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Norwegian Envoy to Return to Broker Peace in Sri Lanka: Local Paper
Norwegian peace envoy Erick Solheim, who paid a visit here last week, is expected to be back in the war-torn country again next week in an effort to revive the peace process, the official Sunday Observer said.
Solheim's visit will follow his meeting with Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) rebels in London.
The paper said that once the government gets to know the response of the LTTE when Solheim returns to the country next Saturday, it will probably give a reasonable response to the LTTE' s unilateral one-month cease-fire.
After Solheim's brief two-day visit here last week, the government said his talks with President Chandrika Kumaratunga and other senior officials late Thursday were encouraging. The government reiterated that negotiations with the LTTE must take place but there would be no cease-fire.
During his visit here Solheim met with Prime Minister Ratnasiri Wickremanayake, Parliament Speaker Anura Bandaranaike and main opposition United National Party leader Ranil Wickramasinghe.
The LTTE rebels announced a one-month cease-fire starting from Christmas Eve last year and wanted the government to reciprocate their truce offer. The government said a cease-fire would be considered only after peace talks between the two sides head toward a settlement for the long-running ethnic war.
The LTTE rebels have been fighting a bitter war against government forces since 1983 for a separate Tamil state in the north and east of the country. In the past they held peace negotiations with the government several times, but they violated agreements with the government and resumed fighting soon.
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