lanka Army (SLA) commander Major General Sarath Fonseka.

Mr.Ashely Wills expressed confidence that in the near future people could expect more improvement in their livelihood through the Memorandum of Understanding signed by the government and the LTTE.

Tamil National Alliance (TNA) Jaffna district parliamentarians Messrs Mavai Senathirajah, N.Raviraj, G.G.Gajendrakumar and Selvam Adaikalanathan met the US ambassador. Mr.Ashely Wills assured the TNA delegation that America would exert more pressure on the government to take forward the peace process. Mr. Wills commended the TNA for working closely with the LTTE, TNA sources said.