LTTE should enhance its military power – MP

[TamilNet, Sunday, 11 May 2003, 00:09 GMT]
“The Liberation Tigers should enhance their military power. This is the only way to ensure our rights in this country. If war is thrust on us again, every Tamil, regardless of any differences, should join the ranks of the LTTE’s armed forces. That is the only way for us to survive as a people," said Mr. Ariyanayaham Chandra Nehru, Tamil National Alliance MP for Amparai, speaking at a seminar on the future of the peace process, organised by the East Lanka Journalists’ Association in Batticaloa town Saturday.

Mr. Nehru speaking at the seminar

Speaking further the parliamentarian said: “The Sri Lankan government and the Sinhala chauvinist forces want to use the LTTE to get aid. That’s all. Beyond that they are not prepared to give anything to reconstruct or develop our homeland. This is the reality today. Sinhala chauvinists who constantly berate the Tigers would have no scruples about spending the money that Colombo may get with LTTE’s help in Japan. All of us should constantly bear in mind the fact that it was the strength of LTTE that brought about the current peace process”.

“Even those Sinhala politicians who are inveterately opposed to the Tigers are scared to let them go back to war. There was no need for the Sri Lankan government to call Gen. Satish Nambiar. His report is one sided. It reflects only the concerns of the Sri Lanka army brass. We do not need such reports. There are better military experts in the LTTE if the Sri Lankan government wants advice," the MP said.

Mr. T. Krishnamohan, lecturer in political science at the Eastern University said that one can take an optimistic or pessimistic view of the peace process and that the concerns and interests of all actors and stakeholders connected to the conflict should be taken into consideration in evolving a workable political solution to the ethnic conflict in Sri Lanka. He said there is a need to study the type of federal system that is suitable to the situation in the northeast.

Journalist Mr. D. Sivaram in his address said: “we can go on talking about federalism for a hundred years. At the end of it we would find Sri Lanka’s unitary state unchanged. The Vaddukkoddai Resolution was passed in 1976 because veteran Tamil politicians and constitutional experts came to the conclusion that there was no way to alter the unitary character of the Sri Lankan state. But Sinhala leaders have been so clever that they have brought us back to square one – to the pre Vaddukkoddai phase. We should do everything in our capacity to enlighten the people to this political reality and exorcise the myth of federalism from their midst."

Mr. R. Thurairatnam, the President of the East Lanka Journalists’ Association presided at the seminar.


Mr. R.Thurairatnam addressing the seminar Saturday