DATE=2/20/2000
TYPE=CORRESPONDENT REPORT
TITLE=SRI LANKA PEACE (L-ONLY)
NUMBER=2-259364
BYLINE=VANDANA CHOPRA
DATELINE=COLOMBO
CONTENT=
VOICED AT:
INTRO: Peace talks between the Sri Lankan government
and Tamil Tiger rebels might
take place in the city of Oslo after Norway said it
was willing to try to broker a political solution
between the two warring sides. Vandana Chopra reports
from Colombo.
TEXT: The state owned newspaper "Sunday Observer"
says no time frame for peace talks has been set but
reports Norway is willing to present to the Tiger
rebels, the government's proposed constitutional
reforms in a bid to end the ethnic conflict which as
raged since 1983 and cost the lives of nearly 60-
thousand people.
Norway's Foreign Minister Knut Vollebaek was in
Colombo last week for dicussions with the government
and the main opposition, United National Party, over
the possibility of starting peace talks. On a one-day
visit to
Colombo, Minister Vollebaek met Sri Lankan President
Chandrika Kumaratunga for 4 hours in a meeting that
originally was scheduled to last only one hour.
President Kumaratunga and United National Party leader
Ranil Wickremesinghe are to meet this week for talks
about a draft peace package to be presented to the
Rebels. President Kumaratunga has proposed a new
constitution which would allow the Tamil Tigers to
administer a region of the country.
Foreign Minister Vollebaek says both the Sri Lankan
government and the Tamil Tiger rebels had asked Norway
to bring the two sides together for talks.
In the past two years, Norwegian diplomats have been
shuttling between the two sides to look for prospects
for peace.
The Norwegian peace initiative is the most serious
international peace
effort since India's failed intervention in the late
1980's, when it sent troops to disarm the rebels under
a peace accord with Sri Lanka.
Before coming to Sri Lanka, the Norwegian Foreign
Minister met Anton Balasingham, the London based
representative of the Tiger rebels.
Tiger rebels are fighting for a separate homeland for
the minority tamils in Sri Lanka's north and east.
(Signed)
NEB/VC/PLM
20-Feb-2000 07:07 AM EDT (20-Feb-2000 1207 UTC)
NNNN
Source: Voice of America
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